Hostel suspect to face trial
BRISBANE, Australia (AP) — A magistrate Monday ordered a fruit picker to stand trial on arson and murder charges linked to the torching of a backpackers’ hostel that killed 15 young tourists in a savage blaze that gutted the building.
Robert Paul Long, 37, faces life imprisonment if convicted of setting fire to the Palace Backpackers Hostel in Childers, southern Queensland, last June 23 and the murder of two of the victims, Australian twins, Kelly and Stacey Slarke.
The 22-year-old twins were among six backpackers from Britain, four from Australia, two from the Netherlands and one each from Ireland, South Korea and Japan who died in the fire. Police authorities did not immediately explain why Long was not charged with murder of the other 13 victims.
Long pleaded innocent to the charges last Friday. He will be tried at Brisbane Supreme Court. No date was immediately set for the trial.
The decision by magistrate Michael Halliday to send Long to trial followed two weeks of hearings at which prosecutors outlined their evidence.
Witnesses who testified at the hearing included survivors of the inferno and the arresting police officers who say Long confessed to starting the fire.
Long allegedly said: “I am dying anyway, I started that fire,” according to an officer, who was not named for security reasons.
Police shot Long when he resisted arrest when captured near Childers five days after the blaze.
One backpacker staying at the Palace hostel on the night of the fire said he saw Long standing over a flaming trash can, others said Long had discussed burning down the hostel in the days leading up to the fire.
Childers is a close-knit agricultural community, 190 miles north of Brisbane, the Queensland state capital.
