eurekapd Chapter 1033 Eliminated Suspicion, No Time to Commit the Crime
Chapter 1033 Eliminated Suspicion, No Time to Commit the Crime
Li Li's reply was a smiling emoji, with the time displayed as 22:35. In the cloud backup of the phone recovered by the technical department, a deleted video was also found: the image was shaky and blurry, showing Zhang Bing drunkenly embracing Li Li, with the background being Hongfa Machinery's warehouse, and the words "scrap...cannot be said" could be vaguely heard.
"At 2 a.m. on July 9th, were you sure the sound of a heavy object falling over that you heard in the workshop was a machine malfunction?" Xiao Zhou suddenly asked. Li Li's pupils contracted sharply, and her right hand unconsciously touched the red marks on her neck—marks left from long hours of operating the machine tools. "I...I was milling parts at the time. The sound was muffled, and I thought the conveyor belt was stuck." Her gaze began to wander, and her feet shuffled back and forth on the ground.
To verify the confession, Xiao Zhou led a team back to Hongfa Machinery. The workshop director retrieved the equipment operation log, which showed that between 2:00 and 2:30 AM on July 9th, only milling machine No. 3 was operating, the very machine operated by Li Li. The technician removed the machine tool's protective cover and found that the milling cutter still had uncleaned metal shavings, which, upon testing, perfectly matched the material of the parts processed that night.
During a visit to Li Li's colleagues, a female worker quietly pulled Xiao Zhou aside: "That night, I went to the restroom and saw her light was still on at her workstation. She usually complains of hunger by eight o'clock, but that day she didn't buy any late-night snacks until she finished get off work." However, when Xiao Zhou pressed for details, the female worker hurriedly waved her hand: "I was just saying it casually; maybe she was rushing to finish her work."
Xiao Zhou decided to start with the timeline. He pinpointed Li Li's movements to the minute: 23:45 she bought instant noodles at a convenience store, 00:00 she returned to the workshop to clock in, 02:17 she called Zhang Bing, and 05:00 she discovered the body after finishing get off work. The convenience store surveillance footage showed that after buying her things, she walked straight to the factory area without stopping; in the workshop surveillance footage, her figure was constantly moving in front of the machine tools, except for a trip to the restroom at 3:00 AM, which lasted seven minutes and twelve seconds.
When the police dog smelled blood outside the factory perimeter wall, everyone tensed up. But the investigation was disappointing: it was just a stray dog hit by a vehicle, and the pattern of the blood splatter was significantly different from human arterial bleeding. Forensic pathologist Zhang Lin shook his head, holding the soil test report: "The fluorescent agent on the dog's fur is different from the footprints at the scene; it's probably a coincidence."
Li Li's phone location records became the final breakthrough. The technical team reconstructed the trajectory, showing that her phone remained within a 50-meter radius of the workshop during the time of the incident. However, Xiao Zhou noticed an anomaly: at 11:00 PM on July 8th, the phone briefly connected to a base station outside the factory, lasting only 17 seconds. Faced with questioning, Li Li suddenly broke down in tears: "That day I went to throw out the trash! Zhang Bing said he wanted to surprise me and told me not to wait for him at the factory!"
After three days of intensive investigation, all the evidence formed a complete closed loop. Li Li's time of the crime was completely ruled out, and the testimonies of 32 colleagues in the workshop, machine tool operating data, and mobile phone location records corroborated each other. However, while sorting through the evidence, Xiao Zhou's eyes fell on the sticky note on the back of Li Li's work badge—the line written in pencil, "7.10 Warehouse Key," suddenly resonated eerily with the encrypted video of scrap smuggling on Zhang Bing's phone.
The atmosphere in the Criminal Investigation Division's conference room was so heavy it seemed almost palpable. The oval conference table was piled high with various documents, photos, and evidence bags. The cold white light from the projector illuminated everyone's tired but focused faces. Li Ming stood in front of the whiteboard, his red pen heavily circling the words "Zhang Bing Case." He cleared his throat, breaking the suffocating silence: "Comrades, this is the first case analysis meeting for the Zhang Bing case. Time is of the essence; we must find a breakthrough from these intricate clues. Now, in order, please report on your respective progress."
The first to rise was forensic pathologist Zhang Lin. He adjusted his black-rimmed glasses and opened the thick autopsy report. The lingering smell of formaldehyde from the autopsy room seemed to still linger as the report pages turned. "The deceased was Zhang Bing, male, 35 years old. A detailed autopsy determined the cause of death to be mechanical asphyxiation combined with an open wound to the neck." He pulled up the autopsy photos on the projector. On the screen, the gruesome wound on Zhang Bing's neck was clearly visible, the surrounding skin tissue turned inside out, showing an irregular tear. "The murder weapon was likely a blunt object of considerable weight with irregular edges, which repeatedly struck him, causing rupture of the trachea and esophagus, ultimately leading to loss of vital signs."
Zhang Lin pointed a laser pointer at the CT scan of the deceased's head. "Furthermore, the deceased had minor axonal damage in the frontal lobe, indicating that the head had suffered a violent shock, possibly from a fall or a blunt object blow, but this was not fatal. Through analysis of the stomach contents, we found that it mainly contained undigested noodles and sausages. Based on the degree of digestion, the deceased was killed 1-2 hours after eating. Considering the rectal temperature, livor mortis, rigor mortis, and other factors, the time of death was pinpointed to between 1:00 AM and 3:00 AM on July 9th. In addition, the skin tissue extracted from under the deceased's fingernails has been sent for DNA testing, and the results may become crucial evidence."
Immediately afterward, Xiao Yang from the on-site investigation team stood up, a probe covered in mud still tucked into his investigation uniform pocket. "We conducted a comprehensive, thorough investigation of the crime scene." He switched the projector screen, and a 3D model of the scene slowly rotated, every trace precisely marked. "In the entryway, we extracted three size 42 sneaker prints. The sole pattern was diamond-shaped. After preliminary comparison, this sole pattern is common in a certain brand of outdoor sports shoes, but that brand has over 200,000 pairs nationwide, making the investigation extremely difficult. We also extracted a complete whorl fingerprint from the doorknob, but unfortunately, there was no matching record in the database."
Xiao Yang showed a photo of the safe, whose surface was covered with chisel marks of varying depths. "The safe was forcibly pried open. The pry marks indicate that the murder weapon was a high-hardness steel chisel with a diameter of 8mm, and the composition analysis showed that it contained 0.6% carbon. We also found two types of foreign fibers at the scene: one was polyester fiber, and the other contained wool, which likely came from the murderer's clothing, but a comparison with the textile database has not yet yielded results. In addition, the distribution of bloodstains at the scene indicates that this was the primary crime scene, and the victim had engaged in a fierce struggle with the murderer."
Xiao Wang and Xiao Zhou exchanged a glance and were the first to report on the investigation. "We have the results of our investigation into Li Qiang." Xiao Wang spread a thick stack of investigation materials on the table, including surveillance screenshots, witness testimonies, and spending records. "Li Qiang has a complete alibi for the night of the incident."