Chapter 980

"Old Cui is such a piece of... he is a character."

Tao Lu sent Old Cui and the others out, then watched Old Cui's retreating back and said: "Say what you will, Old Cui has some intuition. It's a bit like a sixth sense."

"Is it very mystical?" Liu Liu Jinghui asked.

"I don't know if it's mystical or not, but we have indeed encountered it several times." Tao Lu was mainly explaining this to Song Song Tiancheng, and the branch leaders also happened to receive a wave of strange knowledge.

"Actually, it's not strange; some cases and people have many coincidences." Song Song Tiancheng said something useless from a "high-level perspective."

Liu Liu Jinghui was from outside the capital and said with a smile: "Speaking of mystical people, I have really seen quite a few, and some of them do have something to them. Including this thing called intuition, some people are just sharper than others."

Tao Lu laughed it off and said: "As police officers, talking about this turns into superstition."

Liu Liu Jinghui thought to himself, as if the capital didn't have superstition. Changing the subject, Liu Liu Jinghui followed the style that people in the capital liked and said: "This thing can also be explained by science. The more metaphysical side includes things like high-dimensional projection or the influence of dark matter, while the more realistic side includes things like magnetic field influences—like pigeons—or even more basic versions like empirical models or special physiological structures, like wild boars finding truffles."

Once he said this, Tao Lu nodded in agreement; in his view, Cui Cui Qishan probably belonged to the latter category.

"If Old Cui can dig up Kite's corpse, that would be truly interesting." Tao Lu said it was interesting, but his expression didn't feel like it was interesting at all.

This case is a royal pain! If another person in the know dies, it will really become a huge problem!

Liu Liu Jinghui comforted him: "Not necessarily; it's a case from over 20 years ago, where would you even go to dig up a corpse?"

A faint sigh came from behind: "Don't worry. Even if Captain Cui digs up Kite's corpse, we wouldn't recognize him."

The one speaking was Xiao Si, who was sitting in the corner flipping through old case files and documents. Cui Cui Qishan didn't want to take him out, so he dumped him in Jiang Yuan's team to work; anyway, he wouldn't feel bad if he got lost. If Jiang Yuan dared to borrow him, Cui Cui Qishan would dare to send him away.

Tao Lu, on the other hand, felt as uncomfortable as if he were constipated.

The discomfort lay in the fact that Xiao Si was right.

Yes, even now, neither the police nor the suspects know what Kite looks like, nor have they obtained his fingerprints or DNA. Wang Wang Futing had seen Kite, but he hadn't looked at him carefully, nor was he good at remembering people's appearances. After all these years, Wang Wang Futing couldn't describe what Kite looked like at all.

Actually, what he looks like doesn't matter. It is only because of Jiang Yuan's skull reconstruction technique that there is a basis for discussing appearance; otherwise, whether Kite is dead or alive has nothing to do with his appearance. This is without even considering the increasingly common plastic surgery techniques and the makeup techniques that could be used.

Thinking of all the possibilities, Jiang Yuan couldn't help but shake his head and silently went back to reading the case files.

He didn't oppose Tao Lu's strategy; if they were lucky, there was still the possibility of a "lucky punch" solving the case. In fact, most criminal cases don't require special handling; just throwing a bunch of punches often leads to a solution.

The technological revolution of the 21st century has become so impressive that people who don't understand technology can just tinker around and feel like everything is just mediocre, or even see everything as a makeshift operation.

However, since the stage is already set, if a few people go up and sing and dance, it might just work out.

It's like many cases now; using the word "detect" seems inadequate, as they just scan with a police terminal and the result comes out directly. What truly tests criminal police has instead become issues like civilized law enforcement and compliance of evidence.

And the Jianmen Academy case is the exact opposite.

It is a cold case of homicide, and because the victim Zhang Zhang Xiaoming's identity is special—being the grandson of the Zhang family—it means that on one hand, the case is basically fully resourced, but on the other hand, its investigative direction is restricted.

Anything involving politics is annoying, especially criminal cases; the main focus is on pursuing the truth, but what truth is there in politics? Politics is only about picking sides.

If Zhang Zhang Xiaoming's death really involves political reasons, even Jiang Yuan would find it very difficult to investigate.

To be precise, investigating cases involving politics requires even more accurate investigation.

Admittedly, Jiang Yuan could ask Zhang Zhang Xiaoming's sister, Zhang Zhang Xiaoya, to provide a large amount of relevant information. Given Jiang Yuan's status today, Zhang Zhang Xiaoya would likely be willing, but the problem is, without an accurate preliminary investigation, what information should Zhang Zhang Xiaoya provide?

And how would Zhang Zhang Xiaoya judge which information is worth saying and which is not?

If it were an ordinary criminal case, the police's request would actually be to tell everything. In the interrogation room or interview room, the police would ask very detailed questions, and the level of detail is completely different from ordinary conversation. This is even more true in terms of breadth. As for which things are useful to the case and which are not...

Moreover, in a situation like the Zhang family's, with Zhang Zhang Xiaoya's status, she knows a lot of information, but is it appropriate to say it all?

There are some things she might be willing to say, but others might not be willing to hear.

On the other hand, much political-related information is subjective in itself; a lot of it is gathered from hearsay, or to put it euphemistically, it is a summary and re-analysis of information from stakeholders.

Should this kind of subjective information be said? And how much truth is there if it is said?

But if you don't say these subjective things, what else is there to say? For example, is Zhang Zhang Xiaoming's death because of the Zhang family's enemies? Who are the Zhang family's enemies? There can't be an objective answer to this question.

Therefore, even if Zhang Zhang Xiaoya eventually needs to answer some questions, Jiang Yuan must know what the questions are.

These answers can only be dug out from the case files.

This look took an entire day.

When he got up the next day, he continued reading.

Criminal science and technology is essentially a type of technology; saying that solving a case is like doing a problem is a bit frivolous, but the basic process is just like that.

Jiang Yuan dug through the case files, hoping to obtain more known conditions, or hoping to find a path to solve the problem from the existing conditions.

These two things were done together, and from time to time, Jiang Yuan had to receive briefings sent by others. Inside were their rough descriptions of the case files they had read.

This allowed Jiang Yuan to roughly understand the full picture of the case, and if he was interested, he could also read deeper.

At the same time, more information was sent over, especially newly developed photos, which were sent in large quantities, and from time to time, newly restored film rolls were also delivered.

Jiang Yuan looked at them like this for two days, and this day at noon—without any warning, without anyone reminding him—Jiang Yuan focused his gaze on a close-up photo of oil sludge.

The oil sludge came from the victim's fingernails, which wasn't too strange; the workplace where the victim Zhang Zhang Xiaoming worked before he died had its own in-house mimeograph factory, responsible for printing some of the factory's promotional documents, which was also a place Zhang Zhang Xiaoming often visited.

In addition, the printing quality of mimeographed materials at that time was unstable; even if one didn't go to the mimeograph factory and only came into contact with mimeographed products, one would occasionally get such oil sludge into their fingernails.

However, it is very rare for it to be only in the fingernails while the rest of the hands are completely clean.

Jiang Yuan flipped through the crime scene photos again to take a look, then found Wang Wang Futing's confession and read it carefully.

If there is any advantage to the current investigation compared to 20 years ago, Wang Wang Futing is the most important part. After all, he is the eyewitness to this case, although the effect is limited and his ability is also limited...

And regarding the murder process, although the time was extremely short, the police officer in charge of the interrogation still conscientiously conducted a very detailed inquiry.

Jiang Yuan quickly found the process of physical contact between the killer and the victim.

At the moment Zhang Zhang Xiaoming fell to the ground, he should have had brief contact with the killer; at least in Wang Wang Futing's view, he had touched the killer.

In this way, if the source of the oil sludge was indeed transferred from the killer, then the killer had a high probability of being a colleague.

This could also explain many problems, such as why he would kill upon meeting, and why the killer couldn't be screened out from the Jianmen Academy where people were coming and going.

However, just this little bit of oil sludge is not enough.

Jiang Yuan thought for a moment, then called Wang Wang Chuanxing and said: "Make a statistic, see who among the people who were colleagues with Zhang Zhang Xiaoming later struck it rich... well, do this statistic later, see how many people who once lived in Jianmen Academy later struck it rich!"

It must be said that this method of directly looking for beneficiaries is also an advantage that couldn't be obtained back then.