A 21-year-old man from Groningen has been sentenced to 10 years of jail and long-term psychiatric treatment (tbs) after shooting at and crippling a random passerby.

The NOS broadcaster reports on Friday that the man named as Azim A. was sentenced for trying to kill the 21-year-old Sydney Ruiter last October.

He and two friends had stopped the student on the street on October 15^th 2017, and then A. had shot at him four times as he cycled away.

Ruiter was permanently paralysed in his lower body and now uses a wheelchair. A. must also pay his victim almost €370,000 in compensation for the apparently motiveless attack.

A. had reportedly told somebody later that the shooting ‘felt good, like shooting a bird out of the air’ and threatened to kill his victim in hospital to prevent him from testifying. He had cleaned the gun in his newborn baby’s bath.

A. was given two years’ less punishment and a slightly weaker charge than the prosecution had demanded, and made no defence in court. The verdict was also partially based on other criminal acts, including a ram-raid in Zuidlaren and abuse and death threats against a former girlfriend.