Chapter 175 No matter how he changes, he can't escape...
Half an hour later, the surveillance video that Guan Xia needed and had been waiting for was finally delivered.
The laptop had been fully charged long ago, and Guan Xia didn't want to stay in the car any longer, so she found a place nearby, stretched her limbs, and looked for Wu Yingze again.
Xu Nian went to the nearby area to inquire about the latest developments in the case. He then came over and squatted beside Guan Xia, saying, "I just asked around, and according to the residents of this small town, not many people usually come to their town. After all, there aren't many scenic spots nearby, and it's too close to Shangshuang City, so transportation isn't very convenient. But a few days ago, a few tourists started arriving, all driving cars and carrying large backpacks. They thought Shangshuang City was overcrowded and hotels were too expensive, but after booking accommodations, they didn't leave. Instead, they wandered around town, even going to supermarkets and shops to buy a lot of things. Then, tonight, around 12:00 PM, they checked out and drove away, as if they had made an appointment."
Guan Xia was busy staring at the computer screen. When she heard the words, she stopped immediately and subconsciously looked up at Xu Nian. They saw the same thoughtful look in each other's eyes.
"What a coincidence," Guan Xia said. "According to the timeline we know now, the bar was discovered on fire at 10:57 p.m., and Wu Yingze fled the scene at 11:13 p.m. Given the distance from the bar to this town, he also arrived around noon."
Lu Tingfeng was standing nearby, swatting mosquitoes. Hearing this, he said with understanding, "It seems this is his next plan. He wants to confuse his sight once more to increase his chances of escaping. But he certainly can't imagine that we'll catch up so quickly."
Zhong Xiaoyu raised her wrist to check the time and said, "It's past three in the morning. Judging from how cautious he's been, he should still be fleeing non-stop at this time. We need to hurry. Shangshuang City is much closer to the border than Yongquan City."
As soon as Zhong Xiaoyu said this meaningful sentence, several people looked at her with surprised expressions.
"You mean, he wants to smuggle out of the country?" Ji An was the first to ask.
Zhong Xiaoyu nodded. "He was able to flee so decisively. He must have known that if we caught him, he would be dead. Our country is big, but with the crimes he committed, it would be difficult to escape capture. So his only choice was to leave the country."
"But he has another person on his side," Pang Le said, "Could it be that the buyer is not from our country, but from abroad? Otherwise, he will definitely find a way to trade the organs in our country and then escape."
Guan Xia nodded thoughtfully again. "It seems that the direction he fled in represents the buyer's location. If he went straight to the border, it means that the buyer is most likely not in the country, and it is very likely that he is not from our country."
"Traitor," Pang Le gritted his teeth upon hearing this analysis. "This bastard deserves to be hacked to pieces. He's using the lives of our people to trade for the lives of foreigners. Once we find him, I'll definitely break his legs."
Because of this possibility, Guan Xia felt a stronger sense of urgency.
The first surveillance video she watched was the place where Wu Yingze was last seen, as provided by an eyewitness. It was a supermarket called Longxing. According to information Xu Nian had inquired about, this supermarket was the largest in the town, covering an area of nearly 1,000 square meters. There were four entrances and exits for customers alone, not to mention employee passages. If it was used for supplying supplies and changing clothes for escape, it would be a more suitable place.
Guan Xia fast-forwarded again and again until the progress bar of the surveillance video reached 0:14 in the morning. Finally, she saw a familiar figure in the surveillance video at the main entrance of the supermarket. She was still wearing the same dress and high heels, and her wig was still slightly curly long black hair, but she had a very wide sun hat on her head and a mask on her face, so she couldn't see her appearance clearly, but it didn't arouse suspicion.
Guan Xia calculated the time and turned the surveillance video to three times the speed, but until the time on the surveillance video reached 1:30 in the morning, there was no sign of Wu Yingze, not even after he changed his clothes. It seemed that he ran away from another exit.
Guan Xia closed this surveillance video and opened a new one. After thinking for a few seconds, in order to save time, he simply opened all the surveillance videos of the other three customer entrances and exits of the supermarket. However, for the sake of caution, Guan Xia did not dare to open it at triple speed, but only at double speed. However, even so, he could not find Wu Yingze.
Guan Xia was sure that she had not missed it, which meant that Wu Yingze did not go through the aisle where customers went.
Guan Xia immediately went to the small box containing surveillance videos to look for the surveillance video of the employee passage, but after searching around, he found nothing.
Guan Xia was a little surprised and subconsciously looked up to ask Xu Nian, "Why don't I see any surveillance videos at the entrance and exit of the employee passage? Could it be that there are no surveillance cameras installed?"
Guan Xia felt that this was a bit inappropriate. Although the population of this town was small and the economy was not very developed, it was the largest supermarket after all, and the basic facilities should be complete.
Xu Nian made a phone call and asked a few questions, then said, "What a coincidence! The surveillance cameras in both employee passages broke down three days ago, and the supermarket hasn't had time to arrange for replacements yet."
Lu Tingfeng chuckled, "What a coincidence indeed! It seems this small town is not only used to confuse people, but also to pave the way in advance."
Guan Xia couldn't help but sigh in her heart. As expected, this kind of local criminal organization was very difficult to deal with. It would always create certain obstacles to their pursuit in unexpected places.
"What about the ones inside the supermarket?" Guan Xia asked, "The ones at the entrance and exit are broken, but the ones inside are not broken, right?"
Xu Nian replied, "When the police from the police station asked the supermarket for the surveillance footage, the supermarket staff checked it and found that except for two employee passages that were vandalized, everything else was functioning normally."
That's fine, at least the clues are not completely lost. Guan Xia breathed a sigh of relief, controlled her temper, and continued to search for a needle in a haystack in the surveillance video.
Compared with the surveillance videos at the entrances and exits, restoring Wu Yingze's behavior trajectory through the surveillance videos inside the supermarket is indeed like looking for a needle in a haystack.
Fortunately, Wu Yingze's appearance before changing clothes was obvious enough, and they had enough manpower, so they restored the route before changing clothes with almost no time wasted.
Through the successive discoveries made by Guan Xia and five or six other people, they had been following Wu Yingze's figure through the beverage area, snack area, sanitary products area, rice, flour, grain and oil area, and then he disappeared.
While they were looking through the surveillance video, Xu Nian asked the task force for the floor plan of the supermarket. From the plan, it could be seen that the warehouse was behind the rice, flour, grain and oil area, and it covered a large area. But the strange thing was that through the surveillance video at the door of the warehouse, Guan Xia and the others did not see Wu Yingze enter.
In order to confirm whether someone had missed it, several people exchanged computers and checked, and finally confirmed that Wu Yingze's figure had indeed disappeared in the rice, flour, grain and oil area.
"Strange," Pang Le pondered, "Could it be that this supermarket has a tunnel or something? How could someone just disappear out of thin air? It's impossible for Wu Yingze to fly into the sky and disappear into the ground."
"Flying and hiding underground is impossible, but a tunnel is possible," Lu Tingfeng stared at the blueprint for a long time, suddenly pointing to a place and said, "Look here, there is an unmarked empty room. It might be a staff lounge or something like that."
Everyone leaned over to take a look when they heard this. If Lu Tingfeng hadn't pointed with his finger, Guan Xia and the others would have almost failed to notice it. After all, compared to an area of more than a thousand square meters, a small square that was not even the size of a fingernail on the drawing was too inconspicuous. Perhaps because it was too small, no one bothered to mark it on the drawing.
Without Guan Xia's urging, Xu Nian made another call the moment Lu Tingfeng finished speaking. A few minutes later, Xu Nian put down his phone and said, "I've checked and it's indeed a staff rest room. It's only four square meters. There's nothing else in there except a stool, a small table, and a water dispenser. Because the place is so small, no one except the staff in the rice, flour, grain, and oil area would go in there on purpose."
"Looks like we've caught another peripheral member," Ji An asked, "Are there any blind spots for surveillance after leaving this lounge?"
Xu Nian shook his head and said with certainty: "No."
"That's strange," Guan Xia said. "According to the blueprint, behind the rice, flour, grain and oil area is a warehouse. Further in, through a fire door, there's a passage for customers and an employee passage. We've already seen the surveillance video of the customer passage, and Wu Yingze didn't go there, so he obviously could only have gone through the employee passage. If he changed in this small employee rest room, how did he manage not to be captured by the surveillance cameras when there's no blind spot?"
When Guan Xia said this, Zhong Xiaoyu suddenly remembered something and said with sudden enlightenment: "The staff who loaded the goods."
After being reminded by Zhong Xiaoyu, Guan Xia also remembered that when they were watching the surveillance video just now, at about 0:25, a middle-aged man in supermarket work clothes drove a small cart used for loading goods and frequently ran around the entire supermarket. The cart contained bags of packaging like rice and flour, as well as large and small cardboard boxes. If a person curled up in some of them, it was indeed possible to hide someone inside.
Thinking of this, Guan Xia closed the computer and stood up. "Let's go to that supermarket. Have the technical team members gone in?"
Xu Nian said, "The technical team is still surrounding the car and searching for evidence. As far as I know, there's nothing in the supermarket."
Guan Xia was just about to suggest calling someone over when Lu Tingfeng said, "I took a related course in college, so I know how to do simple evidence search. Xu Nian has done it too. Bring your tools and we can temporarily serve as the technical team."
Guan Xia was a little surprised and subconsciously turned to look at Xu Nian and Lu Tingfeng.
Xu Nian nodded slightly, without finishing his words, but he confirmed what Lu Tingfeng said.
So they waited there for a few minutes until Xu Nian trotted over to the technical team to ask for a toolbox, and then the group trotted over to the supermarket.
With the blueprint in hand, Guan Xia and her team found the employee lounge easily without the help of the police officers from the police station and the special task force who had entered earlier. Guan Xia even took a special look at it. It was indeed very small, but it could accommodate two people standing compactly. If the stools were moved to the table, there was still enough space for people to change clothes.
Bending over to take a closer look at the stool and table, Xu Nian suddenly said, "If Wu Yingze had touched this stool before, there might be fingerprints left on it. Old Lu, bring the toolbox over. Let's see if we can scan for fingerprints."
Lu Tingfeng chuckled with amusement, "You bastard, I've already left the police force, and you're still using me."
Despite the verbal fight, Lu Tingfeng still obediently squeezed in with his tools.
Guan Xia stood on tiptoe at the door and took a look, but saw nothing. She then looked away and followed the movement of the loading staff member she had seen in the surveillance video, slowing down her pace as she walked towards the employee passage.
Judging from the drawings, the employee passage is not far from the warehouse, but when you walk on foot, it is actually quite far away.
Guan Xia stood at the door of the warehouse and looked up at the surveillance camera, recalling that because the main function of this camera is to ensure the safety of the warehouse, there is a blind spot from five meters away from the warehouse to the employee passage.
It seems that the problem lies in the distance of five meters. Guan Xia thought carefully for a moment. In the employee lounge, there was said to be no blind spot for surveillance, but because of the obstruction of the goods, a part of it was actually invisible from the perspective of the surveillance camera. Although people walking upright normally would appear in the surveillance camera, if they bent over or simply crawled on their knees, the surveillance camera would not be able to capture it at all.
If the loading staff drove by in a small car, it is possible that they could have taken Wu Yingze out without anyone noticing in the cardboard box. But how did Wu Yingze manage to avoid exposing himself in the five meters from the warehouse to the blind spot of surveillance?
Guan Xia frowned and suddenly thought of something. She remembered that at 0:40 in the surveillance video, several people passed by carrying some large promotional posters and billboards. Not only were they large in size, but there were also many of them. They had briefly blocked the camera, although only for a few seconds. But now it seems very likely that Wu Yingze successfully got away in those few brief seconds.
Thinking of this possibility, Guan Xia immediately ran quickly in the supermarket. She vaguely remembered that when she was following Wu Yingze's path into the supermarket to find the employee lounge, she saw staff replacing floor stickers. Obviously, this supermarket was too big and they had too few people working. Even though it was already past four in the morning, the work was still not finished.
As Guan Xia ran, Pang Le and the others, confused as they were, followed suit. After a while, Guan Xia finally found the person. She practically pounced on a young girl who was working and asked, "At 12:40 a.m., when you were carrying the materials you needed through the back door and passing the warehouse, was there someone coming out of the warehouse, brushing past you, and heading in the direction you came from?"
Guan Xia's sudden appearance startled several people who were working. The girl subconsciously struggled a little, startled, until Wang Yu, who had arrived shortly after, showed her police ID. She finally relaxed and recalled, "There was a man like that. He was quite tall, wearing supermarket work clothes and a hat. He seemed to be in a hurry and walked past us with his head down. I didn't get a good look at his appearance."
Guan Xia asked, "What color was your hair? Do you remember?"
This time the girl spent more time recalling it, and after a moment she spoke uncertainly, "It seemed to be black. I didn't see it clearly. After all, the things my colleagues and I were lifting were too heavy, so I just glanced at it."
In order to confirm the authenticity of what the little girl said, Ji An and the others asked several staff members around them. After getting roughly the same answers, Guan Xia and the others did not bother to communicate and immediately went through the employee passage to the outside of the supermarket.
Although it was the back door of the supermarket, because the supermarket was located in the center of the town, the roads were quite interconnected. From what Guan Xia saw, there were several roads for people to leave.
After a brief look around, Guan Xia subconsciously wanted to look for witnesses, but thinking of the current time, he had to give up and simply returned to the supermarket. While Xu Nian and the others were searching for evidence, the others continued to watch the surveillance video. Now they knew which door Wu Yingze left the supermarket through, and also knew what he was wearing in disguise. With so many people, they expected to find out the license plate number of the car he drove away again before five o'clock.
As Guan Xia expected, about ten minutes before five o'clock, Zhong Xiaoyu made another key discovery.
"This car, the white one," Zhong Xiaoyu said confidently, pointing to a corner of the computer screen. "Wu Yingze drove this car out of town."
"No matter how he changes, he can't escape our eyes," Qi Bai chuckled to himself in his sleepy state. "Even though we arranged so many vehicles and changed his clothes so carefully, he was still found by us. Now let him feel what a regular army is. With so many of us, how can we not catch this grandson?"
While Qi Bai was making these harsh remarks, Xu Nian took off his gloves and reported the new clue.
Finally, they found Wu Yingze's trace again. Guan Xia breathed a sigh of relief and couldn't help yawning. She had done everything she could. Now it was up to the task force. As long as this guy didn't go crazy and change his clothes again, maybe they could catch him before noon today.
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