ABC '20/20' brings into focus the kidnapping and murder of a Chinese scholar named Yingying Zhang who went missing on 9 June 2017. Yingying Zhang (simplified Chinese: ; traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: Zhng Yngyng) (December 21, 1990 - June 9, 2017) was born in the city of Nanping, Fujian Province, to Ronggao Zhang and Lifeng Ye.Zhang has one younger brother, Zhengyang. The sentencing phase of the trial took place two weeks later. From as far as I could remember, my mothers fervid fear of my sudden vanishing filled the air around her. Co-Author. On June 9, 2017, the day Zhang went missing, she was supposed to meet a leasing agent to sign for a new apartment where she planned to stay. Her body never found, the family still hoping to someday bring her . That I had emerged unscathed made everything seem surreal. Born 12/21/1990, she grew up in the Jianyang District, Nanping City, Fujian Province, China. About. Prisons cannot solve the problem of prevalent harm in society and are in fact part of the problem, as they perpetuate the logics of power and domination, of segregation and dehumanization, which are also the logics of patriarchy and white supremacy. Apr 7, 2021 Also part of the case that was sealed: a motion to exclude evidence of a lost Illinois State Police badge found on the roadway four days after the disappearance of Yingying Zhang. The kidnapping and murder of Yingying Zhang occurred in Urbana, Illinois on June 9, 2017, when Zhang, a visiting Chinese scholar at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, was abducted by Brendt Allen Christensen, a Champaign resident and former physics graduate student at the university. The spectacle at the scaffold routinely attracted larger crowds than any other public event. Like every other institution in this country, the evolution of the death penalty in the U.S. is intertwined with slavery and codified with racism. Based on this, and other facts uncovered during the investigation of this matter, law enforcement agents believe that Ms. Zhang is no longer alive, the affidavit contends. Thus, Zhangs family continues to mourn Zhangs death without even the smallest comfort of being able to lay her body to rest. According to this unsealed motion, he was placed on suicide watch and isolated from the general population for several months. Yingying Zhang, a 26-year-old Chinese scholar, traveled to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in April 2017 to pursue research in agriculture. It's June 12, 2019, two years and three days after Yingying went missing, the first day of the jury trial in the United States v. Brendt Christensen. The political catastrophes in the first half of the 20th century brought a new urgency and understanding to human rights and the necessity of constraining state power. On June 29, 2017, while Christensen was under law enforcement surveillance, agents overheard him explaining that he kidnapped Zhang. (MORE: Man found guilty of killing visiting Chinese scholar Yingying Zhang) Mike Christensen believes Zhang's killing could have been avoided if counselors took action then and there. People from the FBI also testified that Zhangs DNA and her blood were found inside Brendts apartment, which unmistakeably linked him to the crime. Brendt had previous mental health issues as an ABC news report mentioned that in 2017, he had admitted to having homicidal intent after conducting researches on serial killers. Prosecutors said Christensen raped, choked and stabbed Zhang before beating her to death with a bat and decapitating her. He also claimed he choked Zhang for 10 minutes as she fought for her life. Citations 15. New information is expected to be provided on the search for her body in a . After her education, she planned on marrying her fianc and eventually returning to China to become a teacher. The female entered his vehicle and attempted to show Christensen where she needed to go through her cell phone map app.. Yingying Zhang is from a small city in South east China called Nanping (a prefectural city in the Fujian province). April 02, 2022. Deceased/Not Found IL - Yingying Zhang, 26, Urbana, 9 June 2017 #11 *GUILTY* Thread starter liltexans; Start date Jul 2, 2017; . She was last seen on surveillance video at her . I pretended that our discussion was an academic exercise because I could not bear the thought that in the fragile mind of my mother, who had raised me as a young widow, Yingying was me and I was her. Amidst a global pandemic caricatured as a product of Asian pathology, my birth country has descended further down the abyss of authoritarianism, my adopted home teeters on the brink of fascism, and relations between the two superpowers are at their lowest point in decades. However, soon, through the lenses of CCTVs, the police learned that the answer might be a lot closer to home than people thought. The music starts and a dam breaks in me. The defense was signaling to the jury that life in prison is already a very harsh sentence and sufficient punishment for this crime. She is gone. Former US doctoral student Brendt Christensen, 29, has been found guilty of the violent abduction and slaying of Chinese scholar Yingying Zhang in 2017. Born on December 21, 1990, in Nanping, Fujian Province, Ying Ying Zhang was a Chinese student at the University Of Illinois. Copyright 2023 WLS-TV. Yingyings life was precious. Zhangs friends, too, had no idea about her whereabouts, and they were worried about the visiting student getting into trouble in an unfamiliar place. Ph.D., 2016, Xiamen University. In the just-unsealed documents was the story of a woman who claimed Christensen choked and sexually assaulted her sometime in 2012 or 2013. Yingying Zhang Zhang; Zhonghua Gao (Contributorpp. The I-Team has also learned that soon after Christensen's arrest, he wrote a letter saying he wanted to end his life. Torture during detention is commonplace in China. She said she was running behind, but would arrive about 2:10 p.m. At 1:35 p.m., she was observed on video boarding a public bus. Yingying Zhang, Clinical Social Work/Therapist, Chicago, IL, 60640, (872) 274-4302, As a first generation immigrant, I recognize the unique experience individuals face in life. MRS Proceedings 1753 . In a series of surveillance videosUIUC has more than 2,000 cameras on campusshe gets on a bus. Joined Aug 8, 2019 Messages 18 Reaction score 210. Previous Articles Next Articles The Empowerment of Rural Women through Digital Entrepreneurship: A Case of Typical Villages in Qianpai Town, Guangdong Province In England and colonial America, as legal historian Stuart Banner writes, the death penalty circa 1700 was the equivalent of prison todaythe standard punishment for a wide range of serious crimes including arson, theft, and counterfeiting. The family of murdered Chinese scholar Yingying Zhang has finally learned what happened to the body of their beloved daughter. At 2:38 p.m,, the apartment manager sent Zhang a text message and received no response. As an undergraduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Christensen worked briefly on the Large Hadron Collider, the worlds largest particle physics experiment where I spent over a decade of my career. I also recommend this Washington Post article, which links to a partial transcript of the trial. They also found evidence of a part of the car being cleaned extra thoroughly, which hinted towards Brendt hiding something. Please let us bring Yingying home," Ronggao Zhang said. The judge confirmed that its the former. He confessed to posing as an undercover police officer and picking Zhang up before bringing her back to his apartment. He was recorded confessing to killing her and has an online history at FetLife re . All Rights Reserved. My biggest concern is that the suspect wont get a severe punishment, Yingyings father says in the film. On most days, its barely noticeable; then suddenly, the sharp end declares its piercing presence. I watched it again this spring, when haunting images from the mass shooting in Atlanta were still in the news, and every day seemed to bring fresh reports of harassment or assault against people who look like me. She clutches the mic. For those opposed to the death penalty, is replacing the needle with a cage the only option? Christensen is not a social, charismatic person, and so is unlikely to recruit others to commit violent acts on his behalf. Five jurors agreed with this point. She called Christensen a demon. Steve Beckett of the Beckett Law Office in Urbana said Friday that Zhang's family learned from prosecutors in the case that her remains could be in a landfill in Vermillion County. Brendt Allen Christensen, a physics graduate student, will appear in federal court on Monday, on charges of abducting 26-year-old Yingying Zhang in June. Sep 2017 - Dec 20225 years 4 months. She is wearing a gray baseball cap, a white jacket, and jeans. An officer met with the professor and other colleagues of Zhang, who said they had not been able to contact her for several hours. The surveillance video was provided by University of Illinois police. The same jurors took less than 90 minutes to convict Christensen last month in the killing of Yingying Zhang. 0000-0003-3769-079X; 0000-0003-3819-5467; . By 9:24 p.m., an associate professor reported that Zhang was missing. Race Asian. All rights reserved, WATCH: Procession Escorts Body of Fallen Chicago Officer From Hospital, Storm System Could Bring Rain, Snow, and Gusty Winds to Chicago Area Friday, Chicago Police Officer Shot and Killed on Southwest Side, Secret Service, Police Seen Investigating Business in Suburban Lisle. The black sedan that picked up Yingying was quickly identified as belonging to one Brendt Christensen. Beckett said the defense team for her killer, Brendt Christensen, disclosed the location of Zhang's body as part of a failed immunity agreement. Yingying Zhang; Liangtao Li; Jiarui Guo; Yang Zhang; Xufeng Niu; Yang Wang ; Liang Hu et al. It doesnt reveal whom Christensen was allegedly speaking with at the time. Sex Female. With trucks taking their loads to landfills across the city, authorities figured that her remains might have been spread around several landfills by the time Brendt was convicted. Im not trying to find excuses for what Christensen did, but to view it as an isolated incident, an example of the dangerous few, would be to miss the underlying context and eschew collective responsibility. Zhang was remembered as intelligent and extroverted. Its sadly ironic that prisons are called penitentiaries or correctional facilities, while theyre designed for neither repentance nor rehabilitation but segregation and retribution. After moving to the U.S., I would soon realize how my body is perceived differently here and slowly learn how to navigate space with unwanted attention. Illinois has outlawed the death penalty, but the case was tried in federal court. Christensen was convicted of kidnapping and killing Zhang at trial in June, and later was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of release. / CBS Chicago. The jury was not told about his death wish. One student who had Christensen as a TA wrote on Reddit, I had him 3 years ago for physics 212 TA. With the defense already admitting that Brendt killed Zhang, the jury did not take long to find him guilty of the crime. It was invaluable. Brendt also had a masters in Physics but dropped out from his Ph.D. program and instead claimed that he was searching for employment. Prosecutor Eugene Miller alleged that Zhangs blood was found on a bat that Christensen used to strike Zhang, as well as in other places in his apartment, according to WTTW-TV. Today, over 140 countries have abolished the death penalty by law or in practiceat times against popular support for retentionincluding every country in Europe with the exception of Belarus and nearly half of the countries in Africa. Very new to the country, Zhang still hadnt settled down properly when a devastating state of affairs snuffed out her wonderful life. Citing Authors. It was labeled Government Exhibit 1A and shown on the first day of the trial. Publications 10. h-index 3. Her name was Yingying Zhang. In this security video from the B-4 parking garage on North Goodwin Avenue, Urbana, just after 2 p.m. Friday, Ms. Zhang is seen standing on the east side of Goodwin Avenue as a black Saturn Astra (unknown, According to the University of Illinois police. Students grouped together to find her, while the FBI was brought on to help the local police department. The answer is no. Since Zhang was last seen in the video entering the car, said the news release issued by authorities, the FBI, the University of Illinois Police Department and the Illinois State Police and local law enforcement have worked around the clock to locate Ms. Zhang and to investigate her disappearance., Please review our privacy policy here: https://heavy.com/privacy-policy/, Copyright 2023 Heavy, Inc. All rights reserved. Tragically, and horrifically, her family has not been given that closure. The International Journal of Human Resource Management Informa UK Limited 1 - 25 0958-5192 2021/08 [Refereed] An Eco-Systematic View of Cross-Sector Fintech: The Case of Alibaba and Tencent. A source close to the investigation said the landfill has not been searched. Zhang went missing on June 9, 2017, as she was headed to sign a lease for an off-campus apartment in Urbana. U. of I. The badge was found by a motorist about two-and-a-half miles from Christensen's apartment. Yingying Zhang-Zhang; Sylvia Rohlfer; Jay Rajasekera . I was furious at my mother, who appeared oblivious to the cruelty and repeatedly defended the inhumane practice. Christensen's defense attorneys admitted at trial that he killed Zhang, and focused on convincing the jury to spare him from the death penalty. When Yingying Zhang went missing on June 9, 2017, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign was thrown into chaos as people searched frantically for the visiting Chinese scholar. However, was Zhang's body ever found? Her phone was disabled moments later. "Due to the compaction process, Yingying's bodily remains may be very, very small in size," Beckett said. We were the same age. The case is being featured on 20/20 on November 15, 2019. She refused to let me out of her sight, and I refused her suffocating love by leaving China as soon as I could. It was revealed that Brendt had dismembered her body and put it into separate garbage bags, which he kept outside his apartment only to be picked up by garbage trucks. The defense pointed to inconsistencies in her claims. Jul 2021; Xu Junhao; Yingying Zhang . Like her, I had grown up in a provincial city in China and clung to academic excellence as the only way out. According to News Gazette, she testified that Christensen typed the following, showed it to her, and then deleted it: It was me. Statement from family's lawyers: @WCIA3 pic.twitter.com/SaYqeuwE3h. A woman who testified during the trial said Christensen showed her a silver sheriff's star when he asked her to get into his car. 43 Issue (2): 234-246. doi: 10.13284/j.cnki.rddl.003620. Tragically, and . . We condemn his brutal and malicious actions and we hope that he suffers the rest of his life as he made Yingying suffer in the final moments of her life., He added, We now understand that finding her may be impossible.. 116313 (2021) [j53] view. "There is nothing in the world that we want more than to find our daughter and bring . Yingying Zhang. After the trial ended and public attention moved on, Yingyings disappearance has stayed with me like a needle floating in my veins. ABC 20/20 brings into focus the kidnapping and murder of a Chinese scholar named Yingying Zhang who went missing on 9 June 2017. Im surprised, though perhaps I should not be, by how little awareness there is. A bilingual memorial service for Zhang will be held on Friday in Savoy, Illinois. However, soon, through the lenses of CCTVs, the police learned that the answer might be a lot closer to home than people thought. Co-Authors. We are both mothers. Christensen, 30, abducted Zhang Yingying on campus in June 2017 before beating her to death with a baseball bat and decapitating her. 2023 Cinemaholic Inc. All rights reserved. After his conviction and trial, the fate of Yingying Zhangs body came to light. June 16, 2021. However, calls and texts to Zhangs phone went unanswered, and the worry heightened with time. It took more than two years for Christensen to be convicted. Brendt Christensen, who was sentenced to life in prison without parole in Yingying Zhangs murder, said he put her body in three separate trash bags and threw them in a dumpster. Would love your thoughts, please comment. The Wisconsin native had just graduated from UIUC with a masters degree in physics, after deciding that a Ph.D. was not for him. After nine days of trial and less than two hours of deliberations, the jury found Christensen guilty. I find a clue in the jury notes. In that split second of irrational fear, I took solace in the fact that he is behind bars. 2021 | Journal article DOI: 10. YINGYING ZHANG WAS ABDUCTED AND MURDERED IN 2017. However, Brendt never returned for a second counseling session like he was asked to. Ive never felt as acutely aware of my identity as a Chinese woman in the U.S. My body is a constant reminder of the many ways society renders it vulnerable. Completely normal, perhaps a bit awkward but with no unusual vibes.. Having seen how much Yingyings family has suffered, Shi, the director, narrates in the film, I really hoped for the death penalty. We met for breakfast in Chicago and I asked about this statement. Ten of the 12 jurors voted for the death penalty. Every person deserves safety, but when does justice bleed into vengeance, and how may our desires for protection embolden the systems that harm us? A new documentary, Finding Yingying, premiered at film festivals last year to critical acclaim and is now available on streaming platforms. Christensen, 30, was sentenced to life without parole. The remains of Yingying Zhang, a Chinese scholar at University of Illinois who was murdered in 2017, could be in a landfill in central Illinois, according to multiple reports, though her body has . The only logical explanation, as far as I can tell, is that the jurors were only thinking about violence outside prison, whether Christensen would be able to commit it himself (impossible) or persuade someone on the outside to (unlikely). The family of murdered Chinese scholar Yingying Zhang has finally learned what happened to the body of their beloved daughter. 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