A British banker was jailed for life on Tuesday for the
"sickening" murders of two Indonesian women he tortured in his Hong
Kong apartment in what the judge said was one of the most
horrifying cases the Chinese-ruled territory has
known.
Rurik Jutting, 31, a former Bank of America employee, had denied
murdering Sumarti Ningsih, 23, and Seneng Mujiasih, 26, in 2014 on
the grounds of diminished responsibility due to alcohol and drug
abuse and sexual disorders.
He had pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter in a
case that gripped world media due to graphic video footage seen by
the jury and the brutality of the killings.
The jury unanimously found Jutting guilty of murder and he was
sentenced to life in prison.
His lawyers have said he will apply to serve his sentence in
Britain, the former colonial power in Hong Kong, where prisoners
can in some cases apply for parole after a fixed number of
years.
Judge Michael Stuart-Moore agreed for an application to be
filed, but said he would inform the authorities in Britain exactly
what they would be dealing with and urged caution against falling
for Jutting's "superficial charm".
Cambridge-educated Jutting, wearing a blue shirt, looked down
and showed no emotion when the verdict was read out in an open
courtroom, packed with international and local journalists.
It took the jury, made up of four women and five men, around six
hours, including a lunch break, to reach its decision.
In closing remarks, the judge described Jutting as the
"archetypal sexual predator" who represented an extreme danger to
women, especially in the sex trade.
He cautioned that the possibility of a repeat crime would have
been very likely.
The murders were even more damning because Jutting had been
given every possible material advantage in life from a very
privileged upbringing to a great career and immense pay cheque, the
judge said.
"They are sickening in the extreme and beyond a normal person's
imagination... There are insufficient superlatives to describe what
he did."
Ningsih's 61-year-old father, Ahmad Kaliman, said he thought the
verdict was appropriate.
"I want to say thank you to Hong Kong’s legal system for what
they've done," he told Reuters TV calmly in his village in central
Java. "I hope we can get compensation to support (Ningsih's
son)."
Ningsih leaves a seven-year-old son.
In a statement read out by Jutting's lawyer, Tim Owen, Jutting
said he was haunted daily by what he had done.
"The evil can never be remedied by me, nevertheless... I am so
sorry. I am sorry beyond words," Owen said, citing Jutting.
Jutting, the grandson of a British policeman in Hong Kong and a
local Chinese woman, had argued cocaine and alcohol disorders as
well as personality disorders of sexual sadism and narcissism had
impaired his ability to control his behavior.
The prosecution rejected this, stating Jutting was able to form
judgments and exercise self-control before and after the killings,
filming his torture of Ningsih on his iPhone as well hours of
footage in which he discussed the murders, binging on cocaine and
his graphic sexual fantasies.
Jutting exhaled deeply as he walked out of the courtroom,
flanked by three police guards.