They were most like hunted and killed due to the money. In as much as it is very bad to scam people of their belonging, killing is not a way forward. Also, part of the reason not to involve in illegal business especially on the internet because you only know yourself but you have no idea what people you scammed are capable of doing. Scam is not a good thing and shouldn't be a means of survival. A lot of people dies just because they are being scammed and could feed themselves
who knows, one of those investors that they scammed orchestrated this gruesome murder? this is the reason why we should always live by this golden rule -- "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" we dont know what kind of people we are encountering everyday so better stick to this golden rule to have peace of mind.
I invested around 200USD into Conligus, after some time Conligus was bought by Onecoin and they merged together. If I invested 200USD into Bitcoin instead of Onecoin, I would have thousand percents profit, now I don't have anything. 
you can never go wrong with bitcoin. alts come and go but bitcoin will always be here...