A former University of Illinois doctoral student on Thursday was spared the death penalty and sentenced to life in prison for kidnapping and killing a 26-year-old academic from China.
Her parents, disappointed he was not sentenced to death, publicly begged for the killer to reveal where her remains are so they can be returned home.
Jurors deliberated about eight hours over two days before announcing they were deadlocked on whether 30-year-old Brendt Christensen should be put to death for killing Zhang Yingying (章瑩穎) in 2017 as part of a homicidal fantasy, automatically resulting in a sentence of life behind bars without the possibility of parole.
Federal Judge James Shadid later castigated Christensen in court as he formally sentenced him, telling him his “inexplicable act of violence has taken its toll on so many, first and foremost the Zhang family.”
“The Zhang family ... must live with the thought that Yingying was ripped away from them by a total stranger, thousands of miles away, fulfilling his self-absorbed and selfish fantasies,” he told Christensen.
The same jurors took less than 90 minutes to convict Christensen last month for abducting Zhang from a bus stop, then raping, choking and stabbing her, before beating her to death with a bat and decapitating her.
Prosecutors called for the death penalty, which the Zhang family also supported, but a jury decision on that had to be unanimous.
Christensen, who has never revealed what he did with Zhang’s remains, shut his eyes in obvious relief and looked back smiling at his mother when he heard that his life would be spared. He also hugged his lawyers.
Illinois abolished the death penalty in 2011, but Christensen was charged under federal law, which allows for capital punishment.
Speaking through an interpreter outside the court, Zhang’s father, Zhang Ronggao (章榮高), appealed to Christensen to reveal where her body is so that the family can take her remains back to China.
“If you have any humanity left in your soul, please end our torment. Please let us bring Yingying home,” he said.
US Attorney for Central Illinois John Milhiser said that efforts to find Zhang Yingying’s remains would continue.
As Milhiser spoke, Zhang Yingying’s mother, Ye Lifeng (葉麗鳳), sobbed.
When the judge asked Christensen if he wanted to make a statement at the formal sentencing, Christensen responded politely: “No, thank you.”
Minutes later, Shadid criticized him for not taking the opportunity to make a statement for the first time publicly and express remorse, especially when he no longer had anything to lose.
“You could have said whatever you wanted to say for as little or as long as you wished,” Shadid said. “And yet today, 769 days after you took Yingying’s life, you could not muster a simple: ‘I’m sorry.’”
Christensen sat stone-faced, looking straight ahead and not at the judge.
Shadid said he hoped that Christensen might one day consider an apology before he dies “lonely” and “isolated” in prison.
“Maybe, just maybe, the moment will strike you to pick up paper and pen and write: ‘I’m sorry,’ to Mr and Mrs Zhang,” he said.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing