Suspect of quadruple murder in Lithuania detained: police

Lithuanian police detained a suspect who allegedly shot to death four members of his family during a shocking attack in the country's Kaunas region on Monday.

Twenty-six-year-old Egidijus Anupraitis fled the crime scene and was detained in the Lithuanian town of Marijampole, around 50 km from where the crime was committed.

The suspect was apprehended following information provided by residents to the police, Darius Pliavga, deputy chief of Kaunas police headquarters, told reporters in a press conference on Tuesday.

"The man had a firearm and ammunition tray with him," Pliavga was quoted as saying by local website 15min.lt. According to Pliavga, Anupraitis had bought the weapon at a shop earlier in March and had passed all necessary medical tests in order to keep it.

According to the police, the motives of the crime remain unclear.

"The crime is extremely cruel, both in terms of the way it was conducted and its scope," Lithuanian Prime Minister Saulius Skvernelis, who is also the country's former head of police, said in an interview with local broadcaster LRT.

In a separate meeting with reporters on Tuesday, Skvernelis suggested creating a centralized database for storing data on people who intend to acquire a weapon.

On Monday afternoon, the police received a report that four dead had been shot in Gaizenai village: a man, his wife, the man's mother, and the man's brother. Police officers also found at the scene the suspect's grandfather who was injured in the leg and in shock. The married couple was the suspect's parents, police said. Endit