Chapter 162 Questioning
When Zou Chengye arrived at the Criminal Investigation Brigade and sat in the interrogation room, he felt a little confused.
He looked around the interrogation room and found that the decoration style here was completely different from the warm reception room.
The snow-white walls, blue-gray cement floors, tables, chairs and benches are all made of metal. They look extremely cold and hard, without any human touch.
There are no windows on the walls, and once the door is closed, the whole room is like a small box isolated from the outside world. The words "Leniency to those who confess, severity to those who resist" written on the wall appear very large, making people feel suffocated.
As soon as he sat down, Zou Chengye felt uneasy. He looked at Xia Mufan cautiously and asked, "Did Officer Xia find the person who hid the device in my kitchen?"
Xia Mufan was wearing a uniform and a wide-brimmed hat, with a serious expression on his face.
She shook her head, her tone a little stiff: "From what we have investigated so far, there are no suspects. The decoration of the new house was done by you and your lover, and you also asked your old family to help. They are on the same page with you. It stands to reason that outsiders cannot enter the new house, and there is no way to install such a trap."
Zou Chengye was very observant and his heart skipped a beat: "Officer Xia? What do you mean by this?"
Xia Mufan did not respond to him, but turned to look at Gong Weiguo and gave him a wink.
Gong Weiguo took out the printed phone list and threw it in front of Zou Chengye: "We went to the telecommunications bureau to print out the call records of your landline phone for the past two months, but there were no incoming calls during the time period you agreed on."
Zou Chengye's eyes flashed, obviously he thought of something, but his lips were tightly closed and he didn't say a word.
Immediately afterwards, Xia Mufan placed the threatening letter in the evidence bag in front of Zou Chengye.
Xia Mufan's usual gentle demeanor was replaced by a hint of arrogance, which made people feel that he was difficult to approach. "Judging from the postmark on the threatening letter, it should have been sent from a mailbox not far from your home. The suspect should be near you, or..."
Xia Mufan's voice suddenly rose, with a hint of anger after being fooled: "You directed and acted this yourself!"
Zou Chengye's pupils shrank and he shuddered. He raised his head and looked at Xia Mufan blankly. His whole body was in a stiff state, obviously frightened by her words.
Before Zou Chengye could react, Xia Mufan's words came like a string of cannonballs, dense and loud.
"In my opinion, no one wants to harm you. This is all just your imagination."
"There was no threatening phone call at all. You were just pretending to be imitating some weird female voice and trying to fool us police officers. Do you think it's fun?!"
"You wrote the threatening letter yourself, right? You asked your son to copy the envelope, and you cut and pasted the contents from newspapers at work. You then dropped it into a nearby mailbox. How convenient."
"As for the mechanical devices at home, you also communicated with the decoration team in advance, installed a double-control switch speaker, recorded the speaker in advance, and asked it to start in the middle of the night."
"I don't know what your purpose is in doing all this, but I am sure that you have no respect for us police officers. You are playing us for fun. Let me tell you, Zou Chengye, if you report a false case, you will be held legally responsible!"
Having interrogated so many vicious criminals, Xia Mufan had a kind of aura of oppression. His words were sharp, and every word was like a knife, stabbing Zou Chengye's heart and making him feel weak.
Zou Chengye was speechless. He sat on the chair, his face pale, and thought for a long time.
His eyelids drooped and his gaze unconsciously drifted to a certain place in the lower right, and he was completely lost in memories. A distant memory was awakened, and he seemed to have thought of something and looked up suddenly.
I don't know when it started, but beads of sweat appeared on Zou Chengye's forehead. It was early winter and the weather was cold, but Zou Chengye felt that this small interrogation room was stuffy and hot.
Zou Chengye tried to defend himself: "Officer Xia, it's not like that. I can explain. I respect the police very much and have never thought of wasting police resources, let alone reporting a false case and directing and acting in such a drama. Everything I encountered really happened. Someone really wanted to harm me. Please believe me."
Xia Mufan leaned back, staring at Zou Chengye with sharp eyes.
Under such a stare, Zou Chengye felt like a prey being targeted by a tiger. He wanted to escape, but was frightened by Xia Mufan's gaze. His legs were trembling and he didn't have any strength at all.
Zou Chengye could no longer care about anything else. He picked up the phone list on the table and explained, "Well, there is actually another situation. There is a call, but it is not shown on the list."
Gong Weiguo leaned forward and listened carefully. Sure enough, this bastard knew how to avoid leaving any trace on the phone list. Wasn’t the reason why the police didn’t believe Cai Qinglian’s words because the phone list did not show any signs of threatening calls?
In order to clear his suspicion, Zou Chengye had to reveal his biggest secret: "If the caller is an employee of the Telecommunications Bureau and uses an internal phone, there will be no record on the list."
Xia Mufan and Gong Weiguo exchanged glances and said in a long tone: "Oh... So that's how it is."
This would also explain why Cai Qinglian clearly received threatening phone calls, but the police could not find any incoming calls.
Zou Chengye was now determined to clear himself of the charge of directing and acting in the incident. After explaining the threatening phone call, he pointed to the threatening letter and said to the police, "Well, the letter was indeed sent from near the school, but this only means that the sender is very close to me. It doesn't mean that I must have sent it myself, right? What's more, my son is already in the fourth grade of elementary school. His handwriting is very neat, which is completely different from the childish handwriting on the envelope."
"oh……"
Xia Mufan once again made a deliberately drawn-out sound. Zou Chengye's logic was rigorous and his explanation was indeed very reasonable.
"Then what about the device in the kitchen? If you didn't send someone to do it, who else could come to your new house to install these things? You have to know that this is installed on the wall behind the cabinets. The decoration workers will definitely find it before installing the cabinets. How could you hide from the sight of so many people and install these things by yourself?"
Seeing that Xia Mufan didn't seem to believe him, Zou Chengye hurriedly defended himself: "This is actually very simple. If this person bribed my relatives or people in the decoration team, or even sneaked into the decoration team, he would have the opportunity to do this."
Xia Mufan looked at him coldly and said, "What you said is not completely unreasonable, but there is no evidence to support it. Let's put it this way. Anyway, no one is going to hurt you right now. We are very busy in the Criminal Investigation Team and don't have time to protect you 24 hours a day. You go back first and call us if there is anything."
After saying that, Xia Mufan stood up and began to organize the documents on the desk without even looking at Zou Chengye.
Zou Chengye saw her attitude and thought the police were about to give up on him, so he immediately became anxious: "If I wait until something really happens before calling you, it will be too late. You must send someone to protect me, or else go catch the person who secretly wants to harm me. Only when you catch him can I feel at ease."
Xia Mufan stopped what he was doing, his eyes moved slightly, and he glanced at Zou Chengye with undisguised disdain in his eyes.
"There is no such person! From all the evidence so far, I am more inclined to believe that you imagined it. Maybe you have a strong personality and have offended many people, so you feel guilty. Over time, your mind has gone wrong and you imagined that someone wanted to harm you. Don't Western psychologists call it paranoia? I think you fit the description."
Hearing this, Zou Chengye became even more anxious: "What do you mean by paranoia? I know my own mental state very well. I am normal. I go to get off work normally, interact with students and colleagues, and there is no problem communicating. There is no mental disorder at all. Don't talk nonsense!"
Xia Mufan glanced at Zou Chengye coldly.
Didn't you try every possible means to slander Cai Jinlian as mentally ill and send her to a mental hospital yourself? Well, today I will let you experience the embarrassment that Cai Qinglian experienced back then, where she had no way to defend herself!
Xia Mufan said, "Whether you have a mental illness or not is not up to you to decide. It needs to be determined by an expert. How about this, you wait here for a moment, I'll call the psychologist in our team. He's a professional, and he can tell you whether you have a mental problem just by asking you a few questions."
Seeing that Xia Mufan still refused to let him go and was determined to treat him as mentally ill, Zou Chengye became extremely anxious and shouted, "Those psychiatrists are all liars. No matter who they are, as long as they take his test questionnaires, there will be problems. I will not report the case. You police officers should not frame me casually."
After saying this, Zou Chengye stood up and wanted to leave the interrogation room.
Want to run? Don’t even think about it!
Xia Mufan grabbed Zou Chengye's arm and blocked his way. She leaned forward slightly, closing the distance between her and Zou Chengye.
The sudden approach of the police made Zou Chengye feel the hairs on his body stand on end. He subconsciously leaned back to put some distance between them. Xia Mufan pressed on step by step and continued to move forward. The distance between their noses was only 20 centimeters. Their eyes were facing each other and their breathing could be heard.
Such a close physical distance made Zou Chengye develop a strong inner defense. His back was already against the wall, and the cold touch of his back made his uneasiness even stronger. With no way to retreat, Zou Chengye was forced to look up and face Xia Mufan head on.
Zou Chengye's voice trembled a little: "Xia, Officer Xia, if you have anything to say, just say it. Can you not get so close?"
Xia Mufan carefully observed the changes in his pupils and found that his pupils were indeed contracting. This should be the resistance and disgust at work in his heart.
Xia Mufan asked: "What are you afraid of?"
Zou Chengye said: "I, I'm not afraid."
Xia Mufan asked: "If you are not afraid, why did you become a stutterer?"
Zou Chengye said: "I, I, am I stuttering? You are wearing a police uniform and you suddenly get so close to me. I am a little nervous. It is normal that I can't speak fluently, right?"
Xia Mufan sneered: "If you have a clear conscience, why are you so nervous when you see the police?"
There was an enlarged policeman's face in front of Zou Chengye. There was no way for him to avoid Xia Mufan's scorching gaze. He felt as if he was imprisoned in a cage, with a tiger standing in front of him, staring at him with its bloody mouth wide open.
Xia Mufan's approach made Zou Chengye's mind a mess. He couldn't function normally at all. He could only answer instinctively: "I'm not nervous."
Xia Mufan pressed forward step by step.
"How do you know that there will be no record on the list if you call from the internal phone of the telecommunications bureau? Have you done the same thing before?"
"How do you know that the questionnaire that psychologists use to determine whether a person's mental state is normal will give the same result no matter who takes it? Have you ever consulted the same psychologist and had him produce a ridiculous appraisal report?"
Zou Chengye felt as if he was being cornered, and he shouted loudly, "No, no, just because I know this doesn't mean I've done the same thing before. I'm a university teacher with a wide range of knowledge. What's the problem? Don't talk nonsense about this!"
Xia Mufan raised the corners of his mouth slightly, staring into his eyes, and said in a relaxed tone: "Since you don't admit it, then wait for a mental evaluation. You are a university teacher, you have knowledge and culture, so you should believe in science, right?"
When Zou Chengye heard this, he was so frightened that his soul flew out of his body. He screamed loudly, and cold sweat broke out on his back. Beads of sweat rolled down his forehead. The past flashed back to his mind. He could no longer care and shouted loudly: "No! I don't want to do a mental evaluation report. I am not mentally ill. Don't force me!"
Xia Mufan slowly straightened up, turned around and glanced at Gong Weiguo: "Teacher Zou's current mental state does not look normal, and I don't know if he really has paranoid delusions. Didn't our team just get a psychologist who came back from abroad? I heard that he is very knowledgeable about criminal psychology, why don't we invite him over and let Teacher Zou take a look?"
Gong Weiguo nodded in agreement: "Teacher Zou's condition does seem a little unstable, but I think it's okay."
Feng Xiaoyu, who was in charge of recording the statement, also exaggerated at this time: "I remember that Mr. Zou's ex-wife was also hospitalized for mental illness. Could it be that all of their family members are not normal? We have been busy with Mr. Zou's case for so long, who would have thought that it was just a mental patient's fantasy? What a waste of police resources."
When Mr. Zou heard the word "ex-wife", he became even more nervous. His face was livid, his teeth were clenched, and his hands were clenched into fists, as if he was determined to fight the police to the death.
"I said I don't have a mental illness. Why are you forcing me to undergo a mental evaluation? You are forcing me to confess by torture. I want to sue you. I want to file a complaint!"
Zou Chengye shouted at the top of his lungs, looking as if he was determined to fight to the death, but Xia Mufan became relaxed and contented.
She sat back in the chair, found the most comfortable sitting position, and looked up to meet Zou Chengye's eyes.
"Teacher Zou, I remember that before your ex-wife was sent to the mental hospital, she kept emphasizing that she didn't have a mental illness. Why didn't you believe her?"
Zou Chengye was like a dud; it lit up, crackled for a long time, and then suddenly went out.
Looking at the policemen who were watching him eagerly, Zou Chengye suddenly realized that all this was a setup. But he was already deeply trapped in the situation and could no longer escape.
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