In the middle of Hamburg's Reeperbahn, a 31-year-old man was shot and critically injured in a kebab shop. The crime happened just after 1 a.m. Tuesday night, police said. According to the current state of knowledge, several strangers entered the snack bar shortly before the incident, and the subsequent victim was already sitting there.

According to the police, shortly after the group arrived, there was an argument and also a physical altercation, the trigger and cause are still unclear. One of the rivals shot the 31-year-old, hitting him in the stomach. "Then the strangers ran to an apparently waiting dark car and fled in an unknown direction," it says.

A large-scale manhunt was immediately launched, involving more than a dozen patrol cars, officers from the riot and federal police, and service dogs – but without leading to an arrest.

The victim suffered a life-threatening abdominal injury and had to be operated on immediately after emergency medical treatment in the hospital. Police say his condition is stable again. Meanwhile, the investigations by the homicide squad of the Hamburg State Criminal Police Office, among others, are in full swing - especially with regard to the background, as they say. The police are asking possible witnesses for information about the crime or the perpetrators. It is therefore still unclear whether there is a connection to other acts from the recent past. The NDR had pointed out in a report that there had been shots in the drug scene again and again in the recent past.

Sources: NDR, police

In the gallery: The Goldener Glove and Café Lehmitz were the last refuge for the exhausted. Photographer Anders Petersen created a memorial full of heart for the whores and drinkers with his pictures.