Chapter Twelve: The Village Murder Case

  It's been seven or eight days since Liu Li arrived at the Diying Township Police Station, and he's already getting bored. When he was at Huangcai Township Police Station before, although there were fewer cases, he could still handle one police situation per day. But here in Diying Township, it takes a whole week to get just one report of a case.

  Liu Li had finally waited for a case, and the case was caused by a poplar sapling. Zhang Lao Shi planted ten poplar saplings on the side of the road, but after one night, he found that one of the saplings had been snapped in half. Zhang suspected his neighbor Li Si, because they had a conflict five years ago, so he reported to the police and asked them to catch the person.

  After driving more than 10 miles to the scene of the case, Liu Li looked at the sapling in his hand, which was not much thicker than a chopstick, and asked about the value of this sapling in the case. When Zhang Laishi told Liu Li that the value of each sapling was 1 yuan and 80 cents, Liu Li almost cried.

  Liu Li tearfully told Zhang Lao Shi that from the police station to the scene, just the cost of gasoline was over 10 yuan, and the loss of this case was not even comparable to the cost of gasoline. After finishing the record and taking pictures, Liu Li asked the village committee staff to find Li Si.

  As the case was not serious, after seeing Li Si, it was confirmed that the seedling was indeed broken by him. Liu Li criticized and educated Li Si, and then closed the case.

  As Liu Li was about to leave, he tightly grasped Zhang Lao Shi's hand and seriously handed him 20 yuan: "Brother, this is the money for ten saplings. If you find any more saplings being trampled in the future, just consider that I've bought them, let's not report it to the police, okay? Coming all the way here to file a report really isn't worth the gas money."

  On the way back, Liu Li was fiddling with the camera and suddenly asked Zhang Liang if there were any rotary wood veneers in their jurisdiction. Rotary wood veneer refers to the process of using a machine to peel the harvested trees layer by layer, each piece as thin as paper, which is then dried and sold to furniture factories and plywood factories.

  When Liu Li heard this question, Zhang Liang told him that there were more than a dozen small workshops for wooden chips in the jurisdiction, and asked Liu Li what he was doing.

  Upon learning of these workshops in the jurisdiction, a smile appeared on Liu Li's face. After a pause, he instructed Zhang Liang and others to register all private gas stations, wood chip factories, waste plastic processing plants, restaurants operating wild game, unlicensed black factories, and vendors engaged in liquefied gas refueling within the jurisdiction.

  Although they didn't understand what Liu Li wanted to do with these, after seeing the confident smile on Liu Li's face, Zhang Liang and others all remembered Liu Li's instructions in their hearts.

  Liu Li and his team had just returned to the police station when they heard the alarm call ringing in the duty room. Looking at the caller ID, it was the command center's number. Liu Li picked up the receiver: "Hello, this is Diying Township Police Station."

  The voice of the operator came through the receiver: "Hello, is this the local police station? Someone just called to report a murder in your jurisdiction, Tan Guo Village. The name of the person who reported it is Guo Yang, and the phone number is 152..."

  As soon as he heard that a homicide had occurred in the jurisdiction, Liu Li suddenly became energetic and ordered: "Zhang Liang, bring your equipment and go out to respond. Zhao Ming, immediately notify the director of the police station and report the case to Director Du. I'll go to the scene with Zhang Liang to understand the situation."

  Tan Guo Village is a small village with only over 300 people, because most villagers have gone out to work, so the village is left with some elderly and children who are left behind. The victim's name is Guo Qinshi, female, 82 years old, her husband passed away early, usually alone at home taking care of her grandson.

  The deceased had a son and a daughter. The daughter was married to someone from another place, so she only came back home during holidays and not at ordinary times. The deceased's son and his wife worked outside all year round and would only come back when it was time for farm work.

  Usually, the deceased lived with her grandson Guo Yang. Guo Yang was a second-year junior high school student in the village and had always been at the top of his class. Guo Qinshi was kind to others in the village and never offended anyone. The reputation of the grandmother and grandson in the village was very good, and no one expected that such a thing would happen in their home.

  After Liu Li and others arrived at the scene, they first dispersed the villagers who were watching. Liu Li called Guo Yang over to ask him about the situation when the case occurred. Guo Yang was just a child and had been scared silly by what he saw. When he heard Liu Xiu's inquiry, he stuttered out what happened.

  It turned out that after school this afternoon, Guo Yang invited two classmates to go home for dinner. Usually at this time, his grandmother had already cooked lunch and was waiting for him, but today he saw no smoke coming from the chimney.

  Not only that, Guo Yang's grandmother had the habit of washing clothes in the morning, but today Guo Yang found that there were no clothes hanging on the clothes rack in the yard, so he felt something was wrong and shouted twice, but no one answered from inside the house.

  Under suspicion, Guo Yang and his classmates rushed into the house. As soon as they entered, the three of them saw Guo Qin's body lying on the floor in the living room, surrounded by blood, with no signs of life. Seeing this, Guo Yang was at a loss for what to do, but with his classmate's reminder, he called 110 to report the crime.

  After listening to Guo Yang's account, Liu Li took out a pair of disposable plastic gloves and put them on. He then walked towards the corpse lying in the living room. First, he took photos as evidence, then opened a camera and placed it aside. After that, he squatted down to examine the body.

  After about twenty minutes, footsteps came from outside the yard, followed by a loud voice: "What are you doing? Why did you touch the body casually? Do you know that your behavior may have destroyed the scene?"

  At this time, Liu Li had just finished examining the body. He stood up and took off his gloves one by one, looking at the door. Five people walked in from the courtyard, except for Director Du Zhiqing, the other four people were all unfamiliar to Liu Li.

  The man who just spoke, about forty years old, with a strong and majestic appearance, sporting a flat-top haircut, looking very neat and tidy. He was wearing a second-class police commander uniform, walking among the crowd.

  After entering the house, Du Zhiqing introduced Liu Li's identity to everyone, and then introduced the four people beside him to Liu Li. After Du Zhiqing finished introducing, Liu Li only knew that the four people opposite were all from the county criminal police brigade, and the leader, a sturdy man, was Cheng Bin, the captain of the criminal police brigade.

  Cheng Bin was very dissatisfied with Liu Li's private autopsy. When Liu Li stretched out his hand to shake hands, Cheng Bin ignored him and ordered the subordinates beside him to investigate the scene, collect fingerprints at the scene, and then squatted down to examine the body.

  Cheng Bin ignored him, Liu Li helplessly shrugged his shoulders and withdrew his hand. Seeing Cheng Bin squat down to examine the body, he said in a low voice: "The deceased died from being stabbed in the abdomen."

  The murder weapon was a fruit knife, with a blade length of 15 cm and a width of about 4 cm. After the victim was stabbed in the abdomen, he died from internal organ damage and excessive blood loss. There were no other external injuries on the body.

  The deceased had no conflicts with others before his death, so it can be ruled out as a revenge killing. The old lady is 82 years old this year, and except for wrinkles, her face can't show her appearance anymore, so there's also no possibility of a love affair murder. Since that's the case, then there's only one last possibility left - murder for financial gain."