On January 26, 2024, at 1:35 p.m. local time in the United States, the "Google Wife Murder Case" was heard again in the Santa Clara County Court in the San Francisco Bay Area.
And this time, we still did not wait for the appearance of the defendant Chen Liren.
This much-watched trial has been delayed again and again.
The previous three court hearings were scheduled for the 18th, 19th and 24th, but they were all postponed for some reason, and this time, he was still "unable to appear in court because he was in the hospital".
The trial was postponed again to February 5, local time in the United States, and according to California law, he must appear in court within 14 days of being indicted, that is, on February 5, he must appear in court!
Supreme Court of Santa Clara County, San Francisco Bay Area
The picture comes from the Internet, and the copyright belongs to the original author
01
Chen's lawyer is not small!
Chen's defense lawyer in this case is Wesley James, who has 40 years of legal experience and specializes in domestic violence cases.
According to local netizens, he is the best defense lawyer in Santa Clara County in the Bay Area.
Lawyer James had hoped to secure bail, but the judge rejected it and made it clear that he would not be released on bail.
Michael Gadeberg, the prosecutor in charge of the case at the Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office, said the district attorney's office had tried to arraign Mr. Chen on January 18 and 19, but both were postponed for some reason, and it was unclear whether the suspect's medical condition prevented him from appearing in court.
On the 24th, Chen Liren was arraigned again, but Chen Liren was unable to go to the scene, saying that he "left the prison and returned to the hospital." ”
The prosecution insisted that it would continue to be arraigned at a later date and would not give up.
Gadeberg said the district prosecutor had filed murder charges with the court and filed a statement of facts and explained why prosecutors held Mr. Chen responsible.
Chen Liren was charged with felony first-degree murder.
According to the World News Network, citing an online name called @Wuji Netizen (the netizen claimed to be a relative of Yu Xuanyi), Chen Liren's parents rushed to the United States from China as soon as the case occurred and hired three lawyers.
The parents of the victim's woman, Yu Xuanyi, are still waiting for the visa procedures because they could not get a visa to the United States in the first time. It is estimated that it will take about a week to process the visa.
02
会用精神病Insanity Defense辩护吗？
According to the speculation of netizens, the reason why Chen has been delaying again and again is to "hold back the big move", and he may use insanity defense.
Insanity defense refers to a criminal defense system in which the defendant requests the court to reduce or exempt him from criminal responsibility on the grounds that he suffered from mental illness or defect at the time of committing the criminal act.
The psychiatric defense system is an important system in the American criminal justice system, which is rooted in the culpability of punishment and emphasizes the "free will" of the perpetrator:
That is, only the criminal act committed by the perpetrator under the control of his free will is "blameworthy" and responsible for his or her act.
After the complainant has filed a psychiatric plea, the judge may direct the jury to render the following four verdicts:
One is "not guilty," which means not admitting guilt.
The second is "not guilty by reason of insanity", that is, although the prosecution proves that the defendant committed all the necessary fields to commit the crime, the defendant suffered from mental illness or defect at the time of the crime and is not criminally responsible;
The third is "guilty but mentally ill", that is, although the defendant suffered from mental illness or defects at the time of the crime, he is guilty because he does not meet the legal standards for mental illness defense.
If this is the case, it will not be in prison, but in a psychiatric hospital,
In fact, in the United States, the use of psychiatric defense is time-consuming and labor-intensive, and the success rate is very low. Unless Chen is really mentally ill and meets the criteria for a psychiatric defense.
03
Before the incident, he had a dinner party with friends
According to the Santa Clara Police Department, based on the on-site investigation, interviews with witnesses and related persons, review of official reports, and review of evidence, the following reports were provided to reconstruct the scene of the crime and before and after the crime:
The report comes from the Santa Clara Police Department's website
The copyright belongs to the original author
At around 11 a.m. on Jan. 16, the Santa Clara County Police Department received a call that a fatal case had occurred at a home on Valley Way in Santa Clara, Bay Area, and police came to conduct a security check.
The house is home to a young Chinese couple, Liren Chen, a 27-year-old Google employee, and Yu Xuanyi Yu, a 27-year-old Google employee.
The picture shows the wedding photos of Chen Liren and Yu Xuanyi.
Image source network, the copyright belongs to the original author
The informant said that he was a friend of the couple, and according to the friend, he had dinner with the couple the night before the incident, but apparently felt that Chen Liren was "quiet and in a daze all night". The friend told police that he was concerned about this apparent change in Mr. Chen's demeanor.
The next day, when he tried to contact the couple, he found that the phone had not been answered. Because the two families lived not far away, they decided to drive to the client's house to see what was going on.
When the friend arrived at the couple's door and rang the doorbell, no one answered the door for a long time, so he went around to the back of the house and tried to look inside through the back window. Through the window, he saw the man Chen Liren kneeling motionless, his hands in the air, and in a daze, but his coat and socks were stained with blood, so he called the police.
When the police arrived at the scene, there was still no response, so the police forcibly entered the house and detained him. Subsequently, his wife, Yu Xuanyi, was found lying in a pool of blood in the bedroom, with no vital signs.
According to the police, the scene was very tragic, with a lot of blood on the floor of the bedroom and blood stains behind the door. The victim, Yu Xuanyi, had "severe blunt force trauma" to his head, but no murder weapon was found in the house that caused the blunt force trauma. In addition, her husband, Chen Liren's right hand, was extremely swollen and purple, and there were blood stains on his clothes, legs, arms and hands, and scratches on his arms.
When questioned by the police, Chen Liren confessed and said, "I beat to death." Therefore, it is inferred that it is very likely that Chen Liren beat his wife to death with one punch after another.
According to public allegation documents, Chen Liren is currently charged with a felony of wounding causing death. If convicted, he is most likely sentenced to life in prison.
Pictured here is the arrest record released by the Santa Clara Police Department.
The picture shows the scheduled records of the Chen Liren Correctional Facility.
04
They in the eyes of their neighbors
According to California real estate records, Chen Liren and Yu Xuanyi bought their house at 714 Valley Way for $2.05 million last April. The two-story house is located in a quiet residential area of Silicon Valley, freshly painted with a manicured lawn and bushes.
The picture shows Chen Liren and Yu Xuan's newly moved into the house.
Source: Dailymail.com
A silver BMW SUV is parked in front of the now-closed garage door. Last Tuesday (January 16), when crime scene investigators arrived at the scene of the crime in the morning, the house was crowded with crime scene investigators inside and outside until the evening.
"That's my bedroom window," said Jenny Powell, a 43-year-old neighbor next door to the couple, "and I was shocked that I didn't know anything about it when it was all happening." ”
More than a dozen police cars poured into the neighborhood, and a CSI truck was parked in front of her house almost all day. ”
The picture shows Chen Liren and Yu Xuanyi's neighbor, Jenny Powell.
Source: Dailymail.com
Powell said the young couple moved next door in April last year and that they also have a cat named Cooper together. They seemed friendly and gave her cookies and a card when they moved in.
But the young Chinese couple was mostly silent. Powell's son, surprised to hear about the murder, asked his mother, "Do you mean the neighbor next door who is often closed?"
Powell said that because they had only been here for a short time, they had not had the opportunity to interact with many people.
Another neighbor, Sylivia Atondo, also said she rarely saw the young couple, only occasionally seeing them walk through the neighborhood a few times.
"Every time I see them, I feel like they're friendly and I don't find a single thing. Our community is very close-knit, so generally if it's any quarrel that is designed, the people around you will talk about it. But this time no one understood, and that's why the neighbors were shocked," Atondo said.
05
Chen Liren was once a "celebrity" in Chengdu's education circle
What is embarrassing is that Chen Liren graduated from Chengdu No. 7 High School and was admitted to Tsinghua University in 2014 with high scores in the school.
Because of his height of 190 and his handsome face, he is loved and pursued by many people.
The picture shows the wedding photos of Chen Liren and Yu Xuanyi.
Image source network, the copyright belongs to the original author
After graduating from Tsinghua University, Chen Liren went on to pursue a master's degree at UCSD. After graduating, he worked at TuSimple for half a year before joining Google as a programmer developing the YouTube shorts algorithm.
His wife, Yu Xuanyi, was the top science student in the college entrance examination in Songyuan City, Jilin Province in 2014, with a gentle personality, and her parents are in educational institutions. He entered Tsinghua University in the same year as Chen Liren, and after graduation, he also went to UCSD in the United States to study for a master's degree.
Yu Xuanyi worked at Amazon for 2 years, and then joined Google in June 2021 after being pushed by her husband Chen Liren in Google, and is also a programmer.
At present, Chen Liren and Yu Xuanyi are still Chinese nationals.
It is reported that Chen Liren has been a celebrity in Chengdu's education industry since he was a child, that is, "someone else's child". When he was in elementary school, Chen Liren was rated as an outstanding citizen of Sichuan Province, a "top ten" teenager candidate in Chengdu, a deputy captain of the youth team, and won the first prize in the final of the 12th National "Hua Luogeng Cup" Youth Mathematics Invitational Competition.
After graduating from Chengdu No. 7 High School, he was admitted to Tsinghua University, and he is still on the list of high school alma maters.
When Chen was interviewed in high school, he was still a high-spirited and confident teenager.
Chen Liren also became the cover character of West China Metropolis Daily because of his "super learning ability", talking about his learning methods.
was originally a high-IQ scholar who was a good match, but the result was so tragic. It seems that the "right match" that everyone believes in may not be a sufficient condition for a happy marriage.
Academic qualifications can filter the "scum", but not the "scum".
Someday
We are all responsible for what we do
No one is exempt
Hopefully February 5th
We can wait for a convincing answer
END