A violent attack at a German secondary school has left two young teenagers seriously injured and sparked a large-scale emergency response in the small town of Schongau, Upper Bavaria. Law enforcement authorities have confirmed that a 16-year-old suspect has been taken into custody following the Wednesday incident at Welfen-Gymnasium, a local public secondary school with deep community roots stretching back to its founding in 1887.
According to official statements from German police, responding officers found the suspect in possession of both a knife and a firearm when they arrived at the scene. Investigators currently believe the suspect acted alone in carrying out the attack, though many details about the incident remain under active investigation as of Wednesday afternoon.
The two victims, both 13-year-old female students at the school, suffered severe wounds in the attack. Police confirmed that while their injuries are serious, they are not currently considered life-threatening. However, authorities have noted that they are still working to confirm whether additional people were hurt, and are still assessing the full scope of harm from the incident.
Early in the response, a police spokesperson told AFP that the type of weapon used had not yet been confirmed, and declined to confirm initial reports of a stabbing. Bavaria’s Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann later told local public broadcaster Bayerischer Rundfunk that he believed the two girls had been stabbed, though this detail has not yet been formally confirmed by law enforcement.
Multiple key details about the suspect remain unconfirmed, including their full identity and their connection to the school. Herrmann told reporters that the suspect had received prior psychiatric treatment, and there are unconfirmed reports that the individual is a former student of Welfen-Gymnasium. Police have publicly classified the incident as a “rampage” as their investigation continues.
Local authorities have moved quickly to support affected families and community members in the wake of the violence. A dedicated support and contact point for parents, relatives of students, and witnesses has been set up at the town’s local fire station to provide information and mental health resources.
Founded more than 135 years ago, Welfen-Gymnasium began as an almost entirely all-girls school before shifting to a co-educational model roughly 40 years ago, according to information posted on the school’s official website. The incident has shocked the quiet small town community, with a large police operation still ongoing in the area surrounding the school as investigators collect evidence and piece together the full sequence of events.