Anti-gang campaign: Female bureau chief

Jiang Ruolan held the evidence bag up to her eyes and carefully examined the numbers on the slip of paper: "Song Baogen, 45 years old, an old miner from Chenjiagou mining area in Shiqiao County, from the same batch as Liao Guangcheng."

Back when Shen Wangshan was illegally mining rare earth and dumping radioactive tailings in the Chenjiagou mining area, Song Baogen was the mine's safety officer.

Liao Guangcheng mentioned him several times in his mine logbook—Song Baogen was a colleague of Liu Zhenguo and He Dayong. The three of them discovered excessive radioactivity in the tailings dam. Liu Zhenguo and He Dayong decided to report it, but Song Baogen hesitated and didn't go with them.

"right."

Lu Zheng's memory was fully awakened. He walked quickly to Jiang Ruolan's side and spoke rapidly, "Liu Zhenguo and He Dayong were killed by Tang Yuanqing in 2010 and buried in the back mountain of Qingshipu."

Song Baogen escaped punishment because he did not participate in the whistleblowing. However, Liao Guangcheng wrote in his diary, "Baogen knows too much; he'll get into trouble sooner or later."

During the investigation of the Shen Wangshan case, we kept looking for Song Baogen, hoping that he could testify as a witness about Shen Wangshan's crimes in the Chenjiagou mining area, but he disappeared.

His family reported him missing, but there was no trace of him at the time. Later, we only found the remains of Liu Zhenguo and He Dayong in the back hill of Qingshipu, not Song Baogen's. Everyone thought he was still alive, but had simply fled under an assumed name.

"But he didn't run away. He's been living in Nghe An ever since, right under our noses."

Jiang Ruolan's gaze returned to the corpse on the ground, its face corroded beyond recognition. "Then someone poured caustic soda on his face and he died six months after Shen Wangshan was executed."

Why? Shen Wangshan is dead, Tang Yuanqing is dead, and Ren Pengfei and Qian Shouyi are in prison. The core gang from back then has been wiped out. Who else would want to silence him?

With his death, no one can pinpoint the exact location of the radioactive tailings dumped, allowing the costs of environmental remediation to continue to be postponed, and enabling the land's developers to continue pretending ignorance of what lies buried underground.

As for the mining rights that Fengmao forcibly seized, although Shen Wangshan is dead, the related asset disputes are still pending in court. With Song Baogen's death, the last witness who could prove the source of the illegal mining is gone.

The numbers on this note aren't a serial number; they're a code. Who was the killer showing it to by slipping it into the victim's pocket?—It was conveying some kind of message.

Lu Zheng took a picture of the numbers on the slip of paper and sent it to the technical department, asking them to check if the string of numbers corresponded to the last few digits of a bank account, phone number, or ID number.

Then he arranged for someone to send over Song Baogen's household registration information and photos from his time as a miner, in preparation for comparing them with the deceased's physical characteristics.

Mr. Zheng conducted preliminary fingerprint collection at the scene.

Although the deceased's face was corroded, his hands were well preserved, and his fingerprints were clearly identifiable.

Director Fang immediately arranged for the fingerprints to be sent back to the Municipal Bureau for comparison.

More than half an hour later, the technical department called – the fingerprint of the deceased’s right index finger matched closely with the fingerprint in Song Baogen’s household registration file, confirming that the deceased was indeed Song Baogen.

Jiang Ruolan hung up the phone, stood at the entrance of the work shed, and looked at the torrential rain outside.

The mountain of scrap metal in the yard of the recycling station was being washed away by the rain, making a loud splashing sound. The murky water, mixed with rust and oil, flowed across the ground.

Several police officers in raincoats were taking Lao Feng's statement. Lao Feng's voice drifted over intermittently through the rain.

"I don't know him... There was nothing in the shed when we finished work yesterday... I heard the sound of a car in the middle of the night, but it's not strange for someone to come to this scrap yard to sell scrap metal in the middle of the night... I thought it was someone unloading goods and went back to sleep..."

"Old Feng said a car would come in the middle of the night."

Jiang Ruolan turned around and said to Lu Zheng, "This scrap yard is in a remote location, and the nearest residential area is more than 300 meters away. Song Baogen couldn't have walked here by himself—he was brought here."

This is the location where the killer disposed of the body, but it wasn't the primary crime scene. The killer chose this junkyard either because they were familiar with the area and knew no one was around at night, or because the junkyard itself had some connection to the killer.

"Old Feng said his recycling station has been open for more than ten years, and most of the people who come to sell their scrap are stragglers and scavengers from the old industrial area in the east of the city."

He also had business dealings with Duan Pengfei's parking lot—some of the construction waste in Duan Pengfei's parking lot was recycled by Lao Feng.

Song Baogen used to work in a mine, and later went into hiding in Yi'an under an assumed name. Could he have also been involved in the scrap metal recycling business?

Lu Zheng said.

"If Song Baogen has stayed in Yi'an all these years, how has he lived?"

Jiang Ruolan followed Lu Zheng's line of thought and continued, "After Shen Wangshan's case, he did not come forward to testify, which means he was afraid—afraid of retaliation from Shen Wangshan's remaining associates, or afraid of being investigated for what happened back then."

His family had reported him missing, indicating he had lost contact with them. Without any stable income, the most likely place for him to survive in Yi An would be in those gray areas that don't require registration, social security, or cash payments—scrap metal recycling is one such example.

Lu Zheng turned his gaze to Old Feng, who was still trembling in the corner, and suddenly remembered something:

"Director Fang said that Lao Feng reacted strongly when he saw the words on the note, saying that he had seen the handwriting before, and that it was written by a thug from the outskirts of Fengmao. That person was just released from prison last month."

"What's your name?"

"Old Feng can't say his full name clearly, he only remembers that his nickname is 'Iron Head' and his real name seems to be Geng."

"Geng Tietou?"

Jiang Ruolan memorized the name and immediately turned to Lu Zheng, "Go check the list of people recently released from prison in Yi'an, all the peripheral personnel related to the Shen Wangshan case, especially those who used to work as thugs and debt collectors in Fengmao."

Also, regarding the "Iron Head" that Lao Feng mentioned, check his real name, release date, and current address. If his handwriting matches the note, he's currently the most direct lead in this case.

Jiang Ruolan walked up to Lao Feng and squatted down.

Old Feng raised his face, soaked with rain and sweat, his lips trembling, his eyes filled with fear and unease.

She tried to soften her tone:

"Old Feng, you said you've seen that kind of writing on the note. Who is this 'Iron Head'? How do you know him?"

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