Taekwondo instructor in Australia's Sydney charged for killing student, his family

A Taekwondo instructor in Australia's Sydney has been charged with three counts of murder for killing a seven-year-old student and his parents. According to a report by the news agency Associated Press on Thursday (Feb 22), police said that 49-year-old Kwang Kyung Yoo strangled his student and the boy’s mother to death at his Lion’s Taekwondo and Martial Arts Academy in Sydney, the capital of New South Wales, on Monday.

Police said that Yoo allegedly drove his student's mother's car to the family home where he fatally stabbed her husband Steven Cho. Yoo then drove himself to a hospital where he told medical staff and police he had been attacked in a supermarket car park.The Taekwondo instructor was later discharged from the hospital after medical aid.

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The report said that lawyers for Yoo appeared on his behalf in the Parramatta Local Court hearing but did not apply for the 49-year-old man to be released on bail or enter any plea to the charges.

Motive of crime not yet disclosed

The police have not yet disclosed the motive of the triple murders. It is also not known whetherYoo was injured in a struggle or if the wounds were self-inflicted. The man's only connections to family made public so far were that all four are from South Korea. The seven-year-old boy was a regular student at the academy.

Yoomust remain in custody either under police guard in the hospital or in prison until his case is due back in court on April 18. He is expected to appear on the next court date (April 18) via video link.

In New South Wales, the maximum penalty for a person convicted of murder in the state is life imprisonment, with a standard non-parole period of 20 years for the murder of an adult and 25 years for the murder of a child.

(With inputs from agencies)