It is not his first attempt to break out: the Halle assassin threatened two prison employees and tried to escape from prison. It must now be clarified whether the right-wing terrorist had a weapon in his cell and how he caught the guards off guard.
The Halle assassin Stephan B. temporarily took two judicial officers hostage in the Burg prison in Saxony-Anhalt. B. threatened the officials on Monday evening with the aim of escaping the prison, said State Justice Minister Franziska Weidinger in Magdeburg in the afternoon. The hostage-taker was overpowered by other law enforcement officers inside the detention center. According to the ministry, "there was never a danger to the general public".
According to the information, at around 9:00 p.m. during the regular night lock of the cells, Stephan B. took a judicial officer into his power "under the threat of using an instrument of crime" and demanded that he be taken from the detention center to the Freistundenhof. There, the prisoner threatened another employee and asked him to open the doors of the inter-area fence systems, said Wolfgang Reichel, department head at the Ministry of Justice.
Inside the facility, however, B. made no further progress and was overpowered half an hour after the hostage-taking. The 30-year-old was injured, but not seriously. He was taken to a specially secured cell where he is under 24-hour surveillance. The hostages were apparently unharmed. It was not initially known what B. threatened the judicial officers with. The investigations would still have to be awaited, said Weidiger.
The prison system is aware of the danger B. poses. "The prisoner was and is being closely monitored and controlled," emphasized the minister. His behavior is also regularly evaluated. At the same time, she emphasized that the situation had always been under control. After the alarm, police forces secured the outside area of the detention center. The State Criminal Police Office (LKA) Saxony-Anhalt took over the further investigations.
On October 9, 2019, the right-wing extremist Stephan B. tried to storm the synagogue in Halle and shoot the assembled community members on the highest Jewish holiday, Yom Kippur. The attack failed because of the secured synagogue door and jamming of the weapons that B. had made himself. He then shot two people in the city. Two years ago, B. was sentenced to life imprisonment with subsequent preventive detention. The court also determined the particular gravity of the guilt.
Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser called on those responsible to review the security measures in prisons. The incident in the prison in Burg gave reason to "take another very close look at the security measures," the SPD politician told the television station "Welt". Saxony-Anhalt's Prime Minister Reiner Haseloff explained that the incident shows "the danger that the assassin in Halle still poses". "Now it's time to analyze what's happening and draw possible consequences for the future," said the CDU politician.
There have already been incidents with B. in the past: at the end of May 2020, he attempted to escape from Halle prison before the trial. He climbed unattended over a fence several meters high. B. was then transferred to the prison in Burg, where he is more closely monitored. According to the information, the JVA Burg was built on a 220,000 square meter site near the A 2 motorway and has 658 detention places. The prison, which went into operation in 2009, is considered one of the most modern and safest in Europe.
Left and Greens in Saxony-Anhalt called for a comprehensive review of the hostage-taking by the Halle assassin. Both opposition factions are urging the Parliament's Legal Affairs Committee to meet quickly for a special session.
