I Play Dungeons in the Police Station-Chapter 228 - 160: Correcting the Investigation Direction
"In that case, why didn’t the neighbors hear any screams that night?"
"Because they were playing cards; it was already noisy, and the neighbors were used to it, so no one paid attention."
Li Xiang nodded thoughtfully.
Then, looking at the chalk outline on the ground marking the victim’s position, and comparing it with the photos of the crime scene at the time, Li Xiang slowly lay down, aligning himself with the dead body’s posture.
"Team Leader Li..."
Ding Youqiang was surprised that Li Xiang, despite his young age, was so brave. This was where a dead person had lain; the black dried blood on the summer ground still emitted a putrid smell, yet he lay down there.
Moreover, this wasn’t just any dead person, but a violently deceased one, rumored to have turned into a vicious ghost after killing someone.
Of course, these were just rumors, not to be believed. However, whenever he thought about them, they still made him uneasy.
Li Xiang paid no heed to such matters. If they were real, he would be curious to see what this apparition looked like—whether as stunning as on TV—and then see if it could compete with his system.
Anyway, while working, he remained very serious and meticulous. Observing some spatter patterns of blood on the ground, he ignored Ding Youqiang’s peculiar gaze and continually adjusted his own posture as he lay down.
With Grandmaster Level forensic medicine skills, he could reconstruct the crime scene using drip and spatter bloodstains to aid him in understanding the incident.
First, he used formulas to calculate the angle of incidence for these bloodstains and then extended lines along these angles to take multiple points using this method. The intersection point of these lines was the point of bleeding, indicating where the victim was attacked.
"According to the current investigation direction, the suspect might be a traveler from outside looking for cheap travel options. Now, assume you are this outsider, let’s simulate what happened on the night of the crime."
"Uh, okay!"
Ding Youqiang didn’t quite understand how this simulation would help; could it really lead them to the culprit?
Although skeptical, he decided to cooperate when necessary: "What should I do?"
"It’s simple. First, imagine you’re a budget traveler. Under what circumstances would you choose to rob and murder someone?"
"In a dead-end situation!"
"Be more specific. Perhaps he’s very thirsty or hungry, yet has no money, leading him to commit robbery at a small store out of desperation."
"That’s the logic." Ding Youqiang nodded in agreement.
"But there’s a logical gap here. If he was so thirsty or hungry, why didn’t he take food from the shelves? Look at these shelves—they are organized neatly without signs of ravaging. This doesn’t align with our initial assumptions."
"We discussed this before. It’s inconvenient for a suspect to carry a lot of food while fleeing. He would only need a small amount to stave off hunger temporarily. Some spots on the shelves might have been cleared out by him, and then he would take all the cash from the register, allowing him to buy food wherever he fled."
"This is your post-fact assessment. I believe the suspect’s primary motive was monetary, not murder. This becomes evident from his use of the victim’s kitchen knife as a weapon; he didn’t bring a murder weapon with him, indicating he did not plan to kill from the outset.
Instead, he was caught in the act of theft, panicked when the victim appeared, saw the knife, and under sudden impulse, killed her. After a spontaneous act of violent crime, could he really calmly collect items from the shelves?"
"This..." Ding Youqiang was momentarily at a loss for words.
They, too, had been puzzled about this back then, but they exhausted all the potential leads and found none. Without other clues, they reluctantly shifted their focus to outsiders. However, despite a lengthy investigation, no valuable clues emerged.
"There’s another issue here."
"Another one?"
"Yes, reconstructing the scene from these bloodstains, the victim had walked seven or eight steps from inside the room before the assailant stabbed her for the first time. Then, during her escape towards the door, she was stabbed multiple times; yet, there were no bloody footprints on the ground. This suggests the assailant didn’t return but rather, after realizing the murder, quickly fled the crime scene. By this time, he had already stolen the money; his initial goal, after all, was financial gain."
After Li Xiang’s thorough analysis at the crime scene, the nature of the case became increasingly clear.
"This wasn’t a case of home invasion leading to robbery and murder; it was a burglary that escalated to a spontaneous murder out of fear of exposure, and the perpetrator was from this village."
"Oh, how so?"
At this moment, Ding Youqiang felt certain of his abilities. The team leader dispatched from the provincial level indeed had impressive skills, his analysis being logical and well-founded, highlighting numerous issues they had overlooked.
Li Xiang astonishingly narrowed down the suspect to a local, surprising him, as they had initially ruled out local involvement for various reasons, directing their investigation to outsiders.
But now, Li Xiang suggested they had discounted the correct answer from the very start, leaving him at a loss on how to process this revelation.
"According to your investigation, on the night of the crime, the neighbors didn’t hear the victim’s screams because late-night card games were common, and the noise was usual to them. But if the victim found a stranger sneaking around her home, wouldn’t she shout for help? Yet, she didn’t—why not?"
"She knew the thief?"
"Exactly, she knew the thief. When she discovered the thief, she didn’t immediately call out for help but approached to see what he was doing. Not wanting his theft to be exposed, the suspect then formed the intent to kill."
Ding Youqiang had to admit that Li Xiang’s speculation was logically consistent, though he still had a question: "We investigated all the locals, everyone relevant to the case was interviewed, except Qiao Liangfu, who had no alibi during the crime. Later, we conducted a thorough search of his home and found nothing suspicious. Could we have missed something?"
Their initial investigative direction indeed aligned with Li Xiang’s assessment; he merely highlighted details they had overlooked, but their direction wasn’t incorrect.
Yet, their investigation ended with no conclusive findings.
"We need to adjust our investigation, focusing again on locals. We should re-evaluate all the locals’ movements that night, consolidate all suspicious clues, and verify each point of doubt."
In any case, if the investigation’s direction is wrong, no amount of effort will yield results.
Li Xiang timely redirected their investigation, steering them back to focusing on villagers.
He believed that clues would emerge soon. 𝘧𝘳𝘦ℯ𝓌𝘦𝒷𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝓁.𝒸𝘰𝓂
After all, this village had only a few hundred households. With divided investigations, it wouldn’t take long to cover them all.
"Alright, I will arrange that right away."
"Wait a minute. I have a rough guess on the suspect’s profile. The perpetrator is male, aged between 20 to 50, and stands over 1.75 meters tall. Concentrate your investigation on this demographic, and you should find something."
"Uh, why would the suspect be taller than 1.75 meters?"
The first two criteria for the suspect were not difficult to understand. The victim had little chance to resist before being killed, indicating the suspect had superior strength, adequate to overpower Qin Qinglian. Thus, the theory of a young and robust suspect was plausible.
But how was the suspect’s height deduced?
No footprints were found at the scene to assist in this deduction.
