The crackdown on organized crime began with the arrest of the mother-in-law.

Chapter 1210 Volkswagen Lavida

"I'll contact the hydrological department first thing tomorrow morning to conduct a segmented investigation of the river. Even if the physical evidence is submerged, we'll find a way to locate it." He looked at the setting sun outside the window, knowing that solving cases is inherently full of setbacks. As long as he didn't give up and continued to expand the scope of the investigation, he would eventually find clues pointing to the truth.

At 8 PM, Xiao Yang sat in his office, organizing tomorrow's investigation plan. He marked the river below the mountain into sections, assigning two team members to each section and equipping them with underwater detection equipment. He took out Li Kui's photo, gently wiping it, and silently said to himself, "Li Kui, don't worry, we won't let you sacrifice yourself in vain. Even if we have to dig three feet into the ground, we will find the evidence and bring the murderer to justice." The lights in the Criminal Investigation Division were still bright. Although the current investigation had encountered a bottleneck, no one had given up and they were still working hard to uncover the truth of the case.

In the video analysis room of the Municipal Criminal Investigation Detachment, 12 screens simultaneously played surveillance footage from the area around Beishan. Vehicles and pedestrians moved back and forth in the footage. Xiao Wang's gaze quickly switched between the screens, his eyes bloodshot. Since the case analysis meeting, he had led his team to track the suspect vehicle for 48 consecutive hours, from monitoring the mountain roads of Beishan to traffic checkpoints in the city, trying to find the black sedan that might have carried the suspect away, but they had been unable to lock onto the key information.

"Team Leader Wang, look at this!" Team member Xiao Chen suddenly pressed the pause button and pointed to the image in the lower right corner of the screen. This was footage captured by a private surveillance camera in Donghe Village at the foot of Beishan Mountain at 8:15 PM on August 18th: a black sedan was driving out from the direction of an abandoned mining road at a relatively high speed. There was a noticeable white scratch on the right side of the car, the taillights were intact, and the car's outline was highly similar to the previously speculated "Volkswagen Lavida." "The vehicle didn't have license plates, and there was no temporary license plate on the windshield," Xiao Chen zoomed in on the image. "The driver's side window was tinted with dark film, and you could only see a blurry figure; you couldn't make out facial features or body shape."

Xiao Wang leaned closer to the screen, carefully examining the vehicle's details: "The scratches on the body extend from the front to the rear, about 1.2 meters long. They are likely old scratches from long-term use, not from a recent collision; the wheel rims are silver five-spoke, consistent with the configuration of the 2018 Volkswagen Lavida." He asked Xiao Chen to take a screenshot and send it to the vehicle management office for comparison with information on all registered black Volkswagen Lavida vehicles in the city, "with a focus on checking vehicles with white scratches, those without license plates, or those using temporary license plates."

To find more witnesses, Xiao Wang led his team to Donghe Village to interview villagers around the surveillance camera location. Grandpa Liu, a villager living in a bungalow opposite the camera, recalled the events of the evening of August 18th: "That night, around 8 pm, I was relaxing in the yard when I heard the sound of a car engine outside. It was very loud, like someone was pressing the accelerator hard," Grandpa Liu pointed to the path outside the village. "I looked up and saw a black sedan speeding past. I couldn't see the license plate clearly, but I remember it seemed to be carrying something covered by a tarpaulin, bulging out."

"Do you remember any other features of the car? For example, the logo, the style of the headlights, or the driver's appearance?" Xiao Wang pressed. Grandpa Liu tried hard to recall: "I couldn't see the logo clearly because it was dark. The headlights were rectangular and had high beams on, which were very dazzling. The driver's side window seemed to be rolled down a little, and I could see a hand wearing a black glove. I can't remember anything else."

The team members visited more than 10 households in Donghe Village, but only one villager, Aunt Zhao, provided a new clue: "I went to the small shop at the village entrance at 8:30 that night to buy something. I saw a black sedan parked next to the shop. The driver didn't get out of the car and seemed to be on the phone," Aunt Zhao said. "There was a smell of smoke coming out of the car. When I passed by, I heard the driver say, 'It's all taken care of. Don't worry about it.' I didn't hear what else he said. About a minute later, the car drove away, heading towards the city."

According to Aunt Zhao's description, Xiao Wang retrieved the municipal surveillance footage around the convenience store. At 8:28 PM on August 18th, the black sedan indeed appeared on the footage, stayed for about one minute, and then drove towards the city center. "The vehicle's route was Donghe Village → Huancheng Road → Jiefang Road," Xiao Wang marked the route on the map. "We retrieved all the surveillance footage from these three road sections, focusing on tracking the black sedan's trajectory."

However, after the black sedan entered the ring road, it suddenly disappeared into the blind spot of the surveillance cameras. "There is no surveillance for 500 meters of this section of the ring road because it is a construction area," said team member Xiao Li helplessly. "By the time the next surveillance camera captured the exit of the ring road, the black sedan could no longer be seen. It is possible that the suspect changed to another vehicle in the construction area or changed the direction of travel."

Undeterred, Xiao Wang led his team to investigate the construction section of the ring road. The construction area was covered in gravel and sand. At a temporary parking area, the team discovered two sets of tire tracks—one a black sedan tire track (model 205/55 R16, consistent with previous findings), and the other a motorcycle tire track (60 cm in diameter, matching the motorcycle tracks found on the mining road). "The suspect may have switched to a motorcycle here," Xiao Wang analyzed. "There are obvious braking marks next to the sedan tire tracks, and the motorcycle tire tracks overlap with the sedan tire tracks, indicating that both vehicles stopped here simultaneously. The suspect likely hid the sedan near the construction area and escaped on the motorcycle."

Sure enough, the team found a black Volkswagen Lavida sedan in an abandoned factory near the construction site. The right side of the car had white scratches, perfectly matching the characteristics of the vehicle in the surveillance footage. "The vehicle had no license plates, and we didn't find any items inside to identify the owner," team member Xiao Chen reported after the inspection. "The steering wheel, door handles, and other parts had been deliberately wiped clean, leaving no fingerprints; there was a small amount of reddish-brown soil in the trunk, consistent with the composition of soil from the Beishan brick kiln; we also found a grayish-brown hemp rope fiber, identical to the fiber composition of the restraint marks on Li Kui's wrists."

However, when technicians checked the vehicle's VIN, they found that it had been ground off, making it impossible to find the owner's information through the vehicle management office system. "The suspect's counter-surveillance awareness is too strong. Not only did they remove the license plate, but they also ground off the VIN," Xiao Wang frowned. "This car is likely a stolen vehicle, or a 'cloned car' that the suspect purchased through illegal channels. We cannot identify the suspect through the vehicle information."

To further investigate the origin of the vehicle, Xiao Wang led his team to visit used car markets and auto repair shops throughout the city.