The sentencing phase of the Brendt Christensen trial enters its fifth day Friday. Federal public defenders called eight witnesses Thursday in their effort to save him from the death penalty. 

Federal public defenders trying to save Brendt Christensen from the death penalty presented emotional testimony from character witnesses Wednesday --- including the defendant’s father.

Federal prosecutors will officially rest their case Wednesday in the sentencing phase of Brendt Christensen’s trial for kidnapping and killing University of Illinois visiting scholar Yingying Zhang. Government prosecutors spent the second day of the sentencing phase presenting testimony from Zhang’s family and other loved ones, as they tried to prove the aggravating factors that would qualify Christensen for the death penalty.

A federal jury that convicted a former University of Illinois doctoral student of kidnapping, torturing and killing Yingying Zhang, a young scholar from China, now must decide if Brendt Christensen should be put to death.

Brendt Christensen, the man accused of kidnapping and killing U of I visiting scholar Yingying Zhang, will not testify in his own defense. The jury will get the case Monday.