A New Zealand woman has been found guilty of murdering her two young children, whose remains were discovered inside suitcases purchased at a storage unit auction by an unsuspecting family.
The victims, eight-year-old Yuna Jo and six-year-old Minu Jo, were found in August 2022 after a family unknowingly bought the suitcases containing their bodies. Authorities believe the children had been dead for three to four years before the gruesome discovery.
Their mother, 44-year-old Hakyung Lee, denied the charges, but a jury at Auckland High Court took just two hours to convict her of two counts of murder. She now faces life imprisonment, with no chance of parole for at least ten years, reports the Mirror.
Lee, a New Zealand citizen originally from South Korea, had been extradited from South Korea after investigators identified her as the children’s mother. During the two-week trial, jurors heard chilling evidence about how both children were found fully clothed and individually wrapped in layers of plastic.
According to the prosecution, Lee used the antidepressant Nortriptyline to kill or incapacitate her children in 2018. A forensic pathologist testified that the passage of time made it impossible to determine the exact cause of death, but confirmed that both children were victims of homicide.
Prosecutors said Lee’s actions after the killings proved she was aware of what she had done. After the deaths, she concealed the bodies in suitcases, abandoned them in storage, changed her name, and fled to South Korea.
Crown prosecutor Natalie Walker rejected claims that Lee acted out of delusion or maternal despair, telling the court: “I suggest this shows her thinking rationally, even clinically, about taking her children’s lives and then covering up her heinous crimes. It was not the altruistic act of a mother who had lost her mind and believed it was the morally right thing to do — it was the opposite.”
Walker argued that Lee’s motive was “a selfish act to free herself from the burden of parenting alone” after her husband, Ian Jo, died of cancer in 2017. Lee’s defense team maintained that her mental health had deteriorated after her husband’s death, claiming she had intended to take her own life alongside her children but miscalculated the dosage.
Lee showed no emotion as the jury delivered its verdict. She is due to be sentenced in November.