Borneo Stabbing: Men Who Stabbed Students To Death Were 'High On Crystal Meth'

Men Who Stabbed British Students To Death In Borneo Were 'High On Crystal Meth'

The four men who stabbed two British students to death in Borneo were high on crystal meth, a police report has revealed.

Medic students Aidan Brunger and Neil Dalton were out celebrating the end of a six-week work placement in Sarawack General Hospital in Kuching when they were brutally slain in the street.

Aidan Brunger, left, and Neil Dalton

The students, from Newcastle University, had reportedly got into an argument with the locals who took offence at the pair being "too loud".

The pair had been drinking in the Ambi Borneo bar late on Tuesday evening when they had a confrontation with a group on the next table. After a "prolonged argument", the students left the bar but were followed.

Despite the owner of the Malaysian bar saying he thought he had scared the killers off, they returned to chase the students down in a car.

When the bar owner returned less than an hour later, he was shocked to see the students' bodies lying in the road.

"Why didn't I offer them a ride? They were walking at a distance away when I left them, I thought they were safe," he told The Telegraph.

The paper also reports the killers tested positive for methamphetamine, also known as crystal meth. One of the suspects had a previous conviction for drug dealing, while another had been convicted of gang robbery.

A restaurant worker who witnessed the attack said one student was stabbed in the chest, and the other the chest and the back, according to Malaysia's Bernama news agency.

Aidan, 22, and Neil, 23, were praised by their professor as being "excellent and committed students".

"Neil and Aidan were doing what thousands of medical students do every year by gaining valuable medical experience overseas," Professor Reg Jordan, of Newcastle University, said.

"They were both excellent and committed students with so much potential, who will be greatly missed by everyone in the medical school. The whole university deeply mourns their loss."

The four suspects have admitted to the crime, prompting the local police chief to say the case had been "solved".

We have finished our investigation, the crime has been solved," deputy police commissioner Chai Khin Chung said.

"The suspects have been apprehended and they have admitted the crime. We have recovered the weapons from the crime.

"We are waiting for the corpses in the hospital mortuary to have the post-mortem carried out. We have all the major evidence in our hands which we will send to the prosecution."

Two Irish medics had been attacked and beaten up in a bar just days before the stabbings, according to the Irish Independent. The incident prompted staff at the teaching hospital to warn students to be on their guard while socialising in the area.

Professor Jane Calvert, dean of undergraduate studies for Newcastle University medical school said: "They were excellent students who were doing really well with their studies, they were highly committed and coming back next year to work as doctors.

"Aidan was aspiring to do some medical research on his return, Neil was going straight into his final year and it’s such a tragic thing to occur."

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