The 2020 Stuttgart riot took place during the night of 21 June 2020 when hundreds fought street battles with police in

Stuttgart Stuttgart (; ; Swabian German, Swabian: ; Alemannic German, Alemannic: ; Italian language, Italian: ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, largest city of the States of Germany, German state of ...

, the capital of

Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg ( ; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a states of Germany, German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million i ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. During the riots numerous shops were looted. On 20 June at 11:30pm, police investigated a 17-year-old in Schlossgarten for the possession of small amounts of

cannabis ''Cannabis'' () is a genus of flowering plants in the family Cannabaceae that is widely accepted as being indigenous to and originating from the continent of Asia. However, the number of species is disputed, with as many as three species be ...

, whereupon about 200-500 sided with the accused and started to throw rocks and bottles at the police officers. The rioters screamed "Fuck the Police" and "

Allahu Akbar Allah ( ; , ) is an Arabic term for God, specifically the God of Abraham. Outside of the Middle East, it is principally associated with Islam (in which it is also considered the proper name), although the term was used in pre-Islamic Arabia ...

" in videos recorded. Some rioters had prepared by wearing balaclavas while looting shops. The police apprehended 24 suspects. The riot generated national and international media coverage. In the following weeks, police increased their presence in the city during weekends. Three weeks later, there was further rioting where eleven people were apprehended.

Police response

Two hundred police out of the surrounding area were called to the state capital. About a dozen police were wounded in the fighting and a number of police vehicles were destroyed.

Suspects

During the night, 24 suspects were apprehended, of which 14 were less than 21 years old and 7 were under 18. Half the apprehended were German citizens, of which 3 had a

migration background In the Germanosphere, ''migration background'' () is a term used to describe people on the basis of Identity politics, identity and ancestry. Migration background is a variably defined Social structure, socio-demographic characteristic that desc ...

(German: Migrationshintergrund) meaning at least one of their parents were not born as German citizens. The others originated from a number of countries:

Somalia Somalia, officially the Federal Republic of Somalia, is the easternmost country in continental Africa. The country is located in the Horn of Africa and is bordered by Ethiopia to the west, Djibouti to the northwest, Kenya to the southwest, th ...

Bosnia Bosnia and Herzegovina, sometimes known as Bosnia-Herzegovina and informally as Bosnia, is a country in Southeast Europe. Situated on the Balkans, Balkan Peninsula, it borders Serbia to the east, Montenegro to the southeast, and Croatia to th ...

and

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran borde ...

. On 14 July, police apprehended two further people suspected in having taken part in the violence and plunder. At the beginning of November, 100 suspects were identified. 83 of these 100 suspects have a

. Several of the suspects were

refugee A refugee, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), is a person "forced to flee their own country and seek safety in another country. They are unable to return to their own country because of feared persecution as ...

Criminal investigation

According to police, extreme left activists obstructed the investigations by the police, who had asked the public for video recordings during the riots. The activists responded by flooding the police website with 7500 videos, unrelated to the Stuttgart riot, totalling more than 100GB to the police website to overload. The videos did not overload the police server but would waste police time as they had to be investigated. The German police have made a number of suspect identifications using super recognisers.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Stuttgart riot, 2020 2020 crimes in Germany 2020s in Baden-Württemberg 2020 riot Attacks on buildings and structures in 2020 Attacks on buildings and structures in Germany 2020 riots Attacks on shops in Europe Crime in Baden-Württemberg June 2020 crimes in Europe June 2020 in Germany Riots and civil disorder in Germany