A married couple have been arrested over the suspected murder of a domestic worker, whose body was found at the bottom of a waterfall on Monday.
Hong Kong Police Force. Photo: Kyle Lam/HKFP.
Hong Kong police arrested a 34-year-old man and a 36-year-old woman on Tuesday afternoon in connection with the death of a 25-year-old Southeast Asian female domestic worker, who was found dead on Monday morning at Waterfall Bay Park near Aberdeen.
The man, a foreigner with a Hong Kong identity card, was apprehended for alleged murder, while his wife, a Hongkonger, was arrested on suspicion of assisting a criminal.
Superintendent Sin Kwok-ming said on Tuesday the body of the domestic worker was discovered by nearby residents and she was certified dead at the scene. Wounds were found on the victim’s forehead and the back of her head, while her limbs also sustained minor injuries. Her clothes and belongings remained intact.
A preliminary autopsy showed the victim’s head had been hit by a hard object before dying from drowning. Police said the victim had arrived at Waterfall Park with the male suspect in a taxi at around 11 pm on Sunday, and the pair had gone to the top of the waterfall. Around 30 to 40 minutes later, the man left the scene in a hurry, also in a taxi.
Waterfall Bay Park in Aberdeen. File photo: Wikimedia Commons.
The force was able to quickly identify the male suspect and sent officers to his home in Ap Lei Chau. But they found that he had left Hong Kong and travelled to mainland China with his wife. The pair were arrested when they returned to the city.
Police confirmed that the victim and the male suspect had known one another, but further investigation was needed to prove their relationship, the course of events, and the intent, Sin said.
The superintendent told the press in Cantonese that man aroused suspicion because “a lot of things [about] him were unreasonable.” He did not report the case to the police and left the city immediately, while some evidence had also “disappeared for no reason,” Sin said.
“All this suggests this was not a death that happened naturally,” the superintendent said.
Both arrestees have been currently detained pending investigation.
