Yanfei Bao Case: The Accused’s Car Was Tracked to the Same Location as the Victim’s Phone

Bao was last seen heading to show a house to a potential client in Hornby, where the Crown alleges Cao stabbed her and drove off with her body in the boot of his car.

At the trial on Wednesday, attention turned to Bao’s mobile phone. It was found damaged in bushes off the Christchurch South Motorway near Blakes Road the day after she disappeared.

Detective Inspector Joel Syme told the court the phone appeared to have been broken in half.

He said police were able to track where it was.

“The survey data showed that before it was discovered by police, Ms Bao’s mobile phone was surveying the village of Halswell and the Tai Tapu cell phone towers.”

Blakes Road resident Neil Clode spoke at the hearing and said a car was used in a strange manner on his street on the evening of July 19, 2023.

“About 6.15pm on Wednesday evening I went for tea and walked out behind my car and saw a car on the other side of the road with its headlights on and saw someone walk around the front of the car.

“I then went back inside to get my wallet and as I stood at the dining room table to get my wallet, the car’s headlights were pointed towards my house with the high beams on. I thought it was strange at the time because not a lot of cars usually do that, they usually park in a cul-de-sac with their headlights pointed towards the freeway,” Claude said.

When Claude and his wife went to dinner by car, they saw the car again and followed it.

“I sped up to chase him, to catch up… I thought whoever was in the car was up to something bad,” he said.

He wrote down the details of the car at the red light, including its registration number.

“It was a dirty four-door silver sedan with a dent on the left side of the trunk and a sticker,” Claude said.

A few days after Bao’s disappearance, police contacted the public about the appearance of a silver Mitsubishi sedan with registration number DPH101.

Detective Syme said the license plate was registered to accused Cao.

“Cao’s vehicle was spotted by traffic cameras in the same or similar areas at the time Bao’s mobile phone was conducting a survey in those areas (Halswell and Tai Tapu). Cao was suspected of being involved in Bao’s disappearance,” he said.

On Tuesday, jurors were shown CCTV footage of the man the Crown alleges was her killer buying a shovel on the day Bao went missing.

The Crown’s case is that Cao stabbed Bao several times on the Hornby property, dragged her body through the house and placed her in the trunk of his car. Bao’s body was found in a grave at Greenpark Farm in July.

Crown prosecutor Cameron Stewart said a photograph obtained from Cao’s phone showed an image of what the Crown said was Bao’s dead body, showing her topless and with blood on her body.

Stewart said the Crown does not have to prove motive, but the photograph may indicate a sexual element to the attack.

Tsao’s lawyer Joshua MacLeod said the Crown’s evidence was insufficient to prove the murder charge, and the evidence was much murkier than the Crown wanted it to be.

“How did they approach this case, how did it develop and when? Who did they look at and why and how wide a net did they cast? What evidence can you really rely on?” – he said.

The trial began on October 21 and is expected to last six weeks.

– RNZ