The 77-year-old in-laws accused of killing transgender New York Times technology executive Jonathan McKinsey have been charged with murder. Prosecutors also allege the couple “lay in wait” before the fatal shooting.
Shouyong Zhang and Shili Chen were each charged with murder Wednesday morning, along with numerous special allegations and circumstances tied to the killing.
Among the allegations is murder by “lying in wait,” a special-circumstance charge indicating that the defendants allegedly planned and timed the attack.
The other allegations include violence or bodily harm, violent conduct, the infliction of great bodily injury, use of a weapon, personal and intentional discharge of a firearm, use and personal use of a firearm, and being armed with a firearm.
Zhang and Chen allegedly took turns shooting McKinsey in the parking lot of Dublin Sports Grounds on Saturday. Local police later found and arrested them on suspicion of murder.
A New York Times spokesperson confirmed that McKinsey was the victim. He had worked for the newspaper since 2023 as its head of engineering for games player experience.
Before his death, McKinsey had been involved in a bitter divorce and custody dispute with his wife, Candice Jang. The couple, who married in 2011, had three children under the age of 10. Both had previously accused the other of abuse and filed restraining orders.
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Jang reported McKinsey to police after alleging that he struck their six-year-old son in the face with an open hand. McKinsey was charged with two misdemeanor counts of child abuse, but was later released from jail on the condition that he attend parenting classes.
McKinsey, meanwhile, accused Jang of hitting him with a frying pan in 2013 and verbally abusing their children. He also alleged that she encouraged him to take his own life, claiming she told him that “no one would want to be with someone as f–ked up and transgender like you.”
McKinsey also described a strained relationship with Jang’s parents. According to allegations in a restraining-order filing, Chen visited the family in 2023 and berated the couple’s young son for wearing dresses, calling him a “disgusting queer” and a “pervert.” Chen also allegedly struck the child on the back of the head when he questioned her.
The filing says McKinsey pleaded with Chen to stop. She then allegedly directed the same hostility toward McKinsey, who was transgender and transitioned from female to male in 2010, according to court documents.
Chen allegedly called McKinsey the same slurs, the restraining-order filing stated.
“She blamed me for Wyatt wanting to wear his sister’s dresses and told me to get out of ‘her house’ even though we were in the home owned by Candice and I,” McKinsey wrote.
In another alleged confrontation, McKinsey said his father-in-law punched him in the chest after he underwent a double mastectomy.
A family member told The California Post that he would “lay a lot of money” on the in-laws having killed McKinsey to support Jang’s custody case.
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