Father’s message for daughter’s kidnapper
Print Edition
THE father of Chinese student Zhang Yingying, believed to have been abducted just weeks after arriving in the United States, has a message for whoever might have taken her.
“We will forgive you, but please, let Yingying go.”
Zhang Ronggao has traveled to Illinois from his home in Nanping in southeast China’s Fujian Province, to await word of his daughter.
In an interview, the 53-year-old factory worker, speaking through a translator, also had a message for his daughter: “Yingying, please be strong.”
She took the same career path as many other young Chinese academics before her — traveling to a university in the US with dreams of one day landing a professorship and being able to help her parents financially.
But just weeks after arriving at the University of Illinois, the 26-year-old visiting scholar in agriculture sciences stepped off a bus on a sunny afternoon and got into a black hatchback. She hasn’t been seen since.
Her disappearance on June 9 on her way to sign an apartment lease is being treated as a kidnapping.
The case has shaken staff and students at Illinois’ flagship public school in Urbana-Champaign. And it’s led some parents of the more than 300,000 Chinese students currently studying at American universities to question whether it’s safe to send their children to the US.
Police and the FBI say the case is top priority, though they have withheld details of their investigation, even from the father, said Zhang’s boyfriend, who sat in on the interview at the weekend.
“There’s so little we can do at home, but we’d like the local police in the United States to stay on top of the case and not to let it slide,” said Zhao Kaiyun, a roommate of Zhang’s at Peking University Shenzhen Graduate School. Zhang graduated last year with a masters’ degree in environmental engineering.
The University of Illinois has the largest Chinese student population of any US college, with 5,600 students, according to US government data.
Coincidentally, university representatives recently held an orientation session in China for students headed to the school and their parents. There were several questions about Zhang’s disappearance, said Robin Kaler, associate chancellor for public affairs.
“Parents were very concerned,” she said. “We obviously tell them that it is a very safe community in general, but that there are instances when horrible things can happen. And this is one instance.”
Zhang was researching crop photosynthesis, Kaler said, and was expected to start work on her PhD in the fall.
One central motivation for everything she did was a desire to help her parents in Nanping, a city in a picturesque part of China amid mountain ranges and forests, her boyfriend said. She had set aside part of her research income to buy her parents devices to make their lives easier, including a microwave and a cellphone.
Her boyfriend and her father described her as bright and studious, fun-loving and outgoing. She plays the guitar and was lead singer in band called Cute Horse at college in China.
She is also street-smart and cautious and would not normally get into a car with a stranger unless duped or forced.
Some reports suggested she may have called a ride-sharing service because she was running late, though investigators have not confirmed that. Police said they received a separate report of someone posing as a police officer trying to lure women into his car, but have not said if it could be related.
Henry Chang-Yu Lee, a Connecticut-based criminal forensics expert who was born in China, said Zhang’s case stands out because she disappeared in daylight hours.
Investigators are probably focused on identifying the owner of the car, trying to enhance surveillance video to read the license plate, he said. They would also be combing lists of sex-offenders to see if anyone can be tied to the vehicle.
Zhang’s father refuses to believe she won’t be found alive and he is staying on in Illinois. “I will wait for you,” he said. “And we will definitely find you.”
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