In this case, the prime suspect has been identified so far— Qiao Xuening, who had a deep-seated hatred for both Lin Yiyan and Xu Kai, and whose testimony contained numerous inconsistencies.
The key lies in her modus operandi.
How exactly did she manage to evade the community's surveillance cameras?
None of the community's surveillance cameras captured Qiao Xuening. It was a locked room in a modern city setting, and the murderer couldn't fly or disappear. Unless someone changed their face, it was impossible for them to be missed by the surveillance cameras.
After hearing Yu Hanjiang's speculation, Xiao Lou analyzed seriously: "If she had completely undergone plastic surgery and changed her face, then she wouldn't need to find a body double who looks exactly like her to provide an alibi. Moreover, after changing her face, she would have to give up the career she had worked so hard to build in the entertainment industry, and she wouldn't be able to continue acting as Qiao Xuening, and she wouldn't even be able to use her bank card."
To withdraw a large sum of cash from a bank, the individual must personally visit the bank counter with their ID card to verify their identity before making the withdrawal. Last month, Qiao Xuening withdrew a large amount of cash from the bank, which can be verified through her account statements.
If she withdrew the money herself, it means she hadn't had plastic surgery yet; otherwise, the bank teller wouldn't have allowed her to withdraw such a large sum.
If a body double is going to withdraw the money, Qiao Xuening probably wouldn't entrust her bank account to the double's management, right? That would mean the double could truly replace her at any time.
Xiao Lou added, "I think the person who went to the bank to withdraw money last month was Qiao Xuening herself. If she arranged for a body double before getting plastic surgery... was it really necessary for her to change her face and give up her career in the entertainment industry just to kill Xu Kai?"
Yu Hanjiang thought about it carefully and said, "What you said makes sense. There's another way that satisfies both parties—she can avoid surgery and a complete face transplant, and instead have a temporary face transplant to impersonate someone else."
Xiao Lou understood and said, "Just like Jin Xiaoyue, do a disguise?"
Yu Hanjiang nodded: "Skillful makeup can make the face captured by the surveillance cameras look completely different from her real appearance. In winter, many people wear down jackets, making it difficult to discern her true figure. We need to carefully review the surveillance footage in the community again, checking each one one by one. Captain Li, could you please call the community security guards over to identify her?"
Captain Li Xinyang was completely confused, but he still cooperated by finding the community's security guards for help.
There were no security cameras at the entrance of Xu Kai's villa, but there were cameras at the intersection leading to the villa.
The killer must have entered Xu Kai's villa after he left, killed him, and then left. From the time Xu Kai went out drinking the night before last, to his murder at 4:30 pm yesterday, and then to the police arriving at the scene at 10:30 pm, every second of the surveillance footage must have been reviewed.
Xu Kai's villa faces south. There are two roads leading past the villa: one leads west to the west gate on the side of the community; the other leads to the widest main road in the community.
Yu Hanjiang opened the surveillance cameras at the two intersections on different computers and compared them.
The community security guard stood behind him, checking each passerby. Every now and then, he could hear the guard's voice: "This lady with the child is a resident of apartment 101 in Block C; I know this elderly lady, Aunt Zhang… and the man carrying the briefcase seems to be Mr. Li…"
The villa area has few residents, and the owners are all wealthy and influential. The security guards know more than 90% of the people there.
Yu Hanjiang instructed the security guards to rule out each pedestrian in the surveillance footage as a suspect.
Just as the video was playing at 7 p.m., a sanitation worker wearing an orange down jacket suddenly appeared on screen. She was holding a broom, head down, and walking into the villa area, sweeping the snow along the roadside. The surveillance camera at the intersection captured her figure. She slowly swept the snow forward and soon disappeared at the end of the road.
Yu Hanjiang frowned, immediately rewound a few seconds and pressed the pause button, freezing the image on the cleaner's back, and said, "Pull up the surveillance footage from the other side of this road, starting from 7 pm, and see when this cleaner went out."
Li Xinyang quickly pulled up the surveillance footage from the other side of the road on the computer next to him.
However...
Half an hour passed, and the cleaner still hadn't come out.
Around 7:30, Xu Kai's car drove out of the villa area, which is consistent with his cousin's testimony that he went to the entertainment club to drink with people around 7:30 last night.
In other words, the cleaner was nearby at the time and witnessed Xu Kai leaving.
The thought that there were eyes watching Xu Kai's car sent chills down Xiao Lou's spine.
The cleaner was wearing an oversized down jacket, cotton pants, and cotton shoes, making her look slightly bulky. From behind, she resembled a middle-aged woman, which was the key reason why Yu Hanjiang overlooked her during the first inspection.
Yu Hanjiang asked with a stern face, "Do you know her?"
The community security guard said, "We have a lot of cleaners in our community, so you can't tell just by looking at their backs."
She went to shovel snow on this road, but didn't come out of the intersection. Where else could she have gone?
Li Xinyang shuddered, getting goosebumps all over his body, and said, "It seems the murderer disguised herself as a cleaning lady and sneaked into the victim's villa? She was wearing such a large down jacket, so it's very likely she was hiding the murder weapon... and ice-making tools inside?"
Yu Hanjiang nodded and said in a deep voice, "Check the surveillance footage after 4:30 pm yesterday. I'll see how she got out."
Li Xinyang rewound the surveillance footage to 4:30 PM yesterday, the time Xu Kai died.
part.
Everyone stared wide-eyed at the intersection.
However, even when the police arrived at the scene at 10 p.m., they still couldn't find the cleaning lady.
The police conducted a thorough search of the entire villa. The murderer was definitely not in the villa. Could it be that she escaped again under a different guise?
Yu Hanjiang frowned: "Rewind the time of this intersection camera to 5:30 PM."
Li Xinyang did as instructed, and the video resumed playing at 5:30.
Yu Hanjiang stared at the screen with a serious expression. He had noticed a detail while watching the recording and needed to check it again.
The rush hour is from 5:30 to 7:00, and there were several pedestrians on the road.
Not long after, around 5:40, everyone noticed a man wearing a pure black down jacket, nearly 1.8 meters tall, wearing a hat and scarf, walking over. He was carrying a briefcase and seemed to be in a hurry, as if he had just finished get off work.
The camera captured his profile; he was wearing a mask and silver-rimmed glasses. His sharp eyebrows and narrow eyes gave him a commanding presence, making him look every bit the elite executive of the company.
The road where Xu Kai's house is located leads to another villa area. It makes sense if someone enters the community from the west gate after work and takes this road home.
Yu Hanjiang asked the security guard, "Do you know him?"
The security guard looked at it carefully and said, "I don't think I've seen it before."
Yu Hanjiang said, "Retrieve the CCTV footage from 5:30 PM at the west gate of the residential area."
Li Xinyang quickly found the footage from the security camera at the west gate. Yu Hanjiang stared intently at the screen, and everyone held their breath. However, fifteen minutes passed, and the man in the black down jacket still hadn't appeared at the west gate.
The west gate connects directly to the road in front of Xu Kai's villa. Yu Hanjiang paused the recording, locked onto the man, and said, "The surveillance cameras at the west gate didn't capture him, but he suddenly appeared on this road. Clearly, he didn't come in through the gate, but rather emerged from inside the residential area. We haven't found him at any other intersections near Xu Kai's villa either."
Li Xinyang's eyes lit up: "So, this is the murderer who escaped from Xu Kai's house?!"
Yu Hanjiang nodded: "That's the only explanation."
Xiao Lou analyzed seriously, "It seems that she first disguised herself as a cleaner, wearing an oversized down jacket, and sneaked into Xu Kai's house. Then, she used a container she carried to collect tap water and made a large amount of ice. She then hid in the villa and waited for Xu Kai to come home. She could have committed the crime in the middle of the night, but Xu Kai was drinking that night and didn't come home until almost dawn. Drunk, Xu Kai went upstairs and fell asleep immediately. She didn't do anything then, probably because she didn't want Xu Kai to die in his sleep, so she patiently waited for Xu Kai to wake up?"
Yu Hanjiang continued, "In the afternoon, we suddenly came to the door and rang the doorbell, waking Xu Kai up. The murderer probably didn't expect the police to come to the door. While we were questioning Xu Kai, she hid in the villa and eavesdropped. As soon as we left, Xu Kai went upstairs to take a shower, and she immediately killed Xu Kai, changed into another set of clothes, stuffed the cleaner's clothes into her down jacket, and fled."
No wonder the community's security cameras couldn't capture Qiao Xuening —she came in disguised as a cleaner, and left disguised as a man nearly 1.8 meters tall, wearing 12-centimeter platform shoes.
Li Xinyang pointed to her shoes and said, "These Martin boots, if they have hidden heels, you can't tell. After all, she's a woman, and if her legs are too thin, her figure will look disproportionate, so she bought this extra-long down jacket, the hem of which just covers her shoes."
From his appearance, he looks like a tall, muscular man; it's all due to the visual effect created by the down jacket.
In fact, she had a set of cleaning clothes stuffed inside her down jacket. She drew her original flat eyebrows into sword-shaped eyebrows, put on glasses, and even glued her double eyelids into single eyelids. After killing Xu Kai, she changed clothes on the spot at Xu Kai's house, transformed herself, and swaggered away from the community.
This murderer is truly the pioneer of the cross-dressing world.
Xiao Lou looked helplessly at Yu Hanjiang and said, "When we were at Xu Kai's house, she was hiding in the villa. She already knows we are investigating her, and she will definitely destroy the evidence quickly and run away."
Yu Hanjiang decisively said, "Go back to Binzhou immediately."
The two hurriedly drove back to Binzhou.
On the way back, Yu Hanjiang made several phone calls.
He told Qu Wanyue, "Immediately find a way to control Qiao Xuening from the crew, collect her fingerprints, and have Long Sen send them to the Forensic Doctor Center for identification."
Hearing Yu Hanjiang's serious tone, Qu Wanyue hurriedly nodded in agreement: "Okay. Captain Yu, what's the situation on your end?"
Yu Hanjiang said, "It's a serial murder case. The killer is on the run. We have to outrun the killer."
Qu Wanyue perked up: "I understand, I'll go right away."
Immediately afterwards, Yu Hanjiang called Binzhou Airport: "This is Binzhou City..." Captain Yu Hanjiang of the Criminal Police Department: We are currently investigating a murder case, and the perpetrator may be on the run. Anyone identified as Qiao Xuening is restricted from leaving the country. Also, anyone with suspicious identification information or whose makeup differs from their ID card will be detained.
The airport quickly launched an operation.
Yu Hanjiang sped up and drove back to Binzhou City overnight.
He came to Binzhou City When Xiao Lou arrived at the Forensic Doctor Center, his colleagues had already given him the results of the identification: "We compared the fingerprints sent by the film crew with the fingerprint database—this person's name is Yu Xia, and she died four years ago."
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