Tokyo Unnatural Forensics

Chapter 287, Sakikawa Toshi's Sherlock Holmes

Late at night, when questioned by Chiba police, Kitano Yukari, who had returned to Japan from South Africa three years prior, quickly confessed to the crime.

She confessed to the entire crime.

It turns out that Uesugi Muneyuki's judgment was correct, but not entirely. Nikaido Kei did discover that the company was secretly smuggling anesthetics in foreign trade and therefore went to Mitamura Ken's place.

Unfortunately, Kenjiro Mitamura knew about this and was a major beneficiary. Initially, Mitamura offered to share a small portion of the profits, but Nikaido was a very upright man. He said that he could let go of other things, including accepting small kickbacks, gifts from domestic suppliers, and Walmart gift cards, but there was no room for negotiation on the matter of anesthetics!

This ultimately led to his death.

The method of murder was to stuff buns with aconite.

Nikaido Kei himself loves steamed buns, so when he went out to dinner that evening, he ate a steamed bun laced with aconite, which was provided by Kitano.

"Why did you assist Mitamura in committing the crime?" Chiba Prefectural Police asked. "This is clearly murder!"

“Because there are many things I want.” Kitano Yukari smiled bitterly: “Hermes, Dior, YSL, Balenciaga, Mitamura is very rich, and those who are willing to obey can win his favor. There are three women like me around him.”

"I was just a female college student from Beijing. I met him while working as a hostess in a bar. After experiencing that kind of life, I could never go back to the past. Otherwise, he would ask me to return all the money I had invested in him... You police officers know that a hostess's identity... even if it's a false accusation, the police won't believe it."

"..." After all, it was drug trafficking, so the Chiba Prefecture police had nothing to say: "If you're so rich, why did you come back to Japan?"

“Because, he got tired of it.” Kitano Yukari said with a bitter smile, then suddenly asked the policeman in a neurotic tone, “Is it because yellow men just like white women? There are many white people in South Africa, and quite a few black people too. After he arrived in South Africa, he took his money and went around looking for women, completely ignoring me and not giving me any money. The little savings I had were quickly used up. My friends here also told me that nothing happened, so I decided to go back to China to live. After all, this is a place I'm familiar with, and I don't have to be with black women.”

"Unfortunately, after returning to China, I felt that everything was meaningless. There's no way around it. How can a woman who has been protected by lions care about wild dogs? Earning money is so painful, and spending my own money doesn't feel happy at all..." the woman said sincerely, smiling as if she was reminiscing about the good old days.

Her neurotic behavior made the Chiba police suspect she might be on drugs, but unfortunately she wasn't.

Thirty minutes after eating the bun, Nikaido Kei suffered a stroke. Mitamura Ken and Yukari held him down, one pressing down on his body and the other covering his face with a blanket. After a series of convulsions, Nikaido Kei lost his strength, and the two of them threw him into the river. Then, as agreed beforehand, they took a flight from Haneda International Airport and escaped.

At first, the two were a little flustered living a secluded life in South Africa. However, they soon learned that the Kanagawa police had not filed a case. But since they were just lovers, Mitamura gradually got tired of Yukari after a year or two. Yukari was also unable to adapt to the social environment in South Africa and could not speak English, so she decided to return to Japan.

It must be said that Uesugi Muneyuki's presence had a great deterrent effect on criminals. Kitano Yukari was certainly aware that the family had reported the case multiple times, but she was certain that the Kanagawa police would not cause trouble for themselves by reopening the case.

She saw the news about the disturbance on NHK television and responded with a cold and contemptuous attitude.

Excuse me, but Kanagawa Prefecture has its own regulations. Re-investigate? You might as well say I'm Oda Nobunaga and didn't die at Honnoji!
But the moment she saw on TV that Uesugi Muneyuki of the Metropolitan Police Department's Special Mission Unit had been dispatched and successfully overturned the case, she knew she was in trouble and immediately booked the next available flight to Madrid, Spain, to leave.

That official is no pushover! Don't forget, it was he who cracked the Chiba case with his inexplicable judgment and accurate character sketches!
Fortunately, the Japanese passport grants visa-free access to 190 countries worldwide; otherwise, applying for visas to other countries would be quite troublesome.

When Kitano Yukari was blocked on the shuttle bus, she knew she was doomed.

"After all, he's Sakikawa Toshimura's Sherlock Holmes, that big shot from the Metropolitan Police Department. Once he notices me, I definitely can't escape." Kitano Yukari looked unlucky. "I guess this is fate?"

Thus, the five-year-old unsolved case in Kanagawa was solved.

When Uesugi Muneyuki arrived, the only remaining question was whether the deceased died from aconitine first or from suffocation first.

Five years have passed, and all the clues and evidence are gone. To convict someone, we can only rely on the few existing clues.

In the end, it was Mikoto Ishihara who resolved everything. At her request, Muneyuki Uesugi and she spent an entire night reviewing medical books and various clinical anatomical records, and finally found evidence of aconitine poisoning.

"The victim ingested aconite root containing a lethal dose of aconitine. About ten minutes after ingesting the aconite, he began to experience chest pain, nausea, and vomiting, followed by tonic-clonic convulsions."

"According to the confession of one of the murderers, the victim's face was bruised and swollen, and his lips were blue and swollen." "That's right, these are the symptoms of aconitine poisoning."

"In addition, although the body was severely decomposed when the deceased was found, there were still a few places mentioned in the autopsy report. First, there were burns in the esophagus and inside. Because the deceased liked to eat hot food, this part was overlooked. Now, in retrospect, this is undoubtedly evidence of aconite poisoning. Also, the deceased's heart was relatively swollen. The autopsy report believed that this was caused by drowning and putrefaction, but aconite poisoning can cause depolarization of myocardial cell membranes, which may leave behind myocardial fiber rupture, focal necrosis or inflammation, consistent with the autopsy result of a relatively swollen heart."

At this point, the chain of evidence was barely completed, and Kitano Yukari was formally arrested on charges of "conspiracy to murder".

After a whole night of work, everything finally settled down by dawn the next day.

That morning, NHK News reported the great news that the five-year-old Kanagawa mystery had been solved in a single day, and officially referred to Uesugi Muneyuki as "the Sherlock Holmes of the Sakigawa year".

Five-year cold case solved in one day! Sakikawa Nian's Sherlock Holmes, Uesugi Muneyuki, miraculously reappears!

Five years of continuous police appeals finally led to the exoneration of the wrongfully convicted Nikaido police officer; the police system may need to be re-evaluated!

We need special mission units, but we can't rely solely on them. What comprehensive reforms does the Japanese police force need?

Interview with the family of the person involved in Nikaido's case: It was forensic examiner Uesugi who gave us a second chance.

One of the accomplices in the murder is still at large.

Early in the morning, news of the case being solved spread, causing a stir throughout Tokyo. Many office workers in Kanagawa even shouted "Forensic Investigator Uesugi, Itaru!" when they saw the news on the street.

"Onboard~!"

It is worth mentioning, however, that Kitano Yukari was actually only an accomplice in the murder, but all reports describe her as an accomplice.

Because the real culprit, Mitamura, is still at large, the police tacitly agreed to reduce Kitano Yukari's sentence in exchange for her admitting that she was an "accomplice."

This was also the first case in which Uesugi Muneyuki did not catch all the criminals on the spot.

Has the case been solved? Yes.

Is it really broken? Yes, it is.

Has this five-year-old cold case been solved? If so...
But this was already glorious enough, and Uesugi Muneyuki's name once again resounded throughout the Kanto region.

That morning, at a simple Chinese breakfast shop.

Section Chief Sugishita Ukyo and Chief Cabinet Secretary Onoda sat together.

"Regarding that escaped prisoner..." Sugishita Ukyo said with a smile.

“Oh, so it’s that guy who wanted to request assistance in arresting him through the ICPO!” Chief Cabinet Secretary Onoda seemed completely uninterested. He glanced at Sugishita Ukyo and shook his head: “It really was you. Otherwise, how could Uesugi Muneyuki have read the case file and the forensic report so quickly?”

"Chief Cabinet Secretary, could you try approaching it from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs?"

"Impossible. Even if the Ministry of Foreign Affairs were willing to help, the South African government wouldn't agree. We Japanese aren't the United States." Chief Cabinet Secretary Onoda glanced at Sugishita Ukyo and took the wonton noodles. "Besides, you should watch yourselves!"

"Hi?"

"Once this is set in motion, the First Investigation Division and the Special Missions Division will be very busy!"

(End of this chapter)