Restarting life by going to the countryside to support medical work

Chapter 677 The First

"Leaving aside what kind of gun and bullet it was, as far as I know, the kid my niece mentioned named Liu Xiaotian is currently unemployed, so how did he get the gun?"
Also, my niece said that the bullets she saw looked very strange, and were different from the bullets used for target practice by the militia.

Xiaomin, I don't know why, but I just thought of the case of the missing gun at the West City Sports School that's been making headlines for the past two months.

Although I've never actually seen what those air pistols and bullets the athletes use look like, I figured that since it's called an air pistol, it must be different from the guns issued to us in the bureau. If the guns are different, the bullets must be different too.

Halfway through the conversation, Luo Min already understood what Sister Zhang was talking about.

"Sister Zhang, I understand what you mean. No matter what, I want to thank you on behalf of my Yancheng. Thank you for taking this matter so seriously."

"Hey, we're all on the same side. Director Li also came from our bureau. I've known Director Li for much longer than I've known you. Back then, you two weren't even married yet. No need to be so polite with me. There's nothing to thank me for. We're not even sure if we're even on the same page."

"Whether it is true or not, Yan Cheng should thank you for taking this matter so seriously. It's never a bad thing to be polite."

"Alright, since you've said so, I'll accept it. Xiaomin, why don't you call Director Li now and tell him? I think it's better to do this sooner rather than later."

"You're right, I'll make the call now."

As she spoke, she picked up the phone on the table and dialed the number she knew by heart.

Even if Sister Zhang hadn't said anything, she was already prepared to make that call. As Li Yancheng's wife, she knew very well how much the frontline police officers had sacrificed for the gun theft case at the West City Sports School over the past two months.

Not to mention the frontline staff, Jin Zhihai, the head of the Criminal Investigation Division, hasn't taken a vacation recently, and working overtime at night is commonplace, which Xing Lihua complains about endlessly. She says that he was busy when he was working on the front lines, but now that he's been promoted to a leadership position, he's even busier, and she has to make an appointment to see him.

Now that there's a somewhat plausible clue, whether it's true or false, Luo Min will definitely tell her man. Even if it turns out to be false in the end, eliminating it is still a gain.

"Hello, this is Li Yancheng."

The call was answered quickly, and when Luo Min heard her man's familiar voice on the other end, a sweet smile appeared on her lips.

"Dacheng, it's me. There's something I need to tell you."

Before her husband could ask, Luo Min recounted everything that Sister Zhang had said in one go.

Sitting across from her, Sister Zhang watched as the smile on her face never faded after the call connected, and felt a pang of emotion.

Whether this couple is just making do or not can be clearly seen from the expressions on their faces when they talk.

She started working at the Social Affairs Bureau early and got to know Li Yancheng and Luo Min one after the other. Because of her job, she got along quite well with the couple and knew them very well.

Because she understood this, she felt a little envious of the couple, not of their financial situation, but of the affection between them.

No one wants to just get by, especially emotional women.

Just as Sister Zhang was lost in thought, Luo Min, who was on the phone, had already explained the whole story to her husband.

On the other end of the phone, after listening to his wife's story, Li Yancheng was shocked. It was Yang Chao again!

After finding out the exact address of Sister Zhang's family home, he hurriedly asked his wife to express his gratitude to Sister Zhang on his behalf, and said that no matter what the situation was in the future, he would treat Sister Zhang and her husband to a meal. Then, without saying anything more to his wife, he hung up the phone and called the headquarters.

Although calling the Yangchao branch would be much more convenient, as it's their jurisdiction and they're very familiar with investigating and arresting people, Li Yancheng is ultimately a person with his own preferences and selfish desires.

The head of the Criminal Investigation Corps is a good friend. For this case, the officers of the corps have been working non-stop for the past two months. Almost everyone has been working around the clock. If the case is eventually solved but they get nothing, it will inevitably make the comrades on the front line of the corps feel frustrated.

Therefore, when conditions permit, he is willing to take extra care of the brigade.

"Hey"

The phone was answered after only two rings, and Jin Zhihai's familiar voice came through the receiver.

“Zhihai, it’s me. I just received a lead. You need to immediately send someone to Yangchao District to find a young man named Liu Xiaotian, who is about eighteen or nineteen years old and currently unemployed. Someone found a gun and ammunition in his bag.”

The person who saw it couldn't say for sure what kind of gun and ammunition it was because they had never seen it before. They only said that the ammunition they saw looked different from ordinary bullets they had seen before. They asked someone to go and find out more.

The other side is likely armed. Comrades must be extremely careful. Inform those who go there that if the other side refuses to cooperate and takes any dangerous actions, they can take immediate action.

“Okay, I’ll take people there myself.” Kim Ji-hae on the other end of the phone agreed immediately without uttering a single unnecessary word, and said he would go there personally.

"Yes, but please be careful."

"I understand, thanks!" Jin Zhihai knew perfectly well why his friend hadn't assigned the task to the Yangchao branch, which was clearly a better fit.

"Thanks my ass, I'm waiting for your good news."

"no problem."

Time is life. Those air pistols have been out for too long. Although no cases have been found related to them yet, the uncertainty is too great. Who knows if the guy with the gun might do something outrageous in a moment of passion?

Therefore, they must solve the case as soon as possible and eliminate this hidden danger.

……

That evening, around 8 p.m., Li Yancheng, who was at home, received two pieces of good news.

First, Jin Zhihai called. He arrived at the address provided by Sister Zhang around 6:00 AM. Instead of going directly to Liu Xiaotian's house, he asked around the neighborhood to make sure the kid had gone out that afternoon and wasn't home. They didn't act rashly, but instead inquired about the guy's physical characteristics and then began to set up surveillance in the vicinity.

Liu Xiaotian didn't keep them waiting long. Around 7:00, the guy arrived at the alley entrance on a rickety old bicycle, carrying a yellow satchel. Upon seeing him, Jin Zhihai didn't hesitate and immediately ordered his subordinates to apprehend him. When they opened the yellow satchel and saw the familiar air pistol inside, their hearts jumped into their throats.

Jin Zhihai's hands were trembling slightly. He reached into his bag and took out the air pistol. After seeing the serial number on the gun, he let out a long breath.

To avoid misreading himself, he had his subordinates check it three more times before he was finally relieved.

Of the five air pistols that had been missing for more than two months, one has finally resurfaced.

It was summer, and many people were enjoying the cool air outside. The commotion attracted everyone's attention, and soon a large crowd gathered around.

After gathering around, everyone discovered that the person pinned to the ground was Old Liu's youngest son from the alley, and they started asking him all sorts of questions.

Jin Zhihai quickly took out his work ID and told everyone that they had found one of the guns stolen from the Chengxi Sports School in May, along with a large number of bullets, in Liu Xiaotian's bag.

The gun theft case at the Chengxi Sports School has been making headlines throughout the city for the past two months. Now, everyone is astonished to hear that a stolen gun has been found on a child from their alley.

Liu Xiaotian's parents and brother, who were sitting in front of their house enjoying the cool air, also heard the commotion and rushed over. When they arrived, they discovered that it was their own child who had been arrested.

Upon hearing that her son (brother) was involved in the gun theft case, Liu Xiaotian's mother fainted on the spot.

Liu Xiaotian's father and brother couldn't believe their son (brother) could do such a thing, but facts speak louder than words, and the air pistol that was found couldn't be faked.

They could only keep urging Liu Xiaotian, who had already been dragged away by the police and handcuffed, to explain how he got the gun.

Ever since he was pinned to the ground, the kid had been trembling like a leaf. At first, he was shouting and yelling, but when he heard that the gun in his bag was one of the guns that had been rumored for the past two months, he was so scared that he wet himself and stammered that he couldn't even finish a sentence.

Seeing his appearance, and considering that this was not the place for interrogation, Jin Zhihai immediately ordered his subordinates to take the man to the car and prepare to question him slowly back at the team.

Liu Xiaotian's mother, who had fainted, was not seriously injured. She just couldn't accept that her son was a criminal. She was woken up by other women pinching her philtrum within two minutes of fainting, and then she started wailing.

But what good would crying do at this point? It was a fact that her son was involved in the case, and they could only watch helplessly as their child was taken away by the police.

Just as Jin Zhihai was about to get into the car, Liu Xiaotian's older brother, Liu Xiaogang, rushed over and stopped him, saying with great certainty.

"Officer, please make sure you find out exactly what happened. My brother couldn't have stolen that gun."

"Why are you so sure?" Jin Zhihai asked curiously after hearing him say that.

"I am a security officer at Yangchao Heavy Machinery Factory. Our security department received a report the day after the gun theft at Chengxi Sports School. I don't know exactly what happened with the gun you found in my brother's bag, but I can confirm that my brother could not have been at the scene of the crime on the night of May 6th."

That night, around 8 PM, the courtyard at number four in the alley to the north of ours caught fire. He and I went to help. By the time we finished, it was already dawn. Many people in our alley can testify that he didn't leave all night.

“Yes, yes, Xiaogang is right. Now that he mentions it, I remember. The fire in the No. 4 courtyard in the north happened on May 6th. Xiaotian was definitely there that night, and the officials from the street office can also testify to that.”

"That's right, that's right"

"That's right, officer. Xiao Tian was definitely there the whole night."

……

Liu Xiaogang's words prompted the neighbors in the alley to chime in and corroborate his claims.

Jin Zhihai raised his hand and pressed down twice, then raised his voice and said, "I've remembered what everyone said. We will definitely investigate and find out what really happened. We will never wrong an innocent person. Okay, everyone, stop crowding here. The Public Security Bureau will keep you informed of any further developments."

When he grabbed Liu Xiaotian, he glanced at the kid's feet and squatted down to roughly measure them with his hand.

It is almost certain that the footprint at the scene was not left by this young man surnamed Liu, because the size is inconsistent, and his build is different from what the experts predicted.

Based on the footprint left at the scene, footprint experts deduced that the perpetrator was approximately 1.65 to 1.7 meters tall, with an error margin of no more than two centimeters, and was of slender build.

Liu Xiaotian's height seems to be within the acceptable range, at most a little over 1.7 meters, but this guy weighs at least 150 or 160 kilograms, which is completely inconsistent with being thin.

So when Jin Zhihai saw him, he concluded that at the very least, this kid wasn't the one who crawled through that hole to steal the gun, but since he had the gun and ammunition that had been lost from the West City Sports School, it meant that he was very likely to know the person who stole the gun.

The car drove for a distance and then stopped after turning onto a sparsely populated road.

Jin Zhihai, who was sitting in the front car, opened the car door and got out. He went straight to the car behind. When the police officer sitting in the passenger seat saw him coming, he quickly opened the car door and got out, letting him sit down.

After sitting in the passenger seat, he turned to look at Liu Xiaotian, who was sitting between two police officers, crying his eyes out and trembling uncontrollably.

"Alright, stop crying. What's the use of crying now that it's already happened? Liu Xiaotian, your only way out now is to explain the origin of the gun and the ammunition we found in your bag."

You must tell us everything you know without any concealment. We will record your attitude after your arrest, and this information will play a crucial role in your conviction and sentencing during the future court trial. Otherwise, no one can save you.

Of course, you can ignore me, keep crying, and keep saying nothing. But if you do that, I can assure you that you'll cry even more bitterly in court than you do now.

Whether it was Jin Zhihai's words that had an effect, or the boy simply cried himself out, his crying gradually stopped, though he was still sobbing.

After saying those words, Jin Zhihai didn't say anything more. He took out cigarettes from his pocket and gave one to each of his subordinates in the car.

After they had smoked most of their cigarettes, Liu Xiaotian finally stammered out his words.

"I...I said...Police...Police officers..."

(End of this chapter)