Two children whose bodies were discovered inside bags have been positively identified by New Zealand, but their names will not be released at their families’ desire, police said on Friday.
Since the bodies were found two weeks ago, the deaths, which have shocked the nation, have been the subject of ongoing detective work.
After an unwary family purchased a trailer load of belongings, including the luggage, at an auction for abandoned goods outside of Auckland, the country’s largest city, the terrible discovery was made.
The family that bought the luggage is not related to the fatalities, according to the police. Officials at the time stated that they are getting support to help them cope with the trauma.
The luggage had been kept in storage for at least three or four years, according to authorities, and the youngsters, who were aged between five and ten, had been dead for a while.
Detective Inspector Tofilau Faamanuia Vaaelua reported that a coroner has issued a directive prohibiting the release of any information that would reveal the children’s names.
Police in Seoul, South Korea’s capital, announced on Monday that they had found a woman they thought was related to the kids.
According to immigration records, the unnamed woman in her 40s entered South Korea in 2018, but there is no evidence that she left, according to Park Seung-hoon, a representative of the National Police Agency in Seoul.
The woman relocated to New Zealand after leaving her birth country of South Korea, where she eventually obtained citizenship. As the woman’s previous location in New Zealand was listed with a storage facility where the luggage were kept for years, New Zealand police believe the woman may be the mother of the children discovered dead, according to Park.
Although police have been reviewing hours of CCTV footage, there is a chance that crucial details have already been lost because of the time that passed between the victims’ deaths and the corpses’ discovery.
The location where the luggage were stolen, as well as the storage facility, have both been carefully scrutinised by forensic specialists.