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

Chapter 467 Hu Dali

Hu Dali is from Qingyuan County, Wuguang City. He was born in 1967 and is 30 years old this year.

Nicknamed "Cannon," he has no legitimate job and spends his life in gangs and other illegal social groups, with a history of theft, fighting, and other crimes.

In his previous life in 2007, forty-year-old Hu Dali was arrested by Zhou Yi for armed robbery and assault in the provincial capital.

In order to atone for his crime, he voluntarily confessed to a person, namely the real culprit of the July 27 shooting incident, Liu Zi!
Du Qingming's case was finally brought to light twenty years after the incident, and his injustice was redressed.

This is a cause-and-effect relationship. If Hu Dali hadn't been arrested, he wouldn't have implicated Liu Zi, who possessed police firearms, and Du Qingming's case wouldn't have been overturned.

The problem is that Hu Dali met Liu Zi two years later, in 1999.

Liu Zi and Lao Hei, another murderer in the 727 case, have been on the run and living under assumed names for many years.

Zhou Yi had previously considered ways to overturn the verdict in the July 27 case. The safest approach was to wait until after 1999, when Hu Dali met Liu Zi, then find Hu Dali and extract information about Liu Zi from him.

If that gun is found, the July 27 case will definitely be overturned.

By then, if all goes well, I should be qualified to join the special task force to overturn the verdict.

Although it will take two years, this is undoubtedly the safest approach.

The premise is that Hu Dali's behavior will not be affected by his own butterfly effect.

Compared to Liu Zi, Hu Dali was much easier to find, because Liu Zi and Lao Hei were responsible for human lives, while before the case in 2007, Hu Dali's most serious offense was fighting and injuring someone, for which he was sentenced to six months in prison.

After deciding to come to Wuguang, Zhou Yi had thought about this matter. If Hu Dali was a local in Wuguang, he should try his best not to affect him.

After all, he still hasn't figured out a solution to the July 27 case.

The main reason was that he really couldn't figure out Xie Guoqiang's true nature. This man was too cunning, and Zhou Yi couldn't see through him at all.

But now that Wu Yuemei has mentioned the name Hu Dali, we have no choice but to ask further.

Zhou Yi asked her to explain her relationship with Hu Dali and whether Hu Dali had committed any illegal or criminal acts.

If Hu Dali really committed a crime, then it's impossible for the authorities to turn a blind eye and let him continue to evade justice.

However, two years later, he had to find Liu Zi using a different method.

At least Hu Dali had given an account of the approximate time and city in which he met Liu Zi.

Wu Yuemei said that she dropped out of school in the first semester of her second year of junior high and then spent a few years hanging out with a group of bad friends.

She had several boyfriends during that time, so sleeping with them became a regular thing for her.

However, back then, they were all in Wu Guang, a group of hooligans who did nothing all day, occasionally stealing some worthless little things. Their biggest mistake was going to the vicinity of the school to extort money from elementary school students.

Until she met a man nicknamed Loach.

Wu Yuemei said she still doesn't know what Mud Loach's real name is or where he's from; she only knows he's two years older than her.

When they started dating, Mudskipper was twenty and she had just turned eighteen.

Mudskipper was very generous, much more so than her ex-boyfriends who used to go hungry and would even pick up cigarette butts from the ground to smoke.

And that's how he instantly won her heart.

In the second month of their relationship, Mudfish said he would take her out to see the world and make a lot of money.

But once she arrived in the big city, she discovered that things weren't as she had imagined.

Mudfish had more than one "girlfriend," and all of his "girlfriends" were forced into prostitution.

Moreover, Mudfish isn't the boss; he's just a henchman who specializes in swindling naive and dim-witted young women.

Thus, eighteen-year-old Wu Yuemei was forced into this shady industry.

Although she was initially forced into it, she quickly accepted it because she dropped out of school too early and had a low moral compass.

They even enjoyed it because it was such a quick way to make money.

She soon began living a life of extravagance and debauchery, though that was only in her naiveté and self-perception.

Later, due to a dispute over territory and soliciting customers, the two sides' illegal organizations clashed violently, resulting in several deaths.

The loach was hacked to death on the spot. She heard that she died a terrible death, with someone slashing her neck so hard that the bone was exposed.

Many prostitutes, including her, escaped during the chaos.

After hiding for a while and confirming that the police had not issued a warrant for her arrest, she went out again.

She said she did work as a waitress in a restaurant, but quit after three days.

The reason is that it's too hard and tiring, you're constantly being bossed around, and you only earn a little bit.

It's better to just go there and work; if you're quick, you can earn the equivalent of ten or fifteen days' wages for a waiter in just a few minutes.

So she returned to her old profession, but this time it was entirely voluntary.

In his previous life, Zhou Yi didn't have much contact with prostitutes. Unless there was a major crackdown on prostitution, the handling of prostitutes and their clients was mainly done by local police stations.

His master, Zhang Ning, had told him that it was extremely difficult for prostitutes to turn back from prostitution and go ashore.

It's not that society won't allow it, it's their own problem.

Because money is too easy to earn, they can't endure the hardships of normal labor. No matter what they do, they will eventually go back to their old ways.

Another characteristic is that very few prostitutes work in their hometowns; they usually go to other places, mostly to the capital cities of the south or other provinces. No one in their hometown knows what they do outside, only that they make a lot of money.

This is one of the reasons for the illusion that big cities are full of gold.

Wu Yuemei confessed that she had worked in several cities, in bars, hair salons, dance halls, and nightclubs. Basically, she would avoid places where prostitution was cracked down on, as she was never short of business opportunities. Of course, as the saying goes, "He who walks by the river will eventually get wet," and she was dealt with several times.

However, the place I spend the most time in is the capital city of the neighboring province.

At the karaoke bar there, he met a building materials business owner.

She was 25 at the time, and he was 46. This building materials store owner was particularly fond of her and often asked her to go out with him.

Later, the other party simply proposed to take her as a sugar daddy, and she realized that this might be an opportunity for her to turn her life around, so she gladly accepted.

The building materials boss rented her an apartment and took her in, giving her a sum of money every month and then visiting her for a few days every now and then.

She fantasized about one day becoming a mistress and a wealthy wife, living a life of comfort and ease.

But rich people aren't stupid. They just spend a little money to play around from the beginning, and when they get tired of it, they just kick it to the curb.

And that was indeed the case. After working for this boss for a little over a year, she started causing trouble, hoping to get a permanent position. This led to the boss becoming increasingly cold towards her, and at one point, he didn't come to see her for over a month.

She was unaware of her own actions, believing that the man had simply gotten tired of her and abandoned her.

So she thought of revenge.

The person who helped her take revenge was Hu Dali, nicknamed "Big Cannon".

Wu Yuemei and Hu Dali met at a dance hall. Since she became his sugar daddy, she has had a lot of free time.

The building materials store owner wasn't a local and spent most of his time away from the area, so she had plenty of free time.

She doesn't know how to play mahjong, saying it's too mentally taxing and she can't learn it, so she goes to dance halls instead.

There, she met Hu Dali, who was seven years younger than her. Dancing naturally sparks chemistry, and the two were from the same hometown.

Then, the drama unfolded where she used the money she earned from being kept as a sugar daddy to support a young gigolo.

She also explained the origin of Hu Dali's nickname "Big Cannon," saying that if it weren't for the size of his penis, she would never have fallen for him given his appearance.

Wang Tao felt embarrassed, but Zhou Yi didn't care at all, only warning her not to say those useless things.

After she told Hu Dali about her dissatisfaction with the old man in bed, Hu Dali immediately offered to help her vent her anger.

Finally, the two decided to kidnap the building materials boss and extort money from him.

Upon hearing Wu Yuemei's explanation, Wang Tao was so excited that he almost stood up.

Because this will lead to a kidnapping case.

Fortunately, Wu Yuemei didn't notice that Zhou Yi subtly gestured for him not to alert the enemy.

Wu Yuemei was indeed not very bright; she kept talking nonstop, completely unaware of how serious the problem was.

However, this also means that Hu Dali must be arrested.

The safest path in the July 27th case is gone.

Zhou Yi now only regrets that in his previous life he had asked Hu Dali about the details of how he knew Liu Zi.

Wu Yuemei said that according to Hu Dali's plan, she called the building materials boss and coaxed him over in a soft voice.

After a while, when the others arrived, she put some kind of drug in the drink that Hu Dali had somehow gotten his hands on.

After drugging the man, Hu Dali came in and kidnapped him.

"Wait, when you say he kidnapped someone, do you mean he kidnapped someone alone, or did you kidnap someone with him? And where was the person kidnapped?" Zhou Yi asked upon hearing this.

“He wasn’t alone; he also found an accomplice,” Wu Yuemei said.

"who is it?"

Wu Yuemei shook her head: "I've never met him. He just said he was a friend of his. He told me to just drug the person and he would take care of the rest. Otherwise, Boss Huang would know that the kidnapping and extortion was related to me, and then he would be exposed if he called the police."

Zhou Yi immediately knew that this foolish woman had most likely been used as a pawn by Hu Dali. She was drinking at his place one minute and then being tied up the next; how could he not suspect him? But the fact that she was unharmed and hadn't been arrested could only mean one thing.

This Mr. Huang, who runs a building materials business, is probably already a casual shopper.

As the old saying goes, adultery has always led to murder.

However, since the crime occurred in the capital of a neighboring province, Zhou Yi did not have access to the case files in his previous life, so he was unaware of the situation.

Judging from the current situation, Wu Yuemei should not know about it, otherwise she would not have spoken about it so openly.

However, not knowing that Mr. Huang is dead does not mean that she is innocent. It is an objective fact that she participated in the kidnapping and extortion and caused someone's death.

She is an accomplice, but she has already effectively assisted in controlling the kidnapped person. Even if she did not participate in the murder, her sentence will be at least ten years.

With the two cases combined, his life is basically over.

What did Hu Dali do after he kidnapped the person?

"I need money."

"How much do you want? How do you want it?"

"He planned to ask for 30,000 yuan, then give me 20,000 yuan and he would keep 10,000 yuan. As for how he would get the money, he told me not to worry about it, saying that knowing too much would be bad for me."

According to Wu Yuemei's confession, this incident occurred ten years ago, in 1987. At that time, the average annual salary for ordinary people was only a little over 1,000 yuan. Ten thousand yuan was still a synonym for a wealthy person, and 30,000 yuan was obviously an astronomical figure.

"So how much money did you actually get in the end?" Zhou Yi knew that Hu Dali couldn't possibly give her that much.

Wu Yuemei held up one hand and said, "Five hundred."

Wang Tao was shocked. He was only given 500 out of 30,000. The difference was too big.

"Just five hundred yuan, didn't you have any doubts?" Zhou Yi asked. This amount was indeed beyond his expectations. This Hu Dali was really ruthless.

Wu Yuemei said, "After he kidnapped the man, I waited at home. On the third night, Hu Dali suddenly came to me and said that the man surnamed Huang did not bring much money with him this time."

"I originally wanted to call his family and ask them to send money over, but the man surnamed Huang said his wife had a very bad temper and was a tigress. If they called to ask for money, the tigress would not only refuse to give them the money, but would also call the police."

"So he didn't dare. He said that in the end they beat up Boss Huang, found 2,600 yuan on him, and then released him, warning him not to come back."

Zhou Yi was speechless. This woman was both stupid and wicked; she actually believed such nonsense.

"He robbed you of 2,600, why did he only give you 500? According to what he said before, shouldn't he have given you the lion's share?" Zhou Yi asked.

"Yeah, I was stunned at the time and didn't realize it. It took me several days to think about it, but by then that bastard Hu Dali had already disappeared. He said that just to be on the safe side, we should split up and hide for a while, and then I couldn't find him anymore."

Zhou Yi didn't plan to tell her right now what the consequences would be for the five hundred yuan she had taken.

To avoid upsetting her and causing her to become uncooperative later.

Moreover, he knew that Hu Dali would reappear later. Because this alone wouldn't be enough to show that she had fallen to such a state.

"Go on."

Wu Yuemei said that she hid for several months in fear, afraid that Boss Huang would cause her trouble, and also afraid that the police would arrest her.

When he finally ran out of money, he had no choice but to return to his old ways and go back to his old profession.

However, as she got older, business naturally became less profitable than when she was younger. In addition, the previous incident with Boss Huang resulted in her losing everything, which made her even more irritable. As a result, she had a lot of troubles in the following years.

She blamed all the fault on Hu Dali, and the mere thought of him made her grit her teeth in hatred.

After saving money for a few more years, and seeing that she was about to turn thirty, she thought that if she didn't get married soon, things would get complicated, so she took her savings and started going home to meet potential partners.

Her family introduced her to many potential partners, but she didn't like any of them, finding fault with everything.

Until one blind date, she unexpectedly met the man she would recognize even if he turned to ashes, Hu Dali.

She immediately wanted to settle accounts with Hu Dali, convinced that he must have gotten a lot of money from Boss Huang and that he should return her rightful share.

Otherwise, she would call the police. After all, she only took five hundred yuan, and she could simply return the money to Boss Huang.

Then Hu Dali said in a fit of anger, "If you're so capable, go ahead and call the police. Anyway, since Boss Huang is dead, everyone is implicated."

These words terrified her, and she questioned Hu Dali about what had happened and why he had killed someone.

Hu Dali explained that he did not kill the person; the person died inexplicably during the beating, which is why he did not get the money.

They only found a little over 2,600 yuan on Mr. Huang.

Hu Dali said that the friend he had called for help was so scared that he wanted to turn himself in. In order to prevent the friend from turning himself in, Hu Dali had no choice but to give him the large sum of two thousand yuan to bribe him.

Of the remaining six hundred or so, five hundred was given to Wu Yuemei, and he kept a little over one hundred for travel expenses.

“Hu Dali said at the time that if I wanted to call the police, I could go ahead and do so. We’d die together. Anyway, I was the one who drugged Boss Huang, so I’m also responsible…” As she spoke, Wu Yuemei’s speech slowed down, because she suddenly realized that she shouldn’t have said these things.

But it was too late.

She looked up and found Zhou Yi smiling at her, which made her feel a chill run down her spine.

“Wu Yuemei, Hu Dali didn’t lie to you. If Boss Huang is really dead, you’re an accomplice and will be held legally responsible.”

Upon hearing this, Wu Yuemei turned pale with fright. "But...but I didn't mean to kill him! And Hu Dali didn't say anyone would die at first! I really didn't know, I really..."

"Alright, you're just afraid of taking responsibility, not regretting what you did. Stop playing the victim in front of us. We'll verify whether Boss Huang is dead or not. But you'd better pray he's not dead, otherwise your crime will be much bigger."

After Zhou Yi finished speaking, Wu Yuemei burst into tears, crying so hard she was heartbroken.

So these criminals are a bunch of selfish beasts. They weren't even that heartbroken when their own son died, but when the knife was about to fall on their own heads, they finally got scared.

"Stop crying! Keep talking!" Zhou Yi slammed his hand on the table and shouted.

In truth, Zhou Yi didn't believe Hu Dali at all. Because in his previous life, he had personally interrogated this guy, and he knew how cunning the other party was. Before he confessed to Liu Zi, he had done a lot of groundwork, always trying to bargain and weigh the matter before confessing to Liu Zi.

He himself has a long-standing criminal record, but he never mentions it.

Only someone as brainless as Wu Yuemei would believe him.

Sure enough, Wu Yuemei said she was terrified. Not only did she no longer hate Hu Dali, but she also felt that he was loyal and righteous, just because he only took a little over one hundred of the two thousand six hundred.

Therefore, the two got together again.

Upon learning that Wu Yuemei was going on a blind date, Hu Dali vowed to marry her.

Wu Yuemei gritted her teeth and said that she was too naive and believed this bastard's words.

In the following few months, Hu Dali, under the pretense of having connections with friends who could make big money through investments, swindled Wu Yuemei out of all her savings and then disappeared.

In other words, Wu Yuemei sold for ten years starting at the age of eighteen, and in the end, she lost everything and had nothing left.

That's why she met Yao Xi on a blind date when she was thirty-two.

"I hate him so much, I wish I could tear him to pieces!" Wu Yuemei cursed.

"That's not right. If you hate him so much, why would you say that Yao Huanhuan might be his son? If we work backwards from when you gave birth to Yao Huanhuan, you got pregnant after you and Yao Xi got married."

Given Wu Yuemei's temperament, it's impossible that she would have a relationship with Yao Xi, whom she dislikes, before marriage.

Faced with this question, Wu Yuemei immediately deflated. She said somewhat awkwardly, "After we got married, Yao Xi's...it was too small, it wasn't satisfying. Then I met Hu Dali, and I couldn't resist...so..."

Zhou Yi had no interest in such dirty business.

"So how did Hu Dali explain the scam to you this time?"

"He said he hadn't lost any money; he had committed a crime and the police wanted to arrest him, so he had to run away. Then he gave me three thousand yuan, saying it was a dividend he had earned from investments over the past two years."

Zhou Yi knew this was the beginning of trouble.

"You didn't believe his nonsense and give him the money again, did you?"

Wu Yuemei nodded. "I gave him the three thousand yuan, plus the eight thousand eight-thousand-yuan dowry that the Yao family gave me. Then he disappeared again, and the following month I found out that my period hadn't come, and then I found out I was pregnant."

Zhou Yi had never seen such a stupid person before. Falling into the same ditch three times was unprecedented.

Did you see Hu Dali again after that?

Wu Yuemei shook her head, so it was impossible to determine where Hu Dali was at the moment.

"So you hate Hu Dali for repeatedly deceiving you and taking all your money, and then you suspect that Yao Huanhuan might be his child, so you transfer your hatred for Hu Dali to Yao Huanhuan? Is that it? Or is there another reason?" Zhou Yi asked.

Logically, things should be clear by now.

However, when she heard Zhou Yi's question, Wu Yuemei hesitated instinctively.

She wasn't a smart person, and her unusual reactions were easy to spot.

After hesitating for a moment, she nodded.

But Zhou Yi caught every subtle reaction she made in those one or two seconds.

Before she nodded, her nostrils flared slightly.

This is a micro-expression reaction indicating fear and a desire to escape.

"Fear? Shouldn't she hate Hu Dali? Why would she be afraid?"

Suddenly, a brilliant idea flashed in Zhou Yi's mind.

He knows the truth!

(End of this chapter)