A public schoolboy who claimed he was sleepwalking when he attacked two pupils and a teacher with hammers can now be named.

It comes after a judge lifted an order preventing 17-year-old Thomas Wei Huang from being identified.

Last week he was jailed for life with a minimum term of 12 years after being found guilty of three counts of attempted murder in June following a 10-week trial.

He was wearing only his boxers when he repeatedly punched his housemates as they slept in one of the boarding houses at Blundell Co-ed School in Tiverton, Devonin June last year.

Both boys suffered skull fractures as well as injuries to their ribs, spleen, a punctured lung and internal bleeding. He then attacked a teacher who tried to intervene.

They were asleep in bunk beds when Huang climbed in and attacked them shortly before 1am on June 9 last year.

Maths teacher Henry Roffe-Silvester told Exeter Crown Court he was sleeping in his own rooms when he was woken by noises coming from the hostel and went to investigate.

He said he saw a silhouetted figure standing in front of him in the room, which then turned and hit him repeatedly over the head with a hammer.

“Physically, I stumbled down the corridor. There was a second kick – I can’t remember if it was before I stumbled back – that’s a bit of a blur for me,” said Mr Roffe-Silvester, who suffered six blows to the head. .

Another student heard Mr Roffe-Silvester shouting and swearing as he ran from his bedroom and called 999 – thinking it was an intruder.

The two boys were discovered in their beds a few minutes later.

Huang, from Malaysia, who was 16 at the time, admitted carrying out the attacks but said he was sleepwalking. He pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to three counts of attempted murder.

But the court was told he had an obsession with killing children and hammers, which he said he kept by his bed for “protection” from the “zombie apocalypse”.

Prosecutors said the boy armed himself with three claw hammers and waited for the two boys to fall asleep before attacking them.

At his sentencing hearing last month, judge Mrs Justice Cutts said experts could not say how long he would pose a risk to the public as she jailed him for life with a minimum sentence of 12 years.

“You planned your crimes and used the hammers you bought as weapons,” she told Huang, adding that as a “smart guy” he “knew very well if you hit guys more than or with hammers, they will die”.

She told him there was a significant risk he would repeat the attack and therefore he posed “a high level of danger to the public due to the nature of your offences”.

Huang may be named after a court official confirmed that his lawyers will not appeal the judge’s earlier decision to lift the reporting restriction, which was taken at the sentencing hearing following a request from the AP news agency.