Irish man dies on German road after ‘stabbing incidents’

An Irish man was knocked down and killed on a motorway in Germany yesterday morning after allegedly stabbing three people.

The first two stabbings were said to have occurred after the man took a taxi from Heerlen in the Netherlands to Aachen in Germany. The third occured at a motorway rest stop near the town of Düren.

The man believed responsible for the stabbings died after he tried to make an escape across a motorway after being pursued by police. It is believed he is in his 20s and from Cork.

A Garda spokesman said that Interpol notified gardaí of the death of an Irish man in Germany this morning. The man's next of kin have been notified and offered consular assistance from the Department of Foreign Affairs, which has not yet been accepted.

The episode began at about 1am yesterday when the man got into a taxi in Heerlen and asked to be driven to Aachen. On arriving there, at about 1.25am, the man allegedly pulled a knife when the driver asked for the fare and stabbed him.

The man was then said to have demanded money from a passerby who, when he refused, was stabbed too.

The attacker then summoned another cab and asked to be driven to Cologne.

While en route he asked to pull into at a rest stop so he could use the toilet. The second taxi driver was, while waiting, warned about the previous attacks via radio and drove off.

Discovering the taxi had gone, the man allegedly attacked a lorry driver at the rest stop at about 3am. The driver was seriously injured but is no longer in a critical condition.

After the third and final attack, the man tried to flee across the motorway but was hit by a car. He was fatally injured and died at the scene.

During the episode, the A4 motorway to Cologne was closed to traffic while investigators recorded the scene of the incident, causing traffic jams of up to 10km.

Investigators were initially puzzled by the identity of the man, but discovered English-language documents on his body which lead them to presume he was of British or Irish nationality.