User:BrandenBolte/Better Luck Tomorrow

Similarities To The Honor Roll Murder
The movie shares some similarities to the Honor Roll Murder where an Honor roll student, Stuart Tay, was murdered and buried in a Buena Park back yard. Similar to the film, four teen-agers were involved, and were all charged with murder in the death of Stuart Tay. The names of the accused were: Robert Chien-nan Chan, Mun Bong Kang, Kirn Kim, and Abraham Acosta. A fifth student, Charles Bae Choe, pleaded guilty to a role in the slaying and acted as a key prosecution witness, claiming that Chan and Acosta beat Stuart Tay with a Sledgehammer and baseball bats.

One of the killers, Robert Chan, was a senior in the running for class valedictorian and had applied to Princeton University similar to Ben Manibag's character in the film. Also similar to the movie is the possibility of romance being a part of the motivation for this murder. Speculation of the Tay Family's private investigator suggested the murder was influenced in part because Stuart Tay was dating a girl who had rejected one of the suspects, Robert Chan. This girl was a cheerleader just like Stephanie Vandergosh's character in the movie.