Dutch investigators say the man who attempted to slam his car into an open-topped bus
carrying Dutch Queen Beatrix and her family was acting alone and deliberately targeted the royal family.
Karst T. killed seven bystanders and himself when he plowed through spectators waiting to catch a glimpse of the royal family on April 30, the Queen's Day national holiday. Prosecutors say they still do not know for sure the man's motive for the attack in the central city of Apeldoorn, which played out live on national television to a horrified public.
"We have no final answer to the ultimate question: Why?" That answer had to come from Karst T. himself, said the country's top prosecutor, Bart Nieuwenhuizen. Under Dutch privacy laws, officials use only the initial of criminal suspects, even after they have died.
Police said the 38-year-old man confessed as he lay slumped and bleeding in his car that he intended to hit the royal family. He went into a coma shortly afterward and died of his injuries the following day. Among his final words, T. called Prince Willem-Alexander a "fascist ... a racist", said Tom Driessen of the national investigation bureau that carried out the probe.
But Driessen added that T. had not planned his attack based on any "ideological reasons." Prince Willem-Alexander was on board the bus along with his Argentine-born wife Máxima, the queen and almost all the other members of the royal family. Tens of thousand spectators lined roads leading to the historic Het Loo palace, which was just a few hundred meters from the scene of the attack.
Driessen said T. made no attempt to avoid hitting members of the public as he slammed through police barriers at 70 mph (112 kph), but that after ramming spectators he veered away from the royal bus and crashed into a stone obelisk. "Had there been no spectators, Karst T. would likely have hit the royal bus", Driessen said. GPD © AP; Photos by © GPD
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