Zhou Ning made a call to Cui Lili, telling her about the situation here. Everyone in the conference room was looking at the ti on their phones. Zhang Chunbo’s phone had not stopped ringing. After hanging up the last call, he grinned at Xu Dayuan.
"Director Xu, Wang Hongzhan and his team have boarded the plane, and in coordination with the airport, they were able to change seats. They will arrive in three hours and ten minutes, which is at 18:42 at Qindao Airport. It takes an hour and a half to get here from the airport, so they will arrive here at 20:12."
Just as Xu Dayuan was about to speak, Zhang Chunbo quickly raised his phone and said:
"I’ve already asked Wang Yuan and the others to wait for them at the airport."
Xu Dayuan nodded. Zhu Xingxing had connected to the printer and printed out the recent report for everyone to pass around and read. Zhou Ning was staring at the laptop screen when his inbox flashed. He hurriedly opened the email and started the download.
After glancing at the results, Zhou Ning was stunned. Seeing his reaction, Xu Dayuan leaned in.
"What’s wrong?"
Zhou Ning clicked print and handed the report to Xu Dayuan.
"The examination of the lock and key hasn’t yielded results yet. I just compared Wang Hongzhan’s DNA with the DNA left by the killer, and they are not from the sa person. Additionally, I asked Mrs. Cui to compare Wang Hongzhan’s DNA with the second victim Wang Jiahan, and they are not related by blood."
Mr. Zhao’s eyes bulged, his mouth gaping open in shock.
"Didn’t they say Wang Hongzhan and Ho Dongi had a very good relationship? How could the child not be Wang Hongzhan’s?"
Zhang Chunbo was also bewildered, quickly moving forward to snatch the report from Xu Dayuan’s hands and read it carefully. It wasn’t just a lack of blood relation—Wang Hongzhan and Wang Jiahan’s DNA showed no connection whatsoever.
From the initial case analysis eting to having Wang Hongzhan assist with the investigation, neither Zhou Ning nor Xu Dayuan had any particular impression of Wang Hongzhan. However, from the very beginning, Zhang Chunbo was deeply moved by the relationship between the two and found the results hard to accept.
"How... how is this possible?"
Xu Dayuan said nothing else but turned to Mr. Qu.
"Have you finished processing those surveillance videos from Jiaotuan Village?"
Xia Momo passed her computer to Mr. Qu, who turned on the projector, displaying an image.
"Please take a look, this is a diagram of where the surveillance caras are located. We obtained six surveillance videos in total, but after screening them, we found that the caras closest to the Wang Family’s ho are number three and number four, respectively located at the southeast and northwest intersections.
If soone was driving there, they would have to go through both ends of this road. However, the road is winding, and it isn’t possible to see the front of Wang Hongzhan’s ho. Additionally, if soone passed through the alleys on either side of Wang Hongzhan’s house, they would pass by the roads monitored by cara five and two along the Baisha River.
This way, whether on foot or by car, anyone able to get near the Wang Family’s ho would appear on the surveillance, so we figured it would be sufficient to review these four caras."
As he spoke, he opened two videos labeled three and four. On the left and right monitors, the surveillance videos from the night of August 13, 2011, after 20:00 were being fast-forwarded.
Zhu Xingxing also grabbed a computer, playing caras five and two. With the four videos visible on the projector screen, Xu Dayuan quickly instructed everyone to start watching the surveillance footage in groups.
After Mr. Qu and Xia Momo’s processing, the video quality was already very clear. Caras five and two were a bit dark, with a few streetlights in the distance. Mr. Qu used a laser pointer to gesture between two streetlights.
"Between these two streetlights. Right here, this is where soone could co out from either alley on either side of the Wang Family’s ho. Just focus on this spot."
As ti rapidly advanced, the videos were repeatedly paused. Whenever soone passed by, Xia Momo would conduct facial recognition, but after the search, it was found that these people were residents of Jiaotuan Village.
At 1:07 on all four surveillance caras, a car erged on cara five. Mr. Qu quickly made the video full screen. In the flickering light of the streetlamp, it was visible that this was a sedan, but the license plate had been removed. The driver wore a baseball cap and sunglasses, with fabric covering his face.
Such attire imdiately caught everyone’s attention. Xia Momo took a screenshot and then attempted facial recognition, but the person was not wearing a mask—instead, they used sothing similar to a vest to cover their face, not even the ears were exposed.
On the large projection, a cropped image of the person’s upper body was nearly full screen.
One could discern that the orange baseball cap had white lettering on it, seemingly a ’WO’, although the following ’O’ seed smaller, and the words below could not be made out.
The fabric tied around the person’s face appeared to be a white T-shirt with so dark brown spots that looked like spattered bloodstains, a find that made Zhou Ning lean in closer.
In the picture, the person was wearing a black T-shirt, and the sunglasses were very dark, making it impossible to discern the shape of the eyes. However, on the hand holding the steering wheel, visible was a black mark on the right ring finger, not a ring. It was unclear if it was a scar or a tattoo.
Zhou Ning’s gaze returned to the computer screen. Seeing Xia Momo’s repeated search failures, he stopped her attempts.
"Don’t try anymore, you won’t find anything with that image. Look at this person’s right ring finger. Can you work on that spot to see if it’s a tattoo or a scar?"
Xia Momo zood in and then nodded her head.
"I’ll need half an hour. This won’t be easy to process."
Afterward, Xia Momo took her laptop to a corner.
"Mr. Qu, reverse the surveillance footage and slow it down a bit. We didn’t see when this car appeared just now."
Mr. Qu quickly worked his magic, and at 23:20, a car without lights on passed by cara three. Mr. Qu imdiately paused and enlarged the still image.
"No wonder we missed this car before; it didn’t have its headlights on and was driving from the southeast towards the north side. From this angle of the cara, we can only see the back of the car, and the license plate has been removed."
Zhou Ning waved to Mr. Zhao. Understanding what Zhou Ning ant, Mr. Zhao leaned over the screen and scrutinized it for a while before asking Mr. Qu to slow down the video even more. Finally, he looked up and said,
"This car is a 2006 Geely King Kong 1.6L manual model. It was priced at over sixty thousand upon release, and it’s a silver-gray color. There is damage on the right side of the trunk door. See, the color here isn’t even. Based on this analysis, it must have been rear-ended. We can check for any insured vehicles of the sa model."
Mr. Zhao’s words ignited hope in Xu Dayuan who quickly waved to Tao Zhenshan and the others. Everyone sprang into action, so making calls, others going out.
Xu Dayuan pondered for a mont before moving to Zhou Ning and Mr. Qu’s side.
"Jiao Dazhuang’s wife ntioned that on a day in early August, Jiao Dazhuang went to the victim’s house to help with so work and saw a car going to their house around eight in the evening. Can we find this car?"
"We don’t know the specific date?"
Xu Dayuan dialed a number, which took seven or eight rings before soone answered.
"Is this Jiao Dazhuang?"
"Yes, it’s . Who is this?"
"I am from the Qindao City Criminal Police Brigade. We are investigating the murder of Ho Dongi. Your wife Zhu Xiaohui ntioned that when you were working at Ho Dongi’s house, you saw a man driving to Ho Dongi’s place. Do you rember the exact date?"
On the other end, Jiao Dazhuang paused, then cursed under his breath.
"My wife is talking nonsense. I didn’t see anyone."
Xu Dayuan knew that Jiao Dazhuang definitely didn’t want to draw trouble to himself. After all, in the sa village, if he spoke of seeing a man going to Wang Hongzhan’s house at night, it would be tantamount to gossiping like an old lady.
"Don’t overthink it. We simply want to investigate Ho Dongi’s death. I can’t divulge specific details to you, but I hope you can tell us the truth. It would be of great help for us in solving this case."
Jiao Dazhuang was silent for a long while before saying,
"Wait a mont while I check the paynt records. I recharged my phone the day before. I’ll call you back later."
Mr. Qu, upon hearing the details, began searching for Jiao Dazhuang’s mobile phone paynt information and quickly found a record showing that on August 6, 2011, Jiao Dazhuang had topped up fifty yuan on his phone.
Just then, Jiao Dazhuang’s call ca back.
"Officer, I just checked, and I recharged on August 6, 2011. The next day was Sunday. A few of us parents, whose children learn with Mr. Ho, went together to the Wang family’s house to help clean up trash after a tile removal."
"Good. Can you recall what ti you left the Wang family’s house that day? And did you notice anything distinctive about that car and its driver, like the color of the car? Was the driver male or female? Tall or short? Heavy or slim?"
"I can’t rember the exact ti but I know it was a bit past eight when I got ho. The car wasn’t white, but the color was light. The driver wasn’t very tall, looked quite bulky, about the sa as , no more than 175 centiters, and roughly one hundred fifty to sixty kilos. I didn’t get a good look at his face. But when the man got out of the car, he was carrying a supermarket bag. I glanced at it, saw baby formula, and so snacks. He probably brought them for the kids. And it was the first ti I saw soone visiting Mr. Ho at that ti."
Xu Dayuan thanked him and hung up the phone.
Although Jiao Dazhuang hadn’t said much, one could feel a sense of protectiveness towards Mr. Ho.
By now, Mr. Qu had already brought up the surveillance footage from the night of August 7, 2011. Still using four cara angles, the search continued, with everyone looking up at the fast-forwarding video.
At 8:07 PM, on cara three, a gray sedan appeared in the fra. After repeatedly slowing down the footage, Mr. Qu successfully captured the license plate number: Lu B93104.
Without waiting for Xu Dayuan’s instruction, Mr. Zhao already had his police device out and started searching. The vehicle and owner’s information rapidly appeared on screen.
"Lu B93104, a 2006 1.6L silver-gray Geely King Kong. The owner is Wang Hongwen, born March 3, 1980."
Zhou Ning glanced at it as Mr. Zhao had already looked up Wang Hongwen’s detailed information. His place of employnt turned out to be Hai’an Sixth Elentary School, where he was a colleague of Ho Dongi. But, how co his na was so similar to Wang Hongzhan’s—just one character off? Could they be related?
Just then, Xia Momo spoke aloud,
"The image restoration is complete. This tattoo is of an ECG pattern. Take a look at the picture."
User Comments
0 comments from readers