Chapter 972: Clues and Traces

Crime Scene Investigation Office.

Although Liu Guodong has been promoted to the deputy head of the Criminal Investigation Team, during the period Lu Chuan is absent, Liu Guodong is still in charge of the Crime Scene Investigation office.

Lu Chuan walked out of Qin Yong’s office and when he arrived at the scene office, he found the three people still asleep.

All sleeping on the sofa, obviously having pulled another all-nighter last night.

The sound of Lu Chuan opening the office door woke Liu Guodong. He squinted blearily, thinking he was dreaming.

After a while, Liu Guodong finally confirmed it was really Lu Chuan back.

"Holy shit! How did you come back, kid?"

The noise woke up Yang Sen, Old Bai, and Yang Lin.

Although Lu Chuan had gone over to the High-tech Zone Criminal Investigation Team side, because of Yang Lin’s housing situation, administratively the team here still consists of four people.

However, it was different from when Lu Chuan was here; back then, Old Bai and Yang Sen rarely worked overtime, especially since Old Bai was nearing retirement and hardly ever worked late.

But now, there’s no choice; this recent case has no leads, and the Scene Investigation and Forensic Doctor are constantly busy with that corpse.

Just in Qin Yong’s office, Lu Chuan had roughly gotten a sense of the case, actually thinking it should be fairly easy to solve.

After all, the victim was a teacher at the Experimental Primary School, and personal relationships should be easy to investigate. The disappearance years ago and now being found murdered—chances are the perpetrator is an acquaintance.

Additionally, the victim sealed inside the statue, placed right in the primary school, must have someone to clarify its origin, its timeline; following these leads should uncover the suspect.

Qin Yong sighed.

In the past week, they turned the victim’s relationship network inside out but hadn’t found anything extraordinary.

The routine crime-solving methods Lu Chuan thought of, Qin Yong and his team masterfully handled, probably more adeptly than Lu Chuan. However, a week has passed, and the case has not broken, let alone finding suspects—no clues at all.

Since no clues were found in interpersonal relationships, the pressure on the scene investigation and forensic side increases.

Solving the case is like that; when logical reasoning and normal visits don’t bring clues, you can only search the corpse or the scene for hints.

These past couple of days, Shen Yan and Wang Changjiang have thoroughly studied the corpse but honestly gained no significant clues.

The cause of death is clearly suffocation-induced death by malicious intent.

Since the victim was sealed into the internship high school afterward, the clothes worn back then hadn’t completely decomposed and could still be vaguely identified.

These items, now, are all over at the Crime Scene Investigation side.

"Old Lu!"

Yang Lin’s bleary eyes are full of joy.

To be honest, Yang Lin is certainly grateful to Lu Chuan for transferring him from the police station to the Criminal Investigation Team.

College buddies reaching this point are already considered pretty good—true brothers.

But in truth, though the work here in the Criminal Investigation Team is challenging, also what he had dreamed of previously, the overtime is overwhelming.

While the police station side is busy, Yang Lin is relatively young and has quite a few households to cover, often requiring him to be on duty, yet the work there is chaotic but not urgent, responsibility wasn’t as heavy.

For instance, patrolling—once done with patrol or visits, it’s over; typically, nothing happens. Some officers patrol for ten or twenty years without encountering incidents.

But it’s different here in the Criminal Investigation Team—there’s no need to be outside exposed to the elements daily, however, the work pressure here is immense.

After all, cases reaching the Criminal Investigation Team, handled by the Scene Investigation Office, are mostly murders, or need assessments on clues sent over from other investigation teams, police stations, or county-level police bureaus.

Every clue, every fingerprint, every footprint is the key to cracking the case below.

But being busy has benefits too; Yang Lin, with a solid academic background, learned scene investigation techniques thoroughly. Coupling theory with practice over this stretch, along with experience from Liu Guodong and others, has enabled Yang Lin to advance swiftly.

Although he hasn’t reached the caliber of Yang Sen and Liu Guodong yet, he can be considered a mature crime scene investigator now.

Yang Sen and Old Bai got up as well.

"Lu Chuan?"

"Lu? Am I dreaming?"

Especially in such times, they miss Lu Chuan even more.

Previously, the Criminal Investigation Team faced many tough cases—all had crime scene challenges, where Lu Chuan often provided very helpful leads.

Lu Chuan’s skill was indispensable, turning the Crime Scene Investigation Office into a renowned entity throughout the province.

Although after Lu Chuan left, they continued thanks to existing equipment, to be honest, they are struggling.

"Alright, alright, regardless, since you’re back today, don’t think about leaving, head to the basement with me right away."

Liu Guodong grabbed Lu Chuan, disregarding resistance, heading to the basement.

"Yang Lin, fetch some food from the canteen and bring it directly to the lab..."

Lu Chuan was very familiar with everyone, so there was no formality; being dragged away by Liu Guodong was okay, as he discovered some things in the basement.

Liu Guodong explained the current findings from the Crime Scene Investigation Office.

"The plaster is just ordinary plaster; the corpse was placed in the mold during formation back then."

The corpse is with the forensic side, but apart from that, the plaster and various other small items discovered at the scene including the clothing worn back then are with the Crime Scene Investigation side.

"When we arrived on the scene, the plaster statue was substantially damaged, having split into two when fallen; it was then construction personnel discovered the corpse inside and called the police."

Actually, Liu Guodong hasn’t discovered much.

Or rather, the Crime Scene Investigation Office, though working around the clock these past days, hasn’t gotten any clues.

"Years have passed, 5 years soon, the fingerprints on the sculpture are highly jumbled; we managed to analyze some belonging to school staff, and a few childlike prints are obviously from students."

"Hence... trying to find clues from this, it’s very hard."

Lu Chuan had already changed, inspecting the sculpture meticulously.

Despite the damage, the exterior showed the sculpture was crafted quite exquisitely.

Unfortunately, the source, and how the sculpture came—remains unclear.