A driver rams a car into crowd in Germany’s Mannheim, leaving 2 dead and 10 injured

BERLIN — A driver rammed a car into a crowd Monday in the southwestern German city of Mannheim, and authorities said two people were killed and 10 others injured.

A 40-year-old German from the nearby state of Rhineland-Palatinate was detained and in a hospital after being injured, State Interior Minister Thomas Strobl of Baden-Württemberg, where Mannheim is based, told German news agency DPA.

Police would not immediately characterize the incident as an attack. In a statement Monday night they wrote that “at this stage of the investigation, no political background is assumed.”

Police said earlier that “indications of a second perpetrator cannot be confirmed at this stage of the investigation.” They said there was no more danger to the public.

Police spokesperson Stefan Wilhelm said a motorist drove into people on Paradeplatz, a pedestrianized street downtown, around noon, when workers come for lunch breaks. Local media reported a carnival market was taking place, meaning more visitors than usual in Mannheim, with a population of 326,000.

Mannheim University Hospital said they were treating three people from the crash — two adults and a child — DPA reported. It was not immediately clear whether other hospitals received patients.

Images from the scene showed parts of the downtown area cordoned off, with a heavy police presence and helicopters above. Police gathered around a badly damaged black car as ambulances lined up outside the cordon.

Friedrich Merz, who likely will become Germany’s next chancellor, wrote on X that “the incident — as well as the terrible acts of the past few months — is an urgent reminder that we must do everything we can to prevent such acts.” Outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz wrote on X that “we mourn with the families of the victims of a senseless act of violence.”

Last month, a 2-year-old girl and her mother died two days after they were injured in a car-ramming attack on a union demonstration in Munich. A 24-year-old Afghan man who came to Germany as an asylum seeker was arrested, and prosecutors said he appeared to have an Islamist extremist motive.

Last year, six people were killed and more than 200 injured when a car slammed into a Christmas market in the eastern city of Magdeburg. The suspect, who was arrested, is a 50-year-old doctor originally from Saudi Arabia who had expressed anti-Muslim views and support for the far-right, anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany party.

Dazio writes for the Associated Press. The AP’s Geir Moulson and Kirsten Grieshaber contributed to this report.