Wang Shuo and Wen Yue responded in unison. Fu Wan and the others took the steamed buns. Because there was not enough room in the car, Fu Liang could only go to the county town later with Fu San's tricycle.
Fu Wan first took Su Ran and the other two to the station, and then drove to the food factory.
Fu Wan had indeed been visiting the food factory less often lately. She had originally planned to come over after resting for a couple of days after returning from Gangcheng, but unexpectedly, something happened.
The county bus station wasn't particularly far from the food factory. The jeep drove for about ten minutes before stopping in front of the familiar iron gate.
"Factory manager? Factory manager, you're back?!"
Upon seeing Fu Wan sitting in the jeep, Zhou Haoran, who was smoking at the door, hurriedly put out his cigarette and came to greet her.
Seeing this, the gatekeeper, Grandpa Liu, hurriedly pushed open the iron gate of the food factory.
Fu Wan frowned when she saw the strong smell of smoke on Zhou Haoran.
"Comrade Zhou, why are you squatting by the door smoking?"
Zhou Haoran and Zhang Xiaoqing were both promoted to deputy factory director two months ago. With Fu Wan not around, he and Zhang Xiaoqing are the highest-ranking leaders in the factory.
The leader was standing at the door smoking silently; what kind of image did that make the workers think?
Zhou Haoran didn't expect Fu Wan to bring this up first, but when he saw the workers who were rushing to work looking in his direction, he suddenly realized how bad it was that he was smoking at the entrance.
At this critical juncture, a deputy factory director standing at the factory gate smoking silently—isn't that telling everyone that something terrible has happened at the food factory?
"Factory manager, this was my fault. I thought it was still early and there wasn't much of a crowd, but I got so worried that I couldn't resist having a cigarette with Lao Liu at the door."
Seeing the dark circles under Zhou Haoran's eyes, Fu Wan could guess that he hadn't rested well either.
"Alright, this is the last time. It's urgent. Let's go inside first. Tell me what the situation is."
After saying that, Fu Wan took the lead and walked ahead. After taking only two steps, she saw the tricycle parked at the warehouse entrance.
The car was packed full of unopened seafood.
What's going on?
Upon hearing this, Zhou Haoran, a man in his forties, looked like he was about to cry.
"Oh, those were all goods returned by the sellers last night. There were too many, so they didn't have time to re-inspect and send them to the warehouse last night."
Fu Wan paused, "Tell me in detail what happened these past two days."
Zhou Haoran couldn't see the expression on Fu Wan's face, so he could only tell her the whole story.
In fact, at first, they had no idea that the Longhai Evening News had published such a report.
Early yesterday morning, a group of people put up a white banner at the entrance, saying that the food factory's products had made people sick and demanded compensation from the factory.
When Lao Liu saw this, he thought they were there to cause trouble, so he sent a few young men from the security department to find out what was going on.
Just then, Zhou Haoran arrived at work as usual and learned about the incident from the newspapers thrown at him by these people.
After reading the newspaper, Zhou Haoran immediately called Fu Wan, but the call went unanswered. He then called Wang Jianmin instead.
Wang Jianmin, being a seasoned veteran, suggested that Zhou Haoran and Zhang Xiaoqing go to the hospital to check on the situation. So, after waiting for Zhang Xiaoqing to arrive, the two of them rushed to the hospital.
It was there that I met Fu Liang, who happened to be bringing his son to see a doctor.
Fu Wan sensed something was wrong. "You mean, when those people came to cause trouble, they brought newspapers that had already been published about it?"
Zhou Haoran nodded hurriedly, "Yes, the newspaper is still in my bag. Wait a minute, I'll get it for you."
After saying that, he quickly opened his briefcase and took out a crumpled newspaper.
Fu Wan picked it up and saw that it was exactly the same as the one Fu Liang had given her yesterday; both were newly published newspapers.
"So, when these people came to cause trouble, the newspapers had already reported on it."
Fu Wan thought for a moment and then asked, "Did you receive any phone calls a few days ago saying that the child had eaten something bad?"
Zhou Haoran shook his head. "No."
Is it possible that it leaked?
Fu Ming arrived at this moment and chimed in upon hearing this.
Zhou Haoran shook his head again and said with certainty, "It's impossible for it to have leaked. Comrade Zhang and I haven't gone out these past few days. Only our office in the factory has a phone. I have a record of the calls from the past two days. They were all calls from our sales partners. No one said that the child had an upset stomach!"
Fu Wan glanced at the newspaper again. "That's interesting. So, when their child got sick from eating our food, they didn't contact the factory for compensation right away. Instead, they went to a reporter first, and only came to us after the story was published and things got out of hand?"
"Damn, isn't this just an attempt to extort money from us?!"
Fu Ming was furious and kicked the wall next to him.
Fu Wan chuckled. "Let's go into the office first, sit down and talk slowly."
Knowing that the victim was likely a staged accident to extort money, Fu Wan felt much more at ease.
Just as the three of them sat down in the office, Zhang Xiaoqing, Wang Jianmin, and Fu Jian arrived one after another.
Seeing Fu Wan sitting in the office, the tense expressions on their faces immediately relaxed a lot.
Fu Wan waved and beckoned, "Come in, everyone. Now that everyone's here, let's have a meeting."
After Zhang Xiaoqing and Wang Jianmin sat down, Fu Wan put the newspaper she was holding on the table.
"Everyone knows about the incident at the factory, right? Now let's go over the details. On what date were the problematic products mentioned in the newspaper produced and shipped out?"
Upon hearing Fu Wan's question, Zhou Haoran quickly stood up to reply.
"Factory manager, I checked the records yesterday. The batch of goods mentioned in the newspaper should have been produced on November 16 and shipped out on the 18th."
After saying that, he took out the work records on the table and handed them to Fu Wan.
“That batch of goods passed the inspection at the time, and we also inspected the remaining samples again, and there were no problems.”
At this point, Zhou Haoran paused, clearly not having finished speaking, and Fu Wan frowned and looked up at him.
"What's wrong? Go on."
“Let me tell you the rest,” Zhang Xiaoqing said with a serious face. “I was in charge of that batch of goods. A total of 5,000 products were produced that day, but 3,000 of them were given to the Longhai Railway Bureau, 1,000 to our county’s supply and marketing cooperative, and the other 1,000 were sold to that individual business owner in Hunan Province.”
Therefore, none of our products were sold to distributors in the city.
"In that case, it's getting more and more interesting."
Fu Wan glanced at the work records in front of her and continued, "Have the inspection results from the Industry and Commerce Bureau and the Food Safety Department been released yet?"
Zhang Xiaoqing nodded, "They came out, but there are no specific documents. Several groups of people came. The first group was from the county yesterday morning, which came for a surprise inspection. Another group came from the city, but they didn't find any problems."
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