A 26-year-old Deutsche Bahn security employee suffered life-threatening injuries after falling from a moving regional train near Ettlingen in south-western Germany on Friday evening, 17 July.
The incident began with a ticket dispute on a service travelling towards Karlsruhe. Two DB Security employees were called after a 36-year-old passenger, believed to have been intoxicated, became involved in a verbal confrontation with ticket inspectors.
As reported by tagesschau.de, citing investigators and SWR, the passenger allegedly punched and kicked one of the security employees. A train door was damaged during the struggle, leaving an opening through which the employee fell onto the track while the train was travelling at approximately 120 km/h.
Emergency services found the injured employee in the track area around two kilometres before Ettlingen-Bruchhausen station. He was taken to hospital, where his condition was reported to be critical but stable on Saturday evening.
The suspected attacker was detained on the train. Karlsruhe District Court later rejected a request for an arrest warrant, and the man was released. Prosecutors are reviewing the decision, while investigators have seized the train and are examining the circumstances surrounding the door failure.
Deutsche Bahn condemned the attack and expressed support for the injured employee. The EVG and GDL trade unions renewed calls for stronger protection of railway staff and tougher consequences for violence on trains.
The case follows the fatal assault of a DB Regio conductor during a ticket inspection in Rhineland-Palatinate in February. The attacker in that case was sentenced earlier in July to ten years in prison for bodily harm resulting in death. German federal police recorded around 2,690 attacks on Deutsche Bahn employees in 2025, approximately 11% more than in the previous year.
