After seeing the posters, Wu threatened to “chop [his victim’s] fingers off” if she continued to place them up across the campus the place each had studied. In response to prosecutors, he additionally offered her particulars to his mom, a Chinese language authorities official.
In a message shared with the court docket, Wu informed his sufferer that her household in China ought to count on a go to from state safety brokers, whom he mentioned he had knowledgeable about her actions, warning her that she can be detained by border officers if she have been to return to the nation.
The professional-democracy posters included the slogans: “We wish freedom … We wish democracy … Stand with Chinese language individuals,” in accordance with {a photograph} shared by the sufferer on her Instagram account in October 2022. Prosecutors mentioned she was initially from China however now a everlasting U.S. resident.
In response to prosecuting attorneys, Wu launched into a focused marketing campaign of harassment throughout e mail and social media after seeing the fliers in query. “I already referred to as the tip-off line,” Wu mentioned in a message: “The general public safety company will go greet your loved ones.” In an e mail despatched to the sufferer days later, he wrote: “I hope your loved ones is having a great time being greeted. Be ‘secure.’”
The sufferer’s household in China was subjected to “repeated visits” by authorities officers on account of the case, prosecutors informed the court docket, and she or he now not seems like she will safely return to China.
After his arrest in December 2022, a federal jury convicted Wu in January — he was residing in the USA on a scholar visa — of 1 depend of cyberstalking and one depend of interstate transmission of threatening communication.
Wu will spend three years of supervised launch after the completion of his nine-month sentence, in accordance with Wednesday’s assertion from the Justice Division.
“Mr. Wu’s legal conduct may be very critical,” performing U.S. legal professional Joshua S. Levy mentioned in an announcement. “He harnessed the concern of potential retribution from the [People’s Republic of China] authorities to harass and threaten an harmless particular person who had posted an innocuous, pro-democracy flier on the Berklee campus.”
FBI Particular Agent Jodi Cohen praised the bravery of Wu’s sufferer in coming ahead. “What Mr. Wu did — in weaponizing the authoritarian nature of the Folks’s Republic of China to threaten this girl — is extremely disturbing,” she mentioned.
Legal professionals representing Wu didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark early Thursday.
In an earlier memorandum, Wu’s attorneys mentioned he acknowledged that his conduct over the course of two days had been reactive, impulsive and immature. They mentioned their shopper’s actions mirrored a collision of two cultures: “His personal extremely sheltered upbringing in Communist China, and the democratic norms of the USA, lots of which have been nonetheless comparatively new to him on the time of his offense.” In response to his legal professionals, Wu will likely be deported by immigration officers after his case is over and won’t be permitted to reenter the USA.
Since 2019, the variety of Chinese language college students visiting the USA has declined by greater than 20 %, in accordance with State Division figures — with numbers failing to recuperate from a direct hunch triggered by the pandemic.
A part of the decline is because of Beijing’s crackdown on teams supporting the exchanges, however Chinese language college students and teachers have additionally been subjected to elevated scrutiny on the U.S. border. In 2020, the Trump administration tightened visa laws for Chinese language Communist Celebration members, who quantity round 92 million, in addition to their shut relations — limiting their U.S. visas to a single-entry, one-month keep.