Jersey City Teacher Found In Shallow Grave Was Strangled: Prosecutor

JERSEY CITY, NJ — A Jersey City kindergarten teacher whose body was found in a shallow grave Tuesday died by "blunt force trauma to the head and compressions to the neck," the Hudson County Prosecutor's Office said Thursday.

[UPDATE: 2 Men Have Been Charged In Connection With Her Death. More Here.]

They said that the death of Luz Hernandez, 33, has been ruled a homicide.

Hernandez was a mother of three as well as a teacher at Beloved Community Charter School in Jersey City, reports said.

The school alerted police on Monday that she didn't show up for work. Police conducted a welfare check at a location on Van Horne Street, prosecutors said.

"The findings resulted in the Jersey City Police Department contacting the Hudson County Prosecutor’s Office for assistance," prosecutors said. "During the course of the investigation, the Homicide Unit located what appeared to be a shallow grave in the area of Central Avenue and Third Street in Kearny."

The location is an industrial area across the Hackensack River from Jersey City, near a truck repair yard.

The Hudson County Prosecutor’s Office Homicide Unit is investigating with assistance from the Jersey City Police Department and the Kearny Police Department. No arrests have been made.

Anyone with information is asked to contact the Office of the Hudson County Prosecutor at 201-915-1345 or to leave an anonymous tip at: http://www.hudsoncountyprosecutorsofficenj.org/homicide-tip/.

The death is the second in three weeks of a teacher in Jersey City, and the fourth homicide of a Hudson County woman in three weeks.