The Regional Court of Magdeburg in Germany has sentenced Taleb Al Abdulmozen to life imprisonment after finding him guilty of the deadly attack on the Christmas market in Magdeburg, in which six people lost their lives and more than 300 others were injured.
The incident took place on December 20, 2024, when the 51-year-old, originally from Saudi Arabia and granted asylum in Germany, drove a rented van into the crowd at the Christmas market in the city center.
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As a result of the attack, a 9-year-old boy and five women were killed, while more than 300 people were injured, some of them seriously.
Immediately after the incident, the perpetrator was arrested at the scene of the attack.
According to the Office of the Attorney General, Al Abdulmozen had prepared this attack over a long period of time, but he had not acted for ideological reasons. The investigation concluded that he was driven mainly by personal motives.
“The defendant was and remains interested only in himself,” said the psychiatrist who carried out the forensic evaluation, adding that he suffers from a “narcissistic personality disorder” and has a “great need for attention.”
Taleb Al Abdulmozen arrived in Germany in the 1990s and was granted asylum there. He had completed his medical studies in Saudi Arabia and later specialized as a psychiatrist in Germany.
Until shortly before the attack, he had been working as a psychiatrist at a closed psychiatric institution in Bernburg, in the state of Saxony-Anhalt, where offenders with mental health problems were treated.
In recent years, he had appeared publicly as an activist for women’s rights in Saudi Arabia and had been involved in disputes with an organization that helps refugees.
With the ruling of the Regional Court of Magdeburg, the 51-year-old has been sentenced to life imprisonment for one of the most serious attacks to shake Germany in recent years.
