In September, weeks after New Zealand authorities found the remains of two children, thought to have been between five and 10 years old at the time of their deaths, South Korean police detained the woman in the port city of Ulsan. Key evidence and the ethnically Korean New Zealander woman, 42, were turned up to New Zealand authorities on Monday night.
According to the justice ministry in Seoul, a woman from South Korea has been extradited to New Zealand to face murder charges in connection with the deaths of two children whose bones were discovered in luggage.
"We trust that the fair and rigorous judicial procedure in New Zealand will uncover the truth of this case, which has attracted international attention," the ministry said.
At the time, pictures in the local media showed the woman, who South Korean police have only identified by her last name Lee, being brought out of an Ulsan police station by plainclothes investigators while covering her head with a thick brown coat.
As she was being brought into a police car, the woman was repeatedly questioned by reporters if she would confess to the crimes, and each time she answered, "I didn't do it."
After an unknowing family purchased a trailer-load of belongings, including the luggage, at an auction for abandoned goods, the bodies were later found. As per New Zealand police, the bodies were probably stored for a number of years, which hindered the investigation. Authorities have emphasized numerous times that the family who discovered the death was unrelated to the murders and was receiving treatment to help them cope with the trauma.
The South Korean justice ministry announced that it would "make every effort" to move forward with the woman's transfer "in line with principles of the law" after receiving a formal extradition request from New Zealand.
The incident horrified a lot of people in New Zealand.
"The investigation team would like to acknowledge the assistance from agencies both in New Zealand and South Korea, which has meant we have been able to put an alleged offender before the court," Detective Inspector Tofilau Fa'amanuia Vaaelua said.
The woman's extradition was ordered earlier this month by South Korean Justice Minister Han Dong-hoon. She had already given her written consent to be sent to New Zealand, and the Seoul High Court had previously approved her extradition.
She may be the mother of the two victims, according to South Korean authorities, given the storage facility where the victims' baggage was kept and registered to her previous residence in New Zealand. The names of the two victims cannot be publicly released due to an interim injunction that a New Zealand coroner has put in place.
