Deceased/Not Found IL - Yingying Zhang, 26, Urbana, 9 June 2017 #9 *Arrest*

[tresir2012]

Okay , he mostly used hydrogen peroxide to clean, good for cleaning bloodstains, no chemical smell. Draino is quite a different thing though.. if it's equivalent to drain unblocking stuff in Europe , it may have a strong chemical smell. He did not use bleach which does smell. the mattress stain was not huge.. see evidence photos, but was noticeable at a stretch.. see photo s.

The prosecution gained quite a significant amount of helpful information from Michelle in the early days.
Gazette wrote about this information. I elieve she was quite helpful, told them about dreams he claimed he had, things he had written, none of the information she gave them exonerated him, on the contrary. At one stage they asked her if she thought him capable of killing and she responded in the affirmative. There was also a jail letter he wrote her , not included in evidence cos defense objected. Now i fly off my head when people dump info on posts without links but that's what i'm doing here now because I'm not adept at rooting out early posts from older threads..

I believe Michelle's information helped them considerably in nailing him.

He started communicating with her from prison very early on, july 4, I think..
She started working for his defense a year before she retracted her search permission , nov '18, far as I recall.
So, prosecution had quite a lot of information courtesy of Michelle.
I was still surprised they didn't cross-examine her.
I do suspect that the 'thing' he told her that changed their relationship, while he was drunk was something like his admission to TB about the 12 others.

I also think that she gave this drunken testimony to the police in the early days.
She was frightened.
She asked them if she should consider obtaining a barring orde against them.
He searched the knife sharpening back in April, April 25, I think.
It's on the exhibit list.
The only reason I can think of regarding the lack of cross was that the prosecution knew enough and did not need to do it.

Maybe they do and maybe they do not.
We know nothing, on the other hand.
I'm interested in what her family's questions are at this stage.

Her father and her brother sit there every single day, listening through an interpreter to everything that is stated.

Perhaps she was willing to provide all that info on the understanding that they didn't cross examine too closely in case it incriminated her and put doubt on her testimony. I have never heard of a witness providing so much for the prosecution then testifying for the defence, but this is certainly a strange case and trial. Is there any chance she could be the graveyard strangling victim in 2013? Why hasn't that victim testified?

 

[tresir2012]

I never share in that confident
@i'm sure that the fBI know'
I'm watching them too long, too many years now to presuppose they simply do not know.
Even if they do know, anything about anything, there has been no evidence of the fact produced.

'The FBI believe her to be dead'

Remember that day?
I've been scouring and searching through what has been produced already for clues of evidence of death at that early stage.
I'm not even sure whether they had TB's tape at that stage.
Prosecution highly modified their exhibit list for the trial so that the helpless defense would not be forced to be ready to counter argue every single thing on that list, 'like a needle in a haystack' is how they described it. I made a post comparing original list and current list a couple weeks ago, maybe.
My feeling has always been that searching stepped down considerably after they made that announcement.

FBI are brilliant on Nat Sec, Terrorism and related fields of big crimes.
I doubt their competence in dealing with smaller crimes, such as a single murder, however.
There was chaos within the FBI after Comey was fired, headless chickens type vibe, they were in shock... things slipped... got confused... that's why I want to know what their budget was for YY's case and whether it became modified following internal changes within the organisation.

They have an awful lot of leeway to cut corners, too much, I fear.
I was pleased at their choice of cross examiners when Christensen produced an encyclopaedia of ailments to aid in his mental health diagnosis.
It effectively knocked it on it's ridiculous head, stated clearly that it's not actually possible to have all those symptoms becuse they do not exist under the conditions Christensen listed
Then again, anybody could have googled this information and come up with the same conclusions.
Showed extreme sloppiness by his defense for having submitted them in the first place.
That was really- the trial.
It also afforded him another opportunity to disclose the location of YY's remains.
I
They told him , in effect-you're gonna die and there are NO mitigating factors that can be presented to keep you alive any longer.
It was over for him then.

Did FBI make that statement after they took the drains and the kitchen sink away or before? Once they had evidence of DNA and what was in those drains, maybe that's how they could say that so confidently.

 

[tresir2012]

All court reports have been posted on the thread.
Transcripts will be available on Pacer, for a fee after 90 days.
It may be possible to pay for a court transcript sooner by contacting clerk of the court.
Address is on the exhibits link.

If you have access kitty, or anyone else, could you C/P MZ testimony transcript please, or is that not possible?

 

[kittythehare]

Perhaps she was willing to provide all that info on the understanding that they didn't cross examine too closely in case it incriminated her and put doubt on her testimony. I have never heard of a witness providing so much for the prosecution then testifying for the defence, but this is certainly a strange case and trial. Is there any chance she could be the graveyard strangling victim in 2013? Why hasn't that victim testified?

No, she is not the 2013 graveyard attack victim.

 

[altojack]

I really have no clue.
Has new info come to light?
Who exactly made judge aware that there were 'security CONCERNS'?
Police?
Jail staff?
A threatened suicide is not classed as a 'security concern'
So, police?
Why only alert bC's lawyers and not the prosecution lawyers?
Had Michelle received threats from anybody?
Had TB, following her testimony the day before?
What were the defense lawyers meant to do with this information??
It had to mean something significant.

Re Security CONCERNS. I doubt it involved threats towards Michelle. She walked alone to the court, head held high. Her whole body was held very straight too, almost model like.


Trailing by a few pages lol.

 

[kittythehare]

Re Security CONCERNS. I doubt it involved threats towards Michelle. She walked alone to the court, head held high. Her whole body was held very straight too, almost model like.


Trailing by a few pages lol.

nothing new after that, sadly.
Case attracted worldwide attention when it broke, there's 3 -5 journos tweeting and reporting accurately.
It's a shame.

 

[tresir2012]

No, she is not the 2013 graveyard attack victim.

How do you know that?

 

[tresir2012]

The problem seems to be that there are no recorded movements of that car from very soon after he picked her up.
There is no way to know what he did.
Unless he confesses and the time for that was 2 yrs ago.
He never said he had destroyed her body, he said no-one will ever find her, possibly suggesting she was intact when he hid her.
Michelle left Thursday night.
It's quite possible he went stalking that night too.
No reported movements for Sunday either.
He planned on 'killing a person' according to superseding indictment.
He tortured her- blood evidence confirms that as does dNA evidence
He lied to FBI- confirmed and proved.
He definitely does fit the shoes of a serial killer in many respects.
If he were to keep her body, either intact or beheaded, is it not more likely he would have kept it close to his home, possibly to share with his new-found friends.
I'm disgusted no film footage or photographs were found. He had a declared interest in video-making on his fetlife profile.

Have you got a specific link for the first sentence about no reported movements?

 

[kittythehare]

Have you got a specific link for the first sentence about no reported movements?

You will find all court actions on this link
Docket for United States v. Christensen, 2:17-cr-20037 - CourtListener.com

You will find exhibits list on this link
Exhibits | Central District of Illinois | United States District Court
Everything else is already on the thread.

 

[tresir2012]

You will find all court actions on this link
Docket for United States v. Christensen, 2:17-cr-20037 - CourtListener.com

You will find exhibits list on this link
Exhibits | Central District of Illinois | United States District Court
Everything else is already on the thread.

If you know exactly where it is in there can you please C/P it into the thread so that we do not all have to search thru for the answer. If I am asked for a link then I usually try to provide an exact one and share the info, whenever possible which helps other posters also. That's the purpose of having a discussion thread IMO.

 

[tresir2012]

Re Security CONCERNS. I doubt it involved threats towards Michelle. She walked alone to the court, head held high. Her whole body was held very straight too, almost model like.


Trailing by a few pages lol.

Was this on video or a description in MSM? Would link a link if possible.

 

[kittythehare]

Was this on video or a description in MSM? Would link a link if possible.

yesterday's Gazette.
Christensen's ex-wife testifies about marital issues
This paragraph
Before the trial resumed Friday, Shadid said he met privately that morning with Christensen's lawyers — without Christensen present — about a "security issue brought to my attention." He did not elaborate.
Link was posted yesterday, btw

 

[MeadowMuffin]

Yes, reinterview her and her married boyfriend Ryan and his wife. One of them will break.

Through some internet searching it appears that Ryan and MZ live together, I don't know what happened to his wife, if he was ever married. For the life of me I don't know why she still defends BC. Why she testified for the defense is beyond me. And the fact that her messages to/from BC were redacted is also very telling. BTW RV and BC look so much alike they could be brothers.

 

[kittythehare]

The mold removal would involve beach tho...either way ..for someone to just randomly say...I returned home and everything smelled normal is just plain odd!

That was what he put in his maintenance request on the 12th, I believe.
Maintenance man stated he saw no mold when he came but sprayed it anyway, spent about 30 minutes there.
I reckon he wasn't sure he had completely obliterated all evidence and figured maintenance people would have different chemicals? Maybe?

 

[Deleted member 158085]

Just a few thoughts on the search for YY. Some of my info is just MOO, some from news reports, some from court testimony, some from my knowledge of LE in Champaign County, some from my intinate knowledge of growing up and working on farms and having many farm friends in Champaign CO.

1. The FBI has only a few agents permanently assigned in the Champaign office. Their job in a missing person case is to liason with the much more numerous local LE agencies in the area for the search. The FBI did call in other agents from Springfield and Chicago but these agents were mostly tech experts and crime scene investigators.
2. From local news reports, from the 55 minute interview with BC around June 15, it was clear that LE was working extreme hours looking for YY. There were many tips reported that had to be followed up on, both the FBI agent and the UIPD officer said they (and I assume many others) were working till midnight on the search for those first 6 days.
3. The LE and citizen search efforts were not heavily reported by media and I don't know why. But the agencies involved included: FBI, UIPD, Urbana PD, Champaign PD, Champaign Sheriff Dept, Champaign County Search and Rescue with trained search dogs, LE dive teams, at least 600 U of I Chinese students, and unknown contributions from smaller PDs in Champaign CO. Many hundreds of hours of overtime were put in by these hundreds of LE officers searching for YY.
4. The remoteness of areas in Champaign CO has been quoted in this forum as "vast" to "most farmers know what goes on near their farms". Fom my experience as a high school student and U of I college student in the 80s, if we wanted to drive out to a remote cornfield using a dirt access road between or next to the field we could drive in 50 yards off the county road and be hidden by all cars passing by (if any, which weren't many, and sometimes none) and drink beer and play music all night if we wanted and nobody ever bothered us. We never left a mess so no one knew we were ever there.
5. There are literally thousands of remote turnouts in fields within 20-30 miles of CU in any direction: N,S,E,W. It wouldn't even take any "scouting" to locate a remote place like this, they are everywhere. And unlike this year with the wet fields, the corn crop was already fairly high in June 2017 as seen in the photo of YY out at a U of I field testing location.
6. It would only take approximately two hours max to drive from CU to one of the remote locations in the nearly completely unpopulated areas 20-30 miles from CU, bury a body Ted Bundy style, and be back home in CU. His vehicle had no GPS tracking system like OnStar, he left his disabled phone at home, disposed of YYs disabled phone and backpack no telling where unless he buried them too.
7. That would use around a quarter tank of gas which would leave another quarter tank to drive around campus looking for other victims prior to YY plus run errands to buy rum and cleaning supplies. You can pretty much drive every street in and around the U of I campus in a 30mpg Astra on a quarter tank of gas. The campus isn't that big area wise.

These are MOO based on my experience driving 75% of the country roads in Champaign County over the years. (I worked as a surveyor and in road construction in Champaign County for several years in addition to growing up in the country in the County).

All of this, yes! I didn’t even think to mention the existence of turnouts because they are common knowledge where I’m from.

 

[tresir2012]

yesterday's Gazette.
Christensen's ex-wife testifies about marital issues
This paragraph
Before the trial resumed Friday, Shadid said he met privately that morning with Christensen's lawyers — without Christensen present — about a "security issue brought to my attention." He did not elaborate.
Link was posted yesterday, btw

TY
C/P

Small amount from Kitty's link


"Christensen hasn't done much throughout the trial besides smiling when he sees his dad, chatting with his lawyers and eating a quick snack during breaks.

But when his former wife, Michelle Zortman, walked in Friday to testify for the defense, he couldn't take his eyes off her.

It was in stark contrast to the two previous days, when he tried to avoid looking at his ex-girlfriend, who secretly recorded their conversations for the FBI and testified for about seven hours.

Asked whether she was aware Ms. Zhang got in Christensen's car, Zortman said, "I'm aware he's responsible for her death."

But she said she continues to call Christensen, despite their divorce, because "he was the biggest person in my life for most of a decade."

"It's difficult to end ties like that," Zortman said.

She described how they went to high school together in Wisconsin and worked at Kmart together as cashiers.

They started dating in 2008, the same year Christensen had a horrible accident while working for a roofing company, when a board he was standing on broke and he fell, breaking his wrists and elbows.

His doctor called it the "Super Bowl of wrist injuries," Zortman said.

In 2009, they moved to Madison so Christensen could attend the University of Wisconsin.

She said they had no social life, instead spending almost all their time together, playing video games and watching TV.

Zortman said she did virtually all the cooking.

"He made a steak once in Stevens Point," Wis., she said.

Zortman could recall just one night where they didn't sleep together because he had friends over.

They were married in 2011 by a lawyer in a hotel, with their parents and four friends present. She remembered wearing a green sweater and jeans.

In 2013, they moved to Champaign so Christensen could pursue his doctorate in physics at the University of Illinois."

ETA went back to continue reading and they want a survey completed and to subscribe so couldn't find the "walk like a model" bit.

 

[CUlocal]

I’ve been trying to find that creepy video of BC when he was in high school....can’t find it anywhere...

I don't think you'll find it. I went back quite a ways (thread 4) looking for it. I found the post with the link, but the link is now dead. Someone (I'm assuming MZ), went to a lot of trouble deleting things from the internet for him.

 

[tresir2012]

Christensen's ex-wife differs wth FBI agents' testimony

This article is from December 2018 and is a reminder, maybe, of why she is a witness for the defence.

"Zortman said that when she was awakened by the agents’ arrival at the apartment, Christensen opened the door, and she went to see who he was talking to.

Naked and startled, Zortman said she tried to cover herself with her hands and then quickly went to her bedroom alone to put on a robe after being asked to do so.

That directly contradicted Monday testimony from FBI agents, who said Zortman initially refused to put on clothes and stood there with her hands on her hips before eventually agreeing to put on a robe. Agents testified that she was accompanied for safety reasons by a female agent, Katherine Tenaglia, who checked the robe for any potential weapons."

 

[CUlocal]

Christensen's ex-wife differs wth FBI agents' testimony

This article is from December 2018 and is a reminder, maybe, of why she is a witness for the defence.

Yeah. I don't believe her.

 

[tresir2012]

Yeah. I don't believe her.

Me neither.

Who would you believe, the FBI or the wife of a killer? Also, she had to recognise her car and him on that video and she also knew of his therapy visits. I cannot believe she has escaped charges TBH.