Chapter 909: Bloodstains on the Plum Tree

On Li Donglin’s side, they’d already obtained the personal file on Li Baowei.

There was nothing special about the Li Baowei in the file; he looked completely ordinary, no particular issues.

Song Mingguang continued his report: "Here’s the situation. After we discovered that Li Baowei was a possible suspect, we did a fairly detailed sweep of his movements on that day."

"At 5:30 p.m. on the afternoon when Wang Jingya disappeared, Li Baowei was in the dorm drinking with several co-workers."

"They drank a lot that day. It went on until after ten at night, and after drinking they started playing mahjong. That game ran straight into the early hours of the morning."

"From what we’ve learned so far, there was no gap in the time he was with the others, and the specific time of Wang Jingya’s disappearance was around 9:08 p.m. that night."

"In that case, he has no window to commit the crime."

The exact time of Wang Jingya’s disappearance can be corroborated by surveillance, so there shouldn’t be any major problem with that.

But if what Song Mingguang had found in his investigation was true, that would mean Li Baowei likely wasn’t the suspect.

He started drinking with friends a little after five in the afternoon, drank until after ten at night, and then played mahjong until the early morning.

Under those circumstances, it would be impossible for him to have the time to abduct Wang Jingya.

"When we uncovered this situation yesterday, we were basically ready to rule out the possibility that Li Baowei committed the crime."

"But..."

Song Mingguang looked at Lu Chuan: "But this morning, when I was eating with Lu Chuan, I learned something else."

"Captain Lu did a second Crime Scene Investigation at the scene yesterday and found some physical characteristics of the suspect, such as height. We basically determined it was between 1.6 and 1.7 meters."

Song Mingguang stood up as he spoke.

"And it just so happens that Li Baowei’s height is 1.68 meters."

"There are three coincidences here. First, Li Baowei once lived in East Family Valley Village in Beiwang Town and is familiar with the area."

"Second, the entanglement between Li Baowei and Wang Jingya runs deep. They’ve known each other for a long time. Analyzing it from a crime of passion angle, he does have a motive."

"Third, his height. Captain Lu’s determination of 1.6 to 1.7 meters—among all currently known potential suspects, he’s the only male who fits that height range."

The reason Song Mingguang specifically added "male suspect range" was that based on the current crime scene, they still couldn’t determine whether the perpetrator was female.

However, given their current assessment, a male suspect is more likely, because Wang Jingya is fairly tall; although she’s slender, she doesn’t weigh little.

If it were a woman committing the crime, handling Wang Jingya’s body would be extremely difficult.

Of course, this is all just conjecture at this stage; there’s no evidence to analyze the specifics.

Song Mingguang went on: "Is it possible to have three coincidences in the same homicide?"

"So even though Li Baowei has a clear alibi and no window of time to commit the crime, I still think we need to do a more in-depth investigation on him."

Li Donglin looked at Lu Chuan.

This afternoon Lu Chuan had been busy with trace evidence analysis the whole time, so Li Donglin hadn’t yet briefed him on the detailed situation.

"Lu Chuan, talk about what you found in the Crime Scene Investigation."

"Alright."

Lu Chuan walked over to the projector, pulled up the photos he’d taken at the scene; the first one was the plum tree in the yard.

"Everyone here should have been to the scene. Especially the case detectives from Tianzhou City’s Criminal Investigation Team—they’ve been there multiple times."

"So I won’t get into all the details. You all noticed that when you enter the yard, there’s a plum tree in the passageway."

Everyone was familiar with that; every time they passed it, they had to sidestep a bit, because the tree was big and right in the middle of the path, getting in the way.

Lu Chuan continued explaining: "You must all feel that the tree is a nuisance, blocking the way every time you go in or out. Each time, either you deliberately avoid it, or your clothes will scrape against it if you don’t."

"Since everyone’s clothes or skin brush against the tree when they pass, wouldn’t the killer also leave traces on this tree?"

Uh...

Aside from Zhao Zhigao, who’d gone to the scene with Lu Chuan, everyone else was surprised by Lu Chuan’s line of thought, but once they thought about it carefully, it did make sense.

Especially for the case officers. They only go in and out alone, whereas the suspect might have been taking the victim along—whether carrying her or forcing her to walk—anyway, two people moving together. That would make it even more likely to leave traces.

"So I did a fairly detailed trace evidence collection on the marks on that tree."

Lu Chuan flipped to the next photo; several macro close-ups appeared.

"These are some macro shots I took at the scene. On them I found some fibers, and also some things I couldn’t make out at the time."

"Last night, the techs started examining and analyzing these trace materials. The relevant results only came out about an hour ago."

Lu Chuan’s estimate of the turnaround time had been relatively optimistic; in reality, the technicians at Tianzhou City’s Criminal Investigation Team weren’t as capable as he’d imagined.

So that afternoon, Lu Chuan had stayed with them to help out, which is the only reason the results came out this fast. Otherwise, they would’ve had to wait until tomorrow.

"All these fiber materials are fairly common nylon and synthetic fibers, likely shed from our clothing as we passed. But these fibers aren’t distinctive; we can’t use them to determine whether they were left by the suspect."

"However..."

Lu Chuan changed tack: "Aside from those fibers, we also found a tiny bloodstain on one of the leaves."

Lu Chuan operated the projector, and a photo of a single leaf appeared on the screen.

There were some brownish marks along the edge.

"Is this the bloodstain?"

Lu Chuan nodded: "Fortunately, when we compared this bloodstain with the victim’s, it turned out not to be hers. So it’s either something the suspect left unintentionally,"

"or something one of our detectives left behind."

"That’s easy to sort out."

"We just run a comparison and we’ll know."

No one had expected Lu Chuan to find such an important clue on a single plum tree. This was a deliberately targeted clue, one that could directly lock onto the suspect.

That was exactly what Lu Chuan was thinking: run the comparison and we’ll know whose blood it is.

Next, Lu Chuan talked about the fiber extraction from the firewood in the kitchen. There hadn’t been any particularly good progress there, no major leads. The fibers were all ordinary synthetic fibers, nothing with strong evidential direction.

"Next, let’s talk about the clues from the kitchen where the body was cooked."