A Chinese college student was sentenced to nine months in federal prison Wednesday for stalking and harassing a former fellow student who had shared pro-democracy fliers around campus.
According to prosecutors, Xiaolei Wu, 26, targeted his female victim — who was identified in court documents only as Zooey — after she posted fliers calling for solidarity with pro-democracy activists in China around the Berklee College of Music’s campus in Boston.
After seeing the posters, Wu threatened to “chop [his victim’s] hands off” if she continued to put them up around the campus where both had studied. According to prosecutors, he also provided her details to his mother, a Chinese government official.
In a message shared with the court, Wu told his victim that her family in China should expect a visit from state security agents, whom he said he had informed about her actions, warning her that she would be detained by border officials if she were to return to the country.
The pro-democracy posters included the slogans: “We want freedom … We want democracy … Stand with Chinese people,” according to a photograph shared by the victim on her Instagram account in October 2022, who prosecutors said was originally from China but now a permanent U.S. resident.
According to prosecuting attorneys, Wu embarked upon a targeted campaign of harassment across email and social media after seeing the fliers in question. “I already called the tip-off line,” Wu said in a message: “The public security agency will go greet your family.” In an email sent to the victim days later, he wrote: “I hope your family is having a good time being greeted. Be ‘safe’.”
The victim’s family in China was subjected to “repeated visits” by government officials as a result of the case, prosecutors told the court, and she no longer feels like she can safely return to China.
After his arrest in December 2022, a federal jury in January convicted Wu — who was living in the United States on a student visa — of one count of cyberstalking and one count of interstate transmission of threatening communication.
Wu will spend three years of supervised release after the completion of his nine-month sentence, according to Wednesday’s statement from the Department of Justice.
“Mr. Wu’s criminal conduct is very serious,” said acting U.S. Attorney Joshua S. Levy in a statement. “He harnessed the fear of potential retribution from the PRC government to harass and threaten an innocent individual who had posted an innocuous, pro-democracy flier on the Berklee campus.”
FBI Special Agent Jodi Cohen praised the bravery of Wu’s victim in coming forward. “What Mr. Wu did — in weaponizing the authoritarian nature of the People’s Republic of China to threaten this woman — is incredibly disturbing,” she said.
Lawyers representing Wu did not immediately respond to a request for comment early Thursday.
In an earlier memorandum, Wu’s attorneys said he acknowledged that his behavior over the course of two days had been reactive, impulsive, and immature. They said their client’s actions reflected a collision of two cultures: “His own highly sheltered upbringing in Communist China, and the democratic norms of the United States, many of which were still relatively new to him at the time of his offense.” According to his lawyers, Wu will be deported by immigration officials after his case is over and will not be permitted to reenter the United States.
Since 2019, the number of Chinese students visiting the United States has declined by more than 20 percent, according to State Department figures — with numbers failing to recover from an immediate slump triggered by the pandemic.
Part of the decline is due to Beijing’s crackdown on groups supporting the exchanges, but Chinese students and academics have also been subjected to increased scrutiny at the U.S. border. In 2020, the Trump administration tightened visa regulations for Chinese Communist Party members, who number around 92 million, as well as their close relatives — limiting their U.S. visas to a single-entry, one-month stay.