latelenovela Chapter 1133 Case Analysis and Discussion
Chapter 1133 Case Analysis and Discussion
Sitting in the car, Xiao Wang flipped through the densely packed transcripts. Zhang Jianguo's smiling face overlapped in different people's descriptions: the hand offering cigarettes to coworkers, the back view delivering fried dough sticks to neighbors, the clumsy way of slipping money to his son… No arguments, no grudges, no secrets, just the traces of an ordinary person living earnestly. He suddenly felt the transcript in his hands weigh a ton. Those evaluations of "honesty" and "integrity" had now become the most intractable mystery of the case—why would someone who hated no one be murdered in the shadows of the warehouse?
On the morning of the third day, the sunlight slanted into the Criminal Investigation Division's conference room. Li Ming placed the enamel mug heavily on the table, the tea stains spreading across the bottom like an abstract painting. "Everyone's here, let's begin." His gaze swept over the officers present, each with a thick case file spread out in front of them. In the topmost crime scene photo, Zhang Jianguo's figure, huddled beside a pile of bearings, appeared bluish-gray under the flash.
Xiao Yang stood up first, and a 3D model of the warehouse immediately appeared on the projector screen, with a size 43 diamond-patterned shoe print marked in red. "There are three key traces extracted from the scene," he said, tracing a path on the model with his laser pointer. "First, the drag mark from the warehouse door to the body, 25cm wide, containing the victim's DNA; second, the size 43 diamond-patterned shoe print, with the left forefoot worn 15% more than the right, a stride length of 72cm, estimating a height of 175±3cm; third, the steel pipe, 3cm in diameter, with the victim's blood on the inner wall and the outer wall deliberately wiped clean." He suddenly pointed to a corner of the model, "The most crucial one is the missing 6205 model bearing. The warehouse ledger shows one is missing, only two were found at the scene, and the last one is still missing."
Zhang Lin opened the autopsy report; the table estimating the time of death was clearly visible on the projector. "The deceased, Zhang Jianguo, died between 11 PM on July 14th and 1 AM on July 15th," he circled the vitreous humor potassium concentration of 7.1 mmol/L in red. "The high humidity caused a delay in indicators such as rigor mortis and chlorosis, but after comprehensive correction, the error within this time window will not exceed one hour." He paused, pointing to the anatomical diagram of the ruptured heart. "The fatal injury was a puncture wound to the right ventricle by the fractured bone, resulting in 300 ml of pericardial tamponade. The time from injury to death was less than 15 minutes; the killer acted with great precision."
Xiao Wang's notebook was covered with sticky notes. The top one read, "Zhang Jianguo, male, 52 years old, warehouse keeper at a bearing factory, no bad habits." "I interviewed 23 relevant people," he tapped his pen on the name "Li Jun," "The only person I had a dispute with was repairman Li Jun. We argued over retrieving materials, but Li Jun has an alibi—he was at the hospital on the evening of July 14th. The deceased's wife and sister both confirmed that Zhang Jianguo was introverted and rarely socialized outside of work. Even the neighbors said he 'smiled at everyone he met,' and they really couldn't think of any enemies he might have."
The smoke in the meeting room gradually thickened. Veteran detective Zhou Jianguo stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray. "Could it be a robbery?" His finger traced the photo of the steel pipe. "Is there anything valuable in the warehouse?" Xiao Yang immediately pulled up the warehouse ledger: "Mainly bearings and steel. The most valuable item was a batch of imported bearings, but nothing was missing after the inventory check. Zhang Jianguo's wallet had about 800 yuan in cash in his pocket, untouched, and his cell phone was still on him."
“That’s strange,” the young officer, Xiao Zhao, pushed up his glasses. “It wasn’t robbery, and he had no enemies. Could it be manslaughter?” Zhang Lin shook his head, the cold glint of the scalpel still seeming to flash before his eyes. “Impossible. The blows were precise. A ruptured right ventricle is a fatal wound. It was clearly premeditated murder, and the killer had some understanding of human anatomy, knowing that a blow to the left side of the chest could be fatal.” He suddenly remembered something. “The bearing steel powder under the victim’s fingernails indicates that he grabbed a bearing during the struggle. That missing bearing might be the murder weapon or contain information about the killer.”
Li Ming tapped rhythmically on the table: "Xiao Yang, is there a matching size 43 shoe print in the factory?" Xiao Yang pulled up the employee shoe size registration form: "There are three size 43s in the machine repair workshop, Li Jun is one of them, but his work shoes have a striped pattern, not a diamond pattern. Warehouse manager Lao Li is a size 42, and the workshop director is a size 44, none of them match." He added, "But the surveillance cameras outside the wall captured a blue Qianjiang motorcycle entering and leaving the factory area at 10:20 pm on the 14th, and the rider's work pants match the brown fiber composition extracted from the site."
Xiao Wang suddenly flipped through Li Jun's interrogation record: "Li Jun said he was at the hospital accompanying a patient on the night of the 14th, but the nurse said he went out for about half an hour around 11 pm, saying he was going to buy a late-night snack. But there's a convenience store right outside the hospital; there's no need to walk 20 minutes." He pointed to the map, "From the hospital to the bearing factory warehouse, it's exactly 15 minutes by motorcycle; the time matches perfectly." Zhou Jianguo immediately retorted, "But the shoe prints don't match. Could it be that Li Jun changed his shoes to commit the crime?"
“Changing shoes is normal,” Zhang Lin interjected, the forensic report rustling in his hands. “It’s reasonable for the murderer to not want to leave his shoe prints and to deliberately change into a pair of shoes he doesn’t usually wear. Li Jun is a mechanic, he has an electrician’s knife and can disable surveillance cameras, which fits the characteristic of ‘familiar with the factory environment.’ Moreover, he had a dispute with the deceased, although not a big one, but we can’t rule out the possibility of holding a grudge.” He suddenly pointed to the autopsy photos, “There are metal scratches on the edge of the rupture in the deceased’s right ventricle, similar to the curvature of the wrench that Li Jun often used. Maybe the steel pipe was just a cover, and the real murder weapon was the wrench.”
Xiao Yang pulled up Li Jun's attendance record: "On July 14th, Li Jun left work two hours early, saying his mother wasn't feeling well, but his mother's hospital records show everything was normal that day." His laser pointer paused on the motorcycle photo, "This blue Qianjiang 125 is registered under Li Jun's cousin's name, but Li Jun usually rides it. The seat height has been lowered by 3cm, which matches Li Jun's height of 172cm—3cm shorter than the estimated 175cm, but within the margin of error."
“I think Li Jun is the most suspicious,” Xiao Zhao said, connecting the clues on the whiteboard. “There was a dispute, there was time, there were tools, there was transportation, and he lied.” But Xiao Wang disagreed: “But why would he kill Zhang Jianguo? Just because of that argument? That’s too far-fetched. And Zhang Jianguo’s son said his father was investigating the warehouse theft. Could it be an internal dispute over the loot?”
“The theft case is an important clue,” Li Ming suddenly decided. “Xiao Wang, go check the material requisition records for the past six months again and see if there are any abnormalities. Xiao Yang, expand the scope of the shoe print investigation, not only checking employees, but also suppliers and external repair personnel. Zhang Lin, have you compared the skin tissue under the deceased's fingernails with Li Jun's DNA?” Zhang Lin nodded: “We're comparing them now, the results will be out this afternoon.”