Reborn in 97, I solved a cold case at the Municipal Bureau

Chapter 312 Notice of Corpse Identification (Seeking Monthly Tickets)

Pan Hongjie went aside to make a phone call to his superior to report the case. When he turned around, he saw a group of people surrounding the body, and the young man from Hongcheng had already started to attack.

"Hey, don't you have any manners?" he said, striding over.

Xia Yu turned around and saw Pan Hongjie. He said excitedly, "Captain Pan, these two bodies are related to the one we found before. I think we can combine them into one case."

"What? Combined cases?" Pan Hongjie exclaimed in surprise, quickly approaching to ask, "What's going on?"

The female corpse had been turned to her side, and some dirt had been wiped off her back from her pajamas. There were still some faint grayish-brown marks on the black pajamas.

"Captain Pan, look here. There's a knife wound on the pajamas, and in the same spot, the female victim also has a knife wound on her back," Zhou Yi said, pulling down the camisole pajamas.

Pan Hongjie indeed saw a knife wound on the back of the corpse, which was less than three centimeters long.

Tang Wenli held the Tibetan knife that had been in the evidence bag earlier; the knife had already been drawn from its sheath.

She held the unsheathed dagger close to the wound on the victim's back and said, "Based on preliminary judgment, this knife is the murder weapon that caused the wound on the victim's back. As for whether it was fatal, we need to conduct a detailed autopsy after we get back. However, according to Zhou Yi's analysis, this stab wound is most likely the fatal one that caused the female victim's death."

Pan Hongjie felt a bit confused. How could he have discovered so much information in the short time it took to make a phone call?
"Zhou Yi, tell me in detail, what exactly happened?"

Zhou Yi nodded and shared his judgment.

First of all, this is definitely not the primary crime scene. Judging from the clothing of the two victims and the mud under their toenails, it should be the location where the bodies were dumped and buried.

However, the depth of the mud under the toenails of the male and female victims was different. Zhou Yi speculated that the male victim had already died before being buried, while the female victim was murdered here.

But logically, he felt something was missing. At first, he guessed that the female victim conspired with someone to transport the male victim here to bury him, and then she was strangled to death.

However, Tang Wenli initially judged that the two had been dead for at least a month. The female victim's clothing did not fit this situation. The temperature in the mountains in March is very low, and the body disposal and burial must have been done at night, when the temperature would be even lower.

So he examined the woman's body and found the knife wound on her back, which made sense.

Zhou Yi said, "Both victims were killed at the first crime scene. The female victim was probably strangled and then moved here, but she may not have died at the time. She may have woken up after being transported here and then tried to escape. The murderer caught up with her and stabbed her to death from behind."

Tang Wenli nodded in agreement, saying, "I agree with Zhou Yi's judgment. If someone was stabbed in the back first, there's no need to strangle them with a rope; it would be superfluous. It would be better to stab them twice more. Whether it was death by mechanical asphyxiation will be clear after the autopsy."

Zhou Yi added, "Professor Tang, you can do a matching test later to confirm whether this Tibetan knife matches the wounds on the deceased's body. If so, it means that after the murderer killed and buried the body, he abandoned or accidentally lost the Tibetan knife, which was eventually picked up by the peddler who went up the mountain to steal monkeys."

"Of course, I am more inclined to believe that it was lost accidentally, because the murderer would have no reason to leave the murder weapon at the burial site, which would easily lead to the exposure of the body."

Hearing this, Pan Hongjie nodded involuntarily: "Hmm, that makes sense. It was probably dropped accidentally, and it was too dark, so the murderer probably didn't notice."

Murder, disposing of the body, burying the body, especially late at night, is extremely taxing on physical and mental strength, and can easily leave clues unintentionally. Such cases are quite common.

Pan Hongjie immediately ordered, "Find the park ranger and ask where it's possible to get in at night, whether by climbing over the wall or finding a gap, anything will do."

Xia Yu immediately carried out the order and ran down the mountain.

“If this knife is indeed the murder weapon, then we can really handle the cases together,” Pan Hongjie said, stroking his chin.

One case is better than two murders in a short period of time, but one case has resulted in three deaths, which is going to cause a major security crisis in Anyuan.

"What about the male corpse? How did he die?" Pan Hongjie pointed and asked.

Tang Wenli shook her head and said, "I have already done a preliminary examination of this male victim's body. Strangely, there are no obvious external injuries on the surface of the body. Captain Pan, look, the male victim's lips are purple, so I initially suspect that the deceased may have died of a sudden heart attack."

"Heart disease? Died of illness?"

"I'll tell you the specific results after I finish the autopsy."

Zhou Yi asked, "Professor Tang, can you currently determine which of these two corpses and the male corpse in the well died first?"

Tang Wenli stood up, shook her head, and said, "No, currently, forensic medicine can accurately determine the time of death in the early stage of death, that is, within 24 hours. In this stage, we forensic doctors can pinpoint the accuracy of the time of death to within two hours. The longer the time, the greater the error, because there will be more interference from environmental factors."

“If the previous body was buried in the same soil as these two, with the same composition and humidity, then a judgment could be made based on the degree of decomposition. But the environment is obviously different now, so it is impossible to generalize.”

"I understand, thank you, Teacher Tang."

Tang Wenli smiled at Zhou Yi, then said to Pan Hongjie, "Captain Pan, if there's nothing else, I'll take the two bodies back first."

Pan Hongjie nodded: "Okay, thank you for your hard work. Come on, you guys, come and lend a hand."

Zhou Yi stood up, took off his gloves, and walked to the pit where the body had been buried.

The reason he asked Tang Wenli this question was to determine whether Li Youqiang had killed the two people.
Because he had previously believed that Li Youqiang's visit to Anyuan might be for the purpose of murder.

Combining this with Ding Wenyuan's account of Fu Daqing's business failure, he suspected that the deceased male corpse might be the one who had deceived Fu Daqing. It was possible that Fu Daqing had hired Li Youqiang to take revenge, murdering the two victims and burying their bodies on the mountain.

But the question remains: how did Fu Daqing find this person? And what was the trigger for his revenge killing after so many years?
Moreover, if that were the case, after killing and burying the body, Fu Daqing and Li Youqiang should have returned to Hongcheng and pretended that nothing had happened.

How did Li Youqiang die? Was he killed by Fu Daqing? What was his motive?
I can't figure it out. It seems like I'm getting somewhere, but something still feels off.

Zhou Yi didn't know if this case had become an unsolved case in his previous life, but he really wanted to see the case files now.

The inability to predict the future always leaves one with a sense of insecurity.

"Captain Wu, I told you I was done for, sigh." Zhou Yi sighed inwardly.

On the other side, two bodies were carried onto a vehicle on stretchers.

Before Tang Wenli got into the car, Pan Hongjie rubbed his hands together and said with a smile, "Forensic Doctor Tang, thank you for your hard work. Could you expedite this autopsy?"

Tang Wenli said helplessly, "I will try to give you the preliminary conclusion within two days, but the formal report will not be so quick. Captain Pan, you know that I am the only forensic doctor in Anyuan."

Pan Hongjie was also helpless: "I know, I know, but you also know, when has Anyuan ever had such a big case? I just finished calling Director Guo."

"Captain Pan, if you want to rush me, you might as well make good use of this foreign aid." Tang Wenli pushed up her glasses and looked at Zhou Yi not far away.

"Zhou Yi?" Pan Hongjie followed her gaze, somewhat puzzled.

"What do you mean..." He turned around and found that Tang Wenli had already gotten into the car.

Pan Hongjie smoothed his hair and walked towards Zhou Yi.

"Zhou Yi, what do you think? Any ideas?"

Zhou Yi turned around and saw that it was Pan Hongjie. He immediately shook his head and said, "Not for now. The most suspicious person right now is the one Ding Wenyuan mentioned who cheated Fu Daqing five years ago. I don't know if the male corpse we just saw was that person."

"You suspect that Fu Daqing and Li Youqiang killed someone in revenge?"

"Yes, from the perspective of criminal motive, this is quite reasonable. So the first thing to do is to confirm the identities of the two newly discovered victims."

Pan Hongjie nodded: "When Li Youqiang's body was discovered a couple of days ago, we checked the city's missing persons records. We have them ready, so we can just go back and check them again."

Zhou Yi slowly shook his head: "It might not be enough."

"why?"

"The two bodies that were just unearthed were both wearing pajamas, indicating that they were murdered at night. Due to the severe decomposition, it is currently impossible to determine the age and physical characteristics of the deceased. We have to wait for Professor Tang's autopsy results. However, the fact that the male victim was wearing pajamas on his upper body basically rules out the possibility that the two were involved in an illegal prostitution transaction."

Pan Hongjie thought about it and agreed with Zhou Yi's words. "It's really unlikely that a client would bring pajamas, even if it's for the whole night."

"Yes, Captain Pan, you're right. After all, pajamas are very much for home use, but sex work mainly involves physical and psychological stimulation. The two are contradictory and don't align with normal human psychology. Although the deceased woman's pajamas were quite sexy, they weren't the kind of thing you'd find in sex toys. I've seen them; the fabric is probably expensive silk."

"In other words, this is a couple or lovers who lived together and were murdered and buried here," Pan Hongjie pondered. "But the missing persons list we compiled before only included individuals who went missing alone."

That's exactly what Zhou Yi really meant.

The vast majority of missing persons reports are single-person disappearances.

If it is a case of two or more people going missing, then the nature of the case is different, and the police station will not dare to neglect it after receiving the report.

Because many people have gone missing, they were either murdered or had accidents while in the mountains.

Regardless of the situation, the level of importance attached to the case will be different. Even if the person has not been found, Pan Hongjie and his team have previously investigated local missing persons, so they should be able to make the connection immediately.

Unexpectedly, this means there was no missing person report.

That's why Zhou Yi said it wasn't enough.

Pan Hongjie understood, "Then we have no choice but to issue a notice to identify the body."

This was the outcome he least wanted to see, and it was also the outcome his superiors least desired.

Because once the announcement of the body identification is issued, it means that the authorities have announced the discovery of the body, which will attract social attention and public opinion, and increase the pressure to solve the case.

"Captain Pan, we've found something." At this moment, Xia Yu rushed over, holding a map of the park in his hand.

(End of this chapter)