00:00:04
[ORCHESTRAL MUSIC] ZHIDONG WANG: Yingying is
an intelligent, beautiful, and kind of person.
00:00:18
ANTHONY MANGANARO: Yingying
had come to the United States because she wanted to learn
more about agriculture.
00:00:25
Her end goal was to go
back to China and teach. It was a beautiful aspiration. Yingying was standing on the
corner, waiting for the bus
00:00:37
when all of a sudden,
a car appeared. She got into that car. He was a total
stranger to Yingying.
00:00:46
ANTHONY MANGANARO: This
is a very chilling video. This is not a missing
person anymore.
00:00:54
You're really thinking
this is a kidnapping. It was just one of the most
callous crimes you can imagine,
00:01:01
and it happened to just such
a sweet and caring person. [CAMERA SHUTTER CLICKS] STEVEN BECKETT: I think as a
parent, I would be screaming,
00:01:09
what are you thinking? You definitely should
not get in the vehicle of a car of somebody
that you do not know.
00:01:17
ZHIDONG WANG: In the
morning of the same day, he actually tried to ask
another female student
00:01:25
of the university
to get into his car. I remember seeing
on my left a car pull up on the side of the road.
00:01:33
And the person in the car
wound down the window. And he asked me, can
you get in the car
00:01:41
so I can ask you some questions? He planned, for a
long period of time, to kidnap, rape, and ultimately
kill a complete stranger.
00:01:51
There's no question
that the community was heartbroken for this family. It was just heart-wrenching.
00:01:59
STEVEN BECKETT: The
family and the boyfriend were looking for her. They were never
going to find her.
00:02:05
She was gone forever. [TENSE MUSIC] ZHIDONG WANG (VOICEOVER) I got
a call from someone in China
00:02:30
saying there was a Chinese
student or scholar who went missing in the Champaign area.
00:02:38
And her father and other family
members were coming to the US. She was an international
student here from China,
00:02:47
and she didn't really
know a lot of people. She was also a very
responsible graduate student.
00:02:54
STEVEN BECKETT
(VOICEOVER) She was here, working within the
College of ACES, which is-- the agricultural
programs are there.
00:03:00
And she was a type of botanist
or a plant pathologist. [TENSE MUSIC] June 9th of 2017
was a beautiful day.
00:03:16
That Friday morning,
Yingying went into her lab, where she had been
working on her research.
00:03:22
Over the noon hour, she
went back to her apartment in Orchard Downs, which is in
the southeast part of campus.
00:03:29
She had lunch. Then she had the appointment
to look at a new apartment. She didn't arrive at
North Lincoln Avenue,
00:03:38
and she didn't arrive
back at the lab. ZHIDONG WANG: Yingying
was always on time.
00:03:45
So the supervisor, she
felt something was wrong, was strange. STEVEN BECKETT: Well, everyone
attempted to make phone calls
00:03:55
because they had her
cell phone number, but there was no answer. ANTHONY MANGANARO (VOICEOVER):
In the late evening of June
00:04:02
the 9th, approximately
9 o'clock at night, Yingying's colleagues
had reported her missing to the University
of Illinois Police Department.
00:04:13
They had not seen or heard
from her in several hours, which was very unusual. They had had dinner
plans together,
00:04:20
and she wasn't answering
any of the phone calls that they made to her. The University Police Department
went to Yingying's apartment.
00:04:29
They went to known locations
throughout the campus that students hung out
with and congregated.
00:04:40
STEVEN BECKETT:
Saturday, June 10th, they were contacting all
individuals that they knew
00:04:45
were having contact with her. BRYANNA FOX: Whenever police
get a missing persons report,
00:04:50
they'll evaluate it in
terms of the level of risk and how urgent it is that
they investigate it, in terms
00:04:57
of a worst case scenario. The last time she was
seen was around lunchtime. And this was
particularly unusual
00:05:05
because, for a young student
who doesn't necessarily know a lot of people, have
a large circle of friends,
00:05:11
to just vanish during the middle
of the day with no reason, it certainly indicated that
maybe foul play was at work.
00:05:23
ANTHONY MANGANARO: The police
learned that she was traveling to an apartment complex nearby.
00:05:29
She had wanted to sign a new
lease, get some roommates, meet some new people,
and make some friends.
00:05:36
The police went and talked to
that apartment manager, who showed text messages
that he had on the phone
00:05:41
where he was going back
and forth with Yingying. And she was saying,
I will arrive
00:05:46
at approximately this time. I'm on my way. And he was responding to her. A number of hours go
by, and he sends a text
00:05:55
message asking where she is. And it goes unanswered. [TENSE MUSIC] MARY SCHENK (VOICEOVER): It
was a Saturday afternoon.
00:06:05
I was the sole reporter
working in the newsroom. And I received a telephone
call from a male friend
00:06:15
of Yingying's telling
me that she was missing. I was a little skeptical. So I rang a
colleague of mine who
00:06:26
used to work at
my newspaper who's now employed for the University
of Illinois Police Department.
00:06:33
And I asked him if he
had any reservations about us running a story. And he assured me that,
yes, the police had checked
00:06:42
out several obvious leads. And they couldn't find her,
and they were a bit concerned
00:06:48
and had more
investigation to do, and said it would be a
good idea to publicize the fact that she was missing.
00:06:57
BRYANNA FOX: The
police need to mobilize and get the word out to the
community as fast as possible.
00:07:02
Because the more eyes we have
in that community, the more likelihood there
is that any leads
00:07:08
or unusual circumstances
that could turn into finding that
person successfully are actually going to play out.
00:07:15
The longer time goes without
any leads, the colder a case can get. ZHIDONG WANG: The search
for Yingying started.
00:07:25
It was the local Chinese
student organizations, and the local Chinese
communities started that.
00:07:33
And then the university
got involved as well. There's a lot of people just
looking all over the place.
00:07:41
[TENSE MUSIC] ANTHONY MANGANARO:
The university police began to expand their
search, checking surveillance
00:07:52
footage and bus cameras. They went so far as to get
emergency records for her cell
00:07:59
phone to try to figure
out if it was hitting a cell phone tower anywhere
in the neighborhood anywhere
00:08:06
on campus. STEVEN BECKETT: A
shift of officers basically volunteered
to come in to work
00:08:14
to look at all of this video. And there are all these
cameras all over campus. And they're looking
at all these videos,
00:08:21
and it's almost like looking
for a needle in a haystack. ANTHONY MANGANARO: They
pulled the video footage that
00:08:28
was at the bus terminal
right next to her apartment, and that's when the
first clue came in.
00:08:34
You see her entering that bus
and giving a smile, actually, to the bus driver as
she shows her bus pass,
00:08:43
and then goes and
sits down in the bus. As they review the bus footage,
you see her pull out her phone
00:08:50
and send a text message. And the time stamp on that
mirrored the time stamp that was seen on the apartment
complex manager's phone
00:08:59
when she was telling him
that she was on her way. When she got to
central campus,
00:09:06
she got off of that bus. She had to catch another
bus that was gonna go north. She missed it.
00:09:12
The police continue to
scour the video footage throughout the weekend
into Sunday the 11th
00:09:21
to try to track her
movements since she was no longer on the
bus and wasn't appearing
00:09:27
in that video footage. STEVEN BECKETT: An
officer, Sunday night, sees her image at the
corner of Clark and Goodwin,
00:09:38
standing at the bus stop. There's a camera on
that parking garage that is pointed at
where the bus stop was.
00:09:47
Yingying was standing on that
corner, waiting for the bus when all of a sudden,
a car appeared.
00:09:54
She walks up to the window,
and leans in, and has about a 1-minute conversation
with whoever was
00:10:00
driving this vehicle,
after which she gets into the passenger seat. And the vehicle
drives North outside
00:10:08
of the camera view angle. This is, in a lot of ways,
a very chilling video, because it's at this moment
where all of the investigators
00:10:19
reviewing it-- you know this is not a
missing person anymore. STEVEN BECKETT:
The clear inference
00:10:28
is, she has been abducted. She has been kidnapped. And when a kidnapping
occurs, then
00:10:35
state law enforcement can reach
out to federal law enforcement. In this case, the FBI.
00:10:40
[TENSE MUSIC] I arrived at the
Detective Bureau at the University
Police Department
00:10:53
and learned a little bit
about what was going on. We continued to receive
more information.
00:11:00
One thing that stood out was
another university student had also been approached
the morning of June
00:11:08
by an unknown individual driving
a black four-door vehicle. EMILY HOGAN (VOICEOVER):
It was a sunny day.
00:11:20
It was warm. I was going to the
Union on campus. I think I had my phone in my
hand, and I had my backpack on.
00:11:28
And I was walking towards
the bus stop on Green Street. There were lots of cars
parked on the street,
00:11:34
but no one was around. And I remember
seeing, on my left, a car pull up on the
side of the road.
00:11:41
And the person in the car
wound down the window. And I remember, he
said something to me.
00:11:50
And I couldn't quite hear
him, so I stepped a little further closer to the car. There was a piece of grass
in between the pavement
00:12:00
and the road. And I sort of moved
halfway through it, but I definitely
kept my distance.
00:12:05
He repeated what he said, which
was, hi, I'm an undercover cop doing some work in the area.
00:12:13
Could I ask you some questions? And I remember, I said yes. And he held up sort of a--
00:12:24
I can just only describe
it as something that you would buy in a Halloween store.
00:12:27
It was like a black
plastic kind of thing with a silver
five-pointed star on it.
00:12:34
And so he asked me,
can you get in the car so I can ask you
some these questions?
00:12:37
And I remember, he said no. He seemed a little
surprised that I wouldn't. And he said, OK, well,
if you see anything
00:12:46
suspicious in the
area, please, will you give the police a call? And I said yes.
00:12:51
And he said OK. And he wound up his window,
and he continued onwards. And I moved away, back
onto the pavement,
00:13:00
and went towards the bus stop. Any type of crime
involving a stranger is statistically more rare.
00:13:07
However, when these
do occur, they tend to be some of the most severe. The reason being is that
stranger offenders pick
00:13:16
a victim for a
reason that's often intrinsic, psychological,
and often very negatively motivated.
00:13:25
EMILY HOGAN: I called the
non-emergency police number. And whoever I
spoke to dispatched
00:13:30
me directly to 9-1-1. I explained what happened. And I was on the bus at this
point, heading towards campus.
00:13:37
And I wrote a Facebook status. And I said, "If this happens
to you, do not get in the car."
00:13:43
[TENSE MUSIC] ZHIDONG WANG: Yingying was
very close to her family. Yingying came to the
US in April of 2017.
00:13:56
And we understood
that she was not gonna be here for too long,
because she was going to go
00:14:03
back to China, and she
was going to get married in October of that year. We learned from
Yingying's boyfriend
00:14:14
that they actually met in
their freshman year in college. They both decided to continue
to go to a graduate program
00:14:26
at the same university,
Peking University. She had formed a
band in her college,
00:14:33
and she was the singer. And also, Yingying
had a big heart. She was always friendly, always
smiling, and always willing
00:14:45
to help. She was keeping a
diary, making entries on a daily basis,
happy, at peace,
00:14:54
I'd say, with her experience
here in the United States. [CAMERA SHUTTER CLICKS] MARY SCHENK: In the
days that followed,
00:15:08
it quickly went from being
a University of Illinois Police Department
case to a Federal
00:15:14
Bureau of Investigation case. The FBI does not
confirm, on the record, that the sun is shining.
00:15:22
So all my sources that I
would normally call and say, tell me some more about this,
shut down on me and said,
00:15:30
we can't talk about this. So we were just kind
of left to wonder what was going on behind the scenes.
00:15:38
ANTHONY MANGANARO: We have
a missing student who hasn't been seen in a number of days.
00:15:44
And we have this video
footage of her getting into a stranger's car,
and it's the last anyone
00:15:51
has seen her or this vehicle. There is a real sense of
urgency at this point. [TENSE MUSIC]
00:16:03
STEVEN BECKETT: We can only
assume that, just as he did with the graduate
student, he told
00:16:08
Yingying that he
was a police officer and that he was
there to help her. And she may have reacted
to that inducement,
00:16:15
and that's why she
got into the car. BRYANNA FOX: This was
something that was very brazen.
00:16:21
It took a lot of confidence
to do, a lot of premeditation. This is somebody who had looked
up how to commit this crime,
00:16:27
put a lot of energy
into it, and probably was not going to stop until
they got whatever they wanted.
00:16:34
What is unfortunate about
this video surveillance is that it is not clear enough
to picture out a license plate.
00:16:44
But the vehicle
was unique enough, and it was identified
as a Saturn Astra. MARY SCHENK: The FBI
released the video footage
00:16:56
showing Yingying getting into
this Saturn Astra on the Monday after she was first
reported missing.
00:17:05
And our newspaper
ran it immediately. And as we all
watched it, you know, you just wanted to
scream out, don't get in.
00:17:14
Don't get in. This is not a good idea. And I guess we all hoped
that if it were a kidnapping,
00:17:21
that she'd be found. We just kept thinking, where
could he have taken her? [TENSE MUSIC]
00:17:30
ANTHONY MANGANARO: At this
point, it's all hands on deck. I contacted every other agent
within the Champaign resident
00:17:37
agency and a number
of the support staff and asked them to meet me at
the University Police Department
00:17:44
to help on this. STEVEN BECKETT: They
learned there were 26 Saturn Astras in Champaign County.
00:17:52
And of those 26, only 18 had a
hatchback, as the video showed. ANTHONY MANGANARO: One of the
registered owners of a Saturn
00:18:02
Astra was a couple, the husband
of which was Brent Christensen. So two agents went
and spoke with him
00:18:12
to get eyes on that vehicle. [CAMERA SHUTTER CLICKS] STEVEN BECKETT:
Brent Christensen
00:18:17
was a physics graduate student
at the University of Illinois. Classes were over, so
he was on summer break.
00:18:26
And he indicated to them that he
didn't recall what he had done that day because he didn't
have class, he wasn't working,
00:18:35
but he played video games. Brent's wife was
actually out of town and was able to
show proof of that
00:18:44
through receipts,
which left Brent alone. [CAMERA SHUTTER CLICKS] He allowed agents to look at the
vehicle, noticed it, you know,
00:18:54
looked fairly clean and that had
also had a very large sunroof. At this point, they move on
to the next registered Saturn
00:19:03
Astra on the list. STEVEN BECKETT: Back at
the UVI Police office, another officer who
was looking closely
00:19:15
at the video of Yingying
being picked up enlarged it and focused on the
left front wheel.
00:19:21
It had a defect in the rim
where-- almost as if where you would hit the
curb and, you know,
00:19:31
there was a slight marring
of the metal of the rim. ANTHONY MANGANARO:
Furthermore, when they started
00:19:38
looking at some photos
of Saturn Astras and looking at the
surveillance camera, you could tell this vehicle
has a large sunroof.
00:19:49
Special Agent Smith
walks up to me and says, I remember, there
was a large sunroof
00:19:57
on Brent Christensen's vehicle. And I look at him and I
said, get someone else. Go out there.
00:20:03
Check out that hubcap. Send me a picture. He immediately leaves,
and we're able to snap
00:20:11
a photo of this hubcap. And we compare it to
the video footage, and it's an exact match.
00:20:22
We also decide to see
if we can marry up the prior witness's
statement now that we have a name and a face.
00:20:33
[TENSE MUSIC] EMILY HOGAN: It must
have been a few days later that I got a call.
00:20:41
At this point, they weren't
giving me any information. So they asked me to come
in and do a photo lineup
00:20:51
to see if I could
identify the person that had approached me on the day. But they did not
mention Yingying.
00:20:58
They did not mention that case. I couldn't really ask. I remember sitting there.
00:21:06
And then he said, OK. I want you to turn over
the pictures one by one. I don't remember
which number it was.
00:21:12
But when I saw-- when I saw that picture, I
was so sure that it was him. I felt like it kind of hit me.
00:21:24
It was like a physical feeling. And I was like, oh, wow. I didn't expect that. There he is.
00:21:32
And I told the FBI
agent, this one. [CAMERA SHUTTER CLICKS] It's him. And he just stared at me.
00:21:40
STEVEN BECKETT: When
the FBI agents went back to Christensen,
after identifying the wheel of his car,
this was the second time.
00:21:49
And the FBI asked him if
he would be willing to come to FBI headquarters. He agreed.
00:21:56
DETECTIVE: You originally
told the agents that came to your apartment
that you just played
00:21:59
video games all day long. You didn't leave the apartment. Yeah. But it's fair to say that
we know that that's not true.
00:22:10
Correct? Why would I lie? I mean, I've got her
getting into your car. I need to know why.
00:22:21
Bruce-- Brent, I need to know
why she's getting in your car, and I need to know
where she went.
00:22:27
If we can help her, we
need to know now because we need to move on from this. I think it's a good guess
to say that Christensen was
00:22:35
aware of the CCTV
footage, or certainly, he had given it some thought. So he's wanting to
cover his tracks.
00:22:43
And the best way to do that is
to account for the CCTV footage but not incriminate himself.
00:22:51
So how long do you think
that she was in your car for? Less than five minutes. Not long at all.
00:22:57
Less than 5 minutes? Not long at all. There's just a few blocks, and
I apparently took a wrong turn
00:23:04
compared to what she said. And that was enough
to spook her. DETECTIVE: So you said you
kicked her out of the car
00:23:13
at a residential neighborhood? She got out of the car. Oh, she got out of the car?
00:23:16
She wanted to get out. Like, that's why I let her out. Oh, because she
was freaking out?
00:23:20
- Yeah.
- And she started saying-- Because-- --it because she
didn't understand.
00:23:24
--because you-- She thought you
took a wrong turn? Yeah, and sometimes about--
you know, something like that.
00:23:31
KERRY DAYNES:
There's no evidence to suggest that that is a lie. And so as far as the
police are concerned,
00:23:37
unless he's going to give
them more information, their hands are tied. Were you attracted
to her at all?
00:23:46
--reason you want to know? I mean, she's a
good-looking girl. So you're telling me you
never had sex with her?
00:23:52
I never had sex with her. Are you afraid to
tell me if you did? I've shared enough
with you that you
00:23:59
know that I know
that you didn't drop her off in that neighborhood. Where did you take her, Brent?
00:24:15
We need to find
Yingying tonight. [CAMERA SHUTTER CLICKS] STEVEN BECKETT: The FBI had
two different lines of thought.
00:24:25
If he stayed in jail,
they were at a dead end. But if they released him and
kept him under surveillance,
00:24:33
he might lead them to Yingying
or to evidence that showed what had happened to Yingying.
00:24:40
ANTHONY MANGANARO: We ultimately
come to the conclusion that he's more valuable
out on the street
00:24:45
where we can
continuously monitor him than in a jail cell. He's released from
jail, and we place
00:24:52
him under 24/7 surveillance. [CAMERA SHUTTER CLICKS] [TENSE MUSIC] ZHIDONG WANG: I got a
call from someone in China
00:25:07
saying Yingying's
father and other family members were coming to the US. The person asked me whether I
could provide some legal help.
00:25:18
I said, yeah, of course. And then I was put in touch
with Yingying's boyfriend, who was with them applying for a
passport and visa to come over.
00:25:35
MARY SCHENK: The family arrived
in town about 10 days after she was first reported missing.
00:25:42
They came to our office
on the 22nd of June. I was, you know, secretly hoping
that the family would have
00:25:52
gotten all this
information from the police and that they would
share it with us.
00:25:57
They said they're not
telling us anything. And that's when my heart
just broke for them.
00:26:04
Well, when the interview was
over, I was incredibly sad. I think when-- if
you read the story
00:26:14
and read her dad's quotes, you
know, "Yingying, be strong. Dad is coming for you," how
could you not be moved by that?
00:26:24
I felt-- you know, I was
trying to be positive for him and tell him I was praying
for him and his family.
00:26:33
Yingying's family
were not aware that the FBI had a main
suspect, Brent Christensen.
00:26:41
His wife gives consent for
us to search the apartment and seize a lot of electronics.
00:26:49
As the results of the forensic
examination of the seized computers and cell phones
start to trickle back,
00:26:57
we found search threads
of a graphic sexual nature and, in a lot of ways,
a violent sexual nature
00:27:07
both on the computers as well-- with images as well as in
forums and in chat groups.
00:27:16
And it really conveyed this
other dark sexual side. STEVEN BECKETT: He had a bad
relationship with his wife.
00:27:26
That's actually what was
going on in his life. He met on a dating-type
app a girl in her 20s
00:27:37
who was interested in
hooking up with him. This is in April. They began seeing each other.
00:27:47
They developed a
close relationship, an intimate relationship,
you would say. He was seeing her regularly.
00:27:56
He had said things to her that
led her to believe that he had knowledge if, in
fact, he was not
00:28:04
engaged in a behavior related
to Yingying's disappearance. [TENSE MUSIC] His girlfriend agreed to work
with us, and to wear a wire,
00:28:15
and record the conversations
that she had with Brent. But we still haven't
found Yingying,
00:28:21
and we need to
know where she is. We feel that pressure. And then we get an interesting
piece of information.
00:28:30
On the 29th, there
was going to be a concert and a walk in
support of Yingying in support
00:28:38
of efforts to find her. And while we're meeting
with Brent's girlfriend, she receives a text
message from Brent,
00:28:48
telling her that he wants her
to accompany him to this concert and walk. We immediately gave
her a recording device
00:28:59
and said, hey, go. See why he's gonna be there. And if he makes any statements,
you know what to do.
00:29:36
STEVEN BECKETT: The family and
Xiaolin, Yingying's betrothed, they pleaded emotionally to
the crowd for every effort,
00:29:48
all of the energy that could be
put together by the community to help them find
Yingying, because they
00:29:55
believed her to be alive. They believed that she
was waiting for them, and they just needed to
reach out and find her.
00:30:23
The fact that
Brent Christensen wanted to attend
the March in concert and felt this need to see
seemingly his work, his impact
00:30:32
on the community, really
speaks to his grandiosity, and narcissism, and
lack of remorse.
00:30:37
He almost felt like he
had this godlike complex, that he could impact
all of these people
00:30:43
through his actions. [DRAMATIC MUSIC] I remember listening
to that recording. He describes hitting her in
the head with a baseball bat.
00:31:49
And I'm thinking,
we have that bat. And I'm thinking, we need to
get back into that apartment.
00:31:56
We need to search other
areas for evidence. But overwhelmingly, what
was there was a sense of,
00:32:05
we've got him. We can make this arrest. And that immediately triggered
this push to get everything
00:32:14
lined up to get a good,
solid arrest and hopefully a second interview, where
we could get him to tell
00:32:23
us what he's done with her. [TENSE MUSIC] STEVEN BECKETT: Christensen
refused to confess,
00:32:36
refused to answer questions
about what he had done. MARY SCHENK: None of us
were aware that the police
00:32:43
had honed in on any suspects. So we were all as
surprised as anyone when the arrest was announced.
00:32:53
I don't think we
ever said in print, oh, we think she's dead,
because that wasn't
00:32:58
part of the criminal complaint. But you didn't have to
be a rocket scientist to figure out that something
bad had happened to this woman.
00:33:06
So our attention turned to,
who is Brent Christensen? We were able to put together, in
a pretty short amount of time,
00:33:14
just some background on him. ANTHONY MANGANARO:
Throughout all of this, we still didn't know
where Yingying's body was,
00:33:23
and we were still
searching for that. STEVEN BECKETT: When I
first meet with the family,
00:33:29
it's an awkward situation. I personally believe from
the information that's been filed in court
that Yingying is
00:33:36
dead, that she's been killed. She's been murdered. The family wants
her to be alive,
00:33:42
and they continue with
the hope that she's alive. ANTHONY MANGANARO: In
November of that year,
00:33:48
the DNA that came back
confirmed, really, what we already knew, that
Yingying had been in Brent's
00:33:58
apartment, that she had
been violently assaulted, and that he had
murdered her there.
00:34:06
STEVEN BECKETT: In
the fall of 2017, it goes from a kidnapping to a
kidnapping resulting in death.
00:34:14
So the family has to come
to grips with the notion that they're not looking
anymore for Yingying alive.
00:34:27
EMILY HOGAN: I think I heard
the name probably not long after he had been
arrested, because it
00:34:35
will have been in the news. I learnt that I was
related in November, and that was with the release
of the "Chicago Tribune"
00:34:48
newspaper article. And that day, I had a friend
who messaged me just saying, oh,
00:34:55
my God. Are you OK? And I was like, what
are you talking about? So that was really
when it hit home.
00:35:04
I had probably guessed at that
point that I was involved. But I'd never-- it had
never been confirmed
00:35:12
until that point, and that was
a shock to kind of-- finally, after you've been telling
yourself for a few months,
00:35:23
you're not involved, you
know, you're not gonna help. You're not doing anything
to finally be told,
00:35:27
you know, actually you
did do quite a lot. It was shocking, and
it was emotional.
00:35:35
[TENSE MUSIC] ANTHONY MANGANARO: The entire
trial lasted a number of weeks, and there was an immense
amount of preparation.
00:35:57
This was a federal
death penalty case. It was unusual because
there was no body.
00:36:04
But we were all very focused
on giving Yingying a voice. We wanted the jury to
know as much as possible.
00:36:13
In fact, our
evidence was so good that during the defense's
opening statements, they admitted that
he had killed her.
00:36:24
MARY SCHENK: The information
that he had posed a police officer came out at the trial.
00:36:29
We were all learning
the depravity. I mean, a lot of it had
been sugarcoated in what
00:36:35
had been previously released. And it was just horrible
to hear the detail. And I think we were
hearing it at the same time
00:36:45
her family members were
hearing it in the courthouse. [TENSE MUSIC] STEVEN BECKETT: In a
death penalty case,
00:36:53
the jury is entitled to
consider the impact of the death on the family of the victim.
00:37:01
And they do that by
calling witnesses to testify to those
things, but they also do it by video recording.
00:37:08
And so they went
to China, and they went to all of the important
places in Yingying's life,
00:37:13
where she grew up, where
she went to school, her relationship with her
boyfriend or her relationship
00:37:19
with friends. Christensen,
throughout the trial, was stone cold, emotionless. No expression of remorse.
00:37:32
There were a couple of
occasions where I saw him smile. We learned that there
were records showing
00:37:41
that Christensen had gone
to student counseling at the University of
Illinois and that he had
00:37:48
portrayed himself as homicidal. KERRY DAYNES: Christensen
is very different in terms
00:38:50
of offender and
offending in terms of, we don't usually see
somebody go from naught to 60
00:38:59
in such a short period of time. He is somebody who
is really spiraling but spiraling very fast.
00:39:07
And he's clearly got
conflict about this. It's not true that offenders
like him have no remorse.
00:39:13
They do. They wrestle with themselves. And he's gone through a process
of wrestling with himself
00:39:18
about, should I do this? Can I do this? What does this mean for me? But ultimately, he's
chosen to do this.
00:39:27
He's become a very
callous character. [TENSE MUSIC] ZHIDONG WANG: In
the penalty phase,
00:39:37
the jury could not reach an
agreement for death penalty. And at that moment,
Christensen and his attorneys
00:39:49
were celebrating. So the final result
was Christensen would be sentenced
to life in jail
00:39:58
without parole, without any
possibility of getting out of the federal prison system.
00:40:06
[TENSE MUSIC] [camera shutter clicks] The Zhang family was somehow
informed that Christensen
00:40:22
related to his attorneys that he
put Yingying's remains in three separate garbage
bags and then dumped
00:40:35
those into a garbage dumpster. MARY SCHENK: You
couldn't help but be just terribly moved by the pain
they must have been feeling.
00:40:48
Steve Beckett held
a news conference. And I was sitting very close
to her dad, and I just--
00:40:56
I just patted my-- I just patted my
heart and said I'm-- I just mouthed "I'm
sorry," you know,
00:41:03
because we were at
this news conference where they were
talking about the fact that it would be
impossible to find
00:41:09
her remains in this landfill. [TENSE MUSIC] In terms of his
willingness to take risks
00:41:19
and to do things that are
absolutely unthinkable for most of the people, he did it with a
level of confidence of somebody
00:41:26
who thought he was going
to get away with it. So if he thought he was
gonna get away with that,
00:41:30
imagine what else
he thinks he may be able to do and get away with. STEVEN BECKETT: This is
a spot where Yingying
00:41:37
was standing when
the car stopped and she interacted
with that car. The memorial garden is here,
and you can see it's beautifully
00:41:47
landscaped, and that
there are fresh flowers, , photographs and a
bench where you can sit
00:41:53
and reflect about the
meaning of Yingying and what happened to her. [GENTLE MUSIC]
00:42:12
I think that, you know,
obviously, it wasn't my fault. But it's like a
butterfly effect.
00:42:24
You make a decision to
do or not do something. And because of a
decision that you made,
00:42:33
something happens
to someone else. For a very long time, I didn't
want to do any interviews
00:42:44
because I was
grieving, and angry, and didn't want to draw
attention to myself when,
00:42:55
you know, Yingying's
family were going through something so terrible. But it is important that
people hear this story,
00:43:02
that people can-- can learn from this. So I hope that-- [SNIFFS] I hope that this
never happens to anyone again.
00:43:13
ZHIDONG WANG: Yingying is
an intelligent, beautiful, and kind person. But it's too sad
that she left us too
00:43:26
early and in such a tragic way. I think representing
Yingying's family is the best
00:43:34
decision I have ever made. And I'm proud that I
got to know Yingying. ANTHONY MANGANARO:
You can't help
00:43:43
but get a little personally
involved in a case like this. And I learned a
lot about Yingying.
00:43:53
I think about
holding her journal and reading on the last page of
this beautifully penmanshipped
00:44:02
journal the line, you
know, "Life is too short to be ordinary," and just
that statement, and what
00:44:12
I imagine it meant to her. When everything was
done, getting permission to have that journal
returned to her mom,
00:44:22
I was very honored to
be able to do that. EMILY HOGAN: I
would say I do feel a connection to her in that--
00:44:33
it's difficult, you, know
because I didn't know her. It's a tricky thing to describe,
but I think of her a lot.
00:44:43
Yingying's family,
that's a really hard one. [SOBS] I'm just so
desperately sorry,
00:44:59
and I so desperately wish
that there's something more I could have done. I can't imagine the
pain and the hurt
00:45:07
that they must have gone
through, and I'm just-- I'm so sorry that
happened to them.
00:45:12
[DRAMATIC MUSIC]