3 men and 3 women, some of them tied up, found shot to death at Chinese restaurant in Germany

(AP) Six people were found shot dead early Monday at a Chinese restaurant in northern Germany, police said.

The bodies of three men and three women, some of them tied up, were found in Sittensen, a town of some 10,000 people south of Hamburg, police said in a statement. A seventh person was seriously wounded.

Police said a man found the bodies when he went to pick up his wife from the 100-seat Lin Yue restaurant at about half past midnight. The woman was among the victims.

"We are assuming that they are employees of the restaurant and that the crime happened after closing time," police spokesman Detlev Kaldinski said.

The bodies were spread across several rooms in the restaurant, police said. In addition, a restaurant employee suffered a life-threatening gunshot wound and was taken to a hospital.

By Monday afternoon, they said they had no witnesses other than the man who found the bodies and no tips as to who might have been responsible.

Mayor Stefan Tiemann declined to identify the family that owned the restaurant, but said they were well integrated in the local community. He said they lived above the restaurant, which had been open since December 1997.

"They're really nice people _ I've never seen an angry face there," said a tearful Hilly Behrens, a local resident.