The fatal attack on the cashier at a gas station in Idar-Oberstein and the reactions to it in right-wing extremist circles cause horror.

"The radicalization of the maverick milieu worries me very much," wrote the Greens' candidate for chancellor, Annalena Baerbock, on Twitter on Tuesday.

She had previously shown herself shocked that a young man "who only asked to obey the applicable rules, to be prudent and show solidarity," was shot.

CDU General Secretary Paul Ziemiak reacted in a similar way to Baerbock.

“A young person is almost executed for pointing out the mask requirement,” wrote Ziemiak on Twitter, speaking of an “unbelievable degree of radicalization”.

Sebastian Eder

Editor in the Society department at FAZ.NET.

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Julian Staib

Political correspondent for Hesse, Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland based in Wiesbaden.

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In the dispute over wearing a mouth and nose cover, a 49-year-old man is said to have shot and killed a 20-year-old employee at a gas station in Idar-Oberstein on Saturday evening.

The accused is German and, according to the Bad Kreuznach public prosecutor, he confessed to the crime.

An arrest warrant was issued against him, he is suspected of murder for low motives.

The accused is in custody.

The course of the crime was "pretty clear," said a spokesman for the FAZ public prosecutor's office. There were extensive video recordings. According to the information, the suspect had initially entered the sales room of the gas station without a mask and placed two six-packs of beer on the counter at the cash register. According to prosecutors, he said he forgot the mask. The cashier pointed out the mask requirement to the man - whereupon the man left the room after the investigation and raised his hand threateningly. Then he returned with a mask, took another six-pack of beer and went to the cash register. "There he took off the mouth and nose cover," said the senior public prosecutor Kai Fuhrmann. The cashier had again advised the man to comply with the mask requirement.Thereupon the latter pulled the gun and shot the employee of the gas station "in the head" in a targeted manner.

According to the public prosecutor's office, the alleged perpetrator testified that he rejected the corona measures. As for the motive, he stated that the situation surrounding the pandemic was a heavy burden on him. The accused felt pushed into a corner and "saw no other way out" than to set an example. The victim seemed to him "responsible for the overall situation, since it had enforced the rules," said Fuhrmann. According to the city administration, the 20-year-old student lived in Idar-Oberstein, and with his job at the gas station he wanted to earn money for a driver's license.

According to the public prosecutor's office, the accused is not yet known to the police. During a search of his house in Idar-Oberstein, the alleged murder weapon as well as other weapons and ammunition were found. The accused did not have a gun license and the origin of the guns is still unclear. A spokesman for the public prosecutor said evidence was also seized during the house search. Electronic media would now be evaluated. Whether the accused is part of the so-called lateral thinkers is the subject of investigations. According to the German Press Agency, investigators announced on Tuesday that the man was "well versed" in the theories of the corona deniers. "He knows the sources and has also stated that he has made himself smart," it said.The accused is self-employed in the IT industry.