eurekapd Chapter 924 Clues Provided by Guo Jianfeng's Girlfriend
Chapter 924 Clues Provided by Guo Jianfeng's Girlfriend
The last person was Liu Wei, Guo Jianfeng's direct supervisor and sales director. When he pushed open the conference room door, he was still holding client information in his hand: "Guo Jianfeng's death is a major loss to the company. He had three projects worth tens of millions of yuan that he was working on." He took off his glasses and rubbed his temples. "We will fully cooperate with whatever information the police need, but please try to keep a low profile and not affect the mood of other employees."
"Has he mentioned wanting to change jobs recently?" Li Ming observed Liu Wei's expression.
“No,” Liu Wei shook his head. “On the contrary, he said he wanted to develop a long-term career in the company and asked about the requirements for becoming a partner.” He suddenly remembered something. “Oh right, last week he said he wanted to buy a critical illness insurance policy for his mother and asked me to recommend a reliable product, saying that ‘it’s time to put the money he’s earned to good use.’”
The rain outside the window was getting heavier and heavier. Li Ming looked at Guo Jianfeng's empty seat in the office area, with water droplets hanging on the leaves of the green plants.
Xiao Zhang, organizing the interrogation records, said in a low voice, "None of the colleagues mentioned that Guo Jianfeng had any enemies; on the contrary, his interpersonal relationships were unusually good. But the woman in the red dress that Lao Zhou mentioned is key, and Lin Yutong is blood type B, and she's also close to him..."
“Let’s go meet Lin Yutong,” Li Ming grabbed his coat. “And while we’re at it, let’s check if she really was repairing her computer last month, or if she was deleting something.” He paused, remembering what the forensic doctor had said about “forced injection.” “The person who can make Guo Jianfeng lower his guard might not be a client, but someone he trusts.”
In the corridor of Jinshi Financial Company, Lin Yutong walked in carrying a folder, the sound of her red high heels particularly clear in the silence. The diamond stud earring in her right ear was gone, replaced by a simple pearl design. Li Ming looked at the watch peeking out from her cuff—it was the same couple's watch shown in the photo on Guo Jianfeng's desk.
On the third day, in the conference room of the Dongchuan City Criminal Investigation Detachment, Li Ming slammed a stack of documents onto the table. The name "Lin Yutong" on the cover was circled repeatedly in red pen. "Yesterday, we interviewed 37 employees of Jinshi Financial Company and reviewed 48 hours of surveillance footage," he said, scanning the investigators present. "All the evidence points to one conclusion—Lin Yutong's relationship with Guo Jianfeng was indeed limited to that of colleagues, and the clues discovered earlier, such as the diamond earrings and the figure in the red dress, were coincidental."
"But her blood type is B, which matches the skin tissue left by the murderer under the victim's fingernails," investigator Xiao Zhang raised a question.
“The technical department reviewed the DNA comparison results,” Li Ming said, opening the report. “Lin Yutong’s STR profile did not match the tissue at the scene in three places, ruling her out as a suspect. Moreover, her colleagues confirmed that her right earring was missing, and she was attending a senior management meeting at the time of the incident, providing a complete alibi.”
At nine o'clock in the morning, Li Ming brought Xiao Zhang to Guo Jianfeng's residence. Pushing open the door, the room was simply and neatly furnished. The bookshelves were neatly arranged with finance books, and a framed photo of Chen Lili sat on the desk. Next to the photo was a custom-made fountain pen from Jinshi Financial; the female DNA on the inside of the cap, after verification, belonged to an unidentified woman. "Guo Jianfeng has a girlfriend," Li Ming said, putting on gloves and opening the bedside table, "Chen Lili. They're engaged and have been living together for three years."
Half an hour later, Chen Lili rushed over. She was wearing a plain dress, her eyes were red and swollen, and her fingertips kept rubbing her engagement ring. "Jianfeng rarely brings outsiders home," she said softly, "Is there anything I can do to help you?"
"Has he been behaving strangely lately?" Li Ming noticed the instructions for the cold medicine on the bedside table. "Like, mentioning any particular person or event?"
Chen Lili was stunned upon hearing this, and tears suddenly welled up in her eyes: "When we had dinner on Wednesday night, he drank a little and said... said that he might be able to close a big deal." She took out her phone from her bag and found an unsent WeChat voice message, "This is what he said that night, and I haven't been able to bring myself to delete it."
Guo Jianfeng's voice came through the phone, hoarse from drinking: "Lili, once this deal goes through, we can buy that house with the bay window. Haven't you always wanted a study?" There was the sound of cutlery clattering in the background, which Li Ming recognized as the background music from "Cloud Western Restaurant".
“He said he could make a lot of money from trading,” Chen Lili choked up. “I asked if it was a company project, and he said, ‘It’s not a company project, it’s an opportunity outside,’ and added, ‘We’ll talk about it in detail when it’s done.’” She suddenly remembered something and took out a notebook from the drawer. “This is his work notebook, and there’s a strange note tucked inside.”
On the notebook's inner page, the words "Haichuan Capital Project Matching" were scrawled, dated three days prior. Li Ming stared at the four characters "Haichuan Capital," a private equity fund that had recently become active in Dongchuan, but which had no publicly known business dealings with Jinshi Financial.
At noon, Li Ming led a team to visit Haichuan Capital. The person in charge said they had never met Guo Jianfeng and that the company had not launched any new projects recently. "It's probably just the connections he built up himself," the person in charge shrugged. "In the financial industry, everyone wants to earn some extra money on the side."
At 3 PM, Li Ming met with Liu Wei, the sales director of Jinshi Financial, again. In the office, Liu Wei repeatedly fiddled with his tie clip, his eyes darting around: "Guo Jianfeng is indeed capable, but the company doesn't have any large projects recently. The 'big deal' he mentioned might be private wealth management, right?"
"Private financial management requires encrypted folders?" Li Ming pointed to the client data backup extracted from Guo Jianfeng's computer. "He copied the asset data of 23 of the company's VIP clients. Is that normal?"
Cold sweat beaded on Liu Wei's forehead: "Captain Li, actually, everyone knows this kind of thing. Everyone has their own client base. He can only copy the client data he maintains. If he gets fired one day, he still has some backup plans, right? So, there's really nothing to be surprised about. Not to mention him, everyone else copies it too. As for others, I keep copies of the client data I have on my own computer, and I definitely have a backup on my home computer."
Liu Wei didn't find any clues about Guo Jianfeng's big business dealings, but taking on side jobs was commonplace in their line of work, so it didn't attract much attention from the company. As for whether Guo Jianfeng's death was related to this big project, nobody knew.
However, Liu Wei himself did not have the opportunity to commit the crime; he was in a meeting when Guo Jianfeng died, so it was impossible for him to have done it. Moreover, based on the current clues, Guo Jianfeng's death was very likely caused by a female perpetrator, so Liu Wei's suspicion is actually not very high.
At six o'clock in the evening, Chen Lili was sorting through Guo Jianfeng's belongings at home. She opened her boyfriend's work log and a torn piece of paper fell out from the lining.