US prosecutors say Marcus Hutchins, 23, admitted creating and selling the Kronos program, which steals bank details

THE NHS WannaCry hack hero accused of creating malware was coerced into an alleged confession while intoxicated and sleep-deprived, his lawyers claim.

Marcus Hutchins was held in Las Vegas before he flew home to Britain from a hacking congress.

US prosecutors say Hutchins, 23, of Ilfracombe, Devon, admitted creating and selling the Kronos program, which steals bank details.

Hutchins denies six charges.

He has won praise for finding a kill-switch that scuppered the WannaCry attack which crippled the NHS in May.

His lawyers argued in a document filed in court in on Friday that he had likely been subject to surveillance leading up to his arrest in August and therefore agents “knew he was exhausted and intoxicated at the time”.

“The defence intends to argue that the government coerced Mr Hutchins, who was sleep-deprived and intoxicated, to talk,” they added.

“As such, his decision to speak with the agents was not knowing, intelligent, and made in full awareness of the nature of the right given up and the consequences of giving up that right, as the law requires.”

The legal team also argued that if he was not read his rights he may have wrongly believed his silence could be used against him, as it could be in the UK’s legal system.