Firearms: Man shot in cafe - “Violence as a service”

A man was deliberately shot and seriously injured in a café in Berlin-Neukölln. The perpetrator approached the man in the café late on Monday evening and shot him in the leg, police said. Alerted police officers found the 40-year-old man on the sidewalk with a bleeding gunshot wound in his leg. The perpetrator fled in a car. The injured man was taken to a hospital and admitted there.

More than a thousand firearms investigations

The special unit of the State Criminal Police Office (LKA) is now investigating “Ferrum”. It was formed almost a year ago because of the numerous violent crimes and shootings in Berlin. It is said to be working with around 100 members “without a fixed end date” and adapted to the situation. It is often about the blackmail of shop and restaurant owners of Turkish origin by organized gangs from Turkey.

A total of 1,084 investigations into firearms crime were initiated from November 2025 to August 2026, the police and Senate said in a recent response to a request from CDU MP Burkard Dregger.

Police speak of “violence as a service”

Many crimes are therefore carried out by criminals specially hired over the Internet. The police spoke of the phenomenon “violence as a service”. The preparation and execution of acts of violence are outsourced to third parties for a fee.

The pistols used by the perpetrators are often replica weapons from Turkey. Most of them are counterfeits and imitations of pistol models from foreign weapon manufacturers. “According to current knowledge, these are mostly transported overland from Turkey to Western Europe, such as: Evidence of seizures during controls at the relevant border crossings,” said the Senate and the police.