The 28-year-old pulled a knife on four passengers on a high-speed train in the southern state of Bavaria last November. The trial focused on whether his attack was motivated by Islamic extremism or schizophrenia.
… Presiding judge Jochen Boesl rejected a defense of mental illness on the basis of seven expert evaluations and identified a jihadist motive for the crime.
Boesl said the defendant had frequently listened to radio programs “with Islamist content” and from May 2021 “at the latest” began envisioning “taking part in jihad, or armed combat.”
“These views led him to this act,” Boesl said. “He wanted to kill non-Muslim passengers because they were in his view non-believers and thus had no right to live.”
