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Bound and bleeding on his bathroom floor, a Townsville businessman drew his final breaths after his one-time protege took his life.
The man, whose arms and legs were haphazardly tied together with duct tape, died after inhaling his own blood as a result of the serious injuries he suffered in a violent assault in his own home.
Kyle Robert Thompson on Monday appeared in the Townsville Supreme Court, where he pleaded not guilty to murdering sign-writer David Knyvett in the man's Belgian Gardens home on November 15, 2015.
Thompson, 32, used an empty Jack Daniel's bottle to beat the 59-year-old man - who had taken him in more than a decade earlier - to death, crown prosecutor Nigel Rees told the court.