Who (Really) Killed Jim Li?
By J. J. Ghosh | 03 Oct, 2025

The murder of lawyer Jim Li by his former client Xiaoning Zhang shocked Queen's Chinese community. And there may be even more to the story than they realized.

Jim Li, age 66, was murdered by his former client Xiaoning Zhang

When it comes to committing murder, arguably the most heinous act imaginable, Asian American Pacific Islanders have the lowest arrest rates of any single demographic. 

According to the FBI, while Blacks, Whites and Hispanics combine for about 97% of murders, AAPIs are responsible for just 1.4%, barely 22% of our fair share by population.

So when a murder at the hands of an Asian American does occur, it’s all the more jarring. Especially in a case like that of 27 year-old Xiaoning Zhang whose gruesome actions in 2022 leave us with more questions than answers.

This iconic image, known as "Tank Man" captures the 1989 events in Tiananmen Square which Jim Li participated in 

The Facts of the Case

In January of 2022 Xiaoning Zhang, a 25 year-old Chinese woman, showed up at the office of a prominent Queens immigration attorney in search of legal representation. 

She sat down with Jim Li, telling him a harrowing tale about how she had been raped by a police officer in Beijing, and after coming forward to Chinese authorities, was herself aprehended and thrown in a mental institution in an effort to silence her and cover up her allegations. 

Zhang had allegedly made it out and fled to the US in 2021 in search of political asylum.  She believed that Li was the man who could help her. 

From information that Li would later document in a comprehensive memo, we know the attorney had some concerns about Zhang, including her mental state.  But he ultimately agreed to take her on as a client on a pro bono basis as he had been doing with many Chinese immigrants in need.

As time went on, there were tensions between the two. In his memo, he would describe her as “mentally disturbed.”

Eventually, things came to a head between Zhang and Li.   She demanded that he help get photos of her protest outside of the United Nations removed from the internet.  Li could or would not do it, telling Zhang that this was well beyond the bounds of the pro-bono immigration services he was offering her. 

On one day n February, Zhang admitted to Li that she had lied about being raped in Beijing. While she had heard of something similar happening to other women, it had never happened to her.  She was in the US on a visa. Li dropped her as a client and demanded that she leave. 

But Zhang continued to return to the office. And on one visit she began choking Li by the neck.  The police were called, though according to bodycam footage, Li asked that they not arrest out of fear that it might hurt her asylum case.   Zhang was escorted out and again told to never return.

Three days later, on Monday morning, March 14, Zhang returned to Li’s office.  This time, with a conciliatory tone.  She even brought a cake for him and his staff as a token of her gratitude for all that they had done for her.

Li accepted the gesture and invited Zhang to his office.

Shortly after, employees reported hearing screams.

Once in the office, Zhang had produced a paring knife and a large kitchen knife.  She stabbed him in the neck and abdomen.

When Li's co-worker came running in, following the screams, he found him in a pool of blood, with Zhang standing behind him.  He detained Zhang until the police could arrive.

Li was rushed to the hospital where he was declared dead.

Jim Li

Any murder is a tragedy. But the death of Jim Li, born Li Jinjin hit Flushing’s Chinese community especially hard.

Li a titan in the world of immigration law, was a former Chinese political dissident, like Zhang had claimed to be. 

In 1989 Jim was getting his doctorate in constitutional law at Beijing University when the events commonly known as Tiananmen Square occurred. 

Not only was he present at the pro-democracy student protests that ultimately left hundreds dead when the Chinese government unleashed retaliatory violence on the crowd, but he was providing legal advice to some of the major organizers involved. 

Li was fortunate to survive the events of Tiananmen Square unharmed, but the Chinese government was intent on bringing everyone involved to justice. 

He fled to his home in Wuhan, but Beijing authorities tracked him down, arresting him in front of his family in the dead of night. 

Li would spend the next two years at Qincheng Prison alongside numerous other political prisoners. He would later tell friends that he was interrogated on numerous occasions, but never cooperated. 

In 1991 when he was out, he left China for the US, studying at Columbia University and then University of Wisconsin where he completed his Doctorate.

According to a friend of Li his time at Beijing University — where he held a high position in the student government  — had put him on track for a bright and successful future in the Chinese government. 

Instead, years later, he was working at a restaurant in New York, unable to get a job at a law firm due to his shaky English. 

He had sacrificed nearly everything for his democratic ideals.

And so, once his legal career was underway, he devoted his life to continue pursuing those ideals.

As a lawyer, he helped immigrants make it to the US.

He dedicated his free time to pro-Democracy programs.

And represented clients who had been persecuted just like him, including others who were present at Tiananman Square.

But he always held on to the dream of one day returning to China and helping his homeland achieve the dream of democracy. 

Until he was murdered. 

The Trial

“Why is Mr. Li dead? I still have no idea why,” asked Queens Supreme Court Justice Kenneth Holder. “I don't think we ever will.”

Body cam footage, DNA evidence and eyewitness testimony left little need for speculation as to how this happened. But why is another question. 

Over the two week trial in 2024 the prosecution, led by Assistant District Attorney Kenneth Zawistowski, made the case that Zhang was not just some feeble foreigner but rather “This was a violent act by an educated, manipulative, and vindictive person.” 

He pointed out the reverberating effects of Ms. Zhang’s actions: 

“She took away not just a husband, a son, and a colleague, but the voice of the countless clients who relied on Jim for support.”

But while the prosecution painted the portrait of a pre-meditated action of someone who knew what they were doing, Zhang’s defense attorneys — who must surely have had some level of unease knowing what happened to her last attorney  — told a different story:

Far from pre-mediated, the events of March 14 were the result of “a profound loss of self-control” they argued. This incident was the product of a “schizophrenic, unmedicated, untreated.”  They asked for leniency, calling this “a failure of the system.” 

Zhang’s actions throughout the trial may very well have supported or undermined the mental health argument. While generally calm and quiet, she made at least one outburst against her own attorney during the opening remarks and appeared combative with the prosecutor during her own testimony. 

Finally, at the end of the trial, Zhang removed her facemask for the first time, tears streaming down her face. 

“I am not the person they say I am,” she said through an interpreter.  “For the past three years I have been thinking of him.” 

But that was more or less the extent of her remorse, if you can call it that. 

Zhang pushed back against the prosecution’s portrayal of her as a manipulative murderer, alleging that they had been lying.  She denied choking Jim and claimed that there were discrepancies in the autopsy report and her psychiatric evaluation.

But in the end, the jury didn’t buy it. Zhang was found guilty of murder and sentenced to the maximum 25 years in prison. 

The Motive

The presiding judge may not have known Zhang’s motive. But he did have a theory. 

“One could easily reach the conclusion you came [to this country] to kill Mr. Jim,” he told Zhang. “This killing seemed efficient.”

Even the most conspiracy theory-adverse individuals might agree that there is enough evidence in this case to wonder if the judge is onto something. 

The Judge did not outright accuse Zhang of coming here on behalf of the Chinese government, intent on carrying out a goal of silencing one of their biggest critics.  But at least some facts in this case would support such a theory.

Despite Zhang’s alleged pursuit of freedom from a repressive government, she at times expressed sentiments to Jim Li that disparaged his pro-Democracy work.  Per New York Magazine, a memo by Li detailed a time that she asked whether he “felt guilty about participating in the pro-democracy movement, given the “pain” it had caused his family” which on its own might have seemed like a valid question.  But there were other incidents.

She allegedly referred to other members of the Tiananmen Protests as “dogs” and at one point called Li a loser.

There were a few other pieces of evidence as well:

Li’s co-workers allegedly found flags representing China and the Communist Party that Zhang had left behind in his office. 

And when Zhang was leaving the jail following her arraignment, she got into a shouting match with a heckler who asked if she felt regret.  “You’re the ones who should feel regret!” shouted Zhang, before calling them “traitors” and accusing them of “killing children,” a possible reference to the Tiananmen Square protestors.

And perhaps most damning: At roughly the same time that Li was killed, federal prosecutors in DC announced that five men had been arrested and charged with spying on Chinese dissidents in the U.S.  One such man was Wang Shujun, a historian who served as Secretary-General of Li’s foundation.  According to the Justice Department, Shujun had been collecting intelligence for China’s Ministry of State Security since 2005. 

According to Wang Juntao, a fellow Chinese dissident and friend of Li’s, “The dissident community has a consensus that this is political murder” carried out because Li was helping the US government expose moles.

And yet, the idea that the Chinese government had Li killed is not accepted as fact. 

Others like Nicholas Eftimiades, a foreign intelligence officer and expert in Chinese espionage,  see this as a far-fetched conspiracy.  He believes that China is too smart to risk their entire relationship with the US for a move like this. 

Even Juntao acknowledges that he may be mistaken.  As he told New York Magazine, “Sometimes people like me confuse subjective impression with objective reality. If we believe something is true, it’s actually based on our hope, not on reality.” 

We may never know Zhang’s motives for certain.  Until his last breath, Jim Li died fighting for a Democratic China.  And who knows, we may still see one in Zhang’s lifetime.