Hotel worker sentenced to life after stabbing two colleagues to death before hiding from police inside a bed
Newsdesk • Published 17 Aug 2012 13:00
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The bed Ban hid from police inside
Iver Heath student Alice Adams
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A HOTEL receptionist who murdered two colleagues before hiding from police inside a bed he left one of the bodies on has been sentenced to life.
Attila Ban, 32, of New Road, Harlington, was sentenced to two life sentences, to run concurrently, at the Old Bailey today for murdering student Alice Adams, from Iver Heath, and Tibor Vass, both 20, at the Radisson Edwardian Heathrow Hotel last summer.
The judge recommended he serve a minimum term of 26 years behind bars.
During a three-week trial the court heard how Hungarian born Ban had stabbed Miss Adams 22 times and Vass twice at the hotel where they all worked, in August last year.
He dumped Miss Adams' body in the living room with a cushion over her face before ripping off Mr Vass's clothes and leaving him naked and posed on a double bed.
He then took a water bottle and mobile phone with him and hid inside the bed. He used a knife to fashion a spyhole and even updated his Facebook status just hours later, posting: 'I'd like to wake up from this nightmare'.
Detectives believe Ban was driven to kill after seeing Mr Vass and Miss Adams kissing at the hotel-owned flat Ban shared with Mr Vass in Harlington.
Prosecutors accepted there was sexual activity between all three as the DNA from both men was found on Miss Adam's breasts.
Ban said he could remember the threesome, but could not recall killing the pair.
The alarm was not raised until around 3pm the next day when all three failed to show up for work.
He was found guilty of both murders by an Old Bailey jury on Wednesday July 18, after pleading not guilty but admitting manslaughter with dimished responsibility.
Alice's mum Sara, of Trewarden Avenue, said: "The most difficult thing to cope with is not knowing exactly what happened to my lovely Alice that night.
"Horrific as it would be to hear, the truth would be preferable to the constant struggle going on in my mind of trying to figure out the sequence of events leading up to Alice's murder.
"My heart is broken. My life will always be tinged with sadness. I miss Alice so much. I would do anything for one more Alice squeezy hug, one more smile."
This article appeared in Local Berkshire 17 Aug 12
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