At around 10 p.m. on 14 January 1930, Hoehler and Erwin Rueckert, another member of the KPD, knocked at the front door of the room where Wessel and Jaenicke lived, while the remainder of the gang of at least a dozen men waited on the street outside. When Wessel, who was expecting a visit from the leader of another SA Sturm group, opened the door, he was almost immediately shot at point-blank range. Although it was later claimed that Wessel had attempted to draw a gun and so had been shot in self-defense, this was denied by eyewitnesses, who said that Wessel had no time to react. The attackers searched the room, removed a pistol from the wardrobe and a rubber truncheon, and then fled the scene, meeting up with the rest of the men in the street. The entire group then returned to their usual nighttime activities.
Even as Wessel was lying seriously wounded in hospital, Goebbels was already releasing reports asserting that those who had carried out the attack were "degenerate communist subhumans".
Wessel received medical attention and recovered somewhat, but eventually died in hospital on 23 February from blood poisoning he contracted in hospital.