The Blacklist

Chapter 160: The Strange Case of Smuggling Corpses
In the afternoon, Elizabeth returned to SER from Reddington's secret recuperation center, brought back a new blacklist information, and called everyone together to discuss the new case.

Elizabeth asked Aram to project the information on the big screen and explained, "The person in the photo is called Ma Lian'an... She is from Southeast Asia. Here are her identity documents, birth certificate, passport, etc. Can you see what's wrong with them?"

Everyone looked at the information, and Nawabi was the first to say, "It's fake, all this information is fake."

Mira also nodded. As agents, she and Nawabi had used fake IDs many times. Now they could see the problem with a quick glance. These identity documents must be forged.

Aram put two new documents on the table. Elizabeth said, "Everyone, take a look at these two..."

Huh? Everyone was stunned. The documents on the screen were the death certificate and the embalming certificate!

Donald asked, "Is this man dead?"

Elizabeth nodded and said, "According to the information, this Ma Lian'an died during her visit to the United States, and her family applied to transport her body back to her homeland..."

Cooper crossed his arms and looked at the information. He asked, "Who would go to all this trouble to ship a fake body out of the United States?"

Donald guessed, "I think it's an extremely clever criminal who wants to smuggle under the guise of transporting corpses!"

Elizabeth did not comment and asked Alam to put up a newspaper clipping dated yesterday. The headline of the report was "Guard murdered at grave robbery site"!
Everyone became interested and read the report carefully: Lin Maqiao, 24 years old, was buried at 11 pm on the th. Less than ten hours later, her body was stolen at midnight.

Comparing this Lin Maqiao with the photo of the previous Ma Lian case, it is surprising to find that they are the same person.

Although this case is very strange, it is nothing more than a corpse theft and smuggling case. Everyone doesn't understand why Reddington would hand this case over to SER as a blacklist target?

Elizabeth explained, "Reddington believes that this smuggler has business dealings with the secret society and helps it transport special items..." Then she took out two new documents, "In 2011, there was a festival bombing in a Southeast Asian country, which killed 32 people and injured dozens of people; last year, there was a bombing of a vehicle at a consulate in Jakarta, which killed 17 people!

"Both bombings were committed by the secret society, but the bombs were transported to the destination by this smuggler! Therefore, Reddington believes that stealing the body, changing the identity, and transporting it back to the country should also have similar purposes..."

Everyone immediately took it seriously and thought that Reddington's guess made sense!
Cooper ordered: "Aram, check if there are any similar cases of transporting corpses?"

"Understood." Alam agreed and immediately entered the database to search. Mira and Nawabi also helped.

Soon, after the three of them had summarized the information, Aram reported: "In the past three years, among the list of foreigners who were sent back to their home countries after dying in the United States, there are seven special people. Their passports are all forged, which is the same as the situation provided by Reddington this time."

Nawabi added: "All seven of these people are women. According to the photos on their forged passports, they match the bodies stolen from seven grave robberies." Mira followed up: "These seven stolen bodies are all Asian women under the age of 35, and they were all sent back to different cities in Southeast Asia using forged identities."

Everyone realized the seriousness of the problem. Cooper asked, "Have you found out who received these bodies after they were sent back to the country?"

Alam said: "I have contacted the relevant departments of the relevant countries and they are investigating."

"I don't think they'll find anything," Donald said. "I mean, given how carefully forged the documents are, I'd say the identities of the recipients are fake, too."

Elizabeth considered and said, "I think the purpose of this corpse smuggler may be to use the coffin to transport bombs and other explosives. We must catch him before he transports the body out of the United States."

"I have a plan." Aram raised his hand and said, "The body of 'Ma Lian'an' should still be in the United States. Considering the preservation time of the body, it can only be sent back to Southeast Asia by air. The transporter must sign a formal authorization document before the plane takes off. I can find him in the aviation bureau's cargo system!"

"Okay, let's do it." Cooper nodded in agreement.
-
While SER was busy with the body smuggling case, Carrie was with Reddington.

Reddington is hiding in a safe house in the mountains outside Washington to recuperate. In addition to Dembe, there is a five-man combat team around him. This is a private security team he has prepared long ago. They are well-armed and experienced. They are all retired Navy SEALs. They are used to withstand attackers in critical situations and buy time for rescue.

When Carrie arrived, Reddington was able to get up and eat by himself, and he was recovering well.

This time he brought a special person with him - Leonard Carl, the person that Reddington asked Elizabeth to find even when he was seriously injured.

It took Carrie a lot of effort to find Carl. He and Abby worked together, using the master key system and the confidential algorithm obtained from Seth Nelson, whom he had rescued before, to hack into the NSA's (National Security Agency) top-level confidential database, and finally found his personal information and pulled it out from its hiding place.

However, before meeting Reddington, Carl refused to say anything. Although Carrie learned some things through contact, it was very incomplete. So, after making sure that he was harmless to her, she brought him to see Reddington.

The two of them really knew each other, and they were very cordial when they met.

Reddington introduced to Carrie that Carl was the creator of "Fulcrum". He was originally a senior analyst of the CIA. After discovering the traces of the secret society organization, he privately investigated it for more than 20 years. After being discovered, he began to flee. It was Reddington who helped him change his identity and hide!

Carl gave the "Fulcrum" to Reddington for safekeeping, which made Reddington qualified to negotiate with the secret society, and used the "Fulcrum" to force the secret society to give up the pursuit of Carl; but now the situation has changed, the secret society has officially taken action against Reddington, and Carl will fall into danger again, so they have to unite to confront and fight back against the secret society.

For Reddington and Carl, the most fortunate thing at this time is that they have an ally in Carrie. Not only does she have strength herself, but she also controls the power of SLR and indirectly influences SER, providing protection for their counterattack. Naturally, there is no need to hide it from Carrie anymore, and all the information can be shared.

(End of this chapter)