Prof Told Students All Was Well. Then Cops Found the Body

Cheung Kie-chung of the University of Hong Kong charged Wednesday in wife's murder
By Arden Dier,  Newser Staff
Posted Aug 29, 2018 11:42 AM CDT
Professor Allegedly Killed Wife at Dorm, Hid Body in Office
Hong Kong University mechanical engineering associate professor Cheung Kie-chung is escorted by police officers on Wednesday.   (AP Photo/Apple Daily)

A professor at the University of Hong Kong emailed students Tuesday morning to calm them regarding a police presence at the residence hall in which he lived with his family and served as warden. "They are here to investigate a missing person case," wrote Cheung Kie-chung, who'd told police his wife vanished on Aug. 17 following an argument. "There is nothing to worry about among the students." Later that day, police say they found a wooden box at Cheung's office on the university's main campus. Inside was a malodorous, bloody suitcase holding a woman's body, an electrical wire around her neck, police superintendent Law Kwok-hoi says, per the New York Times. Police allege 53-year-old Cheung strangled his 52-year-old wife after a family dispute.

The dispute allegedly involved the couple's daughter and bathroom cleanliness, per CNN, while the Hong Kong Free Press specifically refers to "toilet hygiene." After the daughter left their residence, Cheung's wife is believed to have confronted her husband for not supporting her in the dispute, police say. She wasn't seen exiting the building, though surveillance video did show Cheung taking out a wooden box measuring roughly 10 by 20 by 30 inches. A member of the department of engineering as well as the school's governing council, he was charged Wednesday with murder as university officials offered counseling to Wei Lun Hall residents, per the South China Morning Post. (Another Hong Kong professor is accused of killing his wife and daughter with a gas-filled yoga ball.)

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