Chapter 590: Chapter 590: The Serial Disappearance Case
No disturbances, the two of them took a nap, and Lu Chuan also dozed off on the couch for a while.
The workload in the homicide squad is extremely heavy, and Lu Chuan hasn’t really rested properly for quite some time.
Even though he had a good night’s sleep last night, he still felt very fatigued.
When he woke up again, it was already five in the afternoon.
Lu Chuan opened his eyes groggily, covered with a police uniform.
"Aren’t you just back from the homicide squad? Why don’t you rest at home for a couple of days? You look exhausted and probably didn’t rest well."
Yang Sen saw Lu Chuan waking up and handed him a cup of tea that had been brewed long ago.
Lu Chuan was indeed thirsty, took the large cup, and drank it down in one go.
"Brother Yang, what time is it?"
"What time? You slept all afternoon, and it’s almost half an hour before the shift ends."
"Oh..."
Lu Chuan rubbed his head, originally intending to just rest for a bit, but ended up sleeping the whole afternoon.
"Where’s Brother Bai?"
"There was a crime scene this afternoon, he went to help out."
"Is there a case?"
"Nothing major, since you left, our team hasn’t received any big cases, everything has been unusually calm."
It’s curious, when Lu Chuan was around, it felt like there were constant cases, everyone always busy.
But as soon as he left, the criminal investigation team hasn’t had any work, and it’s been quite dull for everyone recently.
Yang Sen and Old Bai hadn’t been on a scene for over ten days.
This afternoon, a local station, an old friend came across a case, called Old Bai, and he eagerly went over to help out.
With nothing going on at the criminal investigation team, it’s better to check out the scene.
"I heard you got another commendation?"
Lu Chuan had cracked a case in the homicide squad, and though the details weren’t widely publicized, everyone within the system knew about the big deal the homicide squad accomplished, and word spread fast.
Not to mention the recent family extermination case in Tianzhou City, but that was just a recent incident.
But the Qinzhou City 116 case, there’s hardly anyone in criminal investigation who doesn’t know about it.
Yang Sen and a few others had studied that case back then.
Unexpectedly, Lu Chuan sorted it out swiftly when he went over.
"It’s nothing, just a bit lucky."
Lucky?
Yang Sen shook his head, wondering why he never had such luck.
"Alright, no need to be modest in front of me, freshen up and wash your face, the shift’s about to end. Go home and rest, I’ll talk to Old Liu, you can stay home for a couple of days since there’s nothing going on."
Lu Chuan felt it wasn’t necessary, having just slept the afternoon, feeling much better, and planned to get a good rest tonight, and be back to normal tomorrow.
"Oh? Just woke up?"
As they chatted, the office door opened, and they saw Old Bai had returned.
Just entering the door, Old Bai saw Lu Chuan sitting on the couch, still draped in his police uniform, knowing he had just woken up not long ago.
This guy must be exhausted, otherwise, he wouldn’t have slept the whole afternoon. Having finished a round of work outside, Old Bai just returned to find Lu Chuan waking up.
"Brother Bai."
Lu Chuan greeted him and got up to hang his uniform.
"How was it at the scene?"
Yang Sen casually asked Old Bai about the crime scene investigation status.
It’s nothing big, a local station took on a missing person’s case.
"Just a missing person, nothing much to it."
The scene of a missing person case generally doesn’t have many clues, unless it’s a kidnapping, otherwise, Crime Scene Investigation rarely finds significant leads.
Old Bai just didn’t want to stay in the office, coincidentally an old friend called for help, so he went out for a while.
Missing person cases...
Neither Lu Chuan nor Yang Sen paid much attention.
In a large city like Haizhou City, when doesn’t someone go missing?
Haizhou City has a very large population base, with frequent cases of all types.
Some local police stations are busy from dawn till dusk, overwhelmed.
For example, Yang Lin’s Huaguang Street police station.
The area is not large, but it has a large population, numerous entertainment venues, a heavy transient population, but very few officers.
They have a total of 50 officers responsible for the workload of an area.
Plus, over 200 auxiliary police to help out.
But they are still overwhelmingly busy.
Even though the station has 50 officers, only about 40 are actually working, and over a dozen of those are internal staff, leaving about 30 officers to handle outdoor duties.
These 30 are split into 3 shifts of 10 each, working in rotations.
The station’s shifts differ from general company shifts; not an 8-hour rotation, but a 24-hour schedule per shift.
So 10 regular officers combined with 20 or 30 auxiliary officers form one shift.
While Huaguang Street police station manages about twenty cases of various sizes daily, with a dozen disputes.
Other minor tasks like handling household registrations and IDs aren’t even counted in that.
Thus, grassroots workloads are exceptionally heavy and arduous.
As opposed to units like the criminal investigation team, without cases, they can work regular hours.
But, that’s only when there are no cases.
Speaking of the case-handling frequency in the criminal investigation team, there are few days in a year like this.
Not to mention, during Lu Chuan’s over ten days supporting reorganization case-handling, nearly half a month of continuous work without rest, working through nights with no compensations.
Of course, there’s no choice in the matter. Who wouldn’t want a break? Who doesn’t crave weekends?
But once a case starts, there’s no concept of time, hard to ignore a rare lead just because it’s a Saturday.
Criminals don’t schedule their crimes on weekdays over weekends.
With no immediate work, the three chatted about Lu Chuan’s involvement in cases with the homicide squad.
"You’re incredible, I’ve read the 116 case file myself, got nowhere, heard even experts from the provincial department couldn’t solve it."
Old Bai admired Lu Chuan for cracking the Qinzhou City 116 case.
Lu Chuan chuckled: "It was just luck."
Indeed, Lu Chuan wasn’t just being modest or perfunctory.
He had seen that case file back in school and knew it was a tough nut.
But this time a breakthrough came because the family extermination case in Tianzhou City unveiled damaged fingerprints of the suspect.
Plus growing suspicions towards the survivor led to cracking the case later.
If not for the family case discovery, even if Lu Chuan worked on the 116 case, it probably wouldn’t have been solved.
After all, the offense suffered by Xi Mengyao was very real.
And having eight stitches on the head, who would suspect a student who almost got killed?
After some light talk, the three prepared to leave work.
No case, a happy occasion, Lu Chuan especially so.
As he had a date with Forensic Doctor Shen that evening.
But happy days seldom endure.
Three days later.
Qin Yong chaired a meeting.
The reason was simple, there’s been a noticeable increase in missing persons in Haizhou City lately.
In just one week, over ten people disappeared!
