South Korea announced on Tuesday (November 29th) that it had extradited to New Zealand a woman suspected of murdering two children whose remains were found in suitcases.
The 42-year-old woman, believed to be the mother of the two deceased children - a New Zealand citizen of Korean descent - and key evidence in the case were handed over to New Zealand authorities on Monday evening, a South Korea's Justice Ministry said in a statement.
“We hope that the truth about this case, which has captured the attention of the world, will be revealed after a fair and rigorous legal process in New Zealand
,” he added.
Macabre discovery
South Korean police arrested the woman in the port city of Ulsan in September, weeks after New Zealand authorities discovered the remains of two children, thought to be between 5 and 10 years old when they died, in the around 2018. Footage in the local press at the time showed the woman, whom South Korean police only identified by her surname Lee, being led out of an Ulsan police station by investigators in civilian clothes, covering his head with a coat.
When asked by reporters if she would confess to the murders, the woman repeatedly said
"I didn't do that"
as she was driven away in a police vehicle.
The macabre discovery came in August.
The suitcases were part of a trailer loaded with items, purchased by an unsuspecting family at an auction of abandoned property in Auckland, New Zealand's largest city.
New Zealand Police said the bodies had been placed in the trailer likely for several years, complicating the investigation.
Authorities have repeatedly stressed that the family who found the bodies were not linked to the homicides and were receiving psychological support to help them deal with the trauma of the sordid discovery.