english → English transcript

Since 2022, 45-year-old Yunhai Li has been conducting federally-funded breast cancer

research at MD Anderson, according to investigators.

Research they say he tried to steal and take back to China.

We were able to detain him as he was trying to get on a flight to China.

Court records say that Li uploaded sensitive data to his personal Google Drive, and then

MD Anderson found out and confronted him.

They say that he deleted those files from the drive and even showed MD Anderson proof.

What he didn't tell them was that he uploaded that data to a separate Chinese server, and

then he packed his bags.

There was a pretty good chance that he was going to be either deported or leave the country.

We needed to file something.

We needed to make sure he would stay here and that the information would stay

here, and that he would be held accountable.

In 2019, MD Anderson dealt with something similar, firing three Chinese researchers

who were suspected of sharing sensitive data with China.

Li is charged with theft of trade secrets and tampering with a government record, but

this investigation is far from over.

And from your understanding, are there any other people involved at this time or any

other similar cases that this has tipped off?

We are aware of a number of investigations, some of them kind of tangential to this, some

of them completely independent, that we're working closely with our public corruption

division here at the DA's office, the Texas Rangers, HSI on the federal side.

Li posted his $5,100 bond and is now out of jail, but he did have to surrender his passport

as a bond condition.

I did reach out to his defense attorney, but I haven't heard back.

For Fox 26 News, I'm Abigail Dye.