Chapter 127 Restarting the Investigation
The reason why the investigation into Qian Lailai's kidnapping and disappearance case, which occurred in 1997, was reopened in 2005 was not because of the emergence of new clues.
This was because the deputy captain of the Criminal Investigation Brigade of Qingshan Branch, who was originally responsible for investigating the case, was promoted to the director of Qingshan Branch eight years later.
Obviously, this case was his inner demon, which is why he decided to reopen the investigation shortly after taking office.
However, although the case has been reopened for investigation, the only clues the police have are still those eighteen notes.
And by that time, Qian Hongxing was no longer in Hongcheng.
Half a year after Qian Lailai was murdered, Qian Hongxing and his wife moved out of Hongcheng.
Then all of Hongxing Food’s businesses gradually withdrew from Hongcheng in the next two or three years.
This incident had a certain impact on Hongcheng's economy and industry, and also caused many workers to lose their jobs. This is because Red Star Foods not only employed workers, but also affected many upstream and downstream industries.
After the case was reopened, the Qingshan Branch decided to use the latest computer technology to take notes and analyze the eighteen notes.
In fact, handwriting identification was conducted when the case happened in 1997.
However, human identification has certain limitations after all, so there were no substantial gains at that time.
With the support of the provincial capital's most advanced computer technology, the eighteen notes were scanned, analyzed and compared one by one, and some new directions emerged.
After using computer scans to repeatedly compare the handwriting, stroke order, ink marks and other clues of the 18 notes, trace detection experts in the provincial capital concluded that these notes were most likely written by the same person.
Although there are as many as four or five different handwriting styles on these notes, many similar details were captured after overlapping and comparing these four or five different styles on a computer.
In other words, these four or five types of handwriting may have been written by the same person deliberately disguising or imitating others.
However, due to writing habits, some small habits are retained in muscle memory and still exist even if they are deliberately disguised.
The only odd thing was that the first seventeen notes all showed this disguise. The eighteenth note, though similar in handwriting to the third, seventh, eleventh, and fourteenth notes, lacked this subtle habit.
But this does not affect the reopening of the case, because this possibility completely changes the original direction of the case's investigation.
Initially, the police determined that the kidnappers were a professional kidnapping gang with very strong anti-reconnaissance capabilities based on the various handwritings on the notes and the use of terms such as "we".
But if these notes were actually written by the same person, it means that the original direction was completely wrong.
Just as Zhou Yi had thought before, when the investigation of a case hits a dead end, it is very likely not because of the ability of the criminal investigators, but because there is a deviation in the direction of the investigation, which leads to a huge mistake that can never be reversed.
The director of the Qingshan Branch immediately launched an investigation into this discovery.
When they realized that the kidnapper was just one person, their thoughts opened up.
Someone who has the ability to disguise multiple handwritings but also has muscle memory for the details must be someone who has been working as a copywriter for a long time.
Computers were not widely available back then, so desk work was basically done by hand.
There are mainly three types of people who meet this characteristic: civil servants, editors, and teachers.
These three types of people are basically unlikely to be professional criminals, so kidnapping hostages and demanding ransom must meet two conditions.
First, the motive for the crime must be some special situation that leads to the need to get money quickly, which leads to the kidnapping and extortion behavior, such as drug abuse or gambling.
Second, the criminal's target. Although Qian Hongxing was a renowned entrepreneur, if he were a complete stranger, they wouldn't have targeted him for ransom, nor would they have been able to track the Qian family's movements. This meant the kidnappers must have been someone within Qian Hongxing's network of relationships to have targeted Qian Lailai.
After analyzing these two points, the police targeted the profession of teacher, because as a child who had just started elementary school, the only person Qian Lailai might come into contact with was a teacher.
The police found Qian Hongxing, hoping to learn about Qian Lailai's situation, but were rejected by Qian Hongxing.
Because at this time, he had already married a new love and had a daughter.
He made it clear that he had let it go, and even spent a huge amount of money to keep Qian Lailai's ashes in the temple, so that he could be illuminated by the Buddha's light every day.
He let it go, but the director of Qingshan Branch could not let it go and went to the school to continue the investigation.
After spending a lot of manpower and resources and using computer technology to compare the handwriting records of hundreds of school teachers, they finally identified a suspicious person.
This man's name is Sun Kun, a male who was born in 1947 and turned 50 in 1997. He was a teacher who taught ideological and moral education at the school where Qian Lailai studied.
The reason for suspecting him was very simple. Only the details in the daily documents left by Sun Kun matched the details in the note.
In particular, the character "阅" (read) that appeared in the eighteen slips of paper was exactly the same as the last vertical hook of the character "阅" (read) that Sun Kun wrote when he marked his students' homework.
This discovery is exciting.
But then, the newly ignited flame of hope was extinguished by reality.
Because when the police from Qingshan Branch found Sun Kun, all they saw was an old man lying in a chair with a crooked mouth, squinting eyes and drooling.
Sun Kun's family said that Sun Kun had a stroke two years ago and has since lost his ability to move and speak.
This result was totally unacceptable to the detectives in charge of the case, but they were powerless to do anything about it.
Especially the director of Qingshan Branch, who insisted on interrogating Sun Kun despite tremendous pressure.
But facing Sun Kun who had lost the ability to speak, the interrogation was completely ineffective. The only sentence left from the interrogation was written by the director himself: "When I asked him if he was the one who kidnapped and killed Qian Lailai, I saw great fear in his eyes."
Since Sun Kun couldn't speak, he could only investigate his family and colleagues, and finally managed to piece together some information.
First, Sun Kun had a habit of gambling and playing mahjong, and even borrowed money from loan sharks to pay for gambling. Eight years ago, before Qian Lailai was kidnapped, Sun Kun was looking for people to borrow money to repay loan sharks.
Therefore, he had every intention of committing the crime.
Then, Sun Kun loved watching Hong Kong and Taiwan police and gangster movies, and had a large number of videotapes of such movies at home. This also explained how his anti-reconnaissance ability came about.
Finally, the most crucial evidence besides handwriting identification is the DNA test results.
When the forensic doctor performed an autopsy on Qian Lailai's body, he found signs of Qian Lailai struggling before his death. Some human skin was extracted from one of his fingernails, which must have been used to scratch the murderer when he was killed.
But DNA technology was not well developed at the time, so this piece of human skin could only be collected and sealed for evidence.
After comparing Sun Kun's DNA with that of the skin, it was confirmed that Sun Kun was the suspect in the kidnapping and murder of Qian Lailai.
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