Sedan – Civil rights activists demand independent investigation after a black man was a fatal shot by the police last week outside a nightclub in the northwest of Germany. The murder caused protests nationwide and raised Conerns about what some believe is systemic racism within the agencies of application of the German law.
The victim, identified as Lorenz A., 21, was fired by a 27 -year -old police officer in the city of Oldenburg. According to prosecutors, an autopsy found that Lorenz A. was beaten in the back of the head, torso and hip. According to the reports, a fourth bullet touched his thigh. He died in a local hospital with bullet wounds.
The authorities said Lorenz A. had threatened the nightclub gorillas with pepper spray and a knife after the entrance was denied. When the police faced the police, they said he used the pepper spray in a “threatening way.”
However, for Monday, prosecutors said the preliminary evidence, including the videos of the security camera and witness reports, did not provide indications that Lorenz A. had threatened the officers with a knife at the time he was shot.
Hesham Elserif/Anadolu/Getty 
The cameras of the body of the officers involved were turned off, police said. There is no legal obligation of the police in Germany that their body chambers activate the duration operations; He is at his discretion.
The shooting has caused anger in Germany, with more than 10,000 protesters gathered in a manifestation of “Justice for Lorenz” in Oldenburg on Friday. Vigilias were also planned in Berlin, Munich, Frankfurt, Stuttgart and Vienna in neighboring Austria.
The rights groups, including Amnesty International and the initiative of the black peoples in Germany (ISD), have demanded an independent investigation, arguing that internal police investigations are inherently biased.
“This murder affects not only Lorenz’s family, but all people affected by racism in Germany,” said Amnesty International in a statement.
The campaign groups are also pressing so that police officers are forced to convert their body chambers into operations that involve weapons.
Hesham Elserif/Anadolu/Getty 
The incident echoes cases of police violence in the United States, where 2020 George Floyd murder By a Minnesota officer caused an increase in protests against what many see as systemic racism in the application of police law and brutity.
As US activists have done Pressing for independent supervision and systemic reformGerman groups are now asking for the establishment of a national office to investigate accusations of police misconduct.
The case has also caused comparisons with the death of Ouerry Jalloh, an asylum applicant from Sierra Leone who under suspicious circumstances in a German police cell in 2005, after being fired while he was handcuffed. That case has remained a symbol of alleged institutional racism and impunity within German police forces for two decades.
Despite the relatively low shooting rates involved by Germany officers (which was long around 10 per year), the number has increased sharply, with 22 deaths registered only last year.
A 2024 study found that almost a third of German police officers informed having heard racist comments from colleagues, highlighting what many cultural problems.
