Gun rampage leaves eight dead in Slovakia

A man armed with an assault rifle shot seven people dead, wounded 15 and then turned the gun on himself in a morning rampage yesterday on a street in the Slovak capital Bratislava, the police said.

“A man in his 50s shot six people dead and eventually killed himself after the police cornered him as he tried to escape the crime scene,” police commander Jaroslav Spisiak told reporters at the scene.

“The seventh victim, a 52-year old woman, did not belong to the murdered family and was probably shot accidentally on her balcony when the gunman on the run started shooting into windows,” Interior Minister Daniel Lipsic said later.

The shooting spree started shortly after 10 a.m. in an apartment on a housing estate in Devinska Nova Ves, an otherwise quiet northwestern district of the city.

“The police received an emergency call on a shooting in a flat. The first police officers arrived as the gunman was leaving the house,” where he had killed four women and a man, Mr Spisiak said. Police declined to speculate on a motive for one of the worst such incidents in the country’s history, but said the dead were all probably of the same family.

Marta Vozbranukova, a teacher from a kindergarten close to the scene, said she had seen “an older man carrying an automatic gun walking towards a prefab house”.

“After a while, an injured man of Roma origin, whose family lives in the house, ran out and fell on the ground where the gunman shot him two or three more times,” Ms Vozbranukova said.

Mr Spisiak said the gunman then started to shoot “at everything that moved”.

“More officers came, surrounded him, and he had no choice but to commit suicide,” he added.

Mr Lipsic said the woman shot on the balcony had probably retreated to her flat, where her husband found her dead as he came home from work.

The SME daily quoted an un-named source saying the gunman had been a former soldier. It also ran a picture taken by a witness from a balcony, showing a grey-haired man wearing a denim jacket and ear muffs, carrying an assault rifle and looking at the top storeys of the house.

“We will not comment on the gunman for now. He was about 50 years old. He was using an assault rifle, model 58, and two handguns,” Mr Spisiak said.

“He had eight full assault rifle magazines and several full handgun magazines,” he added.

According to specialist websites the SA Vz.58 assault rifle magazine contains 30 rounds of ammunition.

As he ran away from the house the man fired at random, wounding at least 15 people, including a three-year-old child, who were taken to hospital, emergency services spokeswoman Dominika Sulkova said.

While the child’s life was not in danger, “three people suffered serious injuries”, Ms Sulkova said. Others on the scene were slightly hurt by flying glass.

Interior Minister Daniel Lipsic told reporters a policeman had been hit in the head and was in hospital in a stable condition.

Vladimir Mraz, the mayor of Devinska Nova Ves, told the SITA news agency local authorities had warned people through loudspeakers not to go out or near their windows after getting a tip from the police as the firing started.

The police sealed off the neighbourhood and buses were diverted away from the district, which comprises detached houses and a housing estate and is usually very quiet.

Later yesterday officers were still refusing to let people enter the area, checking all cars leaving.