In Santa Clara County, California, the pre-trial hearing for the case of Liren Chen, a former Google engineer accused of killing his wife, commenced on Monday, June 23. The hearing was scheduled to last for three days, during which multiple witnesses testified, and the parents of the deceased also participated in the hearing remotely.
During the trial, the prosecution presented several surveillance videos from before and after the incident and called three key witnesses to the stand. The first witness, Santa Clara City Police Officer Jessica Mitz, testified that on the morning of January 16, 2024, she responded to a call and upon arrival at the scene, observed Liren Chen through a window with his hands raised, appearing dazed, and with blood stains on his clothing. The police then entered the residence, handcuffed Chen, conducted a search, and found an open suitcase in an upstairs room. It was mentioned that the caller had indicated Chen maintained contact with his ex-girlfriend, leading to tension in the marriage.
The second witness, Santa Clara Police Detective Ronald Miranda, provided kitchen surveillance footage from the time of the incident. The camera was initially set up to monitor pets but inadvertently captured crucial moments of the incident. The footage showed Chen entering and exiting the kitchen multiple times, wearing bloody clothes, and holding a kitchen knife and an electric saw, suggesting self-harm behavior. Additionally, a clip from the day before the incident showed Chen pushing his wife upon entering the house and then leaving alone.
The third witness to testify was the caller, Zixuan Wang. She was a longtime friend of the Chen couple and lived in the Bay Area at the time of the incident. Wang recalled inviting the couple for dinner the night before the incident, but Chen declined, citing work issues and a bad mood. Later, she received a message from Chen’s mother requesting a visit to their home.
Wang described Chen as silent and unresponsive during the visit, with minimal interaction and mostly relying on his wife, Zixuan, to carry the conversation. She mentioned that Chen had expressed experiencing high stress and work difficulties recently. Zixuan added that Chen was having trouble sleeping.
The trial for the Chinese engineer Liren Chen, charged with killing his wife, has not yet gone to full trial, but the couple’s property has been listed for sale. (Photo shows the crime scene. Xue Mingzhu /Epoch Times)
The incident occurred on the morning of January 16, 2024, at a residence on Valley Way in Santa Clara City. That day, Liren Chen had arranged to go to the hospital with a friend, Zixuan Wang, but he didn’t show up as planned. Concerned, Wang went to Chen’s house and discovered no one answering the door. When she looked through the window, she saw Chen kneeling inside, hands raised, with a blank expression and blood on his clothes, prompting her to call the police immediately.
When the authorities arrived, they witnessed Chen kneeling inside through the window, looking dazed with bloodstains on his clothes. They then forced entry and found Chen’s wife, Zixuan, lying lifeless in the downstairs bedroom. Her head had suffered severe blunt force trauma, and her body was positioned not far from where Chen knelt.
Paramedics noted that Chen’s clothes, legs, arms, and hands were “covered in blood,” but there were no apparent wounds on his body that could explain this. When questioned about his hand injuries, Chen admitted, “I hit my wife.” The prosecution later revealed that Chen’s arms showed scratch marks, with his right arm severely swollen and bruised.
The central figure in the case, Liren Chen, born in 1996, graduated from Tsinghua University in China with a degree in Electronic Engineering. He later pursued a Master’s degree in Computer Science at the University of California, San Diego. After graduation, he joined Google, working as a software engineer on the YouTube Shorts algorithm team.
His wife, Xuanyi Yu, also a Tsinghua University and UC San Diego alumna, had previously worked at the Amazon San Diego branch. Subsequently, she was recommended by Liren to work at Google. She achieved a score of 702 on the 2014 Jilin Songyuan City Science College Entrance Examination.
At the end of 2022, the couple entered matrimony. In 2023, they purchased a standalone house in Santa Clara for about $2.05 million. On social media, they often shared photos of their travels and outdoor activities.
On January 18, 2024, the California prosecution formally charged Liren Chen, scheduling the initial court appearance for that afternoon. However, Chen was undergoing medical treatment at the hospital and couldn’t attend, leading to a postponement of the hearing. Subsequent court dates on January 19, 24, 26, February 5, and 6 were arranged, but Chen failed to appear until February 9.
Following this, the defense attorney repeatedly requested delays in the trial proceedings citing the need to review newly acquired medical records, resulting in multiple court dates on April 19, June 7, and October 4, 2024, being postponed, causing a halt in the progress of the case. On May 29 of the same year, the Santa Clara residence where the incident occurred was sold for $2.32 million.
The case resurfaced in court on January 10, 2025. While the judge did not directly inquire whether Liren Chen pleaded guilty, the defense attorney indicated that the case had entered the pre-trial phase, implying the defendant’s non-guilty plea. ◇