Woman who murdered children and left them in suitcases jailed for at least 17 years

3 months ago 14

By Charlotte Graham-McLay

November 26, 2025 — 5.43pm

Wellington: A New Zealand woman convicted of murdering her two children and leaving their bodies in suitcases for years will spend at least 17 years in prison.

Hakyung Lee held her head down during Wednesday’s sentencing hearing in the Auckland High Court, as she did for her trial. Justice Geoffrey Venning told her she would begin her sentence as a patient in a locked psychiatric facility but must return to prison when she was well enough.

Hakyung Lee stands in the dock at the High Court in Auckland in September.

Lee was found guilty in September of murdering six-year-old Minu Jo and eight-year-old Yuna Jo, with a jury rejecting her defence of insanity. Her lawyers on Wednesday argued for a reduced sentence because of her mental illness, saying their client felt shame for her crimes and had been isolated and threatened in jail.

However, the judge told Lee that while she was undoubtedly experiencing severe depression when she killed the children in 2018, her actions were deliberate and calculated.

“Your actions were organised and considered over a number of days,” he said, referring to her name change, buying a suitcase, tidying up affairs and sitting a driver’s test. She left the suitcases containing the children’s remains in a storage unit after murdering the children and flew to South Korea on a business class ticket.

The children’s remains were discovered after Lee stopped paying rental fees for the storage unit when she ran into financial difficulties in 2022. The locker’s contents were auctioned online and the buyers found the bodies of the children inside the cases.

Yuna and Minu Jo in April 2018 before they were killed by their mother.

Lee changed her name once she arrived in South Korea but was arrested and extradited to face trial. She is a New Zealand citizen who was born in South Korea and went by the name Ji Eun Lee previously.

During the trial, Lee’s lawyers conceded that Lee had killed the children by giving them an antidepressant, but lawyer Lorraine Smith said the deaths happened after her client “descended into madness”. Lee had always been “fragile,” Smith said, but her mental illness became worse after her husband’s death. He was diagnosed with cancer in 2017.

Crown Solicitor Natalie Walker said the evidence supported Lee did not attempt suicide and instead deliberately killed the children perhaps to free herself from parenting alone before she went about concealing the crime and left to South Korea to start a new life.

“Her most likely diagnosis was that she suffered from a major depressive disorder or grief disorder.”

A photo captured of Hakyung Lee at Safe Store after she killed her children Yuna and Minu Jo.

Walker said the children were vulnerable and there was a gross breach of trust given Lee was the sole surviving parent.

Those convicted of murder in New Zealand automatically receive a life sentence, with judges setting a minimum period of at least 10 years before the defendant can apply for parole. Lee must serve at least 17 years, Justice Venning ruled.

The children’s uncle, Jimmy Sei Wook Jo, was in court, where a lawyer read a statement on his behalf.

“I never imagined such a profound tragedy would ever befall our family,” the statement said. “I feel like I failed to look after my niece and nephew.”

New Zealand police at the scene where the children’s remains were found in 2022.

A prosecutor read out a statement by Lee’s mother, Choon Ja Lee, who spoke of her devastation at learning what had happened to the children.

“It felt like a pain that cut through my bones, or as if someone was gouging out my chest,” the grandmother said. “I do not know when this pain and suffering might heal, but I often think I may carry it with me until the day I die.”

She said she had been called the “mother of a murderer” at her church, and regretted not taking her daughter to see a counsellor after a trip to Australia in 2017.

“If I had taken her at that time this tragedy might have been prevented,” she said.

After Wednesday’s hearing, New Zealand police acknowledged authorities in South Korea for their help with the investigation.

“Yuna and Minu would have been 16 and 13 today,” Detective Inspector Tofilau Faamanuia Va’aelua said in a statement. “Our thoughts are with the wider family today for the tragic loss of these two young children.”