According to the Gardena Police Department on the 6th, Joseph Chung (51), a Korean living on 172th street and Denker Avenue, killed his wife Chung Yi-young (49) and daughter Alyssa (8), and was found dead with them at around 11 p.m. on the 3rd.
According to the police, the police were dispatched to the scene after receiving a report from a church official that they could not get in contact Chung’s family.
According to the homicide investigation team in charge of the case, Chung appears to have killed his wife in the kitchen and his daughter in a room with a weapon.
The detective in charge said, “An autopsy at the prosecutor’s office showed that he killed his wife and daughter with the same weapon, then took his own life. The murder weapon were found at the scene,” he said. “The scene was so disastrous that all the dispatched police officers were shocked.”
The alleged motive for the crime was financial struggles. The detective in charge said, “We learned that they had financial problems during our investigation. It seems that the husband killed his family after a fight with the wife,” he said. “There were no reports or records of past domestic violence or depression.”
A church official from Chung’s church declined to say anything official on the 6th, saying, “We have yet to decide what to say.”
According to the church’s website, Chung has been working as a minister since 2001.
The police said, “I received a call from the wife’s family in Korea on the 5th. My understanding is that they will be arriving in the U.S. soon.”
The church members who received the call said about Chung said, “He was outgoing and got along well with other church members. But we didn’t know him personally to know what was going on.”
By Nicole Chang [chang.nicole@koreadaily.com]
