The case materials sent by Guqi City Bureau filled four boxes. It’s clear that they’ve done a considerable amount of work.
However, the arson committed by the killer greatly increased the difficulty of solving the case, especially back then. The fire brigade ford spontaneously by neighbors, although successfully extinguishing the fire, objectively caused the loss of evidence.
For a case from 16 years ago, without surveillance and having lost on-site evidence, solving it is highly challenging.
Yet, because many neighbors were present at the scene, the perpetrator was witnessed, and a sketch was ultimately drawn.
"The killer is tall, slightly overweight, male, appears young, has fierce eyes, darker skin, and short hair..." Xu Taining read the description in the file and chuckled softly: "It matches Jiang Yuan’s judgnt. However, Guqi City Bureau never found the person."
"He should be a wandering criminal. The killer probably fled imdiately after committing the cri, which is likely why he avoided repeated investigations." Liu Jinghui reviewed the information from Guqi and iyang City Bureaus, his reasoning ability gradually coming online.
Xu Taining, who always seeks definitive answers, said, "Saying he’s a wandering criminal now still needs proof. Given this case’s situation, his habit is to commit arson after the cri, so related arson cases are suspicious too. Additionally, both the Guqi and iyang cases involve ho invasion murders, so could it be possible that so burglary cases with empty hos are also his doing? Surely he doesn’t just target houses with people inside."
"He might lack skills like lockpicking." Liu Jinghui replied confidently: "The iyang case isn’t very certain; in Guyang’s case, the victim often left the door open to cool off at ho because they lived in a self-built building for employees. Robbing taxis is similar; the killer chose projects that don’t require skill but have a high demand for force."
Xu Taining nodded slowly: "Tall and strong, prefers using violence to solve problems."
"It also aligns with the typical traits of taxi robbery suspects. If they had ho burglary skills, they wouldn’t need to rob taxis." Liu Jinghui discussed a harsh truth that even in cri, those with criminal skills achieve higher rewards with lower risks.
"So the killer first seeks so convenient opportunities to commit violent cris at people’s hos; there’s no need to start by killing, right?" Xu Taining continued to ask.
Liu Jinghui let out an "Um": "If you’re asking how the killer grew step by step, that’s criminal profiling. My answer would be that after the killer started killing, he consciously chose to beco a wanderer. Otherwise, considering the traffic conditions 15 years ago or even earlier, wandering across ti zones was easy, but cross-province wandering, nationwide even? If it wasn’t a conscious act, it’s hard to explain."
Liu Jinghui sympathetically considered the killer’s perspective: "After every cri, his first identity would be that of a fugitive, and then he would fence stolen goods. Resisting the urge to repeatedly commit cris for a one-ti fence and instead wandering shows so smarts. By the ti of the Li Huimin case, it could be considered another upgrade in cri; he faced two victims or coerced the perpetrator to drive thousands of kiloters, a process hard to grasp. Of course... he might have a gang. Taxi robbery and murder cases often involve gangs."
Certain types of typical characteristics often have intrinsic causes, akin to distant prostitutes and near gamblers. Taxi robbery also ideally involves teamwork, not just because taxi drivers back then were frequently robbed, making it easy for them to hide weapons and counterattack, but primarily to intimidate drivers. Multiple people robbing makes resistance less likely and reduces the robbers’ cost.
"Wandering cri was indeed a good idea back then. The gang issue should be considered too." For Xu Taining, wandering cris are troubleso indeed. In fact, for any policeman, wandering cris are difficult cases to handle, often relying on luck and interrogation for a breakthrough.
At this point, both n simultaneously looked at Jiang Yuan.
Jiang Yuan tily raised his head; he had been scanning the photos on his pad. He then had Wang Chuanxing display the marked photos and said, "I just looked at several other C-rated cases, one of which had footprints matching the suspect’s characteristics, providing identity verification."
"Let see. Which one?" Xu Taining imdiately asked.
"The case in Liyuan City." Jiang Yuan had Wang Chuanxing print the materials, simultaneously explaining: "It’s also a murder and corpse-burning case, but outdoors, using gasoline. The body was burned severely, no vehicle at the scene, but footprints were hardened by the fire."
"The Li Huimin case was also outdoors." Liu Jinghui added and then furrowed his brow slightly: "This killer was likely experinting back then."
"Studying murder?" Xu Taining asked.
"Sothing like that. So killers prefer consistent thods, while others like experinting."
"Experinting carries risks too." Xu Taining, not waiting for the prints, took the PAD to start flipping through.
The sound of flipping pages filled the scene, either from PADs or paper docunts.
"Ba River’s corpse burning case, that’s the one with B-level similarity. I think it can tentatively be judged as part of the sa series during the investigation stage." Liu Jinghui spoke, then started discussing detailed bits and pieces to deduce the sa killer.
Jiang Yuan and Xu Taining listened for a while, both expressing agreent, thus the Li Huimin case was upgraded to a series of cases, involving locations iyang, Guqi, Liyuan, Ningtai, and Ba River, totaling five cases.
All five cases were homicides, but apart from the Ningtai County case, the other four didn’t involve car burning. However, Guqi and iyang’s cases were ho invasions, Liyuan and Ba River’s were outdoor corpse burnings. Though uncertain about transportation thods, carjacking was likely.
Consequently, Xu Taining arranged personnel to normally follow up these cases while also sending people to Liyuan and Ba River to investigate car theft cases during the corresponding tiline.
Simultaneously, Xu Taining disseminated the suspect’s height of 1.8 ters, weight of 180 pounds, current age of 42-46. This information was verified multiple tis, providing a new lead, potentially revealing new clues when compared to unsolved homicides, ho burglaries, and carjackings from over a decade ago.
Easy to speak but hard to execute, unless having many people.
Xu Taining’s command, deployed in any city or county, requires several people for investigation at least; those resourceful and willing might send over ten people scouring old records, roughly an investnt of over a hundred police personnel.
For a regular task force of just twenty or thirty officers, even with such leads, a county or city can send only two people to follow up, requiring the utmost coordination, preferably accompanied by local officers. Even then, endless digging is the norm unless everyone mobilizes, with months of effort over dozens of counties and cities being quite normal.
So task forces follow one or two leads to their ends, proceeding if achieved, ceasing if not.
But for Xu Taining, this is rely a segnt in the journey. He continues to gather footprint leads and hopes Jiang Yuan can achieve new breakthroughs. He also specifically dispatches personnel to untangle tilines, studying the killer’s escape routes.
Most importantly, Xu Taining directly reopened the four murder cases in iyang, Guqi, Liyuan, and Ba River.
The two cases from Liyuan and Ba River are outdoor corpse burnings. Main clues lie in the bodies; local investigations are thorough but lack suspect identity information. iyang and Guqi’s cases are ho invasion robberies and murders, focusing heavily on fencing investigations and utilizing intelligence, but if considered part of a series, it’s easy to conclude that the killer may adopt cross-regional fencing or even cross-provincial thods.
Given the situation back then, investigating this was incredibly challenging.
Yet, for Xu Taining, these are new leads.
Like a massive shield machine, the task force tunnels through the dense mountainous regions, seemingly unstoppable, capable of traversing anywhere. In reality, completing the mission requires ticulous planning and exquisite design, and its rapidly spinning internal gears ultimately reflect a re few ters per hour outwardly.
Leads quickly gather only to be redistributed by Xu Taining then gathered anew...
Days later.
Jiang Yuan arrived at work early only to spot a familiar figure standing at Anwan City Bureau’s entrance.
"Director Jiang." Wei Zhenguo spotted Jiang Yuan and hurriedly spoke before he could utter a word: "I know I’m not suitable to participate in the task force operations, but I hope the task force won’t need to avoid . I’ve rented a place nearby; if the task force needs inquiries, I can provide answers anyti."
Having said this, Wei Zhenguo didn’t wait for Jiang Yuan’s response and turned to leave.
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