Mum who murdered her two children, 8 & 6, and hid bodies in suitcases in storage unit for months jailed
A NEW Zealand mum who killed her two young children and hid their bodies in suitcases has been sentenced to life in prison.
Hakyung Lee, 45, was ordered on Wednesday to serve at least 17 years behind bars before becoming eligible for parole.
The High Court in Auckland heard she allegedly killed eight-year-old Yuna Jo and six-year-old Minu Jo in 2018, shortly after the death of her husband, Ian Jo, from oesophageal cancer.
Justice Geoffrey Venning said the murders were “deliberate and calculated”, rejecting claims that Lee acted impulsively.
He said Lee had relied heavily on her husband and “could not cope when he became seriously unwell”.
The judge said: “You relied heavily on him during your marriage, you could not cope when he became seriously unwell, and perhaps you could not bear to have the children around you as a constant reminder of your former happy life, which had been cruelly taken from you.”
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Lee gave the children a fatal dose of the antidepressant nortriptyline mixed into orange juice, according to evidence presented at trial.
She then put their bodies into suitcases and left them in a rented Auckland storage unit before fleeing to South Korea and changing her name.
The children’s remains were discovered more than three years later, in August 2022, when a couple bought the contents of the abandoned storage locker at auction and took the suitcases home.
Prosecutors said Lee’s efforts to conceal the bodies, tidy her affairs and leave the country showed she knew what she was doing.
Crown prosecutor Natalie Walker told the court: “Ms Lee deliberately, and in sound mind, deliberately murdered Minu and Yuna.
“It was not the altruistic act of a mother who had lost her mind and believed it was the right thing to do; it was the opposite.”
Lee’s lawyers admitted she killed the children but argued she was suffering from severe depression and prolonged grief, claiming she believed the family should die together.
She had told multiple people she would kill herself and the children if her husband died and told her mother she had “no will to live”.
Her mother, Choon Ja Lee, said in a statement read to the court: “If she wanted to die, why didn’t she die alone? Why did she take the innocent children with her?”
The court also heard from Ian Jo’s brother, Jimmy Sei Wook Jo, who said: “This situation is something I would expect to read about in a novel or watch in a TV series.
“I never imagined such a profound tragedy would ever befall our family.”
Lee was arrested in South Korea in 2022 and extradited to New Zealand.
A psychiatric assessment reportedly found she was likely suffering from atypical depression at the time of the murders.
Justice Venning ordered that she be treated as a “special patient” under mental health legislation while serving her sentence.
The judge began at a starting point of 22 years but reduced it to 17, citing Lee’s isolation and difficulties in prison.
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The case, dubbed the “suitcase murders”, has drawn intense public interest and left both sides of the family devastated.
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