The Oktoberfest fairgrounds closed for seven hours Wednesday as police conducted a security sweep of the famed beer festival due to a bomb threat by a suspect linked to an explosion and fire across town in northern Munich. Authorities closed the event after they found a note with a "non-specific" explosives threat to the festival in a letterbox near the crime scene. Police say the 57-year-old suspect opened fire on his parents before dawn on Wednesday, killing his 90-year-old father and injuring his 81-year-old mother, the Guardian reports. The man then set the home, which he had booby-trapped with explosives, on fire, police say.
The suspect, who had been living in the town of Starnberg south of the city, had been carrying a backpack containing an explosive device, the AP reports. Police said that the man was spotted by a police helicopter and that he killed himself in a park after a short pursuit. Firefighters rescued the man's 21-year-old daughter, a German-Brazilian dual national, from the burning home.
Alexander Dobrindt, Germany's interior minister, said searches were conducted with sniffer dogs and technological tools at the Oktoberfest site. Bavaria police said more than 500 officers were deployed. Joachim Herrman, Bavaria's interior minister, said there did not appear to be any political motive, the Guardian reports. "It appears, incomprehensible as it may be, that this was solely a family matter," he said.
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