Graduate killed after accepting first tutor job

A 23-year-old university graduate was found murdered yesterday after giving her first lesson as a private tutor. Hong Kong University electrical engineering graduate Lau Wai-yee, 23, was found naked with blood around her mouth near San Tau Kok village, Tai Po, after going out to teach her first pupil on Wednesday night.

She had placed an advertisement in a Tai Po supermarket and received a call from a man seeking tuition for his sister. She arranged to meet him outside a restaurant in Ting Kok Road, Tai Po.

She phoned her boyfriend at 8.45pm and arranged to meet him in Tung Tsz village after completing the lesson but failed to turn up. Her boyfriend was unable to contact her on her mobile phone and Lau's family alerted police at 1am on Thursday. Her body was uncovered by a villager in undergrowth in San Tau Kok village at about 10am yesterday.

It is believed Lau was killed by suffocation or blows to the head. A pathologist estimated Lau had died about 36 hours before the body was found.

Blind villager Tsang Kau, 70, a former guerilla who fought the Japanese during World War II, said he had heard a man and woman arguing during the downpour late on Wednesday. He said he later heard a woman shouting for help. As it was raining heavily, he did not investigate.

Lau worked for a company in Tai Po Industrial Estate and lived with her parents in Kwong Fuk Estate, Tai Po. She was the family's main breadwinner. Lau has a teenage sister, and her boyfriend is a former classmate of hers.