Bio

Tobias Rathjen was born on 17 February 1977 in Hanau, Germany. He lived in Hanau for much of his life. His mother was Gabriele Rathjen. His father also lived in the family home.

Rathjen said he had been guided by voices inside his head since birth. He also claimed he was being followed by secret agents. He published writings and videos on a personal website. Those materials showed racist and misogynist views. He promoted extreme eugenics and wrote about his frustration that he could not have an intimate relationship with a woman because of psychological issues.

Researchers often described him as an incel, but some said he fit the Men Going Their Own Way movement more accurately. On 6 November 2019, Rathjen wrote a letter to the Public Prosecutor General about a supposed "secret service" tapping into people’s brains and asked authorities to contact him. Parts of that letter were very similar to a longer manifesto he later published. He legally owned three firearms. He also asked a private detective and his father to spread the word about his website.

Murder Story

On 19 February 2020 nine people were killed and five others were wounded in Hanau near Frankfurt. The attacks targeted three bars and a kiosk. The gunman was identified as Tobias Rathjen. After the attacks he returned to his apartment, killed his mother, and then killed himself. The German Minister of the Interior called the massacre an act of terrorism.

The shootings began at 21:55:43 CET on the night of 19 February 2020. The attacker entered the La Votre Bar on Heumarkt and fired multiple shots from a CZ 75 pistol, killing a bartender. He then shot a man on the sidewalk outside. Next he entered the neighboring Midnight Bar and fired three shots from the doorway. One shot hit and killed the owner of the Midnight Bar. At least eight shots were fired during this part of the attack, though witnesses said they heard about a dozen.

After shooting at the Midnight Bar, the attacker switched to a SIG Sauer P226. He confronted a man outside a kiosk and asked if he was a foreigner. The man did not answer and the attacker ran off. The shooter then went around the corner onto Krämerstraße and fired several shots at the car of Vili Viorel Păun. Păun briefly reversed and then followed the shooter, which led to a car chase. The attacker tried to enter a kiosk but left when he found no one inside. Three people were killed in the shootings in central Hanau.

The attacker drove about 2.5 km to the Arena Bar & Café in Kesselstadt. During the drive, Păun tried to call the emergency number 110 five times. Two calls failed and three calls got silence because the dispatcher had left to respond to the first shootings. When the attacker arrived, he shot and killed Păun, who sat in his vehicle behind him. He then entered a kiosk next to the bar and killed three people. He went into the bar and opened fire as people tried to flee, killing two more and wounding three others. Survivors said they tried to hide in the bar’s storage room but found it locked; the rear emergency exit was also locked. A reconstruction by Forensic Architecture later found that people inside would have had time to flee if the emergency exit had been unlocked. The attacker left less than a minute after entering the bar. Six people were killed at the Arena Bar and the adjacent kiosk, and three others were wounded.

After the shootings, police launched a large investigation. At first reports said the suspect was still at large. The gunman drove to his home near the Arena Bar. There he shot and killed his mother with two shots. He then shot himself in his room in the basement. His father was not harmed. Forensic Architecture found that the father stayed in the house and used his computer during a police standoff to look up the shooter’s manifesto. It is believed the attacker killed his mother as a mercy killing because she had a neurological condition and was bedridden. Police found the attacker and his mother at 05:15 the next day when they entered the home.

The nine people killed during the two shootings were Gökhan Gültekin (37), Ferhat Unvar (23), Mercedes Kierpacz (35), Said Nesar Hashemi (21), Sedat Gürbüz (29), Fatih Saraçoğlu (34), Hamza Kurtović (22), Kaloyan Velkov (33), and Vili Viorel Păun (22). Victims included people of Turkish, Kurdish, Afghan, Bosnian, Bulgarian and Romanian background. The attacker also killed his mother, Gabriele Rathjen (72), before killing himself. Five people were injured, including two Turkish-Germans, an Afghan-German, and a Cameroonian-German.

The attacker was 43-year-old Tobias Rathjen, born 17 February 1977 in Hanau. He was described as a far-right extremist. On his personal website he published a racist manifesto and posted videos. He wrote about extreme eugenics and showed misogynist beliefs. He said he had been guided by voices since birth and that secret agents followed him. In his manifesto he expressed hatred for migrants from the Middle East, Central Asia, Southeast Asia, and North Africa and called for their “complete extermination.” He also attacked Germans who allowed immigrants and called them impure. In his writings and videos he compared his actions to those of Edward Snowden. There was also evidence he had thought about attacking a school attended by students with migrant backgrounds. In the weeks before the shooting he told a private detective and his father to spread the word about his website.

On 6 November 2019 Rathjen had written a letter to the Public Prosecutor General about a “secret service” he said was tapping people’s brains. Parts of that 19-page letter were almost the same as his 24-page manifesto published in February 2020. Near the Arena Bar, graffiti linked to his website was found and later seen in six other places in and around Hanau. Rathjen legally owned three firearms. A fourth weapon used in the shooting was reportedly borrowed from a gun trader the day before. Federal prosecutors treated the attack as terrorism and said there was evidence of a far-right extremist and xenophobic motive. Police also found a letter and a video confession that were analyzed during the investigation.