Two in one chapter
Yue Xingwen and Lan Yarong were discussing when they saw two university students being brought back to the police station for questioning, one of whom was a cultured-looking boy, Chen Kaiming from the Chemistry Department; Another girl with short hair had a beautiful appearance and a pale face, which was Chen Kaiming’s girlfriend, Lin Xuefei.
Yue Xingwen froze for a moment, stepped forward and asked, “Captain Chen, who are these two?”
Captain Chen said, “The students of Beishan University, brought back to investigate.”
Lan Yarong asked, “These two also went to the beach to eat barbecue on the day of Liu Jiajia’s death, right? Has there been progress in the beach case, confirming that my client Zhu Xiaoting is not the murderer?”
Captain Chen smiled and said, “I’m sorry, the police handling the case is confidential, so I can’t reveal too much to you.”
Seeing that the two were escorted into the interrogation room by Captain Chen, Yue Xingwen and Lan Yarong looked at each other.
On the way back to the Law Firm after leaving the police force, Lan Yarong said suspiciously, “The police brought Chen Kaiming and Lin Xuefei, the two suspects in the beach case, back for questioning. Could it be that the police have found the source of the potassium cyanide that poisoned Liu Jiajia?”
Yue Xingwen said, “It should be. Liu Jiaji was killed by poison, Xie Xiangqin was stabbed to death, and the method of crime of the two cases were very different, it’s clearly not the same person’s handiwork. In addition, Zhu Xiaoting is an ordinary student of the Translation Department, and it’s difficult to get potassium cyanide, a controlled drug. The police should not rashly regard the murderer of the beach case as Zhu Xiaoting, the evidence is not enough.”
Lan Yarong nodded. “It makes sense, the evidence for the beach case is only Zhu Xiaoting’s fingerprints on the bottle, there are no witnesses, and there is no other physical evidence, which is not enough to convict Zhu Xiaoting. As long as the source of the poison is found, it is easy to locate the murderer. So, the beach case is actually just confusing us and increasing the difficulty of investigation? The key is the dormitory case, right?”
Yue Xingwen said, “En, although the police in this world will not do their best to solve the case so that we can lie down and win, they will not mess around. From the perspective of the police, the chain of evidence in the dormitory case is indeed very complete, and we have to find Li Huijuan, the last person in dormitory 703, as soon as possible, and try to ask her to testify in court if possible.”
After Yue Xingwen and Lan Yarong returned to the Law Firm, they seized the time to sort out the materials of Zhu Xiaoting’s case and prepare for the court defense.
The normal criminal case process, from the police arresting suspects, investigating and collecting evidence, submitting them to the prosecutor’s office for review, and then formally filing an indictment in court. It usually took about a month, and it was common to encounter a complex case investigation for six months.
Zhu Xiaoting’s case came to the prosecutor’s office, and the library obviously deliberately sped up the process to make things difficult for examinees, not giving them too much time to slowly search for evidence.
With only two days left before the trial, time was running out.
Yue Xingwen quickly arranged in the group: “The four people in the deceased’s boyfriend, Zou Yijia will be handed over to Pingce, young Ke, and Xin Yan for investigation. Senior brother Xu and senior brother Liu are over at the hospital to find out what happened to the two Medical Department’s girls. Pay close attention to whether Li Huijuan has returned, we only have one day tomorrow, and the trial will be held the day after tomorrow!”
Jiang Pingce asked: “What about the beach case? Don’t you have to check the couples in the Chemistry Department?”
Yue Xingwen replied: “The police have brought the couple back from the Chemistry Department for interrogation, and they must have found clues related to potassium cyanide, and we don’t need to spend too much energy to investigate.”
Lan Yarong said: “These two cases should have a separate trial, rather than being handled together as a serial murder case. Zhu Xiaoting had no motive to kill Liu Jiajia, and the method of crime was also very different, which did not meet the conditions for joint cases of serial murder.”
Jiang Pingce said with understanding: “This is the best, Zhu Xiaoting’s body won’t bear the two lives.”
Ke Shaobin asked curiously: “On the day of the trial, the lawyer representing Zhu Xiaoting’s side, only senior sister Lan can speak?”
Lan Yarong explained: “The court stipulates that a defendant can entrust up to two defense lawyers to participate in the court defense, and I would like to ask Xingwen to assist me. Although Xingwen is not a professional lawyer, he has clear logic, he is also the captain of the debate team of Hua’an University, and his eloquence is also very good. We should be more confident together, right?”
Jiang Pingce was the first to stand up in support: “I think Xingwen can.”
Ke Shaobin said: “I also think that Xingwen and senior sister Lan have a better chance of winning together!”
Senior sister’s recognition flattered Yue Xingwen: “Senior sister, I used to participate in college debates, but I didn’t participate in court defense ah!”
Lan Yarong laughed: “It’s okay, in this world, you have a lawyer’s certificate. In the past two days, I will give you an emergency training to explain the rules of the court, and the rest is improvisation, adapting to changes. Your thinking is flexible and you have enough understanding of this case. We cooperate together to convince the judge more easily than me alone.”
Yue XIngwen had no longer shirking: “Yes, then I will participate in the defense with senior sister Lan!”
Lan Yarong followed the arrangement and said: “As an assistant lawyer, Mango can sit next to listen to the trial and help us sort out some materials. Other people, because you don’t have a lawyer qualification, you can’t sit in the lawyer’s seat, you can listen from the audience.”
Lin Manluo immediately agreed: “No problem, sorting out the information, I’m still relatively good at it.” She also often helped Zhuo Feng summarize information when she was in the Student Council, and the information she sorted out was very clear.
Yue Xingwen said: “Then arrange it like this, students who have not assigned tasks, wherever there is a lack of people, they will go to help on which side. Everyone who has any new clues and ideas can communicate in the group at any time!”
Everyone began to get busy.
Yue Xingwen, Lan Yarong, and Lin Manluo only ate a bowl of instant noodles at noon that day, and Lan Yarong gave the two a lot of precautions for court defense, such as, when could them interrupt the prosecution lawyer, how to question the parties, witnesses, etc. Yue Xingwen and Lin Manluo took notes while listening.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
In the evening, three people stayed in the Law Firm together to work overtime.
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Lin Manlup asked, “If we read the script directly, will it make the judge feel very fake?”
Lan Yarong nodded and said, “That’s right, it’s best to have Zhu Xiaoting recite the whole text, memorize it, and add some truthful expressions, so that it’s easy to convince the judge.”
Yue Xingwen took the initiative to take this task and said, “I will first write a speech in Zhu Xiaoting’s tone tonight, and senior sister Lan will revise it at the end. You have to prepare to ask questions about Zhu Xiaoting and other witnesses in court, I’m afraid you’re too busy.”
Lan Yarong breathed a sigh of relief and said with a smile, “This is the best, thanks for your hard work Xingwen!”
Yue Xingwen said, “It’s okay, I used to write speeches when I was in school.”
Lin Manluo asked, “Which witnesses do we need to invite? Zhuo Feng has no task, let Zhuo Feng and Zhang Xiaonan contact the witnesses.”
Lan Yarong carefully considered for a moment and said, “Mao Yue is a witness for the prosecution, as a witness at the crime scene, she will definitely appear in court at that time, let’s just ask her directly. On our side, we must invite Li Huijuan, the uncle who made the key and the last person in dormitory 703, to court. It’s best if they are willing to appear in court!”
The three worked overtime until late at night before returning to the residence of the Xinghai Apartment together.
At the same time, students at school were also working overtime.
Xin Yan searched the family background of the people in dormitory 105 and clubs they joined at the Office of Academic Affairs.
Jiang Pingce sorted it out and summarized.
Ke Shaobin bought a side account from the Internet to approach the boys in dormitory 105, play a game with them, and listen to the news by the way. Soon, he knew that on the day of the crime, the four boys in dormitory 105 played a computer shooter game in the dark, similar to <PUBG>, four people parachuted to a desert island, collected weapons to live in the safety circle, and killed all other players to win.
Usually, the five-person game in which the four of them take Xie Xiangqin to rank together was a mobile phone tower pushing game, similar to <King of Glory>, and the five could team up to play ranking matches.
Ke Shaobin’s level of playing games was very good, five people opened the ranking matches, won 10 consecutive games and everyone was very happy. He played a game with these people for one night, and soon became a ‘good brother. He privately added four friends, convenient for private chat.
Ke Shaobin asked Zhang Bin from dormitory 105: “Brother, I heard that you have a particularly beautiful girlfriend? I’m envious ah!”
The other party quickly replied: “Hehe, my girlfriend is from the Faculty of Fine Arts, good-looking, but also very temperamental. She can paint Chinese paintings, and often sketches outside.”
Ke Shaobin clicked into the other party’s Moments and found that classmate Zhang often showed affection in the Moments. Every two days he had to send a few photos of his girlfriend, judging from the photos, his girlfriend was indeed very beautiful, more temperamental than Xie Xiangqin.
He had no motive to kill Xie Xiangqin.
Another roommate named Zhong Jian, whose Moments was all basketball, badminton, or screenshots of the record of consecutive wins and losses in ranking, and had never sent girl-related information. The boy with acne was still single.
Zou Yijia’s Moments ‘This friend only shows the Moments in the last three days’, and nothing could be read.
Ji Xiaohui’s MOments also ‘only shows Moments in the last three days’, and Ke Shaobin clicked in to see it empty.
Of the four people in dormitory 105, Zhang Bin, who had a girlfriend, was the least suspected, and the other three could not be completely ruled out.
Ke Shaobin sent a screenshot of Zhong Jian’s game record to Jiang Pingce, saying, “Xie Xiangqin plays games with the four people in dormitory 105 together, and rarely plays alone with her boyfriend. I asked Zhang Bin, he said that because Zou Yijia’s own strength is limited, and Xie Xiangqin is playing poorly, if they played alone, Zou Yijia can’t take this girlfriend and often lose, so he is used to dragging other roommates, 5 people to play together.”
Jiang Pingce directly sorted out a table of the time period and winning rate of their games, and soon found a pattern: “Throughout September, every night at 10 pm until 00 am, the four people in the dormitory 105 will bring Xie Xiangqin to rank together. But since October, Zhong Jian’s Moments has only 4 screenshots of playing computer’s shooting games, or screenshot of playing mobile game rankings alone, and the five have never played mobile games together.”
This was definitely not a coincidence. What happened at the end of September and the beginning of October?
Ke Shaobin asked Zhang Bin: “I looked at senior brother Zhong’s Moments, you used to play ranking together with five people, why haven’t you ranked together recently ah?”
Zhang Bin replied: “COugh, it’s not because Zou Yijia has to bring his girlfriend. His girlfriend is really noob, you know, the higher the rank, the higher the requirements for auxiliary, 4 of us with 1 support that can’t play, it’s difficult to win every game. Sometimes it’s clear that the group is going to attack, his girlfriend didn’t release the big move, and directly die, we are 4 vs 5, it was tiring.”
Ke Shaobin: “So, you guys don’t really approve of him taking his girlfriend?”
Zhang Bin said: “Our room manager Zhong Jian temper is very straight. Once, there’s a big advantage in the game, Xie Xiangqin made a serious mistake and was turned over by the opposite side. He asked Zou Yijia and said directly, ‘Your girlfriend is too noob, the four of us can’t take her’. Zou Yijia’s face was black at that time and ran out to make a call. After he came back, we reached a consensus to take her to the King, no matter how difficult the summit tournament without her to play, we went to play ourselves, she was too pitted and easy to die.”
Ke Shaobin said curiously: “Did Zou Yijia quarrel with Xie Xiangqin after he went out? The room manager said to his girlfriend’s face that she is too noob. You and JI Xiaohui didn’t persuade him ah?”
Zhang Bin said helplessly: “I persuaded, I said it’s okay to bring the girl, don’t take the outcome too seriously. Ji Xiaohui didn’t react much, he didn’t talk much in the dormitory, but he was the best at playing games among the four of us.”
Ke Shaobin played with them for a night, and indeed felt that the taciturn Ji Xiaohui was the strongest one. Zou Yijia was actually the most noob of the four, he couldn’t bring his girlfriend, so he pulled his roommate to help. It was no wonder, this operation would cause disgust of the roommates.
The next morning, the results of the investigation on Ke Shaobin, Jiang Pingce and Xin Yan’s side were quickly summarized in the group.
Jiang Pingce concluded: “The 4 people in dormitory 105 played ranking with Xie Xiangqin for a long time, and they are all very familiar with Xie Xiangqin. Among them, Zhong Jian attached great importance to the victory and defeat of the game, and often disliked Xie Xiangqin as a newbie and unable to carry. Zhang Bin has a fixed girlfriend, stable relationship, and a peacemaker when things happen. His girlfriend is more beautiful than Xie Xiangqin, and he has no motive to kill Xie Xiangqin.”
“Zou Yijia and Xie Xiangqin are superficially affectionate, whether there is a contradiction in private, it’s not clear. We only know that since October their dormitory hasn’t played with Xie Xiangqin. Ji Xiaohui, the most reticent one in the whole dormitory, has the strongest game strength. In order to facilitate playing games, Xie Xiangqin added four boys, and it’s unknown whether she has private contact with anyone.”
The investigation of dormitory 105 couldn’t directly lock the suspect.
But the results given by Xin Yan surprised everyone: “I checked the information on the side of the school’s basketball club. His teammates said that he has this kind of straight temper, quick to speak, and if he is unhappy, he will directly say it. It’s not the first time he scolds people, but there is no bad intention, and he never holds grudges.”
“Ji Xiaohui is a member of the school’s anime club, likes to watch anime, and has a lot of anime beauty pictures on the computer. He has also participated in cosplay held by the anime club. By the way, the president of the anime club is called Qi Xinyu.”
Yue Xinwen froze slightly, and quickly typed: “Qi Xinyu? I remember she was from the Law Student Council, and they organized this beach barbecue. I added her as a friend while we were having a barbecue on the beach.”
Yue Xingwen quickly found this girl from the mobile phone WeChat address book.
Ke Shaobin said: “I also remember, she seems to be the witness of the beach case, right? She went up early to see the sunrise, and then saw a floating corpse in the sea, screaming and waking us up?”
Yue Xingwen nodded: “Yes, it seems that friend was not added in vain at that time, this is a very key clue character!”
********
Yue Xingwen contacted Qi Xinyu through WeChat early in the morning: “Hello senior sister, I was your junior brother who added you on the beach that day.”
Qi Xinyu replied quickly: “Oh, I remember you! Is there something wrong for junior brother looking for me?”
Yue Xingwen went straight into the topic: “What happened to the corpse on the sea that day? Did the police call you to interrogate?” As she was screaming at that time, Yue Xingwen also came to the scene first, they were both witnesses.
Qi Xinyu sent a cracked emoticon: “Ai, it’s really unlucky. Teachers, school leaders, and police have been asking me questions these days. After all, I’m one of the organizers of this event, and I’m also responsible for the accidents of classmates!” She paused and said: “Fortunately, the court session of this case will open soon, and the police have asked me to testify in court, so it should be solved soon.”
“That’s good, I hope this matter will pass as soon as possible.”
Yue Xingwen continued to ask: “By the way, senior sister, do you know Ji Xiaohui?”
Qi Xinyu was stunned: “Why did you suddenly ask Ji Xiaohui?”
Yue Xingwen said: “I’m very interested in the anime club, and I want to join your anime club next semester. Ji Xiaohui is also a member of the anime club, right? I heard that you often hold cosplay, do you have any photos to see?”
Qi Xinyu did not doubt it, and immediately sent a few photos: “We will participate in the city’s comic exhibitions every semester, you can learn about it first! After I graduated, Xiaohui was our next president, and the anime club is still pretty fun.”
Yue Xingwen opened the photos——
He saw a slender girl in the photo, wearing a pink cake dress. The girl had a gold wig, long eyelashes, red lips, fair skin, and smiled gently at the camera, like a doll from an anime.
Yue Xingwen was puzzled: “Who is this ah? So beautiful.”
Qi Xinyu sent a smile emoticon covering her mouth and laughing: “This is Ji Xiaohui ah!”
Yue Xingwen: “……”
If it wasn’t for the president of the anime club personally saying that this was Ji Xiaohui, he would almost recognize it…
This was actually a boy! The boy who was more lustrous and beautiful than girls!
Yue Xingwen immediately sent Ji Xiaohui’s photo to the group: “Young Ke, search on the Internet, search all the photos of Ji Xiaohui participating in Cosplay. I suspect that he has sneaked into the girls’ dormitory in a female costume!”
Zhuo Feng was stunned: “This, this is Ji Xiaohui? It’s completely different from ID photos ah!”
Jiang Pingce: “… .”
Lin Manluo knew more about COS and said, “There are many boys who like to play COS, and they are really more beautiful when they cosplay as women. This Ji Xiaohui himself looks cultured, his skin is also white, and he really has no sense of violation in dressing as a woman.”
Qin Miao sent a supportive emoticon: “As a girl, I’m ashamed of myself.”
Qin Lu said: “The skin is better than mine ah, I’m envious!”
Jiang Pingce put the topic back: “Does Xie Xiangqin like anime very much?”
Qin Miao said: “I passed by her dormitory and saw some anime posters on her wall, and there were cute anime figures on the bookshelf. So, she and Ji Xiaohui have many common interests?”
Jiang Pingce followed up with a message: “Xin Yan found out yesterday that Ji Xiaohui was born in a single-parent family. His father divorced his mother because of an affair, his mother is a nurse, there should be books on anatomy at home. He may also understand the structure of the human body and kill her with a knife.”
Ji Xiaohui’s suspicions skyrocketed.
The big guy who could dress up as a woman at will should not be underestimated.
Building 6 had a total of 10 floors, 30 dormitories on each floor, with so many students, the dormitory manager and aunt might not recognize them all. If Ji Xiaohui dressed as a woman to enter and exit the student dormitory, even if the monitoring was not broken, there was no need to register, and he could walk in openly.
However, Ji Xiaohui’s motive for the crime had not yet been found.
Yue Xingwen immediately asked: “What about Li Huijuan? The court is about to open the day after tomorrow. Hasn’t she returned yet?”
Qin Miao said: “There is only Mao Yue alone in dormitory 703 now, and I still haven’t seen Li Huijuan.”
Xin Yan said: “She is an intern in the Biological Engineering Research Institute, I found out her phone number. If she can’t come back, do you want to call and ask her?”
Yue Xingwen and Lan Yarong glanced at each other, picked up their mobile phones and dialed Li Huijuan’s number.
As soon as the phone was connected, a calm voice sounded in his ear: “Hello, who is it?”
Yue Xingwen said: “Hello, is it classmate Li Huijuan? I’m Zhu Xiaoting’s defense lawyer.”
Li Huijuan was stunned for a moment: “Lawyer? Why are you looking for me?”
Yue Xingwen said, “Zhu Xiaoting’s case, the police should have approached you for questioning, right?”
Li Huijuan nodded and said, “En. I heard Mao Yue say that she saw Xiaoting killing a person with a knife, and the police later called me to ask me about the relationship between Zhu Xiaoting and Xie Xiangqin. The two have never been able to get along, and last month Xiaoting broke Xie Xiangqin’s cup, and Xie Xiangqin scolded her for making her lose money; Later, Xiaoting also accidentally knocked over Xie Xiangqin’s bottle of limited edition perfume, and the two had a very unpleasant fight.” She paused for a moment, her voice sank, “But I didn’t expect Xiaoting to actually kill someone. For this little thing, she is really too impulsive and it’s not worth it.”
Yue Xingwen immediately said, “The murderer is not Zhu Xiaoting.”
Li Huijuan was stunned and wondered, “What do you mean?”
Yue Xingwen asked, “Xie Xiangqin and Zou Yijia, have they quarreled?”
Li Huijuan frowned, and after a moment of silence, she said, “There should have been a fight. Once, I went back to the dormitory, I heard Xie Xiangqin calling and arguing with someone, her eyes were red, as if she was crying. She saw me enter the room, directly dropped the phone, and I looked at the caller ID, it was Zou Yijia.”
Yue Xingwen said, “Are you sure the caller ID is Zou Yijia?”
Li Huijian nodded and said: “I’m sure. Xie Xiangqin had a phone call with Zou Yijia everyday, and I recognized the avatar very clearly. However, it’s normal for couples to have some conflicts between them, and Zou Yijia is usually very good to her, and often buys her snacks.”
Yue Xingwen asked again, “Didn’t Zou Yijia buy those figures on her desk?”
Li Huijuan said, “It should not be, she will show off with us every time Zou Yijia buys something for her. She has never said anything about anime figures. Zou Yijia often gives her gifts, including perfume, lipstick, and snacks.”
Yue Xingwen said sincerely, “Classmate Li Huijuan, are you willing to testify in court? Zhu Xiaoting is innocent, and your testimony is very important and may save her life.”
Li Huijuan said in surprise, “Isn’t Xiaoting the murderer? Mao Yue saw her kill with her own eyes. I can understand your desire to help her clear her name because you are her defense lawyer, but I can’t talk nonsense when the court wants to talk about evidence.”
Yue Xingwen said, “You don’t need to commit perjury, as long as you tell the truth you know.”
Li Huijuan was confused and said, “Then, what can I prove?”
Yue Xingwen said, “It proves that Xie Xiangqin and Zou Yijia quarreled, and the day they quarreled, was it the end of September?”
Li Huijuan thought carefully and said, “That’s right, it’s September 30th, Saturday night. I was going to self-study, but because I forgot to charge the laptop, I came back early, and then I saw her arguing with Zou Yijia, and they quarreled fiercely.”
At this time, it coincided with the testimony of Zhang Bin in dormitory 105, and it could also correspond to the change in the game habits of Zhong Jian’s Moments.
On the night of September 30th last month, something very unpleasant must have happened.
The fierce quarrel between Xie Xiangqin and Zou Yijia might be the real trigger for Xie Xiangqin’s death case.
Meow~ Everything’s getting juicy.
Wow, everything is so complicated
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