{"id":608167,"date":"2026-09-22T12:56:11","date_gmt":"2026-09-22T12:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/608167\/"},"modified":"2026-09-22T12:56:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-22T12:56:11","slug":"lok-li-double-murder-trial-pathologists-outline-how-auckland-couple-died","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/608167\/","title":{"rendered":"Lok Li double murder trial: Pathologists outline how Auckland couple died"},"content":{"rendered":"

His former co-defendant, Shu Man Poon, pleaded guilty to two counts of murder last year and spent four days<\/a> in the witness box at the current trial giving evidence<\/a> against his former church friend<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Defence lawyer Paul Dacre, KC, pointed to multiple contradictions in Poon\u2019s testimony yesterday as he suggested the 45-year-old was the ringleader who influenced his younger friend to participate in a thrill killing. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou fulfilled your fantasy by killing Mr and Mrs Kwok,\u201d the defence lawyer told the witness. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat is incorrect,\u201d he responded. <\/p>\n

\"LokLok Fung Lorrence Li, 27, is on trial in the High Court at Auckland, accused of the double murder in November 2023 of Ellerslie residents Fuk-Fu Joseph Kwok (top inset), 66, and his wife Mei Han Chong, 67. Photo \/ Michael Craig<\/p>\n

Dacre continued: \u201cThe reason you\u2019ve done that [blamed Li] is you are hoping your sentence for murder is reduced.\u201d<\/p>\n

Poon again said the lawyer was incorrect. <\/p>\n

Prosecutors have said the only motive for the killing appears to have been a minor traffic accident between Li and Kwok 10 months earlier that resulted in a Disputes Tribunal case.<\/p>\n

Kwok and his wife were killed shortly after their address was divulged to Li as part of the discovery process for the tribunal case. <\/p>\n

Li and Poon were also accused of having plotted to kill Li\u2019s former landlord before pivoting their murderous plan to Kwok\u2019s household. <\/p>\n

During today\u2019s testimony, the DNA analyst also pointed to statistics linking Poon to the scene. A bloodstain on the back bumper of Poon\u2019s vehicle was found to be 500 billion times more likely to be Chong\u2019s than another random person, Parsons said. <\/p>\n

Poon\u2019s DNA was also on the handle of the tomahawk that was found at Li\u2019s house. Poon said last week both men had taken turns striking Kwok with the weapon. <\/p>\n

Prosecutors placed the tomahawk, secured inside a thick transparent plastic box, on the ledge of the witness box today as pathologist Sinead McCarthy shared her findings about how Kwok died. <\/p>\n

\"AA tomahawk used in the killing of an Ellerslie couple inside their Auckland home is displayed for jurors behind a glass case in the High Court at Auckland. Photo \/ Craig Kapitan<\/p>\n

His main cause of death, she said, was stab wounds consistent with a tomahawk that damaged his aorta and a lung. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey would have caused significant bleeding [and] would have been rapidly fatal,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

Kwok suffered five stab wounds in total, as well as \u201csignificant\u201d blunt force trauma to his head and pellet wounds to his forehead and the back of his head. Poon claimed Li was solely to blame for firing an air gun at the couple and for stomping both of their heads after they fell to the ground. <\/p>\n

Kwok\u2019s head injuries, which included \u201cblow out\u201d fractures to both eye sockets and his nose, were the result of multiple strikes, the pathologist surmised. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe blunt force injuries to the face were also significant … and could themselves have been fatal … had he not sustained the injuries to the chest,\u201d McCarthy said. <\/p>\n

\"DetectiveDetective Inspector Scott Beard (from left) and pathologists Kilak Kesha and Sinead McCarthy visit the bush area in Greenhithe where the body of Mei Han Chong was found in November 2023. Photo \/ Jason Dorday<\/p>\n

Fellow pathologist Kilak Kesha, who examined Chong after her body was discovered already partially decomposing in the bush, determined her cause of death to have been blunt force head injuries. He counted 45 lacerations, abrasions and contusions overall, as well as a neck fracture. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re all over her body, on every extremity, every surface, front and back,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Chong\u2019s head injuries were so severe the tissue between the two hemispheres of her brain was torn, Kesha said, explaining such injuries are typically seen in car accidents, falls down stairs and stomping incidents.<\/p>\n

The trial is set to continue tomorrow. It has been scheduled to last through the end of the week. <\/p>\n

Craig Kapitan<\/a> is an Auckland-based journalist covering courts and justice. He joined the Herald in 2021 and has reported on courts since 2002 in three newsrooms in the US and New Zealand.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"His former co-defendant, Shu Man Poon, pleaded guilty to two counts of murder last year and spent four…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":608168,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1443,74,6127,51,29893,50215,6181,8414,6179,8609,2837,42,9832,1345,221,17702,119273,138710,288314,299669,4275,43,2551,161222,189942,675,18835,299670,299668,1361,684,40,38,41,39,54],"class_list":["post-608167","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-about","tag-after","tag-already","tag-auckland","tag-authorities","tag-cement","tag-collected","tag-couple","tag-died","tag-double","tag-during","tag-headlines","tag-helped","tag-home","tag-how","tag-invasion","tag-killings","tag-li","tag-lok","tag-middleofthenight","tag-murder","tag-news","tag-night","tag-outline","tag-pathologists","tag-police","tag-strong","tag-suspicions","tag-swabs","tag-that","tag-there","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-trial"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/608167","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=608167"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/608167\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/608168"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=608167"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=608167"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=608167"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}