Mengqi Ji Murder Case: DNA Evidence, Trial, and Appeals

The Mengqi Ji murder case ended with her husband, Joseph Elledge, convicted of second-degree murder in November 2021 and sentenced to 28 years in prison for killing the 28-year-old University of Missouri graduate student in their Columbia, Missouri, home in October 2019. Prosecutors built the case without a body for more than a year, then anchored it with 13 hours of secretly recorded arguments and a rare botanical DNA match tying juniper needles on Elledge’s boots to the exact tree standing over Ji’s shallow grave.

What Happened to Mengqi Ji

Mengqi Ji was a Chinese national studying mechanical and aerospace engineering at the University of Missouri. She was last seen on the night of October 8, 2019. Her husband later told police he went to bed around 11:00 p.m. after she rebuffed his attempts at intimacy, and that she was gone when he woke.¹

Ji’s mother in China grew worried when her daughter missed their daily phone call on October 10 and sent a friend to check on her. Elledge reported Ji missing that same day, through a non-emergency 311 line rather than 911.¹

Why Investigators Focused on Joseph Elledge

Elledge sat for a lengthy voluntary interview with Columbia detectives on October 15, 2019. He told them he had been taking “long, leisurely drives to look for new hiking paths” instead of actively searching for his wife. During that interview, officers took his cellphone and found roughly 10 hours of secretly recorded arguments between the couple.¹

On October 25, 2019, Columbia police announced a criminal investigation, and Elledge was arrested that day on child abuse charges after police found a photograph on an iPad showing severe bruising on the couple’s young daughter.² Bail was set at $500,000, and Boone County Prosecutor Dan Knight publicly identified him as the primary suspect in Ji’s disappearance and presumed death.³

Cell tower data showed Elledge had driven to the Lamine River on the day Ji disappeared. The Missouri Highway Patrol searched the area on October 29, 2019, followed by dive teams and cadaver dogs. In May 2020, investigators built a temporary levee in the river to let divers work after detection canines indicated possible human remains.¹ Nothing was found there. Even without a body, Prosecutor Knight charged Elledge with first-degree murder on February 19, 2020.⁴

The Secretly Recorded Arguments

The recordings on Elledge’s phone eventually totaled roughly 13 hours across 12 files, 10 made by Elledge and two by Ji. Prosecutors said they captured months of verbal abuse, gaslighting, and manipulation.⁵

In one recording from May 19, 2019, Elledge told Ji, “Next time you dig a hole just, just, I’m going to just let you jump in, and I’m going to bury the dirt over you.” Other clips captured him disparaging her culture, saying he had held back from hitting her, and, in August 2019, telling her he was “eager to end” the relationship.⁶ Boone County Circuit Court Presiding Judge J. Hasbrouck Jacobs ruled all 13 hours admissible, finding them “relevant and otherwise admissible.”⁷

How Ji’s Body Was Found

On March 25, 2021, more than 17 months after Ji vanished, a hiker named Steven Roberts stepped off a game trail near Rock Quarry Road in Rock Bridge Memorial State Park south of Columbia. In a thick juniper grove, he spotted a shiny rectangular object that turned out to be a woman’s purse. Probing the ground with his walking stick, he uncovered a human skull.⁸ The site sat roughly 30 feet off the road, above Gans Creek.⁹

Crime scene investigators recovered additional bones, two purses, black Nike shoes, Ji’s driver’s license, and credit cards.⁸ A coroner confirmed the remains as Ji’s through dental records in April 2021.⁷

The Juniper Tree DNA Evidence

When police first arrested Elledge in October 2019, they seized a pair of muddy boots from his apartment. The soles held juniper needles and 12 different types of vegetation embedded in the mud.¹⁰ Prosecutor Knight, who had been researching cases that used soil and gravel to place suspects, decided botanical DNA could tie the boots to a specific tree.

Conservation geneticist Christine Edwards and her colleague Alex Linan at the Missouri Botanical Garden ran the analysis. Linan traveled to Rock Bridge Memorial State Park with a ladder and pole pruners and collected fresh needle samples from the highest branches of junipers around the grave, keeping the samples clean of contamination. Lab testing produced an exact DNA match between the needles on Elledge’s boots and the individual juniper standing directly over Ji’s burial site. Edwards, whose lab usually applies these methods to rare plant species, said of the match: “He was actually there. No doubt in my mind. He was there.”⁴ Using plant DNA to place a suspect at a crime scene was a rare development in a criminal case.

The Trial and Elledge’s Testimony

The trial opened in late October 2021 in Boone County and ran nearly two weeks. Dan Knight and Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Merilee Crockett led the state’s case.¹¹ Scott Rosenblum led the defense.¹²

Elledge took the stand and offered an accidental-death account. He said an argument erupted after he confronted Ji about text messages he suspected were from another man. He testified that she pushed him when he tried to pick up their daughter, that he pushed her back and she fell against the kitchen counter, and that a second shove produced “a big thud” and left her dazed. He said he helped her to the couch, took a 30-to-45-minute walk, and that she went to bed after he returned. He claimed he found her not breathing, without a pulse, and cold at 5:00 a.m.¹³ He admitted he never called 911, described that decision as “stupid,” and acknowledged burying her body in the park.¹⁴

Knight rejected that version, calling Elledge a “stone cold killer” and telling jurors he hid Ji’s body in his car trunk on October 8 and waited two days to contact authorities.¹⁴

The Verdict and Sentence

On November 11, 2021, after roughly six and a half hours of deliberation, a jury of seven men and five women found Elledge guilty of second-degree murder. He had been charged with first-degree murder, but jurors concluded he had not deliberated before killing Ji, producing the lesser conviction.¹⁵¹⁶

In January 2022, following the jury’s recommendation, the court sentenced Elledge to 28 years in prison. On February 22, 2022, he pleaded guilty to child abuse, endangering the welfare of a child, and domestic assault, and received an additional 10 years to run consecutively after the murder sentence, with credit for two years already served.²

Appeals and Post-Conviction Rulings

Elledge appealed the murder conviction, arguing the evidence was insufficient to prove he intentionally killed Ji. On August 1, 2023, the Missouri Western District Court of Appeals affirmed. Judge Thomas N. Chapman, writing for a three-judge panel, held that a reasonable jury could convict based on the audio recordings of Elledge’s violent threats, his own admission of shoving Ji, and his extensive efforts to conceal her body and mislead police. Intent, the court noted, can be inferred from behavior before, during, and after the act, and the jury was free to reject Elledge’s account.¹⁷

In June 2024, attorney Tyler Coyle filed a post-conviction motion claiming ineffective assistance of counsel. The motion argued that trial attorneys forced Elledge to testify against his wishes, allowed unqualified evidence and irrelevant photographs before the jury, and failed to rebut the state’s portrayal of him as an abusive husband and father. In April 2025, Judge Hasbrouck Jacobs denied the motion, ruling Elledge had not shown that his conviction or sentence violated the Constitution or the laws of Missouri or the United States.¹⁸

Elledge is incarcerated at the Southeast Correctional Center in Charleston, Missouri, serving the 28-year murder sentence followed by the consecutive 10-year sentence for the child abuse, child endangerment, and domestic assault convictions.¹⁸

1
CBS News. Mengqi Ji Disappearance Timeline
2
The Seattle Times. Missouri Man Convicted in Wife’s Death Admits Child Abuse
3
KRCG. Attorney of Missing Woman’s Parents Says Limited Child Custody Arrangement Reached
4
CBS News. Mengqi Ji Murder: Tree DNA Helped Police Close In on Killer
5
KBIA. Judge Hears Arguments on Allowing Secret Recordings as Evidence in Joseph Elledge Murder Case
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KBIA. Judge to Consider Allowing Secret Recordings Into Evidence in Elledge Case
7
Columbia Tribune. Judge Allows Secret Recordings as Evidence in Elledge Case
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Columbia Tribune. Mengqi Ji Murder Trial: Joseph Elledge Boone County Courthouse Testimony
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KOMU. Mengqi Ji Memorial Created Near Rock Bridge State Park Excavation Site
10
St. Louis Public Radio. How MoBot Used Plant DNA to Convict a Missouri Killer
11
Columbia Tribune. Investigation Discovery Show: Dan Knight’s Joseph Elledge Mengqi Ji
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Columbia Tribune. Joseph Elledge Columbia MO Murder Trial: Opening Arguments
13
KRCG. Elledge Continues Testimony, Talks About Fight That Led to Wife’s Death
14
Court TV. Missouri Man Convicted in Wife’s Death Admits Child Abuse
15
KRCG. Joseph Elledge Found Guilty of Second-Degree Murder of Wife
16
KOMU. Joseph Elledge Denied Appeal of His Murder Conviction
17
FindLaw. State v. Elledge, WD 85109
18
KRCG. Judge Denies New Trial for Joseph Elledge, Upholding Conviction and 28-Year Sentence