The crackdown on organized crime began with the arrest of the mother-in-law.

Chapter 1300 Dongshan Park

Less than a week after Liu Jianjun's case was closed, the Criminal Investigation Detachment received another report.

At 10 a.m. on Friday, the landscaping renovation site on the north side of Dongshan Park was a scene of chaos, with the roar of excavators and the shouts of workers mingling together. Suddenly, a panicked cry broke the busy rhythm—"Dig...dug up someone! It's a body! Call the police!"

Old Chen, the worker operating the excavator, gripped the control lever tightly, his face pale and his voice trembling. He had just dug planting pits according to the construction requirements when the excavator's bucket hit a hard "foreign object" after only half a meter into the soil. At first, he thought it was a rock, but as he gently parted the soil with the bucket, a piece of dark-colored fabric was revealed, accompanied by a pungent odor. Old Chen immediately stopped the machine, climbed down, and went to take a closer look. The blurry human-shaped outline made his scalp tingle instantly, and he scrambled towards the construction supervisor, repeatedly shouting, "There's a corpse!"

The construction supervisor was also startled. He immediately ordered the workers to stop construction, set up a makeshift cordon, and called 110 (the police emergency number). The news spread quickly among the workers, who gathered outside the cordon, discussing the situation with a mixture of fear and curiosity in their eyes.

Forty-five minutes later, Li Ming's police car arrived along the park's main road and stopped near the landscaping renovation site. "Seal off the scene immediately!" Li Ming opened the car door, his black leather shoes stepping onto the soft grass, and gave instructions to his team members behind him: "Use warning tape to cordon off a 30-meter area around the planting pit, prohibiting any unauthorized personnel from entering, especially construction equipment and workers. No one is allowed to touch any items at the scene; Xiao Yang and Xiao Sun are responsible for the on-site investigation, focusing on the location of the body, surrounding footprints, tool marks, and any remaining items. Be careful, as the soil in the construction area is frequently disturbed, and traces are easily destroyed; be thorough. Xiao Wang, come with me to question the person who reported the incident and the construction supervisor to understand the specific process of discovering the body and the recent activities of people in the construction area."

Xiao Yang and Xiao Sun, carrying investigation bags and wearing gloves and shoe covers, cautiously entered the cordon. The stench at the scene was stronger than expected; even with masks on, they could still smell it clearly. The planting pit was rectangular, about 60 centimeters deep. The body was curled up at the bottom, its upper body covered in mud, only the lower half of its body—dark trousers and a pair of worn-out sneakers—was visible. Judging from the build, it was male; age was currently unknown, but height was estimated to be around 170-175 centimeters.

"Don't clean the soil off the body yet. Focus on examining the soil and ground traces around the planting pit." Xiao Yang turned on the high-intensity inspection light, and the beam swept across the soil at the edge of the planting pit. "Look here, the soil shows obvious signs of being disturbed twice—one layer is fresh soil excavated recently during construction, which is lighter in color; the other layer is soil that was filled in earlier, which is darker in color and more compact in texture. This indicates that the body was buried here beforehand, and the landscaping work just accidentally unearthed the body."

Xiao Sun squatted down and gently ran his fingers along the soil around the pit, observing carefully: "That's right, the boundary between the two layers of soil is very clear. The soil where the body was buried also contains a small amount of dead leaves and gravel, so it must have been buried at least half a year ago. We should focus on finding traces left during the burial, such as scratches from digging tools, footprints, and any items that may have been left behind."

The two conducted a detailed investigation around the planting pit, carefully removing the surface soil with small shovels to look for possible traces. About 2 meters east of the planting pit, Xiao Sun found a blurry tool mark: "Xiao Yang, look here! There's an arc-shaped scratch on the soil surface, about 15 centimeters wide, with obvious shovel teeth marks on the edge, like it was left when digging with a shovel!"

Xiao Yang immediately went over and measured the size of the scratch with a ruler: "The width is 15.2 centimeters, and the curvature matches the curvature of a common shovel head. It should have been left by a tool used when burying the body. However, part of the scratch was covered by the soil excavated during construction, and the details are not fully preserved, so it is impossible to extract more features."

The two continued their investigation, searching the area around the planting pit for nearly an hour. Aside from the faint shovel marks, they found no other valuable clues—no footprints (completely destroyed by construction trampling), no hair or fibers (severely mixed with soil), and no items left behind (they may have been deliberately cleared away during the burial). "The construction damaged the site too much; many traces have been covered or trampled away, making the investigation more difficult than we imagined," Xiao Yang said, putting away his investigation light with a hint of helplessness. "Currently, we can only confirm that the body was buried here beforehand, and the burial tool was likely a shovel. Other information is unavailable at this time."

Meanwhile, Xiao Wang and Li Ming found the person who reported the incident, Lao Chen, and the construction manager, Manager Li, in a makeshift rest shed set up at the scene. Lao Chen hadn't recovered from the shock; his hands were still trembling slightly as he held a water cup. "Sir, don't be nervous. Tell us slowly how you found the body? What exactly happened?" Xiao Wang tried to be gentle, avoiding adding to Lao Chen's panic.

Old Chen took a sip of water, composed himself, and slowly said, "Today I was in charge of digging planting pits for the greenery. According to the blueprints, the pits should be 60 centimeters deep and 80 centimeters wide. Just now, when I had dug about 50 centimeters deep, the excavator's bucket hit something hard. I thought it was a rock, so I slowly dug down, trying to remove it. But when the bucket went down, I saw black fabric and smelled a strange odor... I quickly stopped, climbed down, and vaguely saw that it was a human leg. I was so scared that I almost lost my soul. I quickly ran to find Manager Li."

"During your excavation, did you find anything else unusual? Such as bones, fragments of clothing, or metal objects?" Li Ming asked, his eyes fixed on Old Chen, trying to find more clues from his expression.

Old Chen shook his head as he recalled, "No, I only saw the pants and shoes; the rest was covered in mud. I was too scared to look closely or touch anything, so I just ran away. Were there any other workers around at the time? Did they see anything?"

Construction manager Li continued, "At the time, there were a few workers nearby moving saplings, about 5 meters away from the planting pit. They only saw Old Chen stop the machine and climb down from the excavator, but they didn't see what he dug up. It wasn't until Old Chen ran over and shouted 'There's a body' that they realized something had happened. I immediately ordered everyone to stop construction and evacuate to the outside of the cordon. I didn't let anyone approach the site again, for fear of damaging anything."

"When did you start construction in this area? Did you conduct a survey of the land before construction? Did you find anything unusual?" Xiao Wang continued to ask, hoping to understand the site conditions before construction.