Printed gunsGerman Synagogue Attacker Used Homemade 3D-Printed Plastic Gun

Experts say that the fact that the neo-Nazi who attacked a synagogue in Germany used a 3D-printed gun should serve as a warning to security services, experts have said.

Stephan Balliet used only one plastic gun in his attack in the city of Halle, which left two people dead, but had manufactured several more, according to documents seen by The Independent.

The 27-year-old Balliet livestreamed his attack the way the Christchurch, New Zealand shooter did, and posted three documents online in which he outlined his extreme-right, antisemitic, and racist ideology.

Researchers at the International Center for the Study of Radicalization (ICSR), based at King’s College London, uncovered  scores of files showing that Balliet had been making printed plastic weapons even before Brenton Tarrant killed more than 50 Muslims in New Zealand.

The files were posted on an obscure “chan” imageboard.

Minutes before the attack, Balliet posted a message which said: “For all of you, who live in no fun countries [with restrictive gun laws] this may be of interest.”

“All you need is a weekend worth of time and $50 for the materials.”

He wrote that he was about to start “live testing” before posting a link to the Twitch livestream that showed him carrying out the shooting.

The post was made at 11.57am on Wednesday, minutes before the attack on the synagogue.

The Independent notes that the downloaded folder contained the three documents that were shared widely online in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, but there was also a photo of Balliet and more folders containing detailed instructions on how to make homemade weapons.

It contained numerous files that could be run through a 3D printer to make the same firearms, as well as ammunition.

Balliet listed his primary objective as “proving the viability of improvised weapons,” although footage of the attack showed them jamming and failing multiple times.

ICSR research fellow Blyth Crawford said the documents claimed Balliet had been making his own guns for “years.”

She told The Independent the possibility of other terrorists using 3D printed weapons “needs to be responded to” by authorities. 

“Designs for [one of Balliet’s weapons] have been around for a long time, but it is becoming more and more inexpensive to develop them,” she warned.

Rajan Basra, another ICSR research fellow, suggested there would have been a more urgent response from authorities if the attack had claimed more than two lives.

“There is a risk that because he didn’t succeed in launching a mass-casualty attack, it’s delaying the realization that terrorists could use 3D printed guns,” he said.

“The reaction to attacks depends on the number of victims but the risk with that is that we miss longstanding trends, things that are staring us in the face.”

The Independent also notes that the Halle shooting came only weeks after the first person was jailed for printing a 3D gun in the United Kingdom.

Tendai Muswere claimed the pistol, found during a London drugs raid, was for a prop for a university film project but was convicted for firearms offenses.

The German police said that Balliet was not known to be a security risk and had no criminal record.

Analysis of Balliet’s documents shows that several of the image files showing his plastic weapons were created on 8 March, which is a week before the Christchurch attack in New Zealand.

“One line suggested the attacker had intended to create more weapons or do more attack planning but he abandoned that for reasons we can’t speculate on, and decided to conduct the attack on Yom Kippur,” Crawford said.

ICSR researchers said that the adoption of new technologies and platforms by young far-right extremists like Balliet, would make it impossible for his files to be completely removed from the internet.

Basra called for authorities to encourage people to report suspicious offline behavior, rather than solely using internet activity as an indicator of security risks.

“Balliet had been making weapons for a couple of years, he had been planning attacks for months,” he told the Independent.

“He must have spoken to people, they must have suspected something. I think it would be much more effective if there was a focus on real-world behavior.”