British banker charged with gruesome murder of Indonesian prostitutes

A British banker accused of killing two Indonesian sex workers tortured one of them for three days, a court has heard.

Rurik Jutting, 31, was high on cocaine when he filmed himself slitting the women’s throats in a ‘horrifying’ attack in his luxury Hong Kong flat in 2014, prosecutors said.

The Cambridge University graduate on Monday pleaded not guilty to murdering Sumarti Ningsih, 23 and Seneng Mujiasih, 26, whose bodies were found in his apartment.

His attempt to plead guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter was rejected by prosecutors at the High Court.

The gruesome deaths have shocked Hong Kong, widely considered among the safest in the world.

Prosecutor John Reading told the court how Jutting subjected Ningsih to cruel acts of violence using his belt, sex toys, a pair of pliers and his fists.

After torturing her for three days, Mr Reading said Jutting forced her to lick the toilet bowl while he cut her throat with a serrated-edged knife.

Jutting, who studied at £34,000-a-year boarding school Winchester College, continued to saw through her neck when she did not immediately die.

“After torturing her for three days, he took her into the bathroom, had her kneel in front of the toilet bowl with her hands tied behind her back,” Reading said.

“He made her lick the toilet bowl and then he cut her throat with a serrated-edged knife.”

Jutting used his phone to film himself talking about the killing, saying how much he enjoyed dominating Ningsih.

He also said he “definitely could not have done that without cocaine”.

In some shots, her body can be seen on the floor of the shower. At one point he wrapped it up and stuffed it in a suitcase that he left on the balcony.

Just days later, Jutting took Mujiasih back to his apartment near Hong Kong’s Wan Chai red-light district after meeting her in a bar and offering her money for sex.

After they undressed, she spotted a gag made of some rope that he had left next to the sofa and started to shout, prosecutors said.

Jutting grabbed her, took a knife he had hidden under a cushion, held it to her throat and told her he would cut her throat if she didn’t stop.

“She continued to struggle and shout, and he cut her throat,” Reading told the jurors.

He made more video recordings, including one that showed Mujiasih’s body, and told police he used up the rest of his cocaine.

He apparently started hallucinating and, believing that the police were coming to get him, called the emergency number.

Officers discovered Mujiasih’s naked body with knife wounds to her legs and buttocks.

The decaying body of Ningsih was found hours later in a suitcase on the balcony, according to police reports.

Jutting was arrested and he told officers everything that happened as well as discussing his drug use in police interviews.

Mr Reading said traces of cocaine were detected in more than two dozen small plastic bags found in Jutting’s apartment.

The Cambridge graduate on Monday pleaded not guilty to two murder charges after prosecutors rejected his attempt to plead guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter.

A third charge was also read out – unlawful burial of Sumarti Ningsih’s body, to which he pleaded guilty.