20 Jul 2009

Post-mortems to begin on five killed in Sydney home

10:11 am on 20 July 2009

Post-mortems on five family members bludgeoned to death in northern Sydney will begin on Monday, as police continue their investigations into the horrific home attack.

Tributes have poured in for the hard-working Lin family who ran a newsagency in Epping, six years after they migrated from China.

A family member found four of five of her relatives' bodies, including two children, upstairs in the family's secluded home in North Epping on Saturday morning.

Police say the family members, reportedly Chinese-born Min Lin, 45, his wife Yun Li Lin, 43, two sons, Henry aged 12 and Terry nine, and another female relative aged 39, were killed some time between midnight and 9.50am local time on Saturday.

Post-mortem examinations were to begin on Monday to provide formal identification, as well as determine the cause of their deaths.

Police say the examinations will take at least two days to complete.

Detectives have not ruled out an extortion attempt as the motive behind the apparently calculated killings.

However, they have yet to establish any link between the family's murders and Mr Lin giving evidence of an armed robbery at the Epping Club, opposite his newsagency, earlier this year.

Police have reassured frightened neighbours in the suburb that robbery was unlikely to be the motive, because nothing appeared to have been stolen during the attack.