Chapter 16

In the early morning of Ningtai County, there was still a trace of thin mist.

Jiang Yuan rode his electric scooter into the courtyard of the Criminal Police Brigade, his sleeves already slightly damp.

"Morning." A passing officer smiled at Jiang Yuan quite naturally.

Jiang Yuan was stunned for a moment, then hurriedly replied, "Morning."

In all the time he had been at the unit, this was the first time someone had greeted him on the road. The officer who greeted him looked familiar, but Jiang Yuan couldn't recall his name or unit.

Shaking his head, Jiang Yuan turned and entered the building, nodding to two more people along the way.

Although everyone was in a rush, Jiang Yuan's mood unconsciously became happier.

Upon entering the office, Wang Zhong and Yan Ge were already sitting inside.

"Wu Wu Fa Yi Jiang is something else, hiding his light under a bushel." Yan Ge exclaimed with admiration, and he also used the title "Wu Wu Fa Yi Jiang"—truth be told, this sounded much more respectful than "Little Jiang."

And in a place like a local police force where there is no money, no power, and no promotion, respect is the most precious thing.

Hearing Yan Ge's words, Jiang Yuan immediately realized that there must be a result regarding the suspect in the Liu Yu injury case arrested yesterday.

"Did you catch him? Did you re-examine it?" Jiang Yuan looked over with anticipation.

"Caught him. As for the re-examination, see for yourself." Yan Ge handed several fingerprint cards directly to Jiang Yuan.

When Jiang Yuan was matching the fingerprints for the "Liu Yu injury case" yesterday, he had first made multiple fine-tuned adjustments, and secondly, he had only marked 8 feature points, so a re-examination was necessary.

According to regulations, 8 identical feature points is only the standard for investigation. In other words, if a fingerprint has 8 identical feature points, for the criminal police team, it can be considered a match, and they can proceed with the arrest, interrogation, approval of the arrest warrant, and so on.

However, to enter the litigation stage and use the fingerprint as evidence, a fingerprint appraisal report must be issued, and the minimum requirement for a fingerprint appraisal report is 13 identical feature points with no exclusions.

However, now that the person is in custody, comparing the fingerprints again is simple.

After all, the quality of the inked fingerprints themselves is questionable. On the other hand, no matter how well-inked a fingerprint is, it cannot show all the details of the fingerprint.

But with the person in custody, taking more ink prints will naturally make the details more comprehensive. Using the reverse operation—matching the newly inked fingerprints of the person against the fingerprints left at the crime scene—is obviously easier to match.

Jiang Yuan took the fingerprint cards and scanned them twice, his heart already much calmer.

In fact, thinking with a normal mindset, someone in the criminal police team must have already re-examined the fingerprints; otherwise, if nothing else, Yan Ge and Wang Zhong, the two trace examiners, would definitely be busy and overwhelmed, and wouldn't have time to play guessing games with him.

However, speculation is just speculation. Jiang Yuan still immediately pulled open his drawer, took out his magnifying glass, pressed it onto the fingerprint card, and began to look.

At just one glance, Jiang Yuan confirmed that he had made a match.

He had looked at the original fingerprint for too long, and since it was a fingerprint he had just worked on, it was already imprinted in his mind.

Even so, Jiang Yuan opened his computer, pulled up the fingerprint for the "Liu Yu injury case," and scanned it again.

This time, he was mainly looking for any exclusions.

Is it possible in the world for two identical fingerprints to appear? Theoretically, purely from a theoretical standpoint, it should be possible. Because this is a matter of probability; given a large enough number, a monkey randomly hitting a keyboard has a probability of writing a Shakespeare play.

However, if there is one feature point that is different between two fingerprints, then both theoretically and practically, these two fingerprints can be excluded as a match.

Jiang Yuan carefully identified it from beginning to end and found no exclusions. He then casually marked out 13 feature points, let out a sigh of relief, and smiled: "The re-examination is fine; it should be confirmed as a match."

Yan Ge, who had originally wanted to watch the fun, gasped when he saw Jiang Yuan's final action.

He had been notified temporarily last night to do the exact same work—as for why he was the one called out of bed to do the re-examination instead of Jiang Yuan, that was naturally because he was a veteran trace examiner, the most qualified to issue a fingerprint appraisal report. It was definitely not because the Criminal Police Brigade Captain, Comrade Huang Qiangmin, had any selfish motives or was worried about exhausting the police force's precious combat power.

However, precisely because he had done it once yesterday, Yan Ge became even more suspicious of life as he watched Jiang Yuan's final action just now.

He certainly had a slight drop in IQ late at night yesterday, but spending about ten minutes to do a fingerprint appraisal could be said to be very reasonable, right?

But how long did Jiang Yuan just take to mark the feature points?

Inadvertently, Yan Ge recalled the terror of being dominated by all sorts of people during his school days.

After a long while, Yan Ge exhaled a turbid breath and said: "A 20-year cold case, and it was broken by someone like you who sits in an office..."

"We all sit in offices." Wu Wu Fa Yi Wu corrected: "We are all solving cases."

Yan Ge said: "Jiang Yuan today... well, he should have broken this case yesterday, but it's enough to brag about for a lifetime. Serious injury, cold case, and famous... I reckon there are still quite a few people in the bureau who remember this case. Especially the leaders who grew up in our bureau; back then, almost everyone was mobilized..."

"I just found a clue; most of the work was completed by others in the team." Jiang Yuan fully utilized the fake humility skills he learned in school.

Old Yan chuckled and said casually: "Without the clue you found, the others wouldn't have had any work to complete at all, right? They were all off work and called back for overtime, and they didn't even get overtime pay."

Jiang Yuan fell silent, not knowing whether he should be humble or shift the blame at this moment.

"Bang bang!"

Liu Wenkai, captain of the second squadron, poked his head in the door and said with a smile: "Jiang Yuan is here, you worked hard yesterday."

"I didn't work that hard..." Jiang Yuan had eaten skewers and drank beer last night, so he really didn't feel tired.

Liu Wenkai's face was flushed with the excitement of staying up all night, and he said: "If you hadn't matched the fingerprint, this case would have likely died. In a storytelling book, this would be considered the greatest contribution!"

Jiang Yuan changed the subject: "How is the suspect? I mean, what kind of person is he?"

Jiang Yuan had only matched the fingerprint and confirmed the suspect's identity; he knew nothing else. As a young person who had just started his job, Jiang Yuan still held a certain curiosity about criminal suspects and the like.

Liu Wenkai pondered for a moment and then said: "He's just an ordinary person. He was also just unlucky. He had a pen pal in our county back then, and after the college entrance exam ended, he ran over to see the pen pal immediately. As a result, when he arrived at the agreed time and place, he didn't see the pen pal. He waited for a day, and his mood became very bad. He happened to run into the victim, who was half-drunk, and after a few words, a conflict arose. He struck too hard, and it led to a tragic outcome."

"What about the pen pal?"

"After this happened, he also knew he had hit the person too hard, so he never contacted the pen pal again." Liu Wenkai paused and added: "That pen pal of his never wrote another letter either. But in his heart, he probably attributed the reason to the fact that he didn't show up."

"So, apart from the criminal suspect himself, no one knew he had been to Ningtai County." Wu Jun summarized from the side, then sighed heavily: "He was unlucky, but you could also say he was lucky."

"Ordinary people can't handle that kind of luck." Liu Wenkai said lightly: "When he was shoved into the car, he broke down in tears, saying he didn't dare to fall in love, didn't dare to get married, didn't dare to take out a mortgage to buy a house, and had to save money for his parents while avoiding appearing on any social media... He asked us why we didn't come sooner..."

Yan Ge couldn't help but sigh: "When the case happened, this person had just taken the college entrance exam, so now he's about 40 years old. You could say everything was delayed."

Liu Wenkai curled his lip and said: "I asked him one question at the time, and it stopped him from crying."

Yan Ge asked cooperatively: "What question?"

Liu Wenkai said: "I asked him why he didn't turn himself in sooner."