The suspect, Brendt Christensen, pleaded not guilty and refused to give up information. electronic edition via DOI; unpaywalled version; references . 1 hospitalized after fire in West Town, CFD says, Jupiter and Venus appear to 'kiss' in the sky, Belvidere Jeep assembly plant shut down indefinitely. Y Zhang, X Qian, Z Peng, N Yang. Previous Articles Next Articles The Empowerment of Rural Women through Digital Entrepreneurship: A Case of Typical Villages in Qianpai Town, Guangdong Province The public execution, according to Michel Foucault, was not only a judicial but also a political ritual, through which the state manifested its absolute power. When Yingying Zhang went missing on June 9, 2017, the University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign was thrown into chaos as people searched frantically for the visiting Chinese scholar. The Terrifying Right to Remain Silent60 Days after Yingying Zhang's Disappearance. Christensen claimed that he drove up to the Asian female, who relayed she was late to an appointment. One says that I might have had an allergic reaction, which is the version I swear to because the alternative is unthinkable. The attorney argued he had mental health issues and the case was essentially to set up the next phase of the trial, Christensens sentencing. She played guitar and sang in a band called Cute Horse in China. In addition to this, a memorial stone with Zhangs name was placed on the campus of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Zhang was remembered as intelligent and extroverted. 29 Nov - Zhang Yingying and Wang Xiaofei's mother Zhang Lan seem to be butting heads when it comes to the mainland businessman, after the actress seemingly decided to declare that they are dating.. As reported on CTWant, the 26-year-old actress, who has been romantically linked to Wang for months and was even accused of being the third party in his previous marriage with Barbie Hsu, recently . Zhang's father said if his daughter's remains are ever found, her family plans to take her body back to China. Yingying never made it to the leasing office. Classification Endangered Missing. The zonules may directly participate in the formation of cataract via the immune mechanism. Title. Its worth cannot, and should not, be measured by the extent of state-sponsored punishment exacted on the man who took it. In that split second of irrational fear, I took solace in the fact that he is behind bars. She runs after another bus but narrowly misses it. In one recording, Christensen is accused of saying that Zhang fought him, and that he took her back to his apartment and held her there against her will last month, CNN reported. The remains sought by Yingying Zhang's family for proper burial, and whose whereabouts the killer had kept from them, may be "impossible" to retrieve By Jeff Truesdell Published on August 8, 2019 . As per Zhangs family lawyers statements, the contents of the dumpster were taken to Danville, where it was compacted twice. Christensen's attorneys told prosecutors that the day after he killed Zhang, Christensen placed her body in three garbage bags, and put the bags in the dumpster outside his apartment building, Beckett said. I could not move, could barely see or speak, but I was lucid. October 1, 2021, 7:30am. The badge was found by a motorist about two-and-a-half miles from Christensen's apartment. It doesnt reveal whom Christensen was allegedly speaking with at the time. Former US doctoral student Brendt Christensen, 29, has been found guilty of the violent abduction and slaying of Chinese scholar Yingying Zhang in 2017. My mother forwarded many of these reports to me. Because a unanimous verdict was not reached, Christensen was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. 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. The case is being featured on 20/20 on November 15, 2019. He told authorities that he was at home around the time in question. She knows how hard it is to raise a child. I too came to the U.S. for my Ph.D., and studied at the University of Chicago, a two-hour drive from UIUC, where many of my colleagues and friends work. Given the size of the landfill, the amount of time that has passed, and the amount of additional garbage since dumped in the landfill, Beckett said any attempt to find the body would be very costly. Federal prosecutors have said Christensen posed as an undercover officer to lure Zhang, 26, into his car on June 9, 2017. "Due to the compaction process, Yingying's bodily remains may be very, very small in size," Beckett said. Yingying's body has never been found. Brendt Christensen, the 29-year-old who was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole in Zhangs murder, informed his attorneys that after killing and decapitating Zhang, he put her body in three separate garbage bags, then disposed of those bags in the dumpster outside his Champaign, Illinois, apartment. Reactions: ShHolmz, altojack, MajorHoople and 8 others. Beckett said, after the trial, Zhang's family met with federal prosecutors on July 25, and were told what Christensen's defense attorneys had revealed about what he did with Zhang's remains. I am passionate . The fund had already amassed more than $30,000 by Wednesday morning. However, calls and texts to Zhangs phone went unanswered, and the worry heightened with time. Yingying Zhang. According to ABC 7, after Christensens trial, it was revealed that he told his lawyers that he put Yingyings remains in three separate garbage bags and placed them in a dumpster outside his Champaign apartment. Authorities think Zhangs body might be in multiple landfills, but thats never been determined for sure. To do this, representative systems must be strategically selected to stimulate students' motivation. Alpha, our German Shepherd dog, left us forever on Feb 28, 2021. She was No. Christensen was found guilty on June 24, 2019, of kidnapping resulting in death and two counts of lying to investigators. Three days before Christensens arrest, the Chinese government had just issued new rules aimed at curbing police abuse. 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. She was diagnosed with Pyothorax (causes unknown). WTTW-TVs Matt Masterson also reported on Wednesday that Christensen has not and will not file an appeal to his convictions. Without a body, prosecutors based their case on DNA evidence found at Christensen's apartment, and the defendant's own boasting of having killed Zhang in a conversation with his girlfriend. Claim Author Page. Nanoscale thermal transport. She was supposed to check out an apartment to lease and never showed up. 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 . If Yingyings remains are ever found, we will return to take her home to China where she belongs, her father said, according to ABC 7. Her body has never been found. She refused. He confessed to posing as an undercover police officer and picking Zhang up before bringing her back to his apartment. Yingying is on stage with her band. One student who had Christensen as a TA wrote on Reddit, I had him 3 years ago for physics 212 TA. 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. A jury convicted Christensen of all charges in her death after 90 minutes of deliberation in June. According to this unsealed motion, he was placed on suicide watch and isolated from the general population for several months. The only emotion I sensed during those hours of paralysis was an eerie calmness akin to closure, like I had spent my entire life treading the edge of a cliff and finally had to surrender to the air. Share; . ABC Murdered University of Illinois student Yingying Zhang in a family photo. Chemistry and biochemistry instructors must help students to develop the ability to visualize and manipulate 3D biomolecular structures and critically analyze them and their relationship to their functions. When the police questioned Brendt, he denied being involved in Zhangs disappearance. A bilingual memorial service for Zhang will be held on Friday in Savoy, Illinois. (Matt Masterson / WTTW News) Illinois abolished the death penalty in 2011, but Christensen was prosecuted under federal law. We were the same age. 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. The federal government was seeking the death penalty. Authorities interviewed Christensen who allegedly told authorities that, between 2 and 3 p.m. on June 9, 2017, the day that Zhang disappeared, he could not initially recall his whereabouts. Co-Author. To date, Yingying Zhang's remains have never been found. Christensen stated that he offered the Asian female a ride. It has been shown that a low BCAA diet can lead to dramatic changes in metabolism, including an increase in energy expenditure, enhancement of ketogenesis, upregulation of Fgf21, and a decrease in body weight in mice (Newgard et al, 2009; Lotta et al, 2016; Cummings et al, 2018; Karusheva et al, 2019; Zhou et al, 2019; Richardson et al, 2021 . For the closing statement at the penalty phase of the trial, Christensens defense presented a 72-page powerpoint on why his life should be spared. During a follow-up investigation, authorities determined that the contents of Christensens dumpster were picked up on July 12, 2017, compacted at least twice, and taken to a private landfill near Danville, Illinois, the statement said. She stands by the bus stop beneath a tree. Yingyings grandfather is sitting next to him. 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. The drive from the airport is the longest distance in the world. 216-228)Shanghai JiaoTong University Press (in . But the Zhang family understands that the authorities are still considering an attempt to locate and recover Yingyings remains.. I felt fine the next morning, as if it were all just a dream. Zhang's father, Ronggao Zhang, said if the information Christensen gave prosecutors is true "it further confirms that he is a heartless and evil person.". Yingying Zhang, 26, a visiting scholar doing research at the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences, went missing on June 9, 2017 in Champaign, and her body was never found . For me, for myself, the result today seems to tell me that I can kill anyone and I can kill anyone with any kind of cruel method and I will not need to die for it, Yingyings partner of eight years speaks to the press after the verdict. The 26-year-old visiting scholar at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, disappeared June 9, 2017. Murderer Brendt Allen Christensen. The defense was signaling to the jury that life in prison is already a very harsh sentence and sufficient punishment for this crime. In June 2017, Yingying Zhang, a young scholar from China went missing from a bus stop near the University of Illinois.The entire encounter was caught on nearby surveillance cameras. Yingyings father, Ronggao ZhangIf, upon hearing this, later said, If what that man said is true, it further confirms that he is a heartless and evil person We now understand that finding (Yingying) may be impossible. After this news came to light, a memorial service was held for those grieving the death of Yingying Zhang at a church outside Champaign in August 2019. Author pages are created from data sourced from our academic publisher partnerships and public sources. 43 Issue (2): 234-246. doi: 10.13284/j.cnki.rddl.003620. Her body has never been found. My mothers idea of a safe space shifted with my departure, from the immediacy of our home to the territorial bounds of a homeland. At the time of my disagreement with my mother, a former Ph.D. candidate in physics at the same university had been apprehended and charged with the kidnapping and death of Yingying. People from the FBI also testified that Zhangs DNA and her blood were found inside Brendts apartment, which unmistakeably linked him to the crime. Thus, Zhangs family continues to mourn Zhangs death without even the smallest comfort of being able to lay her body to rest. Christensen, a former physics Ph.D. candidate at the University of Illinois, raped, choked, and stabbed 26-year-old Zhang before beating her with a baseball bat and decapitating her in June 2017. Illinois has outlawed the death penalty, but the case was tried in federal court. 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. Was her body ever found? Then came the break in the case: The Saturn. Police continue search for missing person, We are releasing this video as we continue our search for Yingying Zhang, missing since Friday, June 9. Beckett said Christensen's defense attorneys told federal prosecutors what he did with Zhang's body in November 2018, but the information was provided under a grant of immunity, so prosecutors could not disclose the information to anyone until after the trial. Death penalty or life in prison: What if neither leads to justice? Brendt also had a masters in Physics but dropped out from his Ph.D. program and instead claimed that he was searching for employment. However, a few precise details matched Brendts Saturn Astra to the one seen on CCTV. Would UIUC be a safer place if some of its resources for policing and surveillance went toward mental health services and supporting international students? Jul 2021; Xu Junhao; Yingying Zhang . Im puzzled over this question to the judge, why the distinction was necessary. So let me just say here at the outset, it will be startling for many of you to hear Brendt Christensen killed Yingying.. . She wanted to make a difference in the world.. I pursued physics, the same discipline as her killer. Less than 10 percent of murders and 20 percent of rapes are committed by strangers. Hes also accused of stabbing and choking her and comparing himself to Ted Bundy. The U.S. Attorney's office in the Central District of Illinois said Zhang's remains have not been found. University of Minnesota. Articles Cited by Public access. Zhang's father said if his daughter's remains are ever found, her family plans to take her body back to China. Main text. Dated June 1, 2017, it concludes with a line in English, Life is too short to be ordinary!. During the trial, several people, including Terra Bullis, testified against Brendt. 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. (Photo by Mark Van Moer) Inset, top: Yingying Zhang (Courtesy University of Illinois Police Department). 13. He was recorded confessing to killing her and has an online history at FetLife re . Its a potent concept, appealing to our instincts. According to News Gazette, she testified that Christensen typed the following, showed it to her, and then deleted it: It was me. She was a brilliant scholar and had won numerous laurels in China before coming to the US in April 2017, where she was supposed to stay for a year. After nine days of trial and less than two hours of deliberations, the jury found Christensen guilty. 2021. The I-Team has also learned that soon after Christensen's arrest, he wrote a letter saying he wanted to end his life. 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. 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 still not been found, authorities say. Two days later, he put her personal belongings including her clothes, backpack, cell phone, and books into a duffel bag, and drove around the Champaign-Urbana area, throwing them in various dumpsters. A US former doctoral student has been spared the death penalty for kidnapping and murdering a 26-year-old Chinese scholar, prompting widespread anger in China. Listeria monocytogenes is the causative agent of listeriosis, a bacterial infection that can cause severe illness, including septicaemia via blood infection, meningitis and encephalitis in the brain, and perinatal infection or abortion via . 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