In Belgium, inmate on leave kills 3, setting off terror probe

LIEGE, Belgium — A knife-wielding prison inmate on a 48-hour leave stabbed two police officers Tuesday in the city of Liege, seized their service weapons and shot them and a bystander to death before being mowed down by a group of officers, setting off a major terror investigation into the country’s most savage assault since 2016 suicide attacks.

Prime Minister Charles Michel acknowledged the assailant, who had a lengthy criminal record that included theft, assault and drug offenses, had appeared in three reports on radicalism but was still allowed to take a leave from prison.

Tuesday’s attack happened outside a cafe in the eastern city of Liege when the assailant crept up on the two female officers from behind and stabbed them repeatedly before shooting them.

The attacker then shot and killed a 22-year-old teacher in a vehicle that was leaving a parking lot outside a nearby high school, authorities said. He then took two women hostage inside the school before confronting police massed outside.

“He came out firing at police, wounding a number of them, notably in the legs. He was shot dead,” a prosecutor’s spokesman said, adding that the hostages escaped unharmed.

Police Chief Christian Beaupere identified the slain officers as 45-year-old Lucile Garcia and 53-yearold Soraya Belkacemi.

Belgian media identified the suspect as Benjamin Herman, a Belgian national born in 1982.

Authorities were also investigating the slaying on Monday of an old acquaintance of the assailant and said there could be a link.

JOHN THYS/GETTY-AFP Police officers speak to parents of students at a high school where a gunman sought by authorities for killing three people took hostages before engaging in a shootout that left him dead Tuesday. The gunman had been on a 48-hour leave from prison.