29 Apr 2024

Suitcase murders: Trial adjourned, trial date to be set

11:29 am on 29 April 2024
Hakyung Lee appears in the High Court in Auckland in November, 2022.

Hakyung Lee appears in the High Court in Auckland in November, 2022. Photo: RNZ / Nick Monro

The trial for a woman accused of murdering her two children and hiding their remains in suitcases has been adjourned, and will not go ahead this week.

At an administrative hearing in the High Court in Auckland on Monday morning, Justice Rebecca Edwards adjourned the trial, with a date to be set next month.

Hakyung Lee has pleaded not guilty to two charges of murder.

The bodies of her two children were discovered in suitcases in August 2022, after a family bought the contents of an abandoned storage locker in Auckland in an online auction.

Lee, a Korean who is a New Zealand citizen, was taken into custody in South Korea in September 2022, and extradited to New Zealand two months later.

The trial was due to begin on Wednesday.

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