Police officers block the access road to the scene where two officers were shot
during a traffic check. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Thomas Frey
A manhunt is underway after two police offers were shot dead while on routine patrol in the western German state of Rhineland-Palatinate.
The shooting happened at around 4.20am on Monday.
The victims – a 24-year-old woman and 29-year-old man – were carrying out checks on traffic in a routine patrol in the district of Kusel at the time, police in nearby Kaiserslautern said.
The two officers were able to radio their colleagues for assistance at the scene, but they could not be saved.
The perpetrators fled the scene, and police said a huge manhunt is currently underway.
Police at the scene following the shooting of two police officers in western Germany. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Thomas Frey
“We are urgently searching for the fugitive perpetrators,” regional police said in a statement.
Police have urged residents in the Kusel district not to pick up hitchhikers, and warned that at least one suspect is armed.
District road 22 is closed near Mayweilerhof and Ulmet.
The police said they had no description of the vehicle and did not know the direction in which the suspects had fled.
Meanwhile, Kaiserslautern city police said they had extended their search area to the neighbouring state of Saarland.
Germany’s GdP police union expressed its “deep shock and sadness” over the shooting.
“Our thoughts are with the relatives and loved ones of the colleagues who died as a result of an act of violence in the line of duty,” GdP deputy chief Joerg Radek said.
Rhineland-Palatinate state premier Malu Dreyer and interior minister Roger Lewentz also said they were deeply shocked.
“Our thoughts are with the relatives,” they said in a statement. “The crime is horrific. We are deeply shocked that two young people have lost their lives in the line of duty.”
