Pan’s Bail Set At $20M

A judge set Qinxuan Pan’s bail at $20 million at the end of an arraignment hearing where the 30-year-old MIT researcher — recently extradited here from Alabama — was formally charged with the murder of 26-year-old Yale grad student Kevin Jiang.

That hearing took place Thursday morning in Courtroom C on the ground floor of 121 Elm St.

State Superior Court Judge Brian Fischer expressed concern that Pan remains a serious flight risk before setting Pan’s bond as high as he did.

“This court is extremely troubled by the efforts this defendant has made to avoid apprehension and potentially flee this country,” the judge said.

In addition to the $20 million bond, Fischer issued a protective order for Jiang’s fiancee — whom the judge identified by her initials, ​“ZP.” He also transferred Pan’s case to the state courthouse at 235 Church St., and set Pan’s next court date for June 1.

Fischer, Pan’s defense attorney William Gerace, and state prosecutor Stacey Miranda were all physically present in the courtroom Thursday. Pan watched and listened to the hearing remotely from detention in the lockup underneath the Elm Street courthouse.

Visible only in the top left corner of a video monitor stationed in the middle of the courtroom, Pan stood quietly in a white holding cell in between two state marshals. He did not appear to react as the judge set his bail at $20 million.

$19K In Cash, 7 Cellphones, Renting Apartment Under Fake Name

Thursday’s arraignment lasted little more than five minutes. In that time it offered a wealth of new details about Pan, his family, and his capture late last week.

Most of those details came from state prosecutor Miranda during her pitch to the judge to set Pan’s bail even higher, at $50 million.

Miranda said that the defendant is accused of murdering Jiang on Feb. 6. Jiang was found in the middle of the road that night, suffering from multiple gunshot wounds to the head, torso, and his extremities.

North Haven, New Haven, and Massachusetts police all obtained warrants for his arrest, but they were unsuccessful in their attempts to serve those wrants, she said.

“The defendant managed to elude capture, leading to a nationwide manhunt involving the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the State’s Attorney’s Office, the FBI, ATF, U.S. Marshals, and local police departments in the states of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Georgia, Alabama, North Carolina, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York, and New Jersey.”

Miranda said that law enforcement officials were finally able to capture Pan last Friday after approximately three months on the run.

He was captured in Montgomery, Alabama, ​“where he was found in an apartment he was renting under a false name.”

At the time Pan was captured, Miranda said, he had $19,000 in cash, seven cellphones, and several SIM cards in his possession. He also had his father’s passport and computer.

During interviews with Pan’s parents over the course of the investigation, Miranda said, state prosecutors have learned that ​“the defendant and/or his parents have very substantial financial assets, well into the millions of dollars.”

She said the parents claimed that the Malden, Mass., house they live in was in Pan’s name. The parents also appear to own a separate rental property elsewhere in Massachusetts, she said. She added that the parents put in a $320,000 bid for another home in North Carolina just last week.

While Pan is a U.S. citizen and has been in the United States since 2007, Miranda said, he was born in and ​“has ties to” Shanghai.

“The state believes that his act of extreme violence, his flight, the fact that he was very difficult to apprehend, and his national and international ties proves he is a major flight risk.”

“Affable. Engaging. Pleasant. Calm”

In response to Miranda’s pitch for a $50 million bail, Pan’s attorney, William Gerace, called on the judge to set a more ​“reasonable bond” of $2 or $3 million.

“We understand the case against him,” Gerace said in court on Thursday. ​“We understand there’s a flight pattern.”

However, he continued, Pan has no previous criminal record and has never before been arrested. He noted that Pan is a U.S. citizen.

Even if it’s true that his parents own two homes in Massachusetts, Gerace said, ​“that hardly makes them millionaires.”

Gerace lauded Pan’s 11 years studying at MIT, where he received an undergraduate degree and a PhD.

“The primary purpose of bail is to ensure the presence of the accused at trial,” Fischer responded.

He stressed his concerns about Pan’s attempts to flee detention, about the serious, violent nature of the crime he’s accused of, and about his family’s apparent financial resources.

The judge then set Pan’s bond at $20 million, issued the protective order, and agreed to seal the affidavit describing in detail the investigation into Pan’s alleged murder of Jiang.

After the arraignment hearing concluded, Gerace held a brief press conference on the front steps of 121 Elm in which he slammed the bail amount as ​“exorbitant” and unprecedented.

“That’s a record. It’s too much,” he said about the $20 million figure. He said his client will probably be appealing the bond amount soon.

Gerace said he spent some time with Pan while the latter was in lockup underneath 121 Elm before Thursday morning’s arraignment hearing.

The defense attorney described his client as ​“affable, engaging, pleasant, calm, just a delight to be with.”

“He seems fine,” Gerace said when asked about Pan’s mental health. ​“He’s got an IQ that’s stratospheric. He seems like a nice person.”

Gerace also said that Pan’s parents would have driven down from Massachusetts and shown up at the arraignment to support their son if they had more than a few hours heads up that the hearing would be taking place Thursday morning.

Three Months Later

Pan, an MIT artificial intelligence researcher, was extradited to Connecticut from Alabama, where U.S. Marshals caught up with him on May 14. Pan had been on the run while police obtained a warrant for his arrest on charges of murdering Jiang on Feb. 6 in New Haven’s Goatville neighborhood.

Pan has an appearance scheduled Thursday morning in State Superior Court in downtown New Haven.

Jiang was shot to death in the middle of Lawrence Street while near his fiancee’s apartment.

That same night of the murder, North Haven police allegedly encountered Pan in a deserted scrap metal yard—and then let him go, leading to a nationwide manhunt.

City police obtained an arrest warrant in late February charging Pan, who knew Jiang’s fiancee, with murder. The U.S. Marshals also posted a $10,000 reward at that time for information leading to Pan’s arrest.

City and federal law enforcement officials said at the time that Pan was last seen in Georgia. There were fears he may have slipped out of the country.

The murder of Jiang, a grad student at Yale’s School of the Environment who served as a U.S. Army National Guardsman and was an active member of Trinity Baptist Church on State Street, sparked outpourings of grief from shocked city residents and the Yale community more broadly.

It also inspired heated conversations and critiques about the level of local, national and international attention paid to crimes committed against Yale students, and a feeling of neglect among city residents unaffiliated with Yale who have also lost loved ones to homicide.