National Forensic Doctor
Chapter 1036 - 969: Peaceful Times

Chapter 1036: Chapter 969: Peaceful Times

"Get some Luminal ready."

Jiang Yuan turned his head and gave an order, then had people take more and more photos of the bathroom, before three people squeezed into the small space, each marking off an area to start their search.

Jiang Yuan only bent down to examine the washbasin and the floor drain, swept through a few nooks and crannies, and then backed out. Following that, someone from the Changyang Bureau’s crime scene investigators entered to supplement the work.

When he was a rookie handling cases, he and Wang Zhong would spend hours swabbing a bathroom with cotton buds for a secondary inspection.

Now, as he leads a Coaster’s scene investigation, the suspects’ residences aren’t even large enough for everyone to have a room to themselves; the idea of one person per bathroom is unheard of, and requires competition for the role.

Compared to the suspects’ spacious bathrooms during Jiang Yuan’s rookie days, now the criminals, all suspects, only have tiny dwellings to rent. If the rooms were any smaller, they wouldn’t even be able to lay out a body, let alone dismember one.

It could be said that this room was an economical and practical dismemberment space. Any smaller or shared housing would make dismemberment impossible.

In today’s cities, densely monitored by CCTV, a person, especially a man, who cannot afford a room with a private bathroom, does not qualify to dismember bodies, or more broadly speaking, has no qualification to premeditate murder!

"Captain Jiang, we’ve found bags identical to the ones used." A technician searching the bedroom said, pulling out woven bags filled with more bags from under the bed.

"Are these the kind with a coated surface?" Jiang Yuan recognized them with just a glance.

"Yes, judging by the remaining quantity, it should be around two hundred. It is very likely that these are from the same batch as the bags used to dispose of the body. We can take them back for testing," the technician explained.

"Did you find any bags from other manufacturers?" Jiang Yuan asked.

The technician shook his head: "No, just this one type."

Mu Zhiyang commented from the side: "The suspect drives a truck, and he brought these for transporting goods. Logically speaking, buying so many at once, there’s no need to buy from two or three manufacturers."

"Makes sense." Jiang Yuan agreed, a deduction that only required a bare minimum of logic. The other two types of bags were probably obtained from the victims by the suspect.

Disposing of the body twice means having to transport it twice, and the bags used for the first disposal cannot simply be discarded. Regardless of whether the body was dismembered during the first disposal – a fact that many who haven’t killed don’t know – besides blood, the human body can ooze various other fluids and semi-fluids once muscle activity ceases.

Thus, the phrase "covered in filth" powerfully describes the loss of bodily control upon death.

"Has the suspect given any statements?" Jiang Yuan casually asked.

Some suspects, after calming down in the police car for a while, come to their senses.

Wang Chuanxing came over and said, "I just followed up on it, the suspect is keeping tight-lipped. However, Captain Cao has taken the Technical Investigation to the residential area suspected to be the first crime scene. The suspect’s phone records show he stayed in that area for nearly eight hours last month. Additionally, a team has also headed to the warehouse district of the clothing wholesale market."

"Good." Jiang Yuan nodded, his expression relaxed.

Although there’s no concrete direct evidence yet, the information collected from various sources is already plentiful. Now it’s a matter of seeing which lead strikes first.

Soon, the technician reported again: "Captain Jiang, we are ready to spray Luminal."

This stuff is best viewed in complete darkness, so essentially, the technician’s meaning was that he’s going to shut everyone in a pitch-black room.

Jiang Yuan gave his permission.

The officers started meticulously spraying Luminal, then quickly drew the curtains.

Nowadays, police generally don’t use Luminal; after all, it’s a solution that needs to be freshly prepared with even ready-to-use Luminal "concentrate," which still requires carbonated soda and hydrogen peroxide. And since it involves preparation, care must be taken with measuring cylinders and flasks, which often amount to a whole box’s worth of materials.

Compared to that, crime scene investigators currently prefer to use multispectral light sources, various examination lights which Huang Qiangmin came to afford only recently, that can be tuned to different wavelengths where different bodily fluids, or fluids, will fluoresce under different light sources.

For instance, seminal fluid will emit an orange fluorescence when exposed to visible light with wavelengths between 430 to 470 nanometers.

All of these are based on the principle of cold luminescence, just like glow sticks waved at concerts.

However, examining crime scenes with multispectral light sources has certain requirements for the target quantity and is comparatively time-sensitive. Simply put, substances like semen, if too little is present or too much time has passed, could potentially be missed.

Luminal is different, as it can reveal bodily fluids that are several years old, with a single droplet being sufficient.

The bathroom was pitch-dark, and not a trace of blue light emerged, indicating that the bathroom fittings indeed played a role.

But surprisingly, yet unsurprisingly, the kitchen emitted a faint gleam.

"It looks like blood or something spilled on the floor," the technicians said while taking photographs and conversing.

"It’s like a piece of pork belly dropped on the floor," Mu Zhiyang commented, joining them with a daily work-style social smile typical of office workers.

"It does look a bit like that." Jiang Yuan came over, sized up the scene, and said, "It’s possible that the murderer, finding it difficult to operate in the bathroom, brought some of the fattier parts here to work on, and dropped them on the floor. Because fat on the blade makes it duller."

The forensic doctor present also said, "It’s possible. Maybe fatty tissue fell on the floor like this, and since there wasn’t much blood, the murderer might not have cleaned it up well, maybe even forgotten about it?"

Mu Zhiyang’s office-worker-style casual work smile had already faded, and he speculated with the everyday thinking of a non-forensic worker, "Perhaps he thought that since there’s meat and blood in the kitchen normally, it wouldn’t need special concealment."

"Just run a DNA test," said the forensic doctor squatting down to take a sample.

Jiang Yuan watched the entire process with his hands tied, so to speak. His crime scene investigation skills were already quite advanced, but to be honest, such high-level expertise wasn’t really needed at this crime scene.

A group of people busily completed the sampling and then returned to the bathroom to check the situation, signaling, "Go ahead and chisel off the renovation."

The technicians in the bathroom stepped out, and Shen Yaowei entered with a sledgehammer, followed by three people filming him with a camera.

Thud.

Crack crack.

Thud.

Crack crack.

Those shooting videos did their filming, those taking photos snapped away, and there were curious onlookers peeking in from outside the door.

"Put your back into it!"

"Go for it, give it your all!"

"Bro, Captain Jiang is waiting for lunch."

Everyone, wearing white coats, plastic caps, and rubber gloves, enthusiastically cheered on Shen Yaowei as he wielded the sledgehammer.

The limited space in the bathroom meant this was the only way they could help their brother out.

"Wipe the sweat." Shen Yaowei stretched out his head since he couldn’t allow the sweat to drip onto the floor; they still needed to spray Luminal later on.

The detectives chose the ugliest among them to go and wipe Shen Yaowei’s forehead with a piece of paper towel.

"Bring on the chisel."

After smashing a tile, others came over to assist, starting to carefully remove the underlying cement layer.

Summing up his energy, Shen Yaowei continued to work vigorously.

Finally, beneath the large spread of tiles and cement, a portion of the old decoration was exposed.

It seemed that the suspect had originally intended to completely smash the old decoration before applying the new, but he clearly underestimated the workload of this project. As a result, only part of the old decoration was destroyed, and the final renovation was carried out on top of the damaged decor.

Even so, it would have probably kept Xin Shengsi busy for an entire month.

Seeing this, Jiang Yuan said without waiting for the completion, "Spray some Luminal and see."

Shen Yaowei quickly stepped out.

The technician took a small sprayer and hissed it all over, then turned off the lights and drew the curtains, revealing specks of blue light already appearing.

"Ha-ha, just as expected, they’re all underneath."

The police officers present started to get excited.

The detection rate of Luminal is one in a million. Something like blood stains, no matter how thoroughly wiped off, are futile to conceal, even with many chemical reagents. While the suspect’s decision to go for a new renovation was clever, in this case, it served to preserve evidence instead.

Jiang Yuan immediately ordered the sampling.

During his break, Shen Yaowei quietly messaged his elder cousin: [Captain Jiang has rewarded me with merits again today, it feels quite awkward.]

[What’s the situation?] Shen Yaoguo, the head of Changyang City Public Security Detachment, replied instantly.

Shen Yaowei narrated his recent activities and added: [If someone didn’t know better, they’d think I’ve given him a great gift. He’s really looking out for me.]

[Don’t be silly, it really is so. Let me think...] Shen Yaoguo’s WeChat message flickered before inputting more content: [Jiang Yuan seems dissatisfied with the public safety environment around Jiangcun Residential Area; there was even a dedicated report on it before.]

Shen Yaowei’s eyes lit up: [Right, right, right, Captain Jiang was quite concerned about that... Captain Liu even handled a few cases there to deter crime. Could he be favoring me because of that reason?]

Shen Yaoguo: [Don’t overthink it. It must be so! You joined the Changyang Bureau carrying a name that shares the ’Yao’ generational marker, play acting as if you don’t know now.]

Shen Yaowei smiled self-consciously: [That’s true, it can’t just be because I’m a good shot.]

Shen Yaoguo: [That’s why I said, you should learn some skills, but instead, you went to practice shooting. Anyway, I’d better hurry and prepare. The crime rate in various other counties has decreased recently, highlighting issues with public order instead.]

Shen Yaowei: [What are you planning to do?]

Shen Yaoguo: [A public safety crackdown. There’s an existing template specifically for these urban-rural fringe areas. Jiangcun Residential Area has always been a problem area for public safety in Ningtai County. I’ll take a detachment over to help them out, give them a thorough going-over. Ideally, we’ll plow it to the very bottom, dredging up all the muck. Those getting into fights, racing in the wee hours, we’ll make sure they’re caught red-handed!]]