Suspect in Krakow shooting that killed 6 dies, police say

The 24-year-old man suspected of killing six people in Krakow's Main Market Square died in hospital Monday morning, police said, two days after officers shot him to stop the attack.

Malopolska regional police said in a post on X, "We inform you that the perpetrator of the tragic events died this morning in the hospital."

The gunman entered the square by car around 3 p.m. Saturday and fired at people at random as he drove, police said. Six people died and 15 sustained injuries.

Police said he had a military-style rifle and wore tactical attire. Armed officers traded shots with him and hit him within three minutes of the attack's start, an intervention officials said prevented a further massacre, BBC News reported.

Senior Constable Jakub Kulik suffered serious injuries when he confronted the gunman, and police launched a blood appeal as he fought for his life in hospital, The Independent reported.

The suspect underwent several operations following the police shooting. Police have identified him as a 24-year-old Polish national from Ostrowiec Swietokrzyski but have not confirmed his name.

"Until now in Poland we haven't had such drastic cases of terrorism...that's what we have to call this cruel attack on people's lives here in Krakow," Prime Minister Donald Tusk said.

Prosecutors said investigators are treating the attack as a terror incident. Government ministers said far-right ideology had apparently inspired the suspect, though they provided no further details, and one minister called him an "ultra-nationalist."

The Central Bureau for Combating Cybercrime is examining his online activity for possible ties to radical groups. Defence Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz said he was not a soldier and had no military connections. Polish media reported that he had a firearms permit and may have acquired the weapons at his family home.

Tusk said a search of that home after the attack uncovered the bodies of two women and one man.

Police identified them Sunday as the suspect's father, who was 53, his mother, 52, and his sister, 21. Officers believe all three died from gunshot wounds.

Four women and two men died in the square. Police said four were Polish, while the others were a British national and an Austrian woman.

Sixteen people went to hospital, among them five foreigners, two police officers and the attacker. An interior ministry spokesperson said the injured foreign nationals were from Britain, Austria, Germany, Portugal and Russia.

British Prime Minister Andy Burnham said he was "shocked and saddened by the appalling shooting in Kraków" and that the United Kingdom stands in solidarity with Poland's people.

Poland declared two days of national mourning. The square lies at the centre of the Old Town, a tourist destination in Poland's second-largest city.

Mourners placed flowers and candles beside bullet holes there Sunday night. "I come here so as not to get caught up in a spiral of fear and anxiety," Krakow resident Maciej Sikorski told The Associated Press.

"In a situation like this, it's all too easy to stop living — to start being afraid instead, and just vegetate," Sikorski said. "That is something I really want to avoid."