There's not much to add over the Somali guy, who stabbed three folks on the street this week, except to discuss the reasoning (at least in his mind).
This was all over failed driver's tests (plural). Cops aren't clear, but it would appear that it was three or more times failed.
So, to explain this detail about how driver's training works in Germany.....this is the path.
Around age 18, you go to a private driver-tutor. You sign a contract. The training part of this will cost a minimum of 1,800 (usually) Euro, and goes to a higher level of potentially 3,000 Euro.
If you talk to most people....living in urbanized areas.....they end up paying around 2,300 Euro currently. Rural folks can usually find better 'deals'.
At the end of the in-house training and the drive training...you come to the office (business deal, not the government). There's the written test to be accomplished. Cost? Presently around 91 Euro.
The last time I took this (goes back to the early 1990s).....this was a two-part test where you had 10 minutes to do the sign portion (roughly 80 signs) and then the quiz (multiple choice)....of about fifty questions and forty minutes.
On the signs.....there was a strategy....read the description first, then jump to the sign pictures. I'll just say this, if you open up the training book....there's probably over 250 types of signs out there, and 20-percent you might never see in most of Germany (maybe just in railway or Alpine situations).
Most people will tell you that if they failed this once or even twice....it was always the sign part that screwed them up.
The written test? At least 20-percent are these stupid scenarios....four-way crossing where a horse-drawn wagon, a bicyclist, a guy in a postal delivery vehicle, and a regular car come up to the intersection....listing who is turning and who is driving straight. Questions like this.....unless you really understand the dynamics of German driving....will freak you out and cause you to waste a whole 120 seconds on one single question.
So, for this Somali guy.....there's one other test....the actual driver's situation. Cost? It's around 22 Euro. Basically, you get their vehicle and the instructor tells you a route (usually 30 minutes of street and open-driving). The pass-ratio (at least I'm told this over the years)....is around 95-percent. People with bad nerves....are usually the ones who fail.
In this case with the Somali guy.....he's come in and tested several times. I'm guessing on the written/sign test. This means that he's paid 91 Euro....for each test failure.
In his mind....he thought he had a special deal....maybe he paid 2,000 Euro and he felt the two tests at the end would only be 113 Euro total. If you've taken the written/sign test four times, and failed each....that's a fair amount of extra cost.
Adding to this whole thing....at least for 2021 in Germany....the written test can be offered in eleven other languages: English, French, Greek, Italian, Croatian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Spanish and Turkish.
One final note, if you asked me the reading level of the test (I've taken it in 1978, 1984, and 1993)....I'd tell you that it's written for a sixth-grade kid. If you can't read or marginally read at the 3rd grade level....you will not pass, and you won't get a license.
Anyone's guess on how the guy got frustrated, but this private-tutor guy probably didn't bend much on the test, and his 'friendliness' might have been marginal. So I might agree....just a bad day and another failed test.....set the Somali guy off.
I'll add.....there's a hundred 'tough' things about settling into Germany, and getting used to. Most US military folks go and push themselves through this in a 30-day window as they arrive. I could probably write a 300-page book on the hundred tough things to grasp/realize, and detail various people who came up to me to ask 'why is this so damn hard'? My usual response was....after the Romans left, the Germans wised up and made all the processes of life formidable and burdensome.
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