The trial of Hakyung Lee, the South Korean mother accused of murdering her two children and hiding their bodies in suitcases, has been adjourned for fair trial reasons.
Her trial, which had been set down for four weeks, had been scheduled to begin at the High Court at Auckland on Wednesday.
Lee has been remanded in custody and will reappear in court for a callover next month.
A new trial date has not yet been set.
It’s been six years since the deaths of her two children – Minu Jo, 6, and 8-year-old Yuna Jo – and a year-and-a-half since court proceedings against Lee started.
She had previously denied murdering the children.
The case so far
Minu Jo and Yuna Jo were found dead in August 2022 after a family bought the contents of an abandoned storage locker in Papatoetoe.
The family took the goods to their home in Clendon Park, where the bodies were discovered in suitcases among the items.
It’s believed the children died in 2018. Immigration records show Lee returned to South Korea in 2018.
An investigation was opened after the grisly discovery and about a month later, in September 2022, Lee was arrested in South Korea at New Zealand’s request.
South Korean police found her in the city of Ulsan.
Lee was extradited and landed back in New Zealand in November that year.
She’s been before the courts since then, and lost her name suppression in July last year.