The shots at the 16-year-old youth who died after a police operation were fired from a police officer's submachine gun.
According to the preliminary autopsy findings, the young person was hit by five shots, said the responsible senior public prosecutor Carsten Dombert on Tuesday.
The "Bild" had previously reported on the use of a submachine gun.
Six projectile casings were found, according to Dombert, so six shots must have been fired.
The shots hit the youth on Monday in Dortmund in the stomach, in the jaw, in the forearm and twice in the shoulder.
According to the police, the youth had attacked the officers with a knife during the operation.
There were 11 police officers on site, one of them fired the shots from the submachine gun, said senior public prosecutor Dombert.
As is usual in such cases, he will initially be listed as a suspect.
It is about the initial suspicion of bodily harm resulting in death.
The police were called to an inner courtyard between a church and a youth welfare facility in the north of Dortmund on Monday afternoon.
The 16-year-old boy is said to have been cared for there for a short time.
According to the chief prosecutor, one of the supervisors called the police because he saw the youth with a knife.
His exact motivation still has to be clarified, among other things suicidality is in the room.
According to the police, he died on Monday after the shots during an emergency operation in the hospital.
For reasons of neutrality, the Recklinghausen police have been entrusted with the investigation.