53: Chapter 53: Able to Solve the Case 53: Chapter 53: Able to Solve the Case After lunch.
Wei Zhenguo, with his team, leisurely made their way to the Changyang City Criminal Police Detachment.
As a significant unit within the provincial capital, Changyang City’s Criminal Police Detachment was comprised of several criminal police teams, ranking at the same level as Ningtai County’s criminal police team.
Additionally, its subordinate Criminal Science and Technology Center was sizable, with the largest and most diverse range of laboratories.
In terms of sheer quantity, it was several times larger than that of the provincial department.
Furthermore, the Changyang City Criminal Police Detachment had its own office building—twelve stories tall—exuding an air of distinction unattainable by small local police stations.
A small conference room.
Air conditioners were whirring, protesting against the excessive number of people in the room.
Chairs temporarily brought in cluttered the space, even displacing the Diao Lan plant on the windowsill.
Only a few leaves remained, sparsely scattered on the ground, resembling helpless little crayfish being washed.
At the moment, over ten detectives were seated, the most conspicuous of whom was sitting close to the door, a man with a slicked-back hairstyle, his dark hair gleaming—it was the two-bar three-star insignia that caught the eye.
Everyone entering the room who saw him shuddered, sensing his extraordinary presence—at his age, his rank was indeed quite exceptional.
Upon entering, Jiang Yuan’s gaze involuntary wandered over the man’s slicked-back hair and neat shirt.
Other detectives generally sported easy-to-manage short hair and rather untidy and dirty shirts, but this man had meticulous hair and a spotless shirt.
It was as though there was a hairless cat among a group of long-haired ones, an odd sight indeed.
“Now that everyone is here, let me introduce you all,” said Brigade Chief Yu Wenshu, sitting inside.
“This is our provincial Criminal Investigation Bureau’s Third-Grade Senior Police Inspector, Gao Qiang, and the Fourth-Grade Senior Police Inspector, Liu Jinghui.” As Jiang Yuan and the others arrived, he promptly began the introductions.
Liu Jinghui, the young hairless cat with the slicked-back hair, stood up politely and nodded to everyone.
Next to him was Gao Qiang, unremarkable in appearance, probably in his forties, wearing dirty and nondescript clothes.
Brigade Chief Yu Wenshu then introduced Wei Zhenguo and Jiang Yuan, among others.
Wei Zhenguo stood up very sociably, apologizing to everyone, saying, “I’m not too familiar with the roads, so we might have come a bit slowly.
Sorry to have kept you all waiting.”
“It’s alright, we timed our arrival perfectly,” Yu Wenshu curtly finished the topic and then began introducing his team of detectives.
In this tiny conference room, detectives from three different levels were gathered, leaving everyone aware that the case must have taken a significant turn.
Within the police system, the Provincial Department, City Bureau, and County Bureau were not in a hierarchical relationship but merely provided business guidance to each other.
This resembled the relationship between various governmental departments like the Agricultural Department, Finance Department, or the Education Bureau.
The County Education Bureau followed the City Education Bureau’s business directives, but when it came to matters like personnel and financial authority, the County Education Bureau answered to the County Government, and the City Education Bureau to the City Government—they were not subordinate to each other.
Similarly, the detective team of a county bureau had personnel authority under the county bureau and county government, operating independently of the city’s Criminal Police Detachment.
The city bureau’s Criminal Police Detachment, with its own detective teams, could only command its teams.
When it came to county bureaus, the most they did was supervision or provide business guidance.
At the Provincial Department’s Criminal Investigation Bureau or its General Criminal Investigation Team, the nature of the relationship didn’t change much, and business involvement was even less.
Most provincial Criminal Investigation Bureaus didn’t handle cases themselves; they were just another ordinary department within the Provincial Department.
However, within such a concentrated Provincial Criminal Investigation Bureau, its personnel were not necessarily all experts or highly skilled, but those dispatched to supervise cases were certainly not ordinary.
The involvement of the Provincial Criminal Investigation Bureau also accumulated the excitement among the detectives present.
“Next, I’ll read the relevant documents on the 326 missing person case, now referred to as the 326 kidnapping and murder case, as well as the arrangement for restructuring the special case team…
I will serve as the head of the special case team, with deputies including Gao Qiang and Liu Jinghui,” said Yu Wenshu, whose duties in the city bureau were roughly equivalent to those of Huang Qiangmin in the county bureau, only one hundred times larger in scale.
Wei Zhenguo, deputy squadron leader from the Criminal Investigation Brigade Sixth Squadron of Ningtai County Bureau, and Jiang Yuan, along with others in the meeting chaired by Yu Wenshu, had no chance to perform and merely listened as he read out the documents and spoke.
It took nearly ten minutes for Yu Wenshu to bring the topic back: “According to expert analysis, we preliminarily believe that in the 326 kidnapping and murder case, the main perpetrator, Tan Yong, didn’t just participate in one homicide.”
That was the sound of an electric fan.
Everyone remained calm.
Seeing people from the Provincial Department appear was akin to finding a man dressed in your clothes in the bedroom closet—he surely wasn’t there to fix the air conditioning.
Similarly, if there had been only one victim in Tan Yong’s case, sending two people from the provincial department would seem redundant.
“Director Liu, please proceed,” Yu Wenshu yielded his place.
“It’s fine for me to speak from here,” Liu Jinghui stood up and said, “There are several doubts in the 326 murder case.
First, the main perpetrator, Tan Yong, claimed that he kidnapped Ding Lan because he was furious over an unrequited love affair.
His intent was to scare her by leaving her by the side of the highway.
However, after an impulsive action led to rape…
After the rape, he initially intended to take Ding Lan back to his house to kill and bury her.
Instead, influenced by Ding Lan’s pleas, he settled on digging a basement to imprison her.”