After about 10 minutes of recording, the police captain asked, "Mr. Lu, after your wife disappeared, you must have started looking for her. Do you have any clues?"
Lu Jinghuai shook his head. "I haven't found any clues yet, but I spoke with my wife before leaving this morning, and we didn't have any arguments. So I suspect my wife was taken away by force."
The village chief immediately reacted, "Mr. Lu, how could our village possibly be trafficking your wife? After your wife disappeared, our village actively helped you find her. You must not frame us and end up making us traffickers."
Lu Jinghuai also raised his eyes and looked over seriously: "Village Chief, I didn't say that everyone in the village is a human trafficker. I just said that my wife might have been forced to take her away by someone for some reason."
The village chief was successfully choked and didn't know how to respond to Lu Jinghuai for a moment. Could it be that what you said made me stressed?
The police captain just glanced at the village chief, and the village chief could only endure various thoughts.
After questioning Lu Jinghuai, the police captain looked at the village chief again: "Are all the villagers here?"
The village chief nodded: "Most of them are here, but there are still some old, weak, women and children at home. Those people can't kidnap Mr. Lu's wife."
The police captain nodded. After some thought, he said, "If it's convenient, please have those people come over as well."
"I will then ask every villager what they were doing at the time of the incident. How many people in the same group can testify for each other?"
Although the village chief looked unhappy, he nodded in agreement: "We will naturally cooperate with the police, but..."
The village chief subconsciously looked at the villagers who were watching the excitement on the other side.
However, the initial fear of the police among several villagers in the crowd had dissipated, and their faces showed a bit more impatience, and some even spoke up.
"It's almost noon, and we all have to go back to cook. We don't have time to stay here and play question-and-answer games with you guys."
Faced with such words, neither the police nor Lu Jinghuai showed much emotion. Instead, they looked at the village chief, whose expression changed.
Finally, under the watchful eyes of the police, the village chief could only grit his teeth and say, "Shut up, everyone."
"Later, line up and come over here one by one to tell the police comrades, who were you with when Mr. Lu's wife disappeared? Do you have any evidence against each other?"
The village chief's words were obviously more credible than those of the police. Although several people were dissatisfied, they still agreed with frowns.
"Comrade police officer, please hurry up. It's already noon. We need to go home to eat later. We still have work to do in the afternoon. You can't let us go hungry."
The police officer seemed satisfied and nodded again: "Then please ask the village chief to arrange a suitable place for us. We will begin to investigate and ask the villagers about the specific situation at that time."
The village chief ostensibly cooperated with the police's activities and actively led the police to an empty house in the village.
The densely packed crowds of people in the village had filled up the entire house. The police officer then turned to the village chief and asked, "Is everyone in the village here? Is there anyone else who hasn't arrived yet?"
The village chief shook his head and said, "Basically, they're all here."
About a hundred people were gathered in a room. It was hot and stuffy in the hot summer. More and more people were getting impatient, and the villagers were shouting more and more.
"Officer, if you need any cooperation or have any questions, please ask me quickly. I have to go back after you finish asking."
The police captain nodded and gave a look to a colleague behind him.
The police officer reacted immediately: "I'll have someone go around the village."
Then the policeman took seven or eight people out. The village chief's face changed slightly, but finally he calmed down.
Several policemen also started to work. They set up a tattered table that they had found from somewhere, and the villagers came forward one by one to take notes. The questions they asked were indeed the simplest ones.
"How many meters is your home from the scene of the incident? Where were you between 8:00 AM and 10:00 AM? What were you doing? Who were with you? Who can provide evidence for you?"
The villagers answered one by one. Some of them had no accidents between 8 and 10 o'clock and their daily routines were normal, so they answered honestly.
But there were also some villagers who were not serious when answering, and their eyes were darting around. Even a ghost could tell that they were talking nonsense.
However, the police officer who recorded it did not say much, but recorded it truthfully.
After answering, some villagers planned to leave, but before they could go out, they were stopped by two policemen guarding the door.
The police captain looked up and said, "Comrade, please wait a moment. You can leave after we have finished taking all the notes."
There were quite a lot of people taking the statements, with seven or eight police officers working together, and it was completed in less than an hour.
More and more people in the crowd were unhappy and were about to explode in anger.
The police officer looked at the village chief again. The village chief's expression was stiff and hard, but he finally nodded.
"Be patient."
After the village chief finished speaking, he looked at the police officer and said, "Comrade police officer, please hurry up here. The villagers in our village haven't had lunch yet."
The village chief paused and glanced at the villagers who were recording. "Also, police officer, many of our villagers have never left the mountains in their lives. They are very simple and honest. You must not wrongly accuse them."
The police officer smiled and nodded. More than an hour later, more than a hundred transcripts were completed.
One of the policemen collected all the transcripts into a large stack and handed it to the police captain.
The police captain quickly read the transcript in front of him. It can be said that the statements of everyone in the village are quite perfect, as if they had been prepared in advance.
Basically, there were people who could testify for each other during that time period, so everyone basically had an alibi, and without any discussion, the witnesses were one-on-one.
These are really perfect confessions, but the more perfect they are, the more abnormal they are.
From eight to ten o'clock, when the sun is not too hot, it is the time for working, but only 20 to 30 percent of the people in the village go to work in the fields.
Is everyone else resting at home?
The villagers in such remote villages generally rely on the mountains for their livelihood and usually do not have much savings.
The police captain's expression also grew serious, and he subconsciously glanced sideways at Lu Jinghuai.
Lu Jinghuai nodded slightly. Both of them must have noticed something was wrong, and their thoughts might have coincided.
The police captain lowered his eyes and read the confessions again, and patiently divided them into two groups.
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