NSW: Hearses carrying slain Lin family arrive for public funeral

AAP General News (Australia)
08-08-2009
NSW: Hearses carrying slain Lin family arrive for public funeral

SYDNEY, Aug 8 AAP - Five black hearses carrying the bodies of a family brutally murdered
in their Sydney home have arrived at a public funeral service at Olympic Park, which is
being attended by up to 3,000 mourners.

The funeral cortege, which included two flower hearses and a procession of limousines,
pulled up outside the Badgery Pavilion at 10.20 (AEST), beginning what could be a four-hour
public service.

Thousands of mourners from the local Chinese community, and from the community in North
Epping, have descended on the Pavilion to pay their respects to the Lin family, who were
murdered three weeks ago.

Newsagent Min Lin, 45, his wife Yun Li Lin, 43, and their sons Henry, 12, and Terry,
nine, were found bludgeoned in their beds at North Epping on July 18.

Ms Lin's sister Irene Yin, 39, was also killed.

Police are yet to make an arrest or reveal a motive for the murders.

The slayings have shocked and bewildered the North Epping community, in Sydney's north,
many of whom have made the journey to Olympic Park to pay their last respects to the family.

They will also be offering support to the couple's 15-year-old daughter Brenda, who
was overseas on a study trip at the time of the killings.

The Cheltenham Girls High School student has been in hiding and in the care of relatives
since the murders, with police concerned for her safety.

The public memorial, which will be presided over by buddhist monks from the Nan Tien
Temple in Wollongong, begins at 11am with a one-hour service.

At noon, mourners will file past the five caskets, and following Chinese custom, place
money donations in one of three baskets at the front of the pavilion.

At about 2pm the caskets will be taken to a private funeral ceremony at Macquarie Park
Cemetery and Crematorium.

Irene will be cremated, while the rest of the family will be buried.

Brenda Lin will speak briefly at the memorial service, the first time she will have
appeared publicly since the murders.

The memorial service will also be attended by Federal Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull,
local MP Maxine McKew, and officials from the Chinese embassy.

On Friday, Mr Lin's father Yang Fei Lin, 75, reopened the family's Epping newsagency.

"This is the first day I feel lonely because this was the place my son and my daughter-in-law
and myself were working before, but today it's just me," he said through a translator.

AAP ab/cdh

KEYWORD: HOUSE

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