A man and a woman, both 36, have been charged in a homicide investigation following the discovery of an unidentified woman’s body in Auckland’s Gulf Harbour in March.
The pair made their first court appearance at North Shore District Court on Monday, with charges of performing an indignity to a deceased body. They were arrested Sunday evening at the airport and were accompanied by a Mandarin interpreter during the proceedings.
Initial media reports on the arrest were prematurely released due to an internal police miscommunication, leading to a temporary suppression order which was later lifted as the prosecution acknowledged the extensive publicity already surrounding the case.
At a subsequent hearing on Thursday, Judge Anna Fitzgibbon declined the defence’s application for continued name suppression, though the defendants’ names remain temporarily suppressed pending an appeal.
The defence argued that revealing their identities would prejudice their right to a fair trial and one defendant had yet to inform family in China.
The defendants have been remanded until a case review hearing in September, and a house in Ōrewa is currently under police examination as part of the ongoing investigation.
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