SydneyHerald -- May 5, 2004

Four people, including one of Asia's best-known art dealers, were found hacked to death at a luxury villa on the Philippines resort island of Boracay, police said yesterday.

Police yesterday identified Swiss-born Manfred Schoeni, who owns two art galleries in Hong Kong, and German property developer Anton Faustenhauser among the dead. The other victims were a British national and a Filipina maid.

The victims had been stabbed repeatedly and were found on Sunday morning at the German's house, a three-storey villa called Dolce Vita built on a hill with commanding views of the island famed for its white sand beaches.

The three-storey house was in disarray when police arrived, with the bodies of the three men found on the second floor while the maid's body was found in her room on the ground floor.

Superintendent Remus Canieso, head of a special police team in Boracay, said two bladed weapons believed to have been used in the murder were recovered from a lavatory in the house.

Furniture was overturned and clothes taken out of the closets, making it difficult to determine if anything had been stolen, Canieso said.

Police were interviewing 25 staff who worked at the property, and Canieso said a special investigating team had been brought in to probe the crime.

The family of Faustenhauser were due to arrive in Boracay, some 300km south of Manila, yesterday and have requested the crime scene be left undisturbed.