Motive sought for deadly stabbing spree at Paris police HQ

PARIS: Investigators combed an IT staffer’s computer Friday for clues to his motive for stabbing four colleagues to death at police headquarters in Paris, as his wife said he had been “agitated” before going on the rampage with a kitchen knife.

The 45-year-old computer expert killed three men and a woman — three police members and an administrative worker — in a frenzied 30-minute attack that ended when he was shot in the head.

Two others were injured in the Thursday lunchtime stabbing spree that sent shock waves through an embattled French police force already complaining of low morale.

Officials said there was no indication that the rampage was an act of terror but emphasised no theory was being ruled out at this stage.

The man had worked for the police for over a decade-anda-half without ever arousing suspicion.

The attacker’s wife told investigators her husband, who had a severe hearing disability, displayed “unusual and agitated behaviour” the night before his crime, a source close to the investigation told AFP.

A search of the couple’s house in a low-income Paris suburb near Charles de Gaulle airport yielded no evidence that the man, who became a Muslim about 18 months ago, had been motivated by radical religious ideology, the source added.

Computer equipment seized in the search was still being examined.

AFP correspondents saw investigators — faces concealed by balaclavas — lead out from the house late Thursday a man and a woman who hid behind hoods.

The possibility of a terror motive “has clearly not been ruled out,” government spokeswoman Sibeth Ndiaye told Franceinfo radio on Friday. — AFP