By Lisa Goedert
Almost exactly a year after the terrible act, gas station killer Mario N. (50) was sentenced to life imprisonment for murder and violations of the gun law. After a dispute about the corona mask requirement, he shot temporary cashier Alex W. († 20) in cold blood.
The victim’s mother covered her face with her hand at the sentencing hearing, burst into tears, then put her hand over her heart.
The public prosecutor’s office had demanded life imprisonment and a determination of the particular severity of the guilt. N’s defense, on the other hand, pleaded manslaughter.
Flowers and candles in front of the gas station in Idar-Oberstein, where a mask opponent shot and killed the cashier Alex Photo: exa
The cruel act
On September 18, 2021, high school graduate Alex W. (20) worked in the Aral gas station on the main street of the small town in Rhineland-Palatinate. At around 7:50 p.m., computer specialist Mario N. entered the sales room – without a mask. Dutifully, Alex W. pointed out the Corona rules to him. The man left, returned an hour later and shot the student in the forehead. He was dead instantly.
N. sees his mental state after his father’s death as the reason: “I blamed the corona measures for my father’s suicide, my mother’s death.”
N.’s father shot himself after cancer in early 2020 and tried to kill his mother with him. His mother was in the hospital for a long time, but was not allowed to receive visitors because of Corona. He was also not allowed to go to his father’s funeral because of the pandemic.
According to the admission, on the evening of September 18, N. drank an unusually large amount of alcohol. Because of his asthma, he asked W. not to have to wear the mask. “If he hadn’t responded to my request like that, hadn’t lost himself in that commanding tone, the crime could have been avoided.”
He felt “treated like an idiot” by the student. In prison, N. would have been plagued by feelings of guilt.
Attempts at explanations full of self-pity. Just like his closing words before the verdict: N. emphasized that he could not say much about the process because he had never experienced a court hearing. He criticized that he had found the procedure to be “cold” in part, that the process had lost how much he was sorry for the act.