On the evening of June 9, 2017, the Illinois police in the United States received a report that a Chinese female visiting scholar , who was communicating and studying at the University of Illinois at Urbana, Champagne, disappeared that afternoon.
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Reporter is an associate professor at the University of Illinois. There were also colleagues of several missing persons who came with her. They told police that the missing person had previously said he would go to sign a house rental contract in the afternoon and would be back soon. But after that, everyone could not contact her. Until now...
, the police who received their reception learned about the situation, first comforted the other party and said that this kind of thing was very common. It happened to be Friday that day, and many students suddenly disappeared for a while and couldn't get in touch, and later they reappeared.
However, as time goes by, the missing woman is still missing. Soon, after the media reported this incident, it attracted high attention from China and the United States...
The woman who disappeared under surveillance
On the night of June 9, after receiving the alarm, the local police went to the residence of the missing woman to search. Nothing was found except to be sure there was no one there.
At the same time, the police began to search for information about the missing persons. This visiting scholar from China is called Zhang Yingying . He is 27 years old this year and has just arrived for less than two months.
Zhang Yingying was born in Nanping, Fujian, China and studied undergrad at Sun Yat-sen University. During his college years, he was admitted to Peking University for a postgraduate study and successfully obtained a master's degree.
After graduating from Peking University in 2016, Zhang Yingying conducted guest study at the Chinese Academy of Sciences. On April 24, 2017, she went to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in the United States as a visiting scholar to join the School of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences for exchange and study.
Chapter Yingying
This university was founded in 1867 and is located in the Twin Cities of Urbana-Champagne, Illinois. It is a public research university. It not only has the largest number of Chinese students in universities in the United States, but also the best choice Zhang Yingying can find in her subject field.
Faced with this new environment, Zhang Yingying worked hard to adapt. Because the rent of the apartment she lives in was high, she decided to change the place and agreed with a local rental agency on June 8 that would go there the next day to sign a house lease .
After the police investigated, Zhang Yingying went to Turner Hall in the university for an experiment at around 8:30 in the morning. After lunch, she sent a text message to the management of the rental agency at 1:39 pm on her mobile phone, saying that she might be a little late than the agreed time, about ten minutes later. The two parties finally agreed to meet at 2:10 pm.
However, time passed minute by minute, and the administrator of the rental agency did not wait until the other party came to . At 2:38, the staff of the rental agency sent a text message to Zhang Yingying asking if she was on the way, but the other party did not reply.
At the same time, Zhang Yingying's colleagues and contact professors also found that the Chinese visiting scholar could not be contacted. They knew that Zhang Yingying was going to sign a lease, but they didn't see her come back for a long time. Not only that, when calling Zhang Yingying's cell phone, no one answered...
Zhang Yingying
An unknown premonition appeared in their hearts. At 9:24 pm, the liaison professor and others called the local police.
After failing to search the apartment where Zhang Yingying lives, the police retrieved surveillance videos near the campus. Soon, they discovered Zhang Yingying's figure that afternoon.
Chapter Yingying was wearing a baseball cap, a white top and jeans, and a black bag on her back. She first boarded a bus, got off and tried to stop another bus on the side of the road, but the bus did not stop. After
, Zhang Yingying walked north along North Goodwin Avenue and stopped at a bus stop, probably waiting for the next bus. At this time, it was almost 2 pm that day.
Soon, a black sedan appeared in the surveillance video. It first passed by the bus stop where Zhang Yingying was, then circled around the neighborhood, and finally stopped in front of her.
Zhang Yingying walked over and said something to the car driver. Soon after, she got into the passenger seat of the car. The car started and disappeared into the monitoring...
Zhang Yingying
And this is the last scene that Zhang Yingying appears in all the surveillance cameras.
locks the suspect. Unfortunately, there is no evidence.
has made this discovery, the next step is to determine the owner of the vehicle. At this time, FBI agents joined the investigation of the case. After analysis and identification, the black sedan in the surveillance was an Opel Astra, with very few numbers throughout Illinois.
So, police and FBI agents visited the owners of all the cars in the state. After interrogating everyone, no valuable clues were obtained...
Just when things were in a deadlock, a school policeman at Urbana-Champaign made an unexpected discovery in the surveillance screen. By watching the video repeatedly, he found that there was a depression in the front right wheel hub of the car.
After the police grasped this situation, they quickly locked the car owner through the wheel hub characteristics. His name is Brent Christensen, 28, studied for his PhD in the Department of Physics at Urbana-Champaign and served as an assistant teaching assistant at the school.
Christensen is from Wisconsin, USA and has been working as a teaching assistant since 2013. He is responsible for leading 20 students and answering their physics questions, as well as correcting test papers and conducting tests. Not only that, Christensen also won the title of "Excellent Assistant" three times.
Christensen
When the police visited Christensen before, the other party said that he was staying at home to play games on June 9th.
That's it, the police came to his residence for the second time. This is an apartment with a swimming pool, dishwasher and central air conditioning, with a monthly rent of $700 to 800.
When Christensen saw the police and FBI agents again, he looked a little surprised, but his expression was still calm. When the other party asked him to go to the FBI office to talk, he finally agreed.
After coming to the conversation site, the police went straight in and asked Christensen, Zhang Yingying’s whereabouts now. The other party tried to pretend to be stupid at first, but after the detective told him that he had mastered the relevant surveillance and accurately stated the direction of the car that day, the doctor of was obviously a little panicked when he was studying for graduate school...
After a silence, Christensen finally said that he might have remembered the wrong date before. He said that an Asian woman did get into her car that day...
. When the investigator asked him where the other party got out, Christensen was silent again. After a long time, he said: I think it's time to stop answering questions...I know the usual advice is to find a lawyer before answering any questions...I think I've tried my best.
Although Christensen refused to answer the question again, at this time, had been arrested for making false statements to the FBI before . The case handlers at this time have confirmed that Zhang Yingying's disappearance is related to this man.
However, after detaining Christensen for 24 hours, the Prosecutor's Office decided not to prosecute him and put him back to . It turned out that although the suspect had been identified, the investigators had not found substantial evidence. Therefore, and they took the tactic of getting , first letting Christensen go, and then looking for an opportunity to find out Zhang Yingying's whereabouts from him.
The suspect confided his secret to his girlfriend and was reported by him
Christensen was exempted from prosecution and returned to his girlfriend. It is worth mentioning that he was already married at this time.
Christensen and his wife and parents
. As a father, Christensen has a girlfriend, but he cannot be considered cheating. Not only that, his wife also has a boyfriend who is dating at this time... Does
sound a bit messy? It turned out that before this, Christensen and his wife had agreed to maintain an open marriage in , that is, "everyone plays their own things."
. The reason for this is that Christensen has a bad habit of alcoholism, which makes his wife unbearable. In the end, in order not to break down the marriage, the two reached such an agreement.
So, after his wife first had a new love, Christensen, who was very depressed and painful, also found a girlfriend on the dating website - Terra Brees.
The way the case handlers find a breakthrough is related to Terra. They found the woman for a long talk, informing the other party that Christensen was likely to have committed the crime of kidnapping and even killed Zhang Yingying, and hoped that Terra would cooperate with him.
is a way to cooperate with to let Terra carry the eavesdropper with her, recording Christensen's conversation with him in order to extract valuable information from it.
After some consideration, Terra agreed to this request. On the one hand, if the boyfriend did not commit a crime, he could help him get rid of suspicion; on the other hand, if Christensen did do something terrible, this could help find Zhang Yingying.
In fact, this is a very risky thing. As the person with the closest relationship with Christensen, Terra may expose herself by accident and even put her life in danger...
However, Terra did this. While carrying a wiretape, she kept in touch with the investigators.
Days have passed day by day, and in a blink of an eye, Zhang Yingying has been missing for almost three weeks. And in the conversation with his girlfriend, Christensen still showed no flaws.
Zhang Yingying
On June 29, some teachers and students from Urbana-Champaign held a night watch for Zhang Yingying. They hope to increase people's attention in this way and continue to help find the missing woman.
In addition to teachers and students who were concerned about the matter, there were also Christensen and Terra who came to the scene to participate in the walking event that day. At around 6 p.m. that day, the two were walking among the walking crowd.
Terra was extremely nervous at this time. On the one hand, she was opening a wiretap, worried that she would be discovered by her boyfriend; on the other hand, participating in this event was proposed by Christensen. She didn't know what the other party sold...
Just as Terra tried to hide her anxiety, Christensen said to her: "Everyone comes here because of me... I just want to see how many people are coming because of me."
Terra immediately felt something was wrong after hearing this. She tried to calm down and asked, "Are we going to that venue?"
"Go to that venue, because that was also held for me." Christensen's tone was a little proud.
At the venue of the ceremony, Zhang Yingying's boyfriend Hou Xiaolin spoke to everyone: "For me and Zhang Yingying's entire family, the 20-day journey is long and difficult..."
Not only that, this man who has been in love with Zhang Yingying for many years also sang the song he had written for his girlfriend on the spot. When he finished singing, everyone stood up and ovated, except for one person - Christensen.
Christensen at that time just sat in his seat and slowly clapped his hands...
Not only that, in response to Hou Xiaolin's words to everyone on the scene, Christensen also said to Terra: "They thank me for coming, think about it..."
Christensen and Terra in the walking crowd
"Does this mean you believe me?" Terra, who already knew it, asked tentatively.
"Yes, of course I believe you. I want to tell you..." Christensen replied.
"Do you want it?" "I really want it." His tone was very serious.
In the next conversation, Christensen described the story of the day to his girlfriend . He said that he brought Zhang Yingying back to the apartment, she was very brave and resisted for a long time... As for Zhang Yingying's family, "They will never find her"...
And that night, Terra came to the case handler's office and handed them the relevant recordings.At this time, she felt very scared and her body kept shaking...
The suspect was arrested. The court made a verdict.
With these recordings as evidence, Christensen was quickly arrested, and the prosecution filed criminal charges against her. At the same time, the case handlers said that believes that Zhang Yingying has been killed . After the announcement of the news of
, the principal of Urbana-Champaign sent an open letter expressing condolences on the matter and called on all teachers and students of the school to help Zhang Yingying's family and friends through this difficult time.
"I don't know why such a sad thing happened, and I don't know what kind of words can all alleviate the sadness of Zhang Yingying's family and friends. Justice and truth will come soon, but at this special time, I hope everyone can understand and worry about Zhang Yingying's family and mourn her lost life... I hope that Zhang Yingying's kindness, tenderness and her smile will be remembered forever. This is the only thing we can do for her family and friends at present."
zhang Yingying
July 1st night, Urbana Champaign held a memorial service for Zhang Yingying. Two days later, the suspect Christensen appeared in court for hearing, but he did not explain Zhang Yingying's whereabouts.
After a series of relevant procedures, on June 24, 2019, a jury in the Federal Court of Central Illinois found Brent Christensen guilty of kidnapping and murdering Chinese visiting scholar Yingying Zhang in 2017.
On July 18 of the same year, the Federal Court of Central District of Illinois made a judgment, and Christensen was sentenced to life imprisonment and never bail .
