Cinema Hostage Taker Had Harmless Fake Rifle

German security sources on Thursday said the masked armed assailant, who was shot dead by police after shooting up a German cinema, was likely a lone perpetrator and not a terrorist, reported dpa, worldwide newswire of the German Press Agency.

A masked man took hostages at a cinema in western Germany on June 23 before police stormed the complex and shot him dead, police said.

No one was injured when the drama ended after paramilitary officers stormed the cinema, Reuters reports, citing a police spokesman.

Initially the German public TV said that 25 people were injured but it wasn’t clear whether they were shot or that they were hurt in other ways.

An armed assailant who attacked a German cinema Thursday has been killed, a German official said.

According to the interior minister of the state of Hessen, Peter Beuth, “The police had an emergency call at 2:45 pm [.]”.

“We have no information that anyone (among the cinema-goers) was injured”, Beuth added.

Police in Germany are trying to identify the gunman who was fatally shot after storming a movie theater near Frankfurt.

Police say there is a “threat situation” at a movie theater in a town in southwestern Germany which probably involves a weapon. Police spokeswoman Christiane Kobus said she didn’t have a precise number of hostages, but the hostages were not harmed.

By late Thursday, though, investigators weren’t certain whether the suspect’s gun was real. It said special forces were on the scene.

Authorities said he was found armed with a replica rifle, dummy grenades, and a pistol but it was unknown at the time of his death if all weapons were functional or not.

Even the right-leaning New York Post called the incident a “mass shooting”.