A New Zealand woman who killed her two young children and hid their bodies in suitcases was sentenced on Wednesday to life imprisonment.

South Korean-born New Zealand citizen Hakyung Lee, 45, was convicted earlier this year of murdering her children, aged eight and six in 2018, a year after their father died of cancer.

Mother hid children's bodies in suitcases

During the trial, the court was told that Lee gave the children an overdose of prescription medicine, before wrapping their bodies in plastic bags and putting them in suitcases.

The bodies were discovered in 2022 by a family who had bought the contents of an abandoned storage unit at auction.

By then, Lee had changed her name and fled to South Korea but was extradited to face trial in New Zealand in late 2022.

At her sentencing in Auckland on Wednesday, Lee's life imprisonment sentence came with a minimum non-parole period of 17 years. She showed little reaction as the sentence was handed down.

Judge rules Lee aware her actions were 'morally wrong'

Following her confession to the murders, the trial hinged on whether she knew her actions were morally wrong.

She argued she was not guilty by reason of insanity.

However, the prosecution contested that saying that she knew what she was doing, pointing to her efforts to hide the bodies before fleeing the country.

Justice Geoffrey Venning rejected calls for a lesser sentence, ruling that although Lee suffered from depression following the death of her husband, she knew her actions were "morally wrong."

"Perhaps you could not bear to have your children around you as a constant reminder of your previous happy life," Venning said.

He ordered that she begin her term in a secure psychiatric facility before returning to prison once deemed mentally fit.

Edited by: Wesley Dockery