Jutting, 29, accused of killing two Indonesian women after their bodies were found in his apartment last November

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

A British banker accused of killing two Indonesian women whose bodies were found in his apartment in Hong Kong has appeared in court.

Rurik Jutting, 30, is charged with the murders of Sumarti Ningsih on 27 October and Seneng Mujiasih on 1 November last year.

Asked if he understood an updated list of charges, which had been amended to include Mujiasih’s name, he replied: “I do.”

Jutting, who is originally from Cobham, Surrey, did not enter a plea during the short hearing at Hong Kong’s Eastern magistrates court.

The bodies of the women were discovered at his 31st-floor apartment in the Wanchai district on 1 November.

Police were called to the property on the night of Halloween and first found Mujiasih, 29, with wounds to her throat and buttocks. She died shortly afterwards. The body of Ningsih, 23, was found in a suitcase.

Jutting, who worked for the Bank of America Merrill Lynch and went to Cambridge University, was ruled mentally fit to stand trial after undergoing psychiatric tests.

Jutting moved to Hong Kong from London in July 2013 and is understood to have quit his highly-paid job in the days before the incident.

An auto-reply for his email account read: “I am out of the office. Indefinitely. For urgent enquiries, or indeed any enquiries, please contact someone who is not an insane psychopath. For escalation please contact God, though suspect the devil will have custody (Last line only really worked if I had followed through).”

The case has been adjourned until 8 May.