frightfiction Chapter 1186 On-site identification, detailed explanation
Chapter 1186 On-site identification, detailed explanation
"Get out of the car." Li Ming opened the back door. Morning light shone through the thin mist onto Zhou Jianming's face. He subconsciously squinted, the bruise on his left cheek standing out starkly against his pale skin. Two police officers supported him on either side. His steps were unsteady; he was practically being half-carried towards the center of the construction site. Construction workers along the way stopped what they were doing, their eyes fixed on him, whispers spreading in the morning breeze.
"Where did you meet Deng Yong on the evening of October 1st?" Li Ming took out a site survey sketch and pointed to the open space between the temporary prefabricated houses and the abandoned warehouse. Zhou Jianming's gaze fell on the yellow marking line on the ground, his body began to tremble slightly, and his voice became hoarse: "It was here... I arranged to meet him here to discuss the transportation fee. He drove over in a dump truck and parked under the shade of the trees over there." He pointed to a sycamore tree not far away, with half of a faded construction mark still remaining on the trunk. "He got out of the truck and asked me for the transportation fee. I told him to postpone it for a few more days, but he disagreed and said he would sue me to the developer."
Technicians immediately began their investigation at the "meeting point" identified by Zhou Jianming. They sprayed luminol on the ground, and a pale blue fluorescence slowly emerged on the cement floor next to the sycamore tree, forming irregular, patchy areas. "There's occult blood here," the technician noted, "approximately 1.5 x 2 meters, consistent with the area where the two were arguing and fighting. We need to extract a sample for comparison with Deng Yong's DNA." Zhou Jianming stared at the fluorescence on the ground, his eyes becoming increasingly evasive, his hands unconsciously clenching at his sides.
As Zhou Jianming walked from the meeting point towards the abandoned warehouse, his pace slowed, each step feeling like he was stepping on a scorching hot iron plate. "We argued more and more fiercely, and he started pushing me," he said, pointing to the metal sheet at the warehouse entrance. "My back hit it, and it hurt terribly, so I got angry and we started fighting." There was a dent in the metal sheet, with fresh rust showing signs of flaking off at the edges. Technicians used tweezers to pick up a piece of rust. "The shape of the dent matches the characteristics of a human back impact, and the time when the rust fell off is basically consistent with the time of the incident."
Stepping into the warehouse, a damp, musty smell mixed with dust assaulted the senses. Zhou Jianming's gaze fell on a square indentation on the cement floor in the corner, perfectly matching the "body hiding place" previously discovered. "After I strangled him, I put the body here," he said, his voice trembling with tears, his fingers lightly tracing the edge of the indentation. "I was afraid of being discovered, so I covered it with a tarpaulin. I only dared to move him to the foundation pit the next night." The technicians lifted the tarpaulin; the cement at the indentation had a slight color difference, and the extracted fiber sample matched the polyester composition of Deng Yong's work clothes.
"How did you get the body from the warehouse to the foundation pit?" Li Ming pressed, his eyes fixed on Zhou Jianming's movements. Zhou Jianming walked along the route from the warehouse to the foundation pit, his steps unsteady, as if reliving that terrifying night. "I first drove his dump truck to a compartment in the warehouse," he pointed to a hidden compartment at the back of the warehouse, "and covered it with a tarpaulin so no one would see it. Then I came back to drag the body. He was heavier than me, so I couldn't drag it; I could only half-lift and half-drag it." He pointed to a shallow mark on the ground, "This is where his shoulder scraped against the ground; a few strands of his hair fell out at the time." The technicians indeed found several dark hairs at the shallow mark, which, after preliminary testing, matched Deng Yong's hair characteristics.
Reaching the edge of the foundation pit, Zhou Jianming stopped, afraid to go any closer. He pointed to an area at the bottom of the pit: "I buried him here," his voice filled with fear. "I used a shovel I borrowed from Li Jun to dig a shallow pit, wrapped him in a black plastic bag, put him in, and then filled it with soil. After I finished using the shovel, I threw the shovel head nearby and the handle into the stream outside the construction site." Technicians used a probe to test the soil at the "body dumping site" he pointed out. The composition of the soil 30 centimeters underground differed from the surrounding soil, consistent with the characteristics of "refilling," and DNA traces matching Deng Yong were detected.
"Why did you choose this foundation pit to dump the body?" Xiao Wang asked. Zhou Jianming's gaze fell on the construction sign next to the foundation pit, which read "Backfilling on October 8th": "I knew this place would be backfilled soon, and once the soil was back up, no one would find the body." He paused, then added, "The wind picked up that night, and I thought no one would notice, but the excavator operator still found it."
During the identification process, Zhou Jianming broke down emotionally several times, especially when he saw Deng Yong's dump truck. He squatted down, covered his face, and cried, "I'm sorry to Deng Yong, and I'm sorry to his family. I was just too scared at the time, that's why I did this..." His cries echoed in the empty construction site, filled with endless remorse. Technicians used a special reagent to detect Zhou Jianming's fingerprints on the steering wheel of the dump truck, which corroborated the previous investigation results.
As the identification process neared its end, Zhou Jianming suddenly remembered something and pointed to the drainage ditch at the north gate of the construction site: "His phone was thrown here," he said in a low voice. "I turned off his phone and threw it in the drainage ditch, thinking no one would find it." Technicians immediately began searching the drainage ditch, and half an hour later, they found a damaged phone one meter underwater. After being identified by Deng Yong's family, it was confirmed to be the phone Deng Yong had used before his death.
As Zhou Jianming was being escorted into the police car, the morning light had already dispelled the thin mist, and the sunlight shone brightly on the construction site. He glanced back at the direction of the foundation pit and the warehouse, his eyes filled with guilt and fear. Li Ming stood in the center of the construction site, watching the technicians pack the collected evidence into boxes one by one. From bloodstains and hair to cell phones and fibers, each piece of evidence corroborated Zhou Jianming's confession, forming a complete chain of evidence.
"Notify the technical department to conduct detailed testing on the newly extracted evidence as soon as possible, especially the recovery of mobile phone data and bloodstain DNA comparison," Li Ming ordered into the walkie-talkie. "In addition, arrange for someone to retrieve the shovel handle from the river. We must find this key piece of evidence to make the evidence chain in the case more complete."
The police car slowly drove away from the construction site. Zhou Jianming rested his head against the window, watching the Oriental Garden construction site gradually disappear into the distance, tears streaming down his face. He knew that the crime he had committed was irreversible, and he would face the full force of the law. All he could do was truthfully confess all the details and give Deng Yong's family a belated explanation.
Back at the Criminal Investigation Division, Li Ming organized the records of the crime scene identification and the newly collected evidence, adding them to the case file.
This case is now closed.