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When Leo Li arrived in New Zealand on a visitor’s visa five years ago, he used a passport with a different name and birth date to his own.
Authorities had no idea he was a convicted killer jailed for the 2002 murder of his 21-year-old girlfriend, whose body was found in a suitcase near a lake in Canada, where the pair were living as international students.
Had they known, it’s doubtful he would have gotten in.
Li managed to live under the radar and started a new life with his wife and two children, who he lives with in central Auckland.
At some stage - perhaps when Li applied for refugee status - his past caught up with him and Immigration New Zealand is now trying to deport him.
Convicted killer Leo Li has been denied refugee asylum in NZ. Photo / Jason Oxenham
But in an interview with the Herald on Sunday, Li denied being involved in Amanda Zhao’s killing, saying she is “still alive and walking around somewhere”, and claiming he was a “political target” of the Chinese Communist Party.
Immigration NZ has denied Li’s application for refugee and protection status.
But he is appealing against the decision, claiming he would face imprisonment and torture, and his family will be at risk if they were deported back to China.
The 38-year-old is known as Leo Li to friends and associates here but it has emerged he has used multiple identities and was known as Ang Li when he moved to Vancouver from China in 2001.
Accused of murder
Li met Zhao while studying computer science at Simon Fraser University, Vancouver campus. She attended Coquitlam College where she studied English.
The couple moved in together and were living together in a basement flat with Li’s cousin Zhang Han when she went missing in October 2002.
Li told police Zhao went shopping that day and never returned and he had no idea what happened to her.
Amanda Zhao (1981-2002), was murdered in October 2002 in Vancouver, Canada.
Leo Li, also known as Ang Li as a student in Canada 20 years ago.
“We were in a relationship, maybe she wanted to leave me and didn’t know how to say, but she went out and then I never saw her again,” Li said.
“I was heartbroken when she didn’t return. I rang the police many times to report her missing but they took a long time before doing anything.”
About 10 days later, Zhao’s body was found by hikers, stuffed in a suitcase near Stave Lake, east of Vancouver, and an autopsy revealed that she had been strangled to death.
A few days later, Li left Canada for China before police could arrest him, but he said he told the Herald on Sunday he did so because his student visa was running out.
Li said he never saw the body and did not believe Zhao was dead.
“It was a political set-up by the CCP to get me into trouble, I believe Amanda could still be alive and walking around somewhere.”
Canadian police could not apprehend Li at the time because there was no extradition treaty between China and Canada.
His cousin Han had pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact for helping to dispose of Zhao’s body but a Vancouver judge threw out his confession. Han then returned to China.
China considered the killing to be a domestic affair while Canada disagreed, and it was only after years of diplomatic negotiations between the two countries that Chinese police arrested Li in 2009.
Stave Lake, east of Vancouver.
Canadian authorities agreed to provide Chinese police evidence in exchange for a guarantee that Li wouldn’t face the death penalty if convicted.
Li was charged with murder and sentenced to life imprisonment in 2011, but in 2014 a high court in Beijing changed the charge to manslaughter and reduced the term to seven years.
Aliases emerge
Li told the Herald on Sunday that when he first returned to China from Canada, he was very confused about his life and felt very angry with the false accusation about the murder. Around 2004, he met a Christian prophet and fortune teller who told him that his name Ang Li was bad luck.
“He told me that if I kept my name, these false accusations will follow me wherever I go,” Li said.
“So I changed my name to Jiaming Li so that I can get rid of my bad luck.”
Two years later, he married Ruixue Yuan and they had their first son.
In 2008, Li said he moved to Tibet where he joined in protests for democracy for the Chinese autonomous region.
Li said his father was the vice commander of the Tibet Miltary Region at the time and had received orders from top officials for the genocide of Tibetans.
Amanda Zhao's body was found stuffed in a suitcase in 2002.
“My father went against those orders, and I helped my father fight to keep the Tibetans alive,” he said.
Li was then transferred to a detention centre in Beijing and immediately interrogated and said he was referred to only by a secret code so as to prevent his family and friends from finding him.
“Nobody knew where I was, they just thought that I suddenly disappeared,” he said.
Li claimed his hands and feet were chained together, he was starved, not permitted to sleep and was hit by an officer in the head until he fell into a coma.
He was kept in custody until his trial in 2012 where he was found guilty of international homicide and sentenced to life in prison.
Li appealed against his conviction and the charge was eventually lessened to negligence causing death.
“They knew I was totally innocent but had to give me some sort of conviction because the Chinese Government had to give face to the Canadian Government,” he said.
A new life
Li said that after his release in 2016, he started devoting his life to Christianity and attended Jehovah’s Witness religious activities.
He wanted to find a job overseas so he could better support his family but when he applied for a passport under Jiaming Li, it was declined.
So he changed his name again, this time to Zongyuan Li, and also took on a different date of birth to get his new passport.
Using his new identity, he travelled to Europe in 2018 for a month before returning to China.
In September 2018, his wife gave birth to their second son.
Under the identity of Zongyuan Li, he successfully applied for a visitor’s visa and came to New Zealand in June 2019 as part of a Chinese group tour and returned to China after the trip.
Li lives in central Auckland with his wife and two children. Photo / Jason Oxenham.
He then made a new application for visitor visas for himself, his wife and their two sons.
Li said they decided to flee China permanently that month after the CCP asked him to present himself to the military subdistrict office, which he understood would mean that he would be detained and tortured again.
“I know now that I am a target of the CCP and I had to get out of China with my family as fast as I can,” he said.
So instead of presenting himself to the authorities, he packed his bag and headed to the airport with his ticket to New Zealand. He was joined by his family four days later.
Li’s parents provided funding for the travel and gave them money to buy a property in New Zealand.
Shortly after his arrival, he applied for a student visa to study English and this was approved in November 2019.
A month later, a new student visa was approved for him to study at the Southern Institute of Technology in Invercargill.
During the course of his studies at SIT, Li claimed he was harassed by students and teachers who were “acting as agents of the CCP”.
Li said he was currently unemployed as he did not have a visa that allowed him to work.
According to an INZ decision, Li, under the name Zongyuan Li, provided a clear Chinese police check character certificate (police clearance) as support for his application.
In between Covid lockdowns, he participated in protests in front of the Chinese Consulate calling for democracy in China.
Then in March last year, Li complained to police that his car had been damaged which he believed was part of a wider pattern of abuse and threats by people in NZ working on behalf of the Chinese authorities.
Li said he feared returning to China because of his Christian beliefs and his political activism had made him a target of the CCP.
He maintained he was not involved in the murder and thinks the conviction in China was politically motivated.
Li says he fears for the safety of his wife and sons because of their links with him.
Leo Li has been denied refugee asylum in NZ. Photo / Jason Oxenham.
However, in the decision to decline Li’s claims for recognition as a refugee and protected person, a refugee and protection officer concluded that several of his claims were not credible.
Li was asked to provide a psychological or psychiatric evaluation, but he instead gave a handwritten letter of general support from a fellow churchgoer who is a retired nurse with some history of working in psychiatric treatment settings.
“The letter can be accorded no value as a psychological or psychiatric evaluation,” the officer wrote.
Li also asked to revise the chronology to his summary of claims, which were noted but not incorporated.
He told them he did not accept that in 2003, the Crown in Canada approved a second-degree murder charge against him for the killing of Zhao.
He also wished to delete that Zhao’s body was found on October 20, 2002, because he believes she is still alive.
“The points remain unaltered in the chronology as both events were reported by reputable sources,” the report said.
“There is a concern that Mr Li has not been forthcoming in his documents and statements which affects the overall assessment of his credibility.”
It also noted that Li used multiple identities and provided three different dates of birth and two different places of birth.
“Mr Li has provided false, evolving, inconsistent and contradictory evidence to NZ authorities since his first arrival to the country,” it said.
“He has presented different identities and there remains uncertainty about his statement that he also holds a heretofore withheld fourth identity via a false Antigua and Barbuda passport.
“What can be surmised is that Mr Li is of changeable character and accustomed to performance and deception.”
The report also concluded that there was no real chance for Li and his immediate family to face persecution from the CCP if they returned to China now.
“There is no credible evidence of any of his described religious or activist profiles in China and the evidence he has provided during his time in New Zealand is undermined by his clear capacity for long-term fabrication and embellishment to suit his needs,” it said.
Li says he is appealing against the decision and will do everything within his means to stay in NZ because returning to China could mean “the end of me and my family”.
A petition signed by 1315 New Zealanders has also been submitted to Parliament urging the Government to allow Li and his family to remain.
Fiona Whiteridge, INZ general manager refugee and migrant services, says the agency was not able to comment on the case as it is with the Immigration and Protection Tribunal for appeal.
