The authorities in Germany have released the suspect they captured after the horrible terror attack in Berlin for insufficient evidence.
BREAKING: German prosecutors say man who was arrested after Berlin truck attack released because of insufficient evidence.
— The Associated Press (@AP) December 20, 2016
AP – German prosecutors say a man arrested after the truck attack on a Berlin Christmas market has been released because there isn’t sufficient evidence to tie him to the rampage.
Federal prosecutors said Tuesday that that the man, a Pakistani citizen who came to Germany last year as an asylum-seeker, denied involvement in the attack that killed 12 people and injured nearly 50 others.
They noted that witnesses were able to follow the truck’s driver from the scene but lost track of him. The man arrested matched witness descriptions of the truck driver, but investigators haven’t been able to prove that he was in the truck’s cab at the time of the attack.
Under German law, prosecutors have until the end of the calendar day following an arrest to seek a formal arrest warrant keeping a suspect in custody.
They had began to believe that he was not the terrorist attacker after interviewing him. Earlier it had been reported that he was a refugee from Pakistan who immigrated to Germany last year. It appears the police believe there is not enough evidence to pin the attack on him.
This means, of course, that the attacker escaped and is at large.
Earlier today, Chancellor Merkel visited the attack site and said that it would hurt “all of us” if it turned out to be a refugee attacker:
(video does work, even if it may look like it doesn’t)
Yeah, I think it’s gonna hurt you and your re-election chances most of all, Merkel.