POLICE investigating a triple stabbing last night extended their town centre search for clues.

Three Afro-Caribbeans, two women and one man, were stabbed in the back, early yesterday and are reported to be stable in Middlesbrough General Hospital.

Police recovered two knives during fingertip searches of the Kingston Street area of Middlesbrough, where the victims were attacked.

Officers declined to explain why a house in nearby Albany Street remained cordoned off, or the origin of blood stains on the pavement outside the house, but said various addresses were being visited, while door-to-door inquiries in the area was being stepped up.

An 18-year-old woman and a 22-year-old man were being quizzed by detectives last night about the attack, which police believe was not racially motivated.

It is understood the victims, the man aged 25 and the women, 26 and 27, were attacked by about four white people.

Police have attempted to talk to the three victims and are to make a return visit to the hospital to speak to them.

A police spokesman said: "A group of white males attacked an Afro-Caribbean man and two Afro-Caribbean women, leaving the victims with serious stab wounds."

Kingston Street runs off Union Street, the scene of recent police drug raids and is represented on Middlesbrough Council by Coun Ken Walker. He is urging Home Secretary David Blunkett to give police and councils the power to strip rogue landlords of houses they let to drug dealers.