Nilanthan Moorthy, age 17
The devastated sister of student Nilanthan broke down in tears as she paid tribute to her brother at the family's south London home.
Santhiya Moorthy, 18, said she found out about her brother's death while in India with her mother.
Choking back tears outside the family home in New Addington, near Croydon, she said: 'It was incredibly difficult. He was my one and only brother and God has just taken him.'
Friends of the tragic teenager claimed he was the victim of a racist murder.
The 17-year-old student had just put the finishing touches to organising a friend's birthday party when he was brutally stabbed to death in Croydon.
The British-born Tamil, whose father runs a restaurant in nearby Purley, had been setting up the party venue and paying for the bash when friends say he was racially abused before being stabbed an hour later.
A friend of the victim, Amir Butt, 23, said: 'He was in the car park of the restaurant when a minicab pulled up and there was a guy in the back who was really drunk and started shouting 'you f...ing Pak*'.
'Our friends were there and said: "Look, mate, we don't want any problems - just go away because you're being racist."'
'The cab driver took him away, then about an hour later the same guy came back and walked towards Nilathan and threw a punch.
'I don't know, but he must have had a blade in his hand because he ended up with a slashed throat.
'The white guy ran off and one of our mates saw Nilathan lying on the ground and told him to get up before he saw blood dripping everywhere. An ambulance came and took him to hospital.'
He added: 'Nilathan was a calm boy. He came from a good family and he was a good boy. He was not a bad person.
'He was at college studying economics and business and he was helping his dad run his restaurant.'
However, a Scotland Yard spokeswoman said: 'There is no suggestion at this stage that this attack was racially motivated.'
The murdered teenager, believed to be a member of the notorious Croydon Boys street gang, was attacked at around 1am.
He was with a group of friends when a man became involved in a fight with them, fatally knifing Nilanthan.
He was taken by the London Ambulance Service to the nearby Mayday Hospital with serious stab wounds to the neck but died three hours later.
Croydon councillor Mike Selva appealed for calm last night.
He said: 'I am very concerned about community reactions because of the different races involved.
'It's very shocking.'
The owner of a local dry cleaning firm, who did not want to be named, added that a bloody turf war had been raging between rival Sri Lankan gangs in Croydon and nearby Tooting.
He said: ‘It’s non-stop. There are fights between them all the time – the police are always splitting them up.
‘There have been three or four murders in the past year around here but they never get reported. It’s like living in a war zone.’
Police appealed for information about a taxi driver with a blue Ford Mondeo who is thought to have dropped off a man – suspected of involvement in the case – in London Road, Croydon, at 1am.
Scotland Yard said in a statement: ‘The suspect, described only as a white male, got out of the cab and was involved in an argument with the driver.
‘It is now known that after the row with the cab driver, words were exchanged with the victim and his friends standing nearby.
‘The suspect then left the scene, but returned a little while later and was again involved in an exchange of words with the victim and his friends, which resulted in the victim being injured.’
A 31-year-old man arrested on Saturday has been released on bail, pending further inquiries.
RIP
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