WARNING: DISTURBING FOOTAGE
Source: Twitter/LucidHurricane_
A video has surfaced purporting to show the Munich shooter opening fire on civilians.
A teenager who executed a horrific shooting rampage that left 10 people dead in Munich has been identified as 18-year-old Ali David Sonboly.
A photograph of the baby-faced killer was published online shortly after investigators seized disturbing books and a computer from his bedroom after he hacked a Facebook account to lure teenagers to the location of the massacre.
Police have detailed evidence found in the mass murderer's bedroom after raiding the apartment Sonboly lived in with his parents.
Investigators seized a computer which will be thoroughly analysed, and discovered documents and books that suggested the attacker was obsessed with the topic of fatal rampage.
One of the books was an analysis of school shootings. An English version of the book is titled Why Kids Kill: Inside the Mind of School Shooters.
Police have described yesterday's massacre as "a classic shooting rampage", and not terrorism.
The book Why Kids Kill, Inside the Mind of School Shooters. Photo / Supplied
In a press conference in Munich last night, authorities confirmed they had so far found no links to Islamic state and said the government did not appear to have any political motivation.
Munich prosecutors said the man had previously been in psychiatric care treated for depression. Investigators said they suspected the gunman was "deranged" at the time of the mass shooting.
Munich police chief Hubertus Andrae said the assault was a "classic act by a deranged person" and described an individual "obsessed" with mass shootings.
He said German investigators saw an "obvious link" between Friday's killings and Norwegian right wing fanatic Anders Breivik's massacre of 77 people in a bomb attack in Oslo and a shooting rampage on the nearby island of Utoya exactly five years earlier.
Police confirmed the gunman had killed himself following the shooting and had a single gunshot wound to the head. He was armed with a 9mm Glock pistol and was armed with 300 rounds of ammunition which he carried in a bag.
A girl puts down flowers in front of the Olympia shopping centre were the shooting took place. Photo / AP
Police revealed the majority of the victims were teenagers and there were three females and seven males among the dead each aged 15 to 45. All victims lived in the local area, there were no tourists included. Three Kosovans are also among the victims.
Witnesses to the mass shooting in Munich have begun to share chilling accounts of the moment the teen gunman began to shoot, deliberately targeting children.
CNN reports that a woman, known as a Loretta, said she witnessed the shooting as she hid in a store next door to the McDonalds where it occurred.
Her eight-year-old son witnessed the shooter loading his weapon in the men's toilets in McDonald's.
"I come out of the toilet and I hear like an alarm, boom, boom, boom. He's killing the children. The children were sitting to eat. They can't run," she told CNN.
Since the horrific attack police carried out an early morning raid of the apartment where the man who carried out a mass shooting is believed to have lived with his parents.
Officers armed with night vision equipment and dogs swarmed the Munich neighbourhood and raided the property in the early hours of Saturday morning.
A man in the neighbourhood told German newspaper Bild he lived right next to the gunman.
"A friend of mine went to school with him and said he was rather a quiet guy. he recognised him from the videos from the scene," he said.
Police earlier identified the shooter as an 18-year-old German-Iranian man following the shopping mall shooting where the teenager opened fire leaving 10 people dead.
In what French President Francois Hollande described as a "disgusting terrorist attack", the shooter attacked shoppers near a McDonald's restaurant in the city's northwest on Friday night.
A woman lights a candle besides a sign painted in the colours of the German flag besides the Olympia shopping centre in Munich, Germany. Photo / AP
Police chief Hubertus Andrae said the shooter's motive was "completely unclear". "The perpetrator was an 18-year-old German-Iranian from Munich," Mr Andrae told reporters on Saturday morning.
While German police said it was too early to label the attack an act of terrorism, Hollande said, "the terrorist attack that struck Munich killing many people is a disgusting act that aims to foment fear in Germany after other European countries."
Yet German police said in a statement: "The motive or explanation for this crime is completely unclear."
The shooter, whose name wasn't released, was not previously known to police and there was no evidence of any links to terrorist organisations, Mr Andrae said.
"We can't question the suspect so this is all a little more difficult," he said.
While he was initially believed to be one of up to three gunmen, authorities have confirmed the shooter, whose body was found at the scene, had probably acted alone.
"We found a man who killed himself. We assume that he was the only shooter," Munich police said on Twitter.
Nine innocent people were killed in the shooting, which took place at about 6pm local time (2am AEST) in front of scores of shoppers at the Olympia shopping centre in the Moosach district. Another 21 were injured, according to the latest official toll, with 16 being treated in hospital. Three of the victims suffered serious injuries.
Police confirmed during the press conference that they were investigating a fake Facebook advert which offered free food at the McDonald's.
The shooter's body was found about a kilometre away from the shopping centre. A red rucksack found near the body was being examined for explosives, police said. The gunman, who apparently used a pistol according to initial evidence, was not previously known to police.
Confirmation of his death ended a manhunt for potential accomplices - and explosives - that kept the city in lockdown for several hours.
Munich police, who called the attack a "confusing situation" involving "suspected terrorism," initially hunted for up to three possible shooters armed with rifles while investigating whether a man's body, found in the shopping centre carpark, was one of the attackers.
The father of a victim shows a picture of his son near the Olympia shopping centre where a shooting took place leaving ten people dead. Photo / AP
WHAT WAS THE MOTIVE?
As news of the attack broke, conflicting reports emerged about the gunman's potential motives, with some outlets reporting that he was heard shouting "Allahu Akbar" before opening fire.
A Muslim woman told CNN she had heard the man yell out the Arabic phrase, which has become a catchcry of Islamic jihadists.
But local media speculated that a right-wing extremist group could be behind the attack, which came exactly five years after white supremacist mass killer Anders Breivik murdered 77 people in Norway.
In a video believed to have been filmed at the scene of the attack, a man carrying a rifle can be heard shouting racist obscenities up to people filming him from a balcony. "I was born here! ... I am German," the shooter can be heard saying.
Munich police said they believe the footage, filmed on a mobile phone, was genuine.
Witness Luan Zequiri told local broadcaster n-TV that he heard the attacker yell an anti-foreigner slur, followed by "a really loud scream".
"I looked in his direction and he shot two people on the stairs," Mr Zequiri said.
He said he hid in a shop, then ran outside when the coast was clear and saw bodies of the dead and wounded on the ground.
Heavily armed police forces operate at Karlsplatz (Stachus) square after a shooting in the Olympia shopping centre. Photo / AP
EARLIER: MUNICH IN LOCKDOWN
The city of 1.4 million people was in lockdown into the early hours of Saturday morning, with all trains, trams, buses and subways shut down as police urged residents to stay indoors.
Hospitals called in extra staff to prepare for the possibility of large numbers of wounded. Facebook created a safety check for the Munich shooting, while social media users are offered safe spaces to local residents using the hashtag #offentür.
Police set up a hotline for people who are missing relatives and are sending out tweets with safety suggestions in four languages - German, English, French, Turkish. All hotels have been instructed to close and taxis not to pick up customers.
"At the moment no culprit has been arrested," Munich police said on social media. "The search is taking place at high speed."
A security official told The Associated Press that 30 members of the GSG9 special operations unit were landing in Munich "as we speak".
A police officer walks outside the Olympia mall in Munich, southern Germany. Photo / AP
SHOPPERS TARGETED
Police said witnesses reported seeing three different people with guns near the shopping centre in the Moosach district of the Bavarian capital, not far from the Olympic Stadium. Munich police spokeswoman Claudia Kuenzel told The Associated Press there had been "several dead and wounded" at the shopping centre.
Munich police spokesman Marcus Martins has told media they were aware of reports that a man had killed himself while he was being arrested, but said there was no confirmation of this yet.
Public broadcaster Bayrischer Rundfunk reported that shops in the centre of Munich had closed with customers inside.
Munich police urged people to avoid public places. "The situation is still unclear," they said on Twitter.
German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere, left, and Bavaria's Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann, right, give a media conference in front of the Olympia shopping centre. Photo / AP
TERROR RISK HIGH
German security forces have been on alert after a teenage migrant stabbed and injured five people on a train in Bavaria on Monday in an attack later claimed by Islamic State.
On Monday, a 17-year-old Afghan wounded four people in an axe-and-knife attack on a regional train near the Bavarian city of Wurzburg, and another woman outside as he fled.
All survived, although one man from the train remains in a life-threatening condition. The attacker was shot and killed by police.
The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the train attack, but authorities have said the teen likely acted alone.
INTERNATIONAL REACTION
United States President Barack Obama pledged to provide the nation, "one of our closest allies", with whatever help it may need to investigate a deadly shooting incident.
Explaining his tardiness for a White House meeting on police issues, he told reporters that the shooting was a reminder that people's way of life, freedom and ability to go about their everyday business depended upon law enforcement.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said in a statement: "Our prayers are with all those affected by the horrible attacks in Munich. This cannot continue. The rise of terrorism threatens the way of life for all civilised people, and we must do everything in our power to keep it from our shores."
British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said he was "shocked and saddened" by the attack, adding that if the violence was terrorism-linked "it proves once again that we have a global phenomenon, a global sickness." Terrorism and violent extremism must be tackled globally, he said.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel will convene her security council on Saturday to address the deadly shooting.
