National Forensic Doctor

Chapter 1294: Chapter 1220: The Liu Clan’s Excitement Case

Two hours later, Cui Qishan returned.

By then, the tea in front of Jiang Yuan had already been replaced with coffee. Wei Shikan beside him was still shaking the hand grinder saying "Purple Dog Purple Dog."

Cui Qishan didn’t look well and immediately said, "It’s really become the Eastern Train."

Liu Jinghui’s lips curled into a knowing smile, as if he wasn’t surprised at all, and said, "Tell me more."

Cui Qishan sighed, "The wives of two married men provided alibis for their husbands. For those with children, we specifically asked, and they were all at home on the day of the incident."

Although the alibi provided by close relatives has weak validity, in the case of detailed questioning, the detective team needs to consider this possibility.

Cui Qishan continued, "Also, regarding the motive issue raised by Director Liu. Both men admitted that they were invited by Matina to drink on the day she arrived and had a relationship with her."

The two corroborate each other’s statements, making the likelihood of false testimony relatively low. Most importantly, both of them admitted to the affair promptly upon hearing about the murder case, which undermines the theory of killing to cover up the affair.

Jiang Yuan and Liu Jinghui understood the nuances instantly and nodded gently.

From what Cui Qishan’s investigation indicates, the suspicion level of the two men is very low now.

Cui Qishan concluded, "As it is, the footprints of four people found in Matina’s apartment, two of whom have confirmed identities and are male residents, are very likely not suspects. As for the other two, we are seeking insights from Avi Airlines personnel through surveillance videos. These foreigners aren’t too cooperative, so it could take some time."

"The customs people should have their facial recognition data, right?" Liu Jinghui asked.

"The clarity isn’t enough. Since they were all taken at night, none of them are frontal shots." Cui Qishan said, looking at Jiang Yuan.

"Image Enhancement is slow too, and for non-frontal shots, it’s hard to make matches." Jiang Yuan said as he stood up, adding, "I plan to go to the scene first. You can first try asking Avi Airlines’ director; from my contact with him, he should be sensible. If it doesn’t work out, I’ll help with the image enhancement."

"Is it appropriate to directly approach Avi’s higher-ups?" Cui Qishan slightly reminded.

In terms of social experience, Cui Qishan was a few levels above Jiang Yuan. Yet, due to limited resources, he couldn’t maneuver freely.

Just listening to Jiang Yuan, Cui Qishan knew Jiang Yuan wanted to use the combined case of Avi Airlines’ crash and Matina’s murder to pressure the director of Avi Airlines for cooperation from Avi’s employees.

The merging of investigations during a probe phase can seem easy, but Avi Airlines’ director clearly isn’t naive; the old man has his own background and supporters.

Speaking to people like him, someone like Cui Qishan, a detective of his rank, usually hopes for smooth proceedings. If a combined case were to arise, naturally it’s a matter of speaking of the case merger, whereas mere threats are unnecessary.

Jiang Yuan then looked at Wei Shikan.

Though he wasn’t particularly studied in this field, he believed Wei Shikan might have relevant insight.

Indeed, Wei Shikan shook the hand grinder and said, "Captain Jiang’s plan to make a phone call should be fine. Whether or not it offends someone, it’s all just like that."

Jiang Yuan immediately dialed Stefano.

The 69-year-old director of Avi Airlines promptly picked up Jiang Yuan’s call and readily agreed, eventually calling people back to the apartment for questioning convenience.

Naturally, he also didn’t want his employees to be called to the police station one by one.

Thus, Jiang Yuan and Cui Qishan, along with others, headed to Avi’s Apartment.

Liu Jinghui seemed very excited, getting into the car with an unstoppable smile on his face, "Changing the Eastern Train to Avi’s Apartment is acceptable, quite good!"

"It has already been proven not to be personnel inside Avi’s Apartment." Wei Shikan accompanied him with coffee and commented.

"Just because there are no footprints in the victim’s apartment doesn’t mean there was no involvement," Liu Jinghui retorted, "Might be lucky with not leaving any traces; maybe they intentionally wiped them away. Or... if someone was hidden in the apartment earlier, only let out later, that’s also a possibility."

Liu Jinghui paused briefly, then added, "Passion is hard to gauge; if it’s a crime of passion, it could even be without assistance, sneaking in two days prior, hiding in places like an equipment room, and then slipping out through the fire escape..."

Liu Jinghui continued, "If there’s no sign of tampering with the door lock, it shows familiarity... Or maybe, tricking someone into opening it..."

No one else in the car spoke, letting Liu Jinghui continue with his speculative thoughts.

He was talking about possibilities; one couldn’t deny them but could say they belonged to a world of their own in detective stories. Given the current situation, the police indeed hadn’t reviewed the surveillance videos from two or three days ago.

Actually, it was already very challenging to review the videos from the night of the incident; Jiang Yuan still had to call Avi’s director to expand the scope. With so many foreigners coming in and out, facial recognition posed difficulties, especially with nighttime surveillance. Objectively speaking and without racial discrimination, many black faces were indeed hard to make out.

Unless the severity of this case rose, reaching a level where the special team regarded video surveillance as a primary focus, then they could utilize a massive workforce to view all the footage from the past few days and analyze each one for comparison.

That’s why foreigners don’t particularly like installing surveillance; considering their modest investment in policing levels, asking them to dedicate hundreds to an investigation, watching surveillance tirelessly overnight... Even if they could really rally so many people, doing so tirelessly overnight is something they find difficult.

Not to mention facial recognition, gait recognition, and similar techniques that require collecting corresponding physiological characteristics. Most countries don’t have such technology and technical reserves, nor do they have the corresponding judicial and legal reserves.

Countries like Myanmar or Yibenli would find it overwhelmingly difficult to invest billions in monitoring equipment and facilities, billions in relevant databases and surveillance systems, training and increasing a detective force to thousands, then during specific cases, they must dedicate hundreds to thousands of hours of surveillance review.

One could say, the development of global detective technology, especially Chinese detective techniques, is a template that most countries cannot simply copy. But the evolution of worldwide criminal tactics doesn’t bow to the will of small countries.

Things such as submarine and drone trafficking, 3D-printed metal-free firearms, the endless emergence of new explosives and drugs, the established scale of dark web systems, and virtual currency transactions... There are few countries capable of comprehensively addressing these.

Thus, globally, the decline in security levels is universal. Europe’s notorious thefts and robberies are merely superficial; what couldn’t be maintained goes beyond security. Rather, the United States can maintain its security levels without regression, which itself represents a degree of progress.

For the detectives of Zhengguang Bureau and Ningtai County Bureau presently, trying simple modes first, presuming the case is an ordinary one, is the most reasonable choice.

Until...

In the afternoon, Cui Qishan brought back disheartening news that excited Liu Jinghui:

"Through inquiry with Avi’s Apartment residents, the identities of everyone entering and exiting the apartment within two days have been confirmed. After sequencing the phone calls, the other two identities were confirmed. One is Avi’s partner, a 34-year-old Austrian; the other is purely a friend and a researcher from a Beijing institute, a Belgian, whom Matina once brought to Avi’s party." noveldrama

Cui Qishan paused momentarily and continued, "Both have alibis, and surveillance near their residence confirms that they returned home the night of the incident and didn’t leave until the next morning. Technical Investigation’s cell phone location evidence also matches."

Jiang Yuan listened and began to ponder.

Liu Jinghui promptly spoke with keen insight, "All suspects have cleared their suspicions; hence, everyone is suspect now!"