Holland shooting: Police officer kills two family members and himself in Dordrecht

Investigation launched after three die and fourth relative seriously injured

Police investigate after three people were killed at a house (EPA)

A Dutch police officer shot and killed two family members and himself at a home in the city of Dordrecht, a police source has said.

A fourth relative was injured, said the source.

"Three people were killed in the shooting incident in Dordrecht's Heimerstein (neighbourhood). One person was seriously injured," an official police statement said.

An investigation into what happened is under way.

Police spokesman Wim Hoonhout said: “It seems like a family incident.”

Initially police said ”multiple” people had been shot in a residential street on the southern edge of the city, but officers in the nearby city of Rotterdam then tweeted confirmation that three people had died and one was seriously wounded.

Emergency response teams rushed to the scene to treat victims and to investigate.

Dordrecht mayor Wouter Kolff tweeted that there had been “a very serious shooting incident” and that he was heading to the scene.

Footage posted on social media showed a crowd had gathered opposite the house, held back by a police cordon.

Ambulances and police cars were in the road, which looked like an everyday residential street.