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A TERRIFIED British backpacker fled Koh Tao yesterday claiming he was going to be killed by the “Thai mafia.”

Sean McAnna, 25, a friend of murdered David Miller, insisted local “gangsters” wanted him dead.

The busker – dubbed “Guitarman' - has been cleared by police.

But he has angered locals by talking openly about the crime.

He made a desperate 4am Facebook posting: “Thai mafia are trying to kill me. Please help me.”

And yesterday in an interview with our sister paper the Daily Mirror he revealed the local Thai men snarled at him: “You will die tonight.

“It was you who killed them. you've got two people's deaths on your hands.

“We know it was you. You're going to hang yourself tonight and we are going to watch you hang.

“They wouldn't have shot me they would have taken me up into the hills to hang me and make it look like it was a suicide.

“So I just ran. I just left and ran.

“I think they needed a scapegoat. I think they might know who it was.”

Sean was due to meet David on the very night he was bludgeoned to death with Hannah Witheridge.

We watched as he was smuggled onboard the 3pm ferry from the island yesterday.

It capped an extraordinary day which began with a frantic phone call for help at 4.15am.

He said he was trapped in a 24 hour tiny convenience store near the murder scene by the threatening gangsters and was convinced he was going to die.

But eventually police arrived and escorted him away from the scene to safety.

Sean, a bar-tender and busker from Shotts, Lanarkshire, ended up sleeping rough before being escorted to the ferry.

He said: “The two men chased me into a shop and I ran behind the counter.

“I took the girls phone from her that was working behind the counter and I went on my Facebook.

“I took pics of the guys and uploaded them to say that if anything happens to me everybody knows who did it.

“They need a scapegoat and they don't want it to be locals.

“They want it to be a westerner.

“So if I kill myself here, if I hang myself here, then it is easy to say: "see it was him.

“I genuinely thought that was the day I was going to die. I genuinely thought that this was me dead - that I was gone. “I phoned my mum, I phoned my sister.

“I basically wanted to say my goodbyes. I was so scared. I was so scared.

“I just didn't want that to be it.”

Sean has been on the island since September 9.

He has been friends with David, 24, since they met in Leeds last year.

He didn't realise he was on Koh Tao until he saw a Facebook posting.

They had arranged to meet on the night of the murders but Sean was hungover and didn't get out of bed.

He now thinks the killer will never be caught.

“Thai Police have no chance of solving this crime,” he said.

“The Met Police should have been involved as soon as possible.

“The forensic team did not arrive until 20 hours after the incident.”

Sean is now heading to Italy to see his girlfriend 22-year-old Francesca Mussi, 22.

He was last home at Christmas when he went to visit his mum Anne and sister Nicola in Shotts and other sister Deborah in Glasgow.

“I loved this island but I certainly won't be coming back.”

Police last night said they were planned to DNA test every male on the island.