Man sentenced to life in jail over COVID face mask murder

A court in the western German state of Rhineland-Palatinate sentenced a 50-year-old man on Tuesday to life imprisonment over the killing of a gas station worker.

The defendant, named in local media as Mario N., had turned himself in last year after police launched a large-scale manhunt in the town of Idar-Oberstein.

According to authorities, Mario N. said he had acted "out of anger" when a 20-year-old gas station worker refused to sell him beer and demanded that he wear a face mask. At the time, the measure was a requirement across Germany to curb the spread of the coronavirus. 

Police had said the man stormed out and returned to the gas station roughly an hour later. This time, he was wearing a mask but he took it off and the two men started another argument.

Mario N. then pulled a concealed revolver out of his pocket and shot the clerk before fleeing the scene.

COVID extremism? 

Prosecutors said that Mario N. complained that he had been stressed by the coronavirus pandemic and the restrictive measures to combat it, and that he held the victim "responsible for the overall situation because he enforced the rules."

The killing sparked concerns about the radicalization of COVID-deniers and so-called lateral thinkers as it was welcomed in right-wing extremist chats and forums.

Politicians across party lines reacted with horror and dismay. 

It was the first recorded incident related to coronavirus measures in Rhineland-Palatinate.

fb/aw (AFP, AP, dpa, EFE) 

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