Chapter 999: Working Together

"The next one..." Jiang Yuan was amused by Qiao Shengli's question and lowered his head, saying, "The next one will probably still be Qingshi City. Since we're already here, there are always some cold cases or something that need to be cleared up."

"Don't you only pick the hardest cases to do?" Qiao Shengli asked curiously, raising her head.

Jiang Yuan smiled and said, "You can't make cases compete against each other; no one knows which case is the hardest. Some cases are solved just because the investigators chose the right direction; others are because they chose the wrong direction, so they get harder the more you work on them."

"So choosing the right direction is the most important?"

"Maybe. Not necessarily." Jiang Yuan looked at Qiao Shengli and said, "It's somewhat similar to doing scientific research with you guys, right? Between direction and practical operation, which one actually carries more weight?"

Qiao Shengli suddenly realized: "So, you're the type of person who can turn any trash direction given by a supervisor into a top-tier journal publication?"

"It's not that extreme." Jiang Yuan didn't need to be modest at this moment, nor did he feel he needed to carry the burden of EQ, so he said easily, "Some directions are too trashy and are a waste of time, so you still need to correct the direction yourself."

Qiao Shengli understood, then looked up at Jiang Yuan, her eyes full of envy: "If only I had your ability. Sometimes I also want to help my supervisor change the research direction..."

"Professor Su?"

"Don't you tell the professor, okay?" Qiao Shengli shook Jiang Yuan's arm.

"Professor Su handed the Tai River project over to you to do?" Jiang Yuan had also been a criminal police officer for several years, and in this world, the people with the strongest spirit of suspicion are definitely criminal police officers.

Qiao Shengli blushed, but her arm still hugged Jiang Yuan tightly, and she explained to him, "The professor doesn't really do experiments herself, whether it's surface-level projects or horizontal projects. As for me, if it's confirmed that I can secure the Tai River project, I'm prepared to shift the entire direction over here."

In the biology department, there aren't many projects one can do. In fact, they don't even need the Tai River project; as long as they can get a few dozen more kilometers of sections, Qiao Shengli feels she could write a decent paper.

Of course, if she wants to write her doctoral dissertation, just scratching the surface isn't very appropriate; the longer the project, the better.

Jiang Yuan didn't want to interfere with the internal ecology of Su Lei's project team, so he only said, "The Tai River project is confirmed, but this project can only be you guys cooperating with me in the end; it cannot be us cooperating with you."

"That goes without saying." Qiao Shengli looked up at Jiang Yuan, her emotions gradually rising. Jiang Yuan's opinion had no difficulty at all; it was equivalent to setting no threshold. By comparison, the funding and scale of this project had quite a threshold.

Evening.

The suspect Xu Juan finally gave up resistance and confessed everything from start to finish.

She was killing for the first time, had no experience, and was not professionally trained. The strategies she fantasized about in her mind were one thing, but after actually saying them out loud, they were nothing more than a laughingstock.

Whether it was the method of killing, the reason for killing, the reason for abandoning the body, etc., Xu Juan always had something to say, but it was neither legal nor believed. And when the police interrogate, sometimes they can be very fierce.

After Xu Juan cried a bit, under the gaze of the prosecutor, she gathered her hair and began to tell her story again.

She hoped to maintain decency as much as possible, but in the face of a criminal case, as the details of the dismemberment were explained, and as the prosecutor asked questions like "What did you use for the first strike? Where did you cut?", "After picking up the scissors, where did you use them?", the so-called decency vanished into thin air.

And once the interrogation reached this level, the members of the special investigation team were all relieved.

The old criminal police officers with big hearts had mostly gone home by this time. The young criminal police officers didn't have small hearts; they were just left behind to wrap things up, so they could only continue working.

Jiang Yuan was invited to the bureau chief's office.

Compared to the Criminal Investigation Detachment Captain Fang Gang, the bureau chief's rank was much higher, fully reflecting the importance placed on Jiang Yuan.

After listening to a basketful of nice words and drinking a large pot of good tea, the bureau chief still wouldn't let him go. He even looked at his watch and laughed, "Everyone must be hungry, right? I've prepared hot pot for us. I heard Jiang Yuan likes to eat hot pot, right?"

"I do quite like it." Jiang Yuan didn't know how such a reputation had spread, but in matters like this, police officers are all about not seeking deep understanding, not to mention not investigating, they don't even collect evidence.

The bureau chief nodded to the side, and Fang Gang immediately went out to notify. Soon, a hot pot was sent in.

Several people sat around the tea table in the bureau chief's office and started cooking hot pot.

Huang Qiangmin looked around worriedly and said, "Hot pot has a strong smell; don't ruin the calligraphy and paintings in the room."

"The calligraphy and paintings were all written and painted by myself. It's fine if they get ruined; I have many more that aren't even hung up." The bureau chief seemed to have been scratched in an itchy spot and laughed out loud.

Huang Qiangmin hurriedly cooperated with his words.

The bureau chief realized something at this moment, waved his hand, and said, "These are all minor tricks of mine. When I was young, I didn't know what to do, so I learned these things. Now I regret it as much as I can. If I had learned some fingerprint identification technology back then, wouldn't I be able to do more things?"

Huang Qiangmin thought to himself, you've finally reached this topic, and hurriedly said, "Actually, if the Qingshi Municipal Bureau still needs our help, you can just give the order directly."

"Try this beef slice. This cow was slaughtered this afternoon. After the meat was cut, it was sent over immediately." The bureau chief first introduced the beef on the table, then said to Huang Qiangmin, "We have no funding left."

"Huh?" Huang Qiangmin opened his mouth wide upon receiving this answer.

"Have a piece of beef." The bureau chief sighed, then laughed, "Actually, you should have thought of it, right? Our Shannan Province isn't rich. Funding is just that much. Now it's the end of the year, and we are clearing cold cases, running the Tai River working group, and the detection rate of current cases is also so high. Funding is always insufficient."

Huang Qiangmin was stunned. He poked his chopsticks into the hot pot, picked out a green vegetable, put it on a plate, and said, "I thought this day would come, but I didn't expect it to come so soon."

"Right?" The bureau chief laughed and said, "Social stability requires cracking down on criminal offenses, and economic development also requires social stability as a foundation. However, if we raise the crackdown rate of criminal offenses from 90% to 95%, and raise the homicide detection rate from 99% to 100%, this degree of improvement might not be that important."

Huang Qiangmin definitely couldn't accept this and immediately said, "You can't say it like that. The harm caused by criminal offenses is definite. Compared to the cost of handling a case, it is absolutely valuable for the protection of the public. Moreover, a large number of high-value cases being solved not only means that a large number of heinous, high-tech, or professional criminals are captured and swept out of society, but it also means that the environment around ordinary people is greatly improved. It is extremely beneficial for promoting fair trade and a society ruled by law..."

"Political Huang Zhengwei has some substance." The bureau chief laughed.

Fang Gang on the side immediately cooperated and said, "We must learn from Political Huang Zhengwei."

After the bureau chief finished laughing, he added, "Let's talk about ourselves. This year, our Shannan Province's criminal investigation system can be said to have achieved remarkable results. This point really relies on the help of Jiang Yuan and the Ningtai County Bureau, but this year's funding was decided last year..."

He stopped talking after saying this.

The rank of the Qingshi Municipal Bureau is equivalent to that of the Qinghe Municipal Bureau, while the Ningtai County Bureau is one major level lower than the Qinghe Municipal Bureau. Huang Qiangmin is not the top leader, so Huang Qiangmin has always followed the rhythm of the other bureau chief.

But having said this, Huang Qiangmin felt he couldn't continue following, especially after eating a bite of green vegetable, Huang Qiangmin felt his appetite coming up, so he bared his teeth and said, "There are also cases of eating next year's grain today."

The bureau chief, who was feeling happy and thinking his output was smooth, was almost choked to death by a mouthful of beef: "Your words... hey, don't be so aggressive."

Huang Qiangmin smiled faintly.

"How about we do some inter-provincial exchange cases?" The bureau chief proposed an idea at this time: "Qingshi City borders Liangzhou; their funding this year definitely has a surplus."

Huang Qiangmin shook his head: "In this day and age, even the landlord's family has no surplus grain."

The bureau chief said: "Eating next year's grain today is also possible."

Huang Qiangmin looked at the bureau chief's sincere eyes and asked: "What case? Is the difficulty high?"

"High." The bureau chief put down his chopsticks, became more serious, and said: "Anti-trafficking. Child abduction cases. We just merged the cases; there are currently five in the two provinces, and another attempted one. They all target young children under five years old, and the crime scenes are all in townships."

This kind of case can indeed alarm the municipal bureau level, and it is a type that must be taken seriously and solved.

Huang Qiangmin looked at the bureau chief: "For such a case, are there no clues?"

With clues, plus the investment of resources, the case should have a high probability of being solved. And now that they are asking Jiang Yuan for help, they have likely encountered major difficulties.

The bureau chief picked up a piece of meat and ate it, saying: "In short, you can put forward any requirements you have, and I will help you bring them up with Liangzhou. Let's work together and strive to bring these five children back."

"Catching people isn't necessarily hard, but finding children is not easy." Huang Qiangmin said, looking at Jiang Yuan.

Jiang Yuan scooped up several pieces of beef, let them cool in the seasoning bowl, looked up at the bureau chief and Huang Qiangmin, and said: "Since we're already talking about this, let's do it."

As for Qiao Shengli and the others, he couldn't worry about them now. ===== CHAPTER 1000 =====