The death of a missing New Jersey kindergarten teacher whose body was found in a shallow grave Tuesday was ruled a homicide by prosecutors Thursday.
Luz Hernandez, 33, mother of three children was reported missing Monday and a missing-person report was filed Monday after she didn’t show up to work.
Authorities discovered her buried body in Kearny, New Jersey Tuesday just miles from her Jersey City home, and found ‘blood splatters’ in her apartment.
An autopsy conducted by the medical examiner’s office Thursday found Hernandez died from blows to the head and strangulation, Hudson County Prosecutor Esther Suarez said in a news release.
Hernandez taught kindergarten at BelovED Community Charter School in Jersey City, according to a school directory.
Following the news of her death, classes were canceled on Wednesday, ABC News reported.
An arrest has been made in the case of a 33-year-old New Jersey kindergarten teacher who had allegedly been beaten and strangled to death before her body was found in a shallow grave, law enforcement announced.
The Hudson County Prosecutor’s Office said in an early Friday morning tweet that the arrest was made ‘in connection with the death investigation of Luz Hernandez,’ NBC confirmed.
While no charges, identities or any further information was given, the prosecutor’s office said there would be ‘more to follow.’
The announcement came just hours after the prosecutor’s office shared the autopsy results for Hernandez, who was reported missing earlier in the week.
It was concluded that the beloved teacher died by blunt force trauma and compressions to the neck, prosecutors said Thursday, confirming that the case had gone from a missing persons investigation to a homicide investigation.
‘She was always happy. She loved kids. She became a teacher because she loved being around kids,’ Christino Henandez, her brother, told CBS 2 New York.
Hernandez was last seen on Saturday, when she and her kids went to a relative’s. That was the last time her children saw her alive, as they spent Sunday with their father.
