Found dead in the forest

Breathe a sigh of relief: Amok hunter’s escape is over

A patrol of the Rapid Intervention Group discovered the body of Roland Drexler not far from where his getaway car was found in a wooded area in the municipality of Arnreit.

(Bild: Krone KREATIV/APA/FOTOKERSCHI/PLECHINGER FRANZ, LPD OÖ)

Cat-and-mouse game until the end. Feared confrontation with Roland Drexler failed to materialize. 56-year-old double murderer killed himself in a forest between the crime scenes.

"It's over!" - This sentence ended the five-day manhunt for the double murderer Roland Drexler between Altenfelden and Arnreit on Saturday afternoon. The 56-year-old amok hunter, who had shot two hunting guides with whom he had been in dispute for years, was found dead by a patrol of the Rapid Intervention Group in a forest between the crime scenes, sitting on the ground with his rifle.

The body of the double murderer was found in this wooded area.

(Bild: Werner Kerschbaummayr)

Contrary to expectations, he had not entered into the feared confrontation with the up to 300 emergency services who had searched the area over the past week, but he had played a perfidious cat-and-mouse game right up to the end.

The car, the silver VW Caddy, had only been found in the forest on Friday, All Saints' Day, by a farmer who had gone to check for bark beetles. "However, this path had definitely been taken by colleagues and the car had not been there before," says Barbara Riedl, spokeswoman for the Upper Austrian police. "We assume that Roland Drexler only moved his location in the last few days because the questioning of his circle of friends had intensified. It could be that he has become nervous," says Gottfried Mitterlehner, head of the State Office of Criminal Investigation, shortly after the wanted man was found.

The work continues. A key point will be where Drexler has actually been in the last few days.

Gottfried Mitterlehner, Leiter des LKA OÖ

"There were more than 400 tips"
A witness had seen a car driving into the forest on Friday night, but did not recognize it as the Caddy - in retrospect, however, this tip made sense. During an initial search of the car, Cobra officers found one of the two rifles that Drexler had with him on his escape, along with a Glock pistol. Now everything focused on the grove in Partenreit, in the municipality of Arnreit. "Before, there were more than 400 clues, and each one was followed up 100 percent. That was the only thing we could cling to," says Markus Vorderderfler, head of the operations department and head of operations in Altenfelden.

he circumstances point to suicide. I've been in the police force for 41 years and have never seen anything like it.

Rudolf Keplinger, stv. Landespolizeidirektor

The forest was surrounded on Friday and police vehicles were clearly visible all around on Saturday. "The focus was on self-protection. We assumed that someone was a fire hazard," says interim Linz Cobra chief Andreas Feilmayr, explaining why the forest was not "stormed". The autopsy on Monday in Salzburg will reveal whether Drexler committed suicide on Friday or only killed himself on Saturday - in any case, the emergency services never heard a shot.

Where was the double murderer hiding?
But this is not the end of the investigation. The main task is to find out where Drexler hid from Monday morning until Thursday evening and where he parked his car. The investigators are certain that it must have been in the immediate vicinity - because the streets in particular were watched around the clock. Perhaps someone had given him shelter for a few days.

This is how the hunt ended, read the live ticker from November 2:

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