National Forensic Doctor-Chapter 871 - 809: Thinking Outside the Box

"Arf arf!"

"Arf!"

After Dazhuang barked twice, Er Zhuang followed with a bark as well. Both dogs sounded dissatisfied.

Why would someone come to the residence of the police dogs to play with a goat? Moreover, the goat’s name sounded incredibly indecent.

Of course, this wasn’t to say that police dogs could be toyed with, or rather, allowed to be toyed with, but who lets people not play with police dogs, only to come here and play with alpacas instead? That’s just too doggone crazy!

Dazhuang grinned, took a few steps forward, and then stopped to look around, hesitating whether to go up and give these bipeds a lesson.

"Dazhuang, come back!" Li Li called her police dog back with her hands on her hips.

"Er Zhuang, you come back too!" Li Li called out again, and Er Zhuang reluctantly sauntered back with a sheepish look.

"Do you know you’re police dogs? What are the requirements for being a police dog? Being a police dog is just like being a police officer: You need to keep up appearances, be serious, protect the people’s property safety, and also protect yourselves... Now that we’re in the city, we need to show what well-behaved dogs from Ningtai County look like, understand?"

"Arf!"

"Arf arf!"

The two police dogs obediently responded in low barks.

"Bro, I’ll touch it first as a salute, hahaha..." A man, who had taken off his shirt but still wore shiny police trousers, burst into laughter and rushed into the Qianjin District K9 Squad’s station.

Li Li took a closer look and realized it was Shen Yaowei from Jiang Yuan’s Accumulated Case Team.

He was wearing a crumpled T-shirt, looking like he had partied for three or four nights straight, and had a frantic expression like he hadn’t slept, and then he threw himself directly onto a pile of alfalfa...

Li Li covered Dazhuang’s eyes and softly comforted, "We’re the good kids, let’s not learn from them..."

Er Zhuang’s eyes weren’t covered, and the whole dog wore a shocked expression. He was a professional police dog born at the police dog base, the kind who carried his bowl to line up for meals since he was young. He liked interacting with bipeds too, but he had never seen a biped hugging and vigorously rubbing an alpaca before.

"Dinner time!" Jiang Yuan emerged from the kitchen at the back.

Even though they were at the Qianjin District K9 Squad, Jiang Yuan still skillfully whipped up a pan of Uncle Seventeen’s fried rice, and also made a pot of dog food.

The cost of making the dog food was 100 times that of Uncle Seventeen’s fried rice. During busy times, the police department couldn’t afford such expensive food for people; only the police dogs were qualified to eat it.

Li Li first led Dazhuang to get a bowl, and when they came back, they saw several police dogs of the Qianjin District and Er Zhuang all lined up neatly, quietly waiting to eat.

A bit further ahead, Liu Jinghui, Lei Xin, Wu Junhao, and other people were also seated at a long table, each with a bowl of fried rice in front of them.

"You can start eating," Jiang Yuan sat down, picked up his chopsticks, and began to urge everyone.

There were also some pickles on the table, in line with the original intention of Uncle Seventeen’s fried rice.

"This fried rice made by Jiang Yuan is inexplicably delicious," Wu Junhao wolfed down several bites and happily sighed.

"I apologize for not being a good host. Once the case is cracked, I’ll definitely treat everyone to a big meal!" Lei Xin said, slightly embarrassed.

Wu Junhao waved his hand, "Solving the case is what matters. Even if you offer us good food now, we wouldn’t have time to eat. So, what’s next, continuing with the screening or conducting further investigation?"

"Screening also needs a scope. We can’t just screen aimlessly," Lei Xin, who was losing his appetite, quickly added.

Liu Jinghui nodded and said, "We definitely have to investigate first. The problem now is that the clue of the murder weapon has turned into a sketch. The difficulty of this task is hard to predict."

Through investigation into the source of the "heavy back cleaver" which was the murder weapon, the task force eventually locked on a hardware store situated 1.5 kilometers from the crime scene.

The hardware store was licensed to sell knives, and some larger stores had a comprehensive range of knives. This particular store operated both retail and wholesale and even produced some small brands on its own. The heavy back cleaver used as the murder weapon was one such item sold there.

However, the store’s internal surveillance footage was deleted every three days, so no images were preserved.

The owner of the store vaguely remembered the buyer, and Lei Xin, excited, called in an artist to create a sketch of the murderer—such scenes are common in American dramas, but in China, criminal sketches are not popular and are seldom used extensively.

The Baiyin case had involved a forensic sketch that was quite accurate, but it still didn’t lead to the capture of the criminal.

Jiang Yuan and the others were facing a similar issue now; they had a drawing, but what next?

Searching based on the sketch could easily lead to errors and omissions.

If the criminal knows there is a screening happening downstairs, even a slight change in his appearance could render the sketch useless—America is a multi-racial country; their criminal sketches include descriptions of skin color, and distinctions between having a long, wide, flat, or small nose. In contrast, the differences in Chinese appearances are minimal, especially in small towns where many of the descriptors in sketches can be repetitive. fɾeeweɓnѳveɭ.com

"Can we identify the person by their feet?" Liu Jinghui put down his bowl of fried rice, glanced at the alpaca, then looked at Jiang Yuan.

"There were no footprints at the scene; they had been destroyed," Jiang Yuan spread his hands and added, "The scene has already been thoroughly investigated. Even if I go now, I probably wouldn’t find anything as significant as footprints."

"If we don’t conduct a screening..." Liu Jinghui looked at Lei Xin and then said, "We’ll just have to try our luck."

"Go ahead," Lei Xin was open to relying on luck; as detectives, who can solve every case 100 percent? In some cases, even the criminals don’t know how they got in and out, and detectives can’t always guess their thoughts—that would make them psychics.

Liu Jinghui slowly said, "Jiang Yuan and I had a hypothesis while in the car about the criminal’s motive..."

Liu Jinghui briefly shared their discussion and then said, "Assuming the criminal’s initial motive was rape—if he failed at that, does he have other means of venting?"

Everyone was taken aback, as Liu Jinghui’s angle was indeed unexpected.

There are many theories about why criminals resort to rape, and particularly why this criminal chose this method.

Lei Xin pondered and replied, "In trying to prepare for Captain Jiang’s case, we reviewed cases for a long time. I don’t recall any cases of forced entry with the intent to commit rape."

"That likely means he doesn’t have a persistent compulsion for breaking in to commit rape. From this angle, it may also explain why he quickly shifted from attempted rape to murder after being thwarted," Liu Jinghui summarized and continued, "So he goes back to masturbate? Would that satisfy him?"

"That’s unlikely," Liu Wenkai, who had been focused on eating, concentrated and said, "He nearly raped the mother and daughter together. Going back and just masturbating? I don’t buy it."

"What do you believe?"

"At the very least, he would need a woman," Liu Wenkai’s eyes brightened as he spoke, "Perhaps he has specific requirements, like a threesome? Average women wouldn’t comply with him; he would have to seek a prostitute."

Liu Jinghui coughed twice and said, "That’s more or less what I meant, but not limited to just that. There likely aren’t many prostitutes left in Qinghe City, so we might as well find as many as we can and ask them."