A LIFE sentence on an Ealing man was increased today following a brutal attack on three female tourists at a hotel.

Philip Spence, 33, of had originally been sentenced to a minimum of 18 years for the three counts of attempted murder.

But the Court of Appeal quashed this sentence, replacing it with a minimum term of 27 years.

The three sisters, who were visiting London on holiday from their home in the United Arab Emirates, were attacked in their hotel room in front of three of the family’s young children, who were sleeping nearby.

Spence, armed with a claw hammer, was captured on CCTV entering the Central London hotel.

He made his way to the fifth floor, where he entered a room in which one of the victims was asleep with her 10-year-old nephew.

Spence started to gather up cash, jewellery and other items.

He then moved to an adjoining room and began stealing valuables from the table, but one of the sisters was woken by a sound and saw him going through her handbag.

He demanded she hand over money and began attacking her with the hammer.

Her screams woke her sister who tried to stop the attack but was also attacked and clubbed repeatedly over the head.

The third woman was subjected to an even more ferocious assault as she lay in her bed in an adjoining room.

One of the children was later found cowering under the bed covers.

One of the victim’s lives was only just saved by the skills of a medical team.

Her ruptured eyeball had to be removed and she is confined to bed, unable to communicate.

Doctors say she will never have proper brain function, her power of speech is severely limited and she is unlikely to ever walk again unaided.

Leaving the women for dead, Spence made his escape via the fire exit and stairwell hiding the hammer on an external window ledge. CCTV caught him leaving.

Solicitor General Robert Buckland QC, who presented the case in court, said: “Words cannot describe the harm that Philip Spence has done to this innocent family.

“The absence of a conviction of murder makes no difference to the heinousness of his crimes.

"He clearly intended to leave no witnesses behind and did everything he could to commit three murders using premeditated brutality.

“This is not a ‘robbery gone wrong’.

“That these attempted murders were carried out in front of very young children only underlines why the severest punishment was required.”