Chapter 561

There are many ways to infer age through forensic medicine, summarizing them... someone specifically wrote a book, the kind with hundreds of pages.

Basically, from teeth to finger bones to pubic bones to the six major joints to DNA and mitochondria, there are ways to infer age for all of them.

For living bodies, all imaging schemes can be used for identification, including X-rays, CT, MRI, ultrasound, etc.

However, different schemes and positions have different margins of error.

It is not easy to verify within two months.

"The hospital or the Health Bureau should have records; I remember helping someone handle it, reissuing a birth certificate." Shen Yaowei listened from the side and said leisurely.

Meng Chengbiao couldn't help but look at Shen Yaowei and smiled: "Yaowei is someone who can get things done for people. However, for files from 20 years ago, I reckon we'll have to dig through them properly."

"Then go find them. Can Yaowei do it?" Jiang Yuan pointed to Shen Yaowei.

Shen Yaowei responded, took out his phone, and said: "I'll call and ask someone first."

Nearby, Wu Junhao said: "I think we can search Zhang Xiu Lan and the others' residences again; birth certificates are still very important, and they might not have thrown them away. When we arrested them, they shouldn't have thought of this yet."

"Okay, you lead a team to go look for it." Jiang Yuan also agreed.

Meng Chengbiao coughed twice and said: "I have another idea."

"Oh, Team Meng, go ahead." Jiang Yuan placed his hands on the table and looked at Meng Chengbiao.

"This Zhang Haobin, I checked his file; just in the last few years, he's been in and out of the police station for fighting and brawling, but the Zhang family has money, usually compensating actively, and the consequences caused weren't serious..."

Meng Chengbiao paused here, coughed twice more, and said: "What Team Wu just said made me suddenly think, the Zhang family might have faked the birth certificate; could there also be faking in these cases?"

Jiang Yuan asked: "For example?"

"Finding someone to take the fall? Or injuring someone and running away immediately, the victim might not know him, can't find him..." Meng Chengbiao looked at Jiang Yuan, then at the station chief Tang Xiaobiao who had been silent nearby; seeing that neither showed an expression of dismissal, he continued:

"Zhang Enfan's evaluation of his nephew Zhang Haobin is that he is violent and lecherous. I just thought, he doesn't know about Jiao Lina's case; if his evaluation doesn't include Jiao Lina's case, how is it reflected? Zhang Enfan wouldn't make up a evaluation of his nephew out of thin air. There's no need for that; he could just say it directly, right?"

Jiang Yuan and the others fell into deep thought.

Jiang Yuan nodded secretly. It's said that old criminal police are suspicious by nature; for this remark by Meng Chengbiao, hanging an LV1.5 Suspicion tag should be no problem.

Jiang Yuan asked: "Do you think he committed other cases?"

"He had already committed many cases." Meng Chengbiao entered the state now and wasn't too polite, saying straightforwardly: "Now, one is to see if he had the opportunity to commit major cases; I think it's very likely, not just because of Zhang Enfan's evaluation, but speaking of character, a young man who likes to solve problems with violence and has attempted rape and murder—would he not commit similar crimes?"

The criminal police present nodded gently.

As the saying goes, "A prodigal son who returns is worth more than gold"; the gold content of ordinary domestic gold mines is only 2g per ton of ore, which is hard for ordinary criminal police to see.

The violent offenders everyone sees most often are repeat offenders, just like men who commit domestic violence; they won't just do it once. Only those violent offenders who have served long sentences might change. But the reason for their change is likely not a change in concepts, but that long-term imprisonment has changed their behavioral habits; additionally, as they age, the secretion of hormones like testosterone in their bodies decreases, and they become less violent.

And rapists are very prone to becoming repeat offenders.

Adopting the behavior of rape is itself a sign that self-control is weaker than desire, and desire will constantly appear.

If the first crime went unpunished, then when desire runs high, committing a second or third crime is not something hard to understand.

"How do you want to investigate?" Jiang Yuan felt Meng Chengbiao's theory was fine, but how it is in reality and from what angle to investigate is the practical problem before them.

Meng Chengbiao first thought of interrogation and said: "I think we can ask Zhang Enfan; he might know something. Another thing, maybe we can bluff the Zhang family?"

Wang Chuanxing said: "Ordinary Zhang family members probably don't know anything; as for Zhang Xiu Lan's family, I'm afraid they won't expose their own grandson or son."

Meng Chengbiao had to admit that this was indeed a concern.

It was already so difficult to get Zhang Xiu Lan and the others to expose Zhang Enfan; exposing direct descendants would be even harder.

"However..." Meng Chengbiao was a bit unwilling and said: "Zhang Xiu Lan's family also handled the body quite well. Knowing when rigor mortis sets in, knowing how to clean the body, and knowing how to make it decompose more easily, how long to leave it..."

"Indeed bolder than ordinary people." Jiang Yuan nodded.

Mu Zhiyang said: "There are old people in the village who know how to dress bodies in burial clothes; Zhang Xiu Lan is not young, she should have helped before."

"That's also a reason." Jiang Yuan acted as a fence-sitter.

From his perspective, none of the group's deductions had any problems, and the reasons for overturning them also existed.

In general, further investigation was needed.

But to be fair, with this case reaching its current level, concluding the investigation was quite appropriate.

Pursuing heavy sentences purely for the sake of it was obviously a bit of a waste of resources... however, digging deep into one person or a series of events is itself one of the ways to solve cases.

Thinking of this, Jiang Yuan tapped the table twice and said: "Team Meng, continue the interrogation according to your ideas. Wang Chuanxing, flip through the injury cases and sexual assault cases from the last two or three years—not just in Litang Township, but in the surrounding villages as well—and bring them to me later; the number shouldn't be large."

After thinking for a moment, Jiang Yuan added: "Flip through the missing persons cases properly and organize them later as well."

Litang Township is also in Ningtai County, which means that local major cases have already been screened by Jiang Yuan once.

However, Jiang Yuan originally screened cases on a county-wide scale; some minor injuries that might not meet the standard for major cases, or simple molestation cases, or cases outside the county, were all outside the scope.

Additionally, for women like Jiao Lina, if they had no relatives or friends and no one truly looked for them after they went missing, the police would have no way of knowing.

Several people agreed and went to get busy.

Although they had raised objections to each other, everyone's intentions were consistent when it came to putting the villains to death.

Jiang Yuan himself was prepared to continue working on minor cases after the Zhang family case ended, so he didn't change his original intention and continued working.

He didn't look for cases with little evidence, but for cases where a lot of evidence had been collected but not processed further.

Especially cases of minor injury and molestation.

In Jiang Yuan's impression, cases of minor injury were not difficult to investigate. Generally, such cases were because of various reasons, with both sides fighting. If no one was injured, it was a typical public security case—mediation, apology, compensation, up to 15 days of detention.

If someone was injured, then whoever was injured more seriously had the upper hand; minor injury second-degree meant a few months in prison, serious injury second-degree meant a few years in prison.

In a place like a county town, the two sides in a fight likely knew each other, or after asking around a little, one would know which side it was; the difficulty of handling them was not in the investigation.

Those who ran away and couldn't be found were more worth talking about.

Jiang Yuan specifically focused on such cases, using the same method as before: first memorize the fingerprints, footprints, and other information of the Zhang family members, and then directly compare them with the photos in the cases.

Before a day had even passed, Jiang Yuan really did match a molestation case, or, it could be called an attempted rape case!

Zhang Haobin's fingerprints appeared on the victim's backpack, but because the difficulty of comparison was slightly higher, it hadn't been matched before.

Of course, one molestation case wasn't enough force; just as Jiang Yuan was pondering whether to make persistent efforts or find another way, Meng Chengbiao returned again, carrying "Zhang Enfan's curse" with him.

"This guy is asking to perform meritorious service now." Meng Chengbiao laughed as he said this, then his expression became serious: "He said Zhang Haobin had several girlfriends, and among them, there were cases of disappearances."