Police hunt for unstable ‘loner’ after rampage with chainsaw

A PSYCHOLOGICALLY unstable loner who mostly lived in woods walked into an insurance office in a Swiss town and attacked people with a chainsaw, police have said.

Franz Wrousis, 51, wounded two employees of the CSS health insurance firm, one of them seriously, in their office in the town of Schaffhausen near the German border.

Three other people were injured during the incident and Wrousis fled before police arrived on the scene.

Announcing a hunt for the attacker, Ravi Landolt, a senior regional police official, told reporters: “We have information that this man is dangerous, that he is aggressive and, shall we say, psychologically disturbed.”

Police said the assault was not a terrorist attack but more likely due to a grievance the suspect had against the health insurance company.

The suspect apparently lives mostly in woods, Mr Landolt said.

Police released old photos of Mr Wrousis standing among trees in a green T-shirt and black jeans.

They described him as being about 6ft 3in (1.9m) tall and said he was bald and unkempt.

The historic old quarter of Schaffhausen, a town of about 36,000, was sealed off by a deployment of officers following the attack yesterday morning.

They evacuated all businesses and pedestrians, but barricades were later removed and regular traffic allowed to return to the area.

Peter Sticher, a state prosecutor, said Wrousis had two previous convictions for weapons offences, one from 2014 and one from 2016.

Police said they had recovered a vehicle sought in connection with the incident, which they said was apparently the work of the single suspect.

Despite relatively low crime rates, Switzerland has one of the highest rates of firearm ownership in the world and police said it was likely that the suspect would be carrying weapons while on the run.