Eyes that are the same as those of evil

Chapter 253 Perfectionism 7
Early the next morning, Tan Jia set off with the Dingdingmao specialist.

The car was parked at the traffic police station. When they arrived, Zheng Yan was standing to the side with his hands on his hips, staring at the car with his brows furrowed.

"Team Leader Zheng," she called out.

Zheng Yan turned around and was surprised to see Lin Zhiyue.

Then he asked Tan Jia, "Did you send him to find the security camera?"

"Yes. Have you checked it?"

“We checked, but there was nothing,” Zheng Yan said, frowning. “I also asked the traffic police. After the car was brought here, apart from the trace evidence, no one else had contact with it. Xu Youan’s wife, friends, none of them came looking for us.”

Tan Jia patted Lin Zhiyue on the back and told him to go and take a look.

Turning to Zheng Yan, he said, "The fact that the murderer risked everything to destroy the camera is just one possibility. The camera might have been damaged at the scene and fallen to the ground unnoticed, or it might have been removed by the murderer long ago. After all, we haven't confirmed who the murderer is yet. What if it's the semi-trailer driver? What if it's one of those drivers who seemed to be close enough to help? They all came into contact with the deceased and the vehicle before we did."

“Yes, I’ve already sent forensic investigators to search the scene,” Zheng Yan said, glancing at her with a smile in his eyes. “It seems you weren’t affected by the questions you were asked yesterday. I thought I was going to see you with a stern face and not saying a word today.”

Tan Jia shrugged.

Lin Zhiyue quickly returned after the examination and shook his head at her.

"Indeed not."

"Then I'll have to trouble you to go to Chengnan Avenue. Captain Zheng, are you coming with us?"

Zheng Yan shook his head: "The deceased's parents are coming today, so I think we'll be quite busy."

Xu Youan's parents were private entrepreneurs, quite famous in the city's manufacturing industry. When they learned that their second son had died in a car accident before leaving a child, the couple almost fainted.

Then they slammed their fists on the table demanding an explanation, wanting to see the surveillance footage, interrogate the semi-trailer driver, and request the dashcam footage. After seeing the footage, they said they wanted to arrest the driver who was using high beams, stating that they didn't want compensation and wanted the driver to be sentenced to a heavy prison term.

Throughout the process, Yuan Qing silently accompanied them, her eyelids red and swollen, remaining taciturn.

Zheng Yan had no choice but to tell them, "To be on the safe side, we still need to conduct a thorough investigation and gather evidence to prove that Xu Youan's car accident was indeed caused by these external factors, and that there was no human intervention involved..."

"What human factors? You're not traffic police, are you? Is there something wrong here?" Xu Youan's parents reacted in the same way as Yuan Qing, looking at them warily, their voices trembling.

Zheng Yan further explained, "We are still continuing our investigation. Current findings suggest that he likely made a mistake due to fatigue while driving, but it's uncertain whether he had any other acute medical conditions. As for the autopsy..."

"Why bother with an autopsy? My son doesn't have any acute illness. This is clearly the fault of the driver who was using high beams and the semi-trailer truck driver! They won't escape responsibility!"

Zheng Yan's eyes narrowed. They were quite eager to conclude that this was an accident.

When Tan Jia and the others returned from the scene, Zheng Yan brought up the matter.

“Xu Youan’s parents have been trying to shift the blame for the accident onto others. They don’t believe that it was caused by Xu Youan’s own fatigue or acute illness. Moreover, they are very reluctant to have an autopsy performed on the deceased.”

“It is somewhat suspicious. But what would be the motive for parents to kill their son? Was the son not their biological child? Were they ashamed because the son was gay? Or did they intend to care for him but ended up killing him?” Tan Jia could come up with three reasons without having to think about it carefully.

Zheng Yan: "You've watched too many crime dramas, and you dare to make wild guesses right off the bat. But I think if the camera you mentioned is real, it's not something that the couple would do. It seems that their use of electronic products is limited to the function of turning them on and off."

"There are plenty of old women in the world who can use two guns, so we can't rule out the possibility of men, women, young and old being involved."

"...Stop using such nonsensical metaphors." After complaining, Zheng Yan arranged for someone to investigate Xu Youan's parents.

"The people currently under investigation include Xu Youan's parents, wife, friends, the semi-trailer truck driver, and several drivers who approached the deceased and the vehicle after the traffic jam. We hope to get some useful clues as soon as possible, otherwise the family insists it was an accident and wants to close the case, so we have no way to open a criminal investigation."

"Should this be considered a useful clue?" Tan Jia took out their trophy, a small black cube that was slightly melted from the heat. "It was found in the grass at the crime scene and doesn't belong to any car parts."

"Let me see," Zheng Yan took it and examined it, quickly concluding, "It's part of a wireless miniature camera. The camera itself must have been crushed or flown away; it's very small and hard to find."

This was certainly a useful clue; finally, there was something that could somewhat prove that the victim's murder was not normal.

He also shared some knowledge on this topic: "Miniature cameras were originally used by journalists for undercover investigations and by the police for investigations. Most of them were wired and connected to a power source, but some were wireless. Now, some people use them for illegal activities more often than we do. It's not effective to explicitly prohibit their sale, and they are constantly being updated and iterated. Cameras can now be smaller than a mung bean."

Speaking of which, there have been several cases this year that are related to surveillance cameras. The investigations were chilling, making people feel like there are eyes watching passersby everywhere, and wishing that surveillance technology worldwide would be reduced by ten thousand times.

Tan Jia didn't share his frustration with the added troubles brought by rapidly developing technology. He just frowned and said, "If it's smaller than a mung bean, it can be embedded anywhere in the car and is hard to find. This would give the murderer more opportunities to remove it. But so far, the murderer hasn't come to destroy it. Is it because they know we're investigating and therefore dare not come, or is it because they know the camera is no longer in the car?"

Her dream went "black out" after the car crash, but that doesn't mean the camera immediately stopped working. Perhaps the murderer was still watching Xu Youan die behind the camera, and in that case, they might have heard some of what they said at the scene.

"There's another question: what did the killer do with the camera? If it was just voyeurism, then the victim's death has no direct connection to the person who installed the camera. If there is a direct connection, did the killer use the camera's audio function to manipulate the victim into crashing the car?"

There are three questions to ask about everything: Why, why, why? If you can answer them, the problem is almost solved.

Zheng Yan didn't answer her question. After installing the miniature camera, he told her a new message.

“When we were investigating Xu Youan’s social connections, we discovered a very coincidental thing. You were in a multi-vehicle accident a few months ago, right? There were many injured people at the time, and the deceased happened to be one of them. He was injured in the accident and needed to be hospitalized. He met Yuan Qing at the hospital, and the two fell in love.”

Tan Jia showed an unexpected expression.

“Xu Youan and I were in a car accident on the same road a few months ago? What a coincidence… Do you think the murderer could be the same person who caused that accident? They didn’t get rid of Xu Youan that time, so they’re doing it again this time.”