The regional court in Trier on Tuesday sentenced a 52-year old man who killed six people when he drove into crowds in the centre of the German city, to life behind bars. He will be incarcerated in a secure psychiatric facility.

as he drove his Range Rover along Brotstrasse, a pedestrian shopping street, through the main market square and on towards the Porta Nigra via Simeonstrasse before turning into Christophstrasse where he was stopped by police vehicles.

Five people, including a nine-week-old baby and its 45-year-old father, as well as three women aged 73, 52 and 25 were killed by the driver. A 77-year-old also died of serious injuries eleven months after the incident.

Following a lengthy trial that began on 19 August 2021, the accused was found guilty on five charges of murder and 18 charges of attempted murder as well as numerous counts of causing actual bodily harm, Der Spiegel reports.

A psychiatric analysis found that the man suffered from extreme paranoid schizophrenia. He was convinced that he was the victim of a deep state conspiracy, for example. He will spend at least five years in the secure psychiatric facility. If he is found to be cured of his schizophrenia after that, he will be transferred to a normal prison.