Hong Kong police on Sunday arrested a 52-year-old woman on suspicion of killing her husband by smothering him with a mattress after he fell while adjusting the frame.
According to the force, the suspected murder came to light after a man tried to visit his 62-year-old uncle, but the latter’s wife, surnamed Law, refused to open the door of the house in Chai Kek Village in Tai Po.
The nephew alerted police at around 11.30pm on Saturday. Officers arrived at the flat and found the man, surnamed Chung, lying on the floor.
He was pronounced dead at the scene. Police said they believed he had been dead for several days.
Police said initial investigations revealed Chung had accidentally fallen while adjusting a bedframe and it was suspected that his wife had killed him by pressing a mattress and bed slats onto him.
The case has been handed over to the district crime squad for further investigation. The mattress and the platform were taken away by police as evidence.
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Force insiders said the couple were often heard arguing. Their teenage son was recently sent to live with a family friend.
Similar domestic homicides were occasionally reported.
In February last year, a man allegedly attacked and killed his wife with a hard object in Long Ping Estate in Yuen Long.
Investigators were told the relationship between the elderly couple was strained, with frequent fights. The two security guards had lived in the estate for about 30 years.
In Tuen Mun Town Plaza in June 2021, a 60-year-old retired civil servant was allegedly killed by her 66-year-old husband using a meat cleaver. Later, the man was found dead after he jumped from a block where they used to live.
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A 73-year-old woman was arrested in February the same year on suspicion of killing her 69-year-old husband with a meat cleaver at their home in Lai Yiu Estate in Kwai Chung.
Police said they believed that the woman attacked her husband in the head when he was asleep. Investigators learned that she had dealt with mental illness for years and suspected her husband of having an affair.
In the first nine months of 2023, police handled 26 murder cases, according to official data. The figure represents a 13 per cent increase compared with the same period last year.
There were also 942 domestic violence cases, 16.3 per cent more than in 2022.
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