Reborn in 97, I solved a cold case at the Municipal Bureau

Chapter 314 Murder to Silence (Seeking Monthly Tickets)
Upon hearing Zheng Xiaojun's words, Wu Yongcheng knew that he must know something.

"You have a good relationship with Fu Daqing?"

"It's alright. We met at a nightclub and got along quite well."

"Do you know something about Fu Daqing?"

Zheng Xiaojun hesitated for a moment, then sighed and nodded.

"Tell me the specifics," Wu Yongcheng said, taking out a cigarette case and offering one to the other man.

Zheng Xiaojun took a drag of his cigarette and said helplessly, "I should have stopped him then, so he wouldn't do something stupid."

Zheng Xiaojun said that just before the Spring Festival this year, Fu Daqing suddenly approached him one night and asked if he needed money.

Zheng Xiaojun thought he wanted to borrow money, so he cried about being poor and said he really had no money. He explained to Wu Yongcheng that it wasn't that he didn't want to lend money, but that he was just a small business owner and really didn't have much money.

Unexpectedly, after he finished speaking, Fu Daqing immediately said that was perfect, he had a business he wanted to partner with, and if it went well, he could get 10,000 yuan.

Zheng Xiaojun said he was immediately interested because his haircutting business was barely enough to make ends meet, and he had always wanted to open a larger hair salon, but he lacked the start-up capital.

He immediately expressed his willingness and asked Fu Daqing what kind of deal it was.

"At first he refused to tell me, and I had to swear that I would never tell anyone."

Wu Yongcheng had basically guessed it, but Zheng Xiaojun still had to say it himself.

"Then... he said he wanted me to kill someone for him, and he'd give me ten thousand yuan when it was done," Zheng Xiaojun said with a look of horror.

Wu Yongcheng nodded. Sure enough, this matched Zhou Yi's earlier speculation that Li Youqiang went to Anyuan to kill someone.

"Who is he going to kill?" Wu Yongcheng asked.

"How could I dare to ask? I was terrified at the time. I was thinking, why would I become a murderer? I'm tired of living."

"You refused on the spot?"

"Yeah, I asked him if he had drunk too much and was talking nonsense. Murder is illegal, you can go to jail, and you might even lose your head."

What was Fu Daqing's reaction?

"At first he said he wasn't from the local area, but then he changed his mind and said he was just joking with me. Then he sat for a while longer, and then he left, saying he would treat me and Lao Li to drinks after the New Year."

Who is this "Old Li" you're talking about?

“Li Youqiang, the three of us sometimes drink together. He’s close to Fu Daqing; they’ve known each other for a while longer than I have.”

"Have you seen Fu Daqing or Li Youqiang since then?"

Zheng Xiaojun shook his head and said, "I haven't seen them. They used to come here often to get their hair cut, but neither of them has come since the New Year this year. Officer, could they... really have committed murder?"

Wu Yongcheng exhaled a puff of smoke and said, "Don't ask questions you shouldn't ask."

Zheng Xiaojun nodded repeatedly.

Did Fu Daqing mention where this matter should be handled?

"No... After he said he was joking, I didn't dare ask any more questions. I was afraid that if I knew too much, he might want to kill me."

Do you know who Fu Daqing has enemies? Or who he has a serious conflict with?

Zheng Xiaojun immediately nodded and said, "Yes!"

"Who?"

"Back when he was in business, someone cheated him. Every time he got drunk, he would curse that person, saying that if he ever found that bastard, he would tear him to pieces and devour him alive." Zheng Xiaojun asked in surprise, "The person he wants to kill isn't this guy, is it?"

"What's this person's name?" Wu Yongcheng asked.

"His name is... Jiang... Jiang Shun."

"you sure?"

Zheng Xiaojun nodded: "I'm not sure if the character is written like this, but it's definitely pronounced like this."

“Okay, Chen Yan, leave him your phone number. If you think of anything else, or find any trace of Fu Daqing, call us anytime. Don’t even think about protecting him, understand? Just focus on your business, don’t stray from the right path, and keep it up.”

Zheng Xiaojun nodded repeatedly in agreement.

After Chen Yan left him a number, the two left.

Zheng Xiaojun suddenly realized something: why did the old policeman only mention reporting Fu Daqing's whereabouts to the police, but not Li Youqiang?
After listening to Wu Yongcheng's words, Zhou Yi felt that it seemed to make sense. Pan Hongjie was very excited and shouted into the phone, "Deputy Captain Wu, we still have to thank you for finding such important information. It seems that there is no mistake. Fu Daqing must have asked Li Youqiang for help to come to Anyuan to take revenge on Jiang Shun. We just happened to find a male and a female corpse. It is very likely that it is Jiang Shun."

"What? You found two more bodies?" Wu Yongcheng asked in confusion.

"Oh, we just found him. His time of death is estimated to be even earlier than Li Youqiang's. Oh, and we also found Li Youqiang's hidden knife at the burial site. The initial assessment is that the knife was used to inflict the wounds on the victim's body. Now, all we need to do is confirm that the male victim is Jiang Shun, and the case will be solved."

"Oh..." Wu Yongcheng drawled out the sound, without saying anything else.

But Zhou Yi understood from that "oh" that Wu Yongcheng felt the same way he did—that the case wouldn't be so easily closed. "Well, we'll continue investigating Fu Daqing's whereabouts. And Zhou Yi..."

"Captain Wu, I'm here."

"You'd better cooperate with Captain Pan's work and get to the bottom of this case before you come back, understand?"

"Don't worry, Captain Wu, I understand!" This was the tacit understanding between him and Wu Yongcheng.

"Okay. Captain Pan, we'll keep you updated if we get any leads."

Pan Hongjie was in a much better mood. "Thank you for your hard work, Deputy Chief Wu."

After hanging up the phone, Pan Hongjie said to Xia Yu, "Notify everyone to check the household registration files and migrant population registrations of all people with the name Jiang Shun in the local area and match them with the deceased."

"Okay, Captain Pan."

After a while, Xia Yu asked, "Captain Pan, I have a question."

"You said."

"If Fu Daqing and Li Youqiang killed Jiang Shun and that woman, then how did Li Youqiang die?"

"That must have been Fu Daqing killing him to cover it up."

"Kill him to cover it up? What was Fu Daqing's motive for doing this?"

Pan Hongjie said confidently, "Of course it's that hidden knife. Zhou Yi analyzed it before, didn't he? The woman didn't die at first. She woke up when they were burying the body, tried to escape, and was stabbed again before dying. The knife belonged to Li Youqiang, so the person who finished her off must also be Li Youqiang. Afterwards, they found that the knife was missing, so Fu Daqing was afraid that Li Youqiang would be found out and implicated, so he simply killed him to silence him."

Xia Yu nodded: "It seems... to make some sense."

"Of course, this is just my speculation. We still need to confirm the identities of the two bodies, the red car that transported the bodies, and complete the chain of evidence. And most importantly, we need to catch Fu Daqing, then everything will come to light."

Pan Hongjie smiled and turned around to ask, "Zhou Yi, you're right, aren't you?"

"Yes, Captain Pan's thinking is very comprehensive," Zhou Yi replied.

He didn't know if Pan Hongjie was just average or if he was under pressure to solve the case quickly, but he knew that Wu Yongcheng would never have said that.

The reason is simple: there are too many suspicious points.

First, the logic that one would kill someone to cover up the crime simply because the murder weapon was lost seems plausible, but it is actually untenable.

Li Youqiang and Fu Daqing were close friends. When Li Youqiang left Hongcheng for Anyuan, he was traveling with Fu Daqing. If Li Youqiang were to disappear or be found murdered, Fu Daqing would be the first suspect, without a doubt.

Fu Daqing's murder target was Jiang Shun, not Li Youqiang. It's impossible that he deliberately hid or concealed his relationship with Li Youqiang beforehand.

Killing an accomplice to expose oneself to greater risks in order to potentially reveal a missing murder weapon seems like a losing proposition.

Even assuming the murder weapon is missing, shouldn't the first thing to do be to go back and look for it? The burial site is in a remote mountain area, and the risk of going back to look for it is obviously much, much less than killing another person.

Zhou Yi thought that Li Youqiang might not be very smart, but Fu Daqing certainly wasn't too stupid. Stupid people can't do business; he was just not smart enough.

Secondly, the unresolved question is how Fu Daqing, who was hundreds of kilometers away, suddenly learned the whereabouts of his enemy and then dragged Li Youqiang to come and seek revenge.

Without internet access and without friends in Anyuan watching him, did he somehow gain supernatural powers?
To be honest, what if Jiang Shun had swindled his money and then run away to another province or city?

In that case, it's highly likely that Fu Daqing will never be able to find this person again in his lifetime, even in the era of advanced internet information more than 20 years from now.

Even if Jiang Shun didn't run away, or even if he returned to Anyuan after a few years, Fu Daqing would still have to go to Anyuan every few days.

It's utterly absurd that someone would suddenly want to hire accomplices to kill someone out of nowhere.

Finally, Zhou Yi had reservations about whether the male corpse was Jiang Shun.

Because he suspected something: if Jiang Shun had deliberately deceived Fu Daqing from the beginning, then perhaps the name Jiang Shun might not even be real.

But Pan Hongjie clearly hoped that the male corpse was Jiang Shun's. The reason was simple: that way, he wouldn't have to apply to his superiors for a public notice to identify the body, and the case wouldn't have to be made public.

Looking at the darkening sky outside the car window, Zhou Yi felt somewhat anxious. The case seemed to be making progress, but in fact, more problems were emerging.

After returning to the Anyuan Municipal Public Security Bureau, Pan Hongjie began to arrange various investigative tasks.

Looking at the busy crowd, Zhou Yi felt rather idle.

"Captain Pan, is there anything I can help with?" Zhou Yi seized the opportunity to ask Pan Hongjie.

“Zhou Yi, it’s my fault, I completely forgot about you. Look, I’ve finished arranging all the work, the hammer we retrieved, the red car, and the identity matching for Jiang Shun, all of it has been arranged.” Pan Hongjie said apologetically, “It’s getting late, why don’t you go back and rest first? You’ve worked hard these past two days, after all, you’re a guest from afar. Our director just asked me to report on the case, I have to go now.”

"Then you go ahead and do your work, Captain Pan. I'll go back by myself in a bit." Having said that, Zhou Yi stopped worrying about it.

He went to the second team's office to check, but no one was there.

Just as I was about to leave, the phone on the table rang.

Zhou Yi answered the phone and a somewhat familiar voice asked, "Excuse me, is this Officer Xia? This is Ding Wenyuan."

(End of this chapter)