Chapter 1177 - 602: The Dangerous Fourth Person

At this moment, inside the interrogation room.

Chen Guan was staring at the old man in front of him.

The man’s face was purple, his eyes wide open, his chest heaving, like an enraged beast.

From this alone, it was enough to see the anger filling his heart.

Also being the father of a girl, Chen Guan could deeply feel the fury burning inside him.

If something like this happened to any daughter, it would be unbearable.

Not to mention him—if it were Chen himself facing such a blow, he would be the same.

Even if the police didn’t punish the people who committed the crime, as a father he would instinctively make them pay a heavy price.

Chen might even make them pay ten thousand times over.

After all, the bond between father and daughter is thicker than blood.

Even if what he said was only rumor, putting the whole thing together, it didn’t seem impossible.

Perhaps because the love runs so deep, any possibility would be amplified without limit.

With that thought, he gradually let go of his initial prejudice against the old man before him.

In this interrogation room, he had questioned many people.

Lies can be used to cover up the facts of a crime.

But genuine emotion is never something deliberately faked.

Especially an expression of paternal love like this; it should be a true outpouring from the heart.

Thinking of this, he turned and patted Qin Feng on the shoulder.

The two exchanged a look and nodded, then walked out of the interrogation room together.

Right after, Chen Guan took a pack of cigarettes from his trouser pocket, pulled out two, and handed one to Qin Feng.

The two of them smoked in the corridor.

After a long while, Chen Guan turned and asked, "Do you think this man is a suspect?"

Qin Feng thought for a moment and said, "I don’t think he’s very suspicious."

"Just now, his behavior didn’t look like an act."

"And in this situation, if he really had killed someone, he would never take such a risk and openly show his anger."

"Yeah, that’s what I think too." Chen Guan let out a long sigh. "Now this lead is broken."

"But he just mentioned what happened back then. We still need to pull out the case file from that year and go through it again."

Qin Feng said, "Okay, but there shouldn’t be any problem, right?"

"There was a suicide note at the victim’s home, and the forensic examiner was involved. The chance of an error in that kind of situation is extremely low."

"I believe the conclusion wasn’t wrong, but the real reason this girl killed herself is worth digging into."

"The family believes she was driven to her death; that’s probably not the kind of direct assault we talk about in a criminal investigation."

"It’s very likely the reason that led her to commit suicide, so her motive for killing herself is still a key point in our next stage of investigation."

After he finished, he took two drags on his cigarette and added, "Especially that young man, Li Chuang, who gave them the information back then. We have to track him down and find out in detail how he knew what he knew."

Hearing this, Qin Feng nodded. "Li Chuang was dating the victim—could what he said just be his own speculation?"

"Whether it’s speculation or not, let’s not jump to conclusions yet. We’ll find him first."

"We’ve taken this case to the point where the killer deliberately buried the three victims together. There has to be an important reason for that."

Right at this moment, Director Hou and Jiang An also walked over from the far end of the corridor.

"Director Hou, Mr. Jiang." Chen Guan stubbed out his cigarette and turned to greet them.

Director Hou nodded. "We both saw what just happened in the interrogation room."

"To be frank, both Mr. Jiang and I feel that this old man probably isn’t a suspect."

At this, the four of them looked at one another; where their eyes met, they all nodded.

Chen Guan went on, "Next, we’re planning to find this Li Chuang he mentioned and get a detailed picture of what exactly happened back then."

"That’s fine." Director Hou nodded. "We need to broaden our thinking and see whether these two cases are connected."

"But as for the three victims in this case, we still have to keep investigating the places where they lived and see if we can find any overlap, any clue that can break the case."

"Director Hou, I’ll have Qin Feng take two people to bring Li Chuang in and get a detailed account of the situation at the time."

"We’ll go to West Mountain Village, where the three victims were from, to investigate."

After a brief discussion, they split into two teams.

Qin Feng went to look into Li Chuang.

Director Hou, Jiang An, and Chen Guan headed to West Mountain Village to investigate the three victims.

Thirty minutes later, Director Hou, Jiang An, and Chen Guan arrived at Jiahe Gully.

According to the address in the household registration system, they first went to No. 90 Jiahe Gully, to look for Li Jun, the closest one.

These days, the countryside has become hollowed out.

Many people have already gone out to work, the older generation have either passed away or moved away, and those left are basically the native villagers.

When they reached Li Jun’s doorstep, they suddenly saw that weeds had grown thick in front of the door.

Then they went to the homes of Zhang Fei and Chen Bing; in front of both houses it was the same desolation.

At this moment, the three suddenly felt that looking for the families directly like this might not work.

Jiang An spoke up. "Let’s go find the village chief. A lot of people have left the village, but the village chief should still be here."

Ten minutes later, their vehicle pulled up at the village committee office.

Right now the door of the village committee office was open. An old man with white hair was squatting in the doorway, smoking a dry tobacco pipe.

The three walked straight over. The old man stood up and asked, "You here for a village committee stamp? Ten yuan a time."