{"id":153444,"date":"2025-11-25T20:12:12","date_gmt":"2025-11-25T20:12:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/153444\/"},"modified":"2025-11-25T20:12:12","modified_gmt":"2025-11-25T20:12:12","slug":"mother-to-be-sentenced-on-murder-charges-today","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/153444\/","title":{"rendered":"Mother to be sentenced on murder charges today"},"content":{"rendered":"

The woman found guilty of murdering her two children and hiding their bodies in suitcases inside a storage locker will be sentenced at the Auckland High Court today. <\/p>\n

Hakyung Lee \u2013 also known as Ji Eun ‘Jasmine’ Lee \u2013 was convicted in September on two murder charges<\/a> over the deaths of her children, Yuna, 5, and Minu Jo, 3. <\/p>\n

Today’s sentencing caps off a years-long legal proceeding. A previous trial in 2024<\/a> was adjourned for fair trial reasons. <\/p>\n

<\/a>The murder investigation into the children’s deaths was launched four years after the children died in 2018. Their bodies were discovered compacted into suitcases<\/a> into suitcases at a storage facility in Auckland’s Clendon Park on August 11, 2022.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The bodies of Minu and Yuna Jo were found in suitcases in an Auckland storage unit. (Source: 1News)<\/p>\n

The remains were found by a family<\/a> who had bought the contents of the abandoned locker in an online auction. <\/p>\n

Just over a month later, Lee was arrested by the authorities in South Korea and later extradited to New Zealand<\/a> to face murder charges.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: The desperately sad evidence that brought the suitcase killings jury to tears<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a>At her trial earlier this year, Lee’s counsel said the murders were a culmination of a “descent into madness”<\/a> that began with the death of her husband, Jo, from cancer in 2017. Lee represented herself, with the support of two lawyers. <\/p>\n

She had already admitted to causing the children’s deaths and hiding their bodies, but argued she was not guilty by way of insanity.<\/p>\n

\"Police<\/p>\n

Police in Clendon Park, Auckland, following the discovery of human remains in a suitcase. (Source: 1News)<\/p>\n

The court heard that in the months after her husband’s death, Lee fell into a deep depression, becoming isolated and suicidal. <\/p>\n

Her counsel argued Lee believed it was best if the whole family died together. Using the anti-depressant Nortriptyline, which she had been prescribed in 2017, Lee attempted to kill herself and the children, feeding it to them in juice. <\/p>\n

But she got the dose wrong, and she woke up to find the children dead. She then wrapped and hid their bodies inside suitcases, leaving them in a storage locker.<\/p>\n

Lee changed her name to Hakyung and left New Zealand for South Korea on a business class flight. <\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

A family photo of Ian Jo, Hakyung Lee, Yuna Jo and Minu Jo. (Source: Supplied)<\/p>\n

In December 2018, Lee’s mother went to the Auckland Central Police Station, telling them she had not heard from her daughter in a year. An immigration check found she had left New Zealand \u2013 though the full facts of why she left would not be clear until the horrible discovery years later. <\/p>\n

She resurfaced at a psychiatric ward in South Korea, and the hospital helped track her mother down via a Hamilton-based pastor in 2022. She tried to buy a ticket for Lee to come home, but she never got on the plane. <\/p>\n

Later that year, the bodies were found, and Lee was extradited to New Zealand.<\/p>\n

Prosecutors argued Lee’s actions in the wake of her children’s deaths showed she knew what she was doing, and that it was wrong.<\/p>\n

The jury agreed, and Lee was convicted of the murders. Her sentence will be delivered in court today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The woman found guilty of murdering her two children and hiding their bodies in suitcases inside a storage…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":153445,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[51,67,111,43,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-153444","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-zealand","8":"tag-auckland","9":"tag-crime-and-justice","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-newzealand","13":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=153444"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153444\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/153445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=153444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=153444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=153444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}