By snoadmin
EDITOR’S NOTE: This article was updated on Oct. 20 to correct an incorrect date, regarding when Kate Su Yi’s body was discovered.
It’s not surprising that Kate Su Yi’s favorite TV show was “House” or that she chose to dress up as a nurse for Halloween in 2008.
The Cal State Long Beach junior had just entered her first semester in the nursing program. She was also about to move on with her life and start fresh by dumping her boyfriend of one year.
“My one description [of her] would be goofball,” said Auria Zahed, a close friend and former roommate of Yi. “I remember that she laughed a lot, even when something wasn’t funny. It was so cute.”
Yi’s hope of becoming a nurse changed on March 31, 2009.
Her roommate and mother found her dead in a closet at her Bellflower Boulevard apartment near the Veteran’s Affairs Hospital April 2, 2009. Yi had a belt wrapped around her neck, underwear bunched into her mouth, Advil pills stuffed inside her nose and fabric softener laid underneath her.
Long Beach Police arrested her then-boyfriend, 20-year-old Jonathan Huynh, on suspicion of murder the next day. He pleaded not guilty on Sept. 13, 2010, two days before a jury found him guilty of first-degree murder.
Huynh’s sentencing is scheduled for Wednesday.
The defendant’s motivation
Huynh was an obsessive boyfriend, according to Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Lesley Klein, who prosecuted the case. Those who testified established that obsessive behavior.
“The victim’s friends said that he was ‘creepy and weird to the point of obsession,’ ” Klein said. “For example, he would sit at Yi’s work all day and wait for her.”
Yi attempted to break up with Huynh on the night of her murder, but “he wasn’t going to allow her to [do that],” Klein said.
Once they started arguing, he strangled her to death, stabbed her in the back of her head and neck, and placed her body in her apartment closet.
According to Klein, coroners say within 30 to 60 seconds of strangulation, a victim loses consciousness, but it takes six to eight minutes to die.
When Huynh left Yi’s apartment, he failed to report Yi’s death to police. Instead, he took her car, bought clothes at Hollister with her credit card, withdrew $140 from her bank account and went to his parents’ house in Mission Viejo, Klein said.
Huynh also used Yi’s cell phone to call her roommate, claiming that he was at Yi’s apartment, but could not find her. Later, the Long Beach Police Department discovered that Huynh had made that phone call near Mission Viejo, where his parents live.
LBPD began its investigation as soon as her death was reported, which immediately led to their only suspect: Huynh. Officers found and arrested him on April 3, 2009 in the City of Orange.
Huynh gave three different alibis for the murder.
First, he denied everything, claiming that they had broken up and that Yi had left upset.
Second, he said Yi liked to engage in rough sex, such as having a belt around her neck, but when she began hitting him, he punched her and accidently killed her. Huynh said that when Yi hit the floor, she made a gurgling noise and he tried to resuscitate her.
Third, he said that he accidentally strangled Yi to death by wrapping a belt around her neck during consensual sex. He said the belt accidently suffocated her and, again, he said he tried to revive her.
Prosecution of the case
The prosecution’s main pieces of murder evidence included: the hiding of Yi’s body; the use of fabric softener, Glade plug-ins and opening of windows to conceal the smell.
Analyzing the evidence, Klein said that the only question the jury had to answer was whether or not Yi’s death was an accident. The jury concluded, within one hour and 45 minutes, that it was not.
Even though the trial had seven motions, including a change of judge — the only motion accepted — a change of venue and a change of public defender, the 10-month long case maintained a “decent pace,” according to Klein. She added that she’d never encountered a change of venue request before.
“It’s not surprising,” said Klein, referring to Huynh pleading not guilty. She later said that most defendants like Huynh start off doing so.
Huynh’s Long Beach Deputy Public Defender Alan Nakasone declined to comment.
According to Klein, possible reasons why Huynh may have pleaded not guilty include thinking he wasn’t guilty, thinking he had a strong defense or that he wasn’t ready to come to terms with what he had done.
Pleading guilty does not guarantee a shorter sentence, Klein said.
Remembrance of Kate
Yi’s body now rests at Forest Lawn cemetery in Cypress. Her memorial service was held on April 11, 2009 at a funeral home in Downey, according to nursing department progress coordinator Melissa Dyo.
“Kate was in her first semester of the nursing program, but it was clear by the remorse of her classmates that she had made an impact on their lives,” Dyo said.
Zahed, who lived with Yi for three years, said that she placed a high emphasis on school, using her time to either study or nap “like a cat.” Yi moved out of Zahed’s apartment two months before her murder.
“She did very well in school because she wanted to get into the nursing program really badly,” Zahed said.
Dyo said an estimated 150 to 200 people attended the memorial service.
Nursing faculty members and many of Yi’s classmates from the nursing program were there, particularly students from her clinical group. Dyo said they came to the service dressed in their white CSULB nursing uniforms.
They also passed out orange and red ribbon pins as a way to remember Kate. Orange was her favorite color, Zahed explained.
“All her friends knew about her orange obsession,” she said.
According to Dyo, different people spoke at Yi’s service. A former youth pastor of Yi spoke about how vibrant and full of life she was.
“The general sense from being there was that Kate was an outgoing, encouraging and well-liked individual, whose life was ended much too soon,” Dyo said. “It was heartbreaking to see the expressions of grief by her parents and siblings.”
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