A 20-year-old apparently wanted to carry out an attack on the Linz-Ebelsberg police station on New Year’s Eve with a Molotov cocktail out of dissatisfaction with the Corona measures or to incite others to do so. The suspect is the alleged ringleader of a fire attack on a patrol car in mid-November. According to his accomplices, there were plans to pour gasoline over a policeman and set fire to it.
“Police officers are increasingly becoming the target of opponents of Corona measures. We will counteract this development with all consistency and the means of the rule of law,” emphasized Interior Minister Gerhard Karner (ÖVP) in view of the case. According to investigators, the 20-year-old Austrian with Bosnian roots is the head of a group that in recent weeks repeatedly detonated firecrackers in the south of Linz, struck a racket and thus provoked police operations. These actions boasted on social media. The background was frustration or dissatisfaction with the corona measures. However, the 20-year-old should not be part of the Linz corona demo scene.
The preliminary climax of the activities seemed to have been reached on November 14th, when a police car went up in flames in the Ebelsberg district of Linz while the officers checked compliance with the Corona rules. The car had been doused with gasoline and set on fire. Two 16-year-olds and one 20-year-old were investigated as immediate perpetrators. They confessed to the crime, but said they were instigated.
The investigators, who knew from the start that the three were part of a larger group, seemed credible. In the course of the interrogations, it turned out that there was apparently also a plan on that day to douse an officer with gasoline and set it on fire if someone from the gang was arrested. State Police Director Andreas Pilsl spoke at the time of a “perfidy that we have never known before”.
The three men were shown at large. Two of them were beaten up by other group members after their confessions and were told to remain silent. The police have now identified two 16-year-olds and one 14-year-old as attackers. In addition, the group’s ringleaders went online. The 20-year-old was arrested by the Cobra just before Christmas and is on remand. The man has so far remained silent on the allegations.