eurekapd Chapter 910 Floating Corpses After New Year's Day
Chapter 910 Floating Corpses After New Year's Day
Sun Laosi took a deep breath and began to confess: "We scouted the location beforehand and knew Wang Fugui and his gang's schedule. That night, Song Jianchao and Liang Benchao went to buy gasoline and diesel, and I was responsible for preparing ropes and other tools. When we arrived at the scene, they set fire to three corners, and I kept watch outside. When I saw the house on fire and Wang Fugui and his gang screaming inside, I got scared too, but it was too late..."
The interrogation lasted for several hours, during which Sun Laosi gradually revealed more details of the case, including the root of their conflict with Wang Fugui and others, and their escape plan after committing the crime.
After the interrogation, Sun Laosi was escorted back to Dongchuan City.
Li Ning gave Qin Chuan a further report. The situation at the Dongchuan City Public Security Bureau, characterized by frequent incidents, remained unchanged. However, since Qin Chuan's arrival, the success rate of case investigations had improved dramatically; almost all recent homicide cases had been solved.
In reality, since Qin Chuan arrived, he has been directly involved in frontline cases, spending very little time doing so. As the director of the Dongchuan City Public Security Bureau, if someone in his position were to go directly to the front lines to handle cases, what would the rest of the Dongchuan City Public Security Bureau officers be doing?
In fact, Qin Chuan has been focusing his energy on some important meetings in the city recently. The leadership team in Dongchuan City has undergone a reshuffle, and some people have been removed from their posts because they were implicated in the crackdown on organized crime.
It cannot be said that the leadership team in Dongchuan City is completely without problems, but at the very least, they should not have any deep involvement or entanglement with organized crime.
Before they knew it, the year was drawing to a close, and Qin Chuan's appointment was soon announced. As the director of the Public Security Bureau, Qin Chuan could be said to have taken another step forward.
Generally, having a member on the Standing Committee of the Municipal Party Committee is very important in a city's leadership team, as it represents their voting power in various aspects. Qin Chuan was promoted to the Standing Committee of the Dongchuan Municipal Party Committee in his capacity as Director of the Public Security Bureau.
From that day forward, Qin Chuan was officially a deputy director-level cadre. At his age, reaching this level was rare, if not uncommon, nationwide, especially considering that Qin Chuan held the powerful position of the Public Security Bureau.
As the director of the Public Security Bureau, Qin Chuan differs from other members of the Standing Committee because his Public Security Bureau is still part of a vertically led system and is under the leadership of the Provincial Public Security Department.
Therefore, under normal circumstances, if Qin Chuan wanted to be transferred, Dongchuan City might not have the final say. Besides, Qin Chuan was originally from out of town, directly appointed as the Public Security Bureau Chief by the provincial department. In fact, many years ago, the position of Public Security Bureau Chief was appointed locally. Later, after the implementation of vertical management, it was required that the Public Security Bureau Chief be included in the municipal party committee leadership. Since the implementation of this reform measure, the intensity of vertical management has gradually increased, and the appointment of Public Security Bureau Chiefs at the local level has basically been lost.
By the end of December, the Dongchuan Municipal Public Security Bureau held an appointment meeting. However, since Qin Chuan was not in a primary leadership position, the scope of the meeting was relatively small. But Qin Chuan's influence on the municipal party committee was completely different from before.
The frequent cases in Dongchuan City will not change just because Qin Chuan has taken office as a member of the Standing Committee.
The entire city of Dongchuan was still immersed in the afterglow of the New Year when the hustle and bustle of the Dongfeng Road Flower and Bird Market was broken by a scream – a corpse was floating in a merchant's indoor fish tank, its pale face swollen and particularly shocking against the greenish-blue water.
When Criminal Investigation Division Chief Li Ming arrived at the scene, the technical team had already cordoned off the area around the fishpond. He approached through the wet ground, the air thick with the stench of fish and decay. The deceased was a middle-aged man, wearing a black down jacket, his hands bound behind his back with nylon rope, and his feet wrapped in cement blocks—clearly, he had been deliberately dumped. Li Ming put on gloves and crouched down to examine the body's neck: a purplish-black ligature mark extended from behind the ear to the throat, with subcutaneous bleeding points at the edges, initially indicating death by mechanical asphyxiation.
"Time of death?" Li Ming turned to ask forensic doctor Zhang Lin.
"The cornea is moderately cloudy, and rigor mortis has not completely subsided. Based on the water temperature, the time of death is estimated to be between 12 and 24 hours ago." Zhang Lin added while taking notes, "The specific time needs to be confirmed by autopsy, but the ligature marks and obvious signs of life indicate that the person was murdered before death."
The shop where the fishpond was located had suspended operations. The owner, Wang Jianjun, squatted outside the police cordon, his face deathly pale. Li Ming wiped the water off his gloves and walked up to him: "How is this pond usually managed? When was the last time you saw the deceased?"
Wang Jianjun swallowed hard, his voice trembling: "We change the water twice a day, morning and evening. There was nothing unusual before we closed at 7 p.m. last night. The deceased... I don't know him! I came to feed the fish this morning and saw a person floating in the pond..."
"Does the pool lock up at night?" Li Ming interrupted him, his gaze sweeping over the security camera at the shop entrance.
“It’s locked! Only my wife and I have the key.” Wang Jianjun suddenly remembered something, “Oh right! A man in a gray overcoat came by yesterday afternoon, saying he wanted to see the koi. He squatted by the pond for a long time. I was busy packing aquatic plants for a client and didn’t have time to ask him anything.”
Li Ming immediately signaled to the officers to retrieve the market's surveillance footage. The footage showed that at 4:17 PM on January 2nd, a man wearing a baseball cap and a gray shirt entered a shop, lingered by the fishpond for about 20 minutes, and then left, seemingly carrying a black plastic bag. Due to the angle, the man's face was obscured by the shadow of his hat, but Li Ming noticed that he had a slight limp in his right leg when he walked—a feature highly similar to that of a suspect in an intentional assault case six months prior.
"Check the recent missing persons, especially middle-aged men, around 175 cm tall, left-handed," Li Ming said to his assistant, Xiao Zhang. He squatted by the fish pond and used tweezers to pick up white fibers floating on the water: "Nylon rope, cement block, waterproof cloth. The method of dumping the body is quite professional. The murderer may have a criminal record."
Technicians began sampling the water in the fishpond, while Li Ming searched along the back alleys of the shops. In a corner, he found half a muddy footprint, the pattern matching that of common work shoes; in a trash can, he found half a cigarette butt, brand "Hongtashan," with obvious teeth marks on the filter. These pieces of evidence were sealed and stored, awaiting laboratory comparison.
On the way back to the police station, Xiao Zhang handed over the preliminary investigation report: "Nearby merchants confirmed that the deceased was not a market employee, and he did not appear in the surveillance footage of the past three days. Wang Jianjun's call records show that he had a 15-minute call yesterday morning with a number ending in 4729. The owner of that number is Chen Dahai, a seafood supplier who had been dealt with for extortion before."