3 Chinese Students Were Murdered at USC in 3 Years—What Happened?

In the spring of 2012, two Chinese graduate students attending the University of Southern California were shot and killed during a late-night robbery. Two years later, the university was rocked by another violent murder when a Chinese graduate student was beaten to death during a robbery.

The killings caused widespread confusion and fear on campus, particularly among Chinese international students enrolled at USC. Far from home and living in a large, unfamiliar city, many worried about their safety and wondered if they might become the next victims.

“There was a profound reaction and outrage by the community and the student body,” Daniel Akemon, a deputy district attorney with the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office, tells A&E Crime + Investigation. 

In the early morning hours of April 11, 2012, 23-year-old Chinese electrical engineering graduate students Ming Qu and Ying Wu were sitting in Qu’s parked 2003 BMW sedan about a mile from the USC campus when two men with guns approached. Qu tried to flee to safety by getting out of the vehicle and running to a nearby home, but was shot several times in the head during the botched robbery. Wu never made it out of the car and was shot once in the chest. Both were pronounced dead at the hospital. 

“The case was investigated by the elite LAPD robbery-homicide division and assigned to the major crimes division for prosecution, which speaks to how seriously the crime was taken by the district attorney’s office,” Akemon says.

Police later identified the killers as 20-year-old Bryan Barnes and 19-year-old Javier Bolden, who were not USC students. Barnes pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder in February 2014, and Bolden was convicted of first-degree murder and other related charges in October 2014. Both were sentenced to two consecutive life terms in prison without parole.

Four pieces of evidence were key for the prosecution, according to Akemon. Barnes and Bolden stole the victims’ cell phones, which investigators used to track down the suspects. Police also found two shell casings that matched a gun Bolden had used in a previous shooting. Investigators tapped Barnes and Bolden's phones and listened in on conversations in which they admitted to being involved in the killings. And finally, after Bolden’s arrest, he admitted his involvement to an informant sharing his cell.

Two years later, another Chinese electrical engineering graduate student was killed during a robbery. Around 12:45 a.m. on July 24, 2014, Xinran Ji was walking home from an on-campus study session when four teenagers attacked him. After being hit repeatedly with a metal baseball bat and a wrench, Ji managed to stagger back to his apartment, leaving behind a trail of blood. He died shortly after the attack.

Police arrested four suspects in the deadly assault: 16-year-old Alejandra Guerrero, 18-year-old Andrew Garcia, 19-year-old Jonathan Del Carmen and 17-year-old Alberto Ochoa. They were all later convicted or pleaded guilty to their involvement in the crime.

In October 2016, Guerrero was tried as an adult and convicted of first-degree murder, second-degree robbery, attempted second-degree robbery and assault with a deadly weapon. She was sentenced in 2018 to life in prison without the possibility of parole. However, in 2025, as a result of changes to the law that likely would have led to Guerrero’s case being re-tried in juvenile court, prosecutors agreed to have Guerrero’s first-degree murder charge vacated. She was re-sentenced to 15 years and eight months in prison on a voluntary manslaughter charge.

In June 2017, Garcia was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Del Carmen pleaded guilty in August 2017 to second-degree murder and was sentenced to 15 years to life. But in 2021, under a new felony murder rule, a judge redesignated Del Carmen’s conviction to attempted robbery and sentenced him to time served. 

Ochoa, who was also tried as an adult, was convicted in March 2019 of first-degree murder, assault with a deadly weapon, second-degree robbery and attempted second-degree robbery. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. 

The back-to-back slayings left many students at USC feeling shocked, saddened and scared—particularly those from other countries. International students at that time made up about one-fifth of USC’s student body, with about 2,500 students from China.

USC held vigils and memorial services for the victims, attended by hundreds of students and other mourners. Chinese leaders in Los Angeles got “very actively involved” in pushing for the prosecution of the killers, Akemon says. 

The victims’ parents blamed the university for not keeping their children safe. In May 2012, the parents of Qu and Wu sued USC, arguing that the university misrepresented the school’s safety. University officials expressed sympathy while defending the institution, and a Los Angeles judge dismissed the case in February 2013, citing a lack of evidence. 

Akemon says the safety concerns of Chinese international students were valid, but that evidence does not support the theory that the crimes were racially motivated. Qu and Wu, for instance, were targeted because of the vehicle they were in.

“Barnes and Bolden were in that area specifically to rob people,” he says. “They wanted to carjack the car and rob the victims because they were perceived as having something valuable to steal.”

It was dark and rainy that night, he adds, and the perpetrators did not know who was in the car when they approached it.

Ji, meanwhile, was walking alone in the dark, which the perpetrators later said made him seem like an easy target to rob.

“The fact that three Chinese students were murdered in close proximity and time is a tragic coincidence,” Akemon says.

After Qu and Wu’s deaths, the university installed 60 additional security cameras, including some with license plate readers, in a 1.8-square-mile region that included some off-campus areas, The Associated Press reported. USC’s Department of Public Safety and the Los Angeles Police Department assigned 30 extra police officers to patrol neighborhoods surrounding the school. 

After Ji’s murder, USC increased patrols by LAPD officers and campus security personnel, expanded a free ride service for students and added extra staffers to watch surveillance cameras. In addition, unarmed security “ambassadors” who previously worked during the school years began summer patrols.

The university also started an international student safety advisory group and launched an expanded safety training program for international graduate students.

“I don’t know if 911 translates to something that exists in all the students’ countries. So we need to explain it,” John Thomas, chief of public safety at USC, told The Los Angeles Times.

More than a decade later, the killings of Qu, Wu and Ji do not appear to have deterred international students from studying at USC. International students in 2025 made up roughly 27% of the student body, with 5,993 enrolled in the fall of 2024—the most recent statistics available—hailing from China.

Despite the efforts to boost USC safety, violence still happens. In June 2024, 19-year-old USC student Ivan Gallegos fatally stabbed 27-year-old Xavier Cerf, an unhoused man who was allegedly breaking into cars near a fraternity house. Gallegos claimed self-defense, stating Cerf threatened him with a gun, though no weapon was found. Prosecutors ultimately declined to file charges.

The legacies of Qu, Wu and Ji live on in memorial scholarships that the university established after their deaths.

At a memorial service for Qu and Wu in April 2012, then-president of USC C. L. Max Nikias said, “The holders of these scholarships will embody your qualities that were so revered and endeared by your family, friends and fellow students: unrestrained intelligence, unbounded drive, unyielding ambition, unassailable accomplishment and uncompromising kindness.”