Chapter 234: Chapter 231 The Storage Card Inside_1
Sun Gaotie had now approached, seemingly eager to try.
Zhu Xingxing stepped aside, and Sun Gaotie began shaving the head; they did not use electric clippers, those devices although fast, tend to scatter hair everywhere, which could interfere with the observation during the autopsy.
A razor blade flashed quickly, and in no time, the smooth scalp had been completely cleaned.
At this point, Zhu Xingxing noticed that the top and forehead of the corpse’s head were somewhat congested and swollen, it seemed that her external examination was too cursory and had missed these marks.
Mr. Zhao stepped closer to take pictures, only then did Zhu Xingxing raise the scalpel and, using the technique taught by Zhou Ning, made an incision from behind both ears across the top of the skull, peeled it forward and backward, and then sawed the skull parallel.
Now it could be seen that there was slight congestion in the brain tissue at the front part of the corpse’s head, clearly indicating a severe impact, yet the surface swelling was not serious, which left Zhu Xingxing somewhat puzzled.
"Based on this injury, the victim must have hit his head directly on the ground, but the swelling on his forehead isn’t obvious, right?"
It was only then that Zhou Ning put down his arm and, pointing to the position of the corpse’s scalp, said:
"Everything must be considered in context. The victim was 184 centimeters tall and weighed around 190 pounds without blood loss. A direct head impact on the ground would not result in such simple injuries.
Look carefully at the swelling of the scalp; when you were making the incision, you should have noticed the scalp had lacerations and that there were signs of congestion, which seem more severe, right?"
Zhu Xingxing nodded, while Sun Gaotie also moved closer to the other side as Zhou Ning continued.
"The victim had bruises on his knees, and his right shin bone had impact injuries, but there were no defensive wounds on his nails or hands, indicating that the perpetrator had assaulted the victim at the scene of the crime, but the victim did not resist. Instead of reacting with rage or resistance after being kicked, he kneeled straight down.
Maybe it was his own doing, or the perpetrator demanded it, but when he presented the laptop to the perpetrator, his hair was still dragged by the perpetrator. You did not check the victim’s back just now; add that to the examination later. At the scene, I noticed an oval bruise on the victim’s back.
I think the perpetrator forced his knee against the victim’s back, right hand holding the victim’s hair, questioning him about something, and when he did not get a satisfactory answer, slit the victim’s neck with a knife.
Since the perpetrator was behind the victim, the blood sprayed from the victim’s neck was at a 45° angle, which would minimize the chance of the blood splattering onto the perpetrator. This action is similar to how pirates execute their captives.
Of course, some people are decapitated directly, but that would cause a lot of blood to splatter. Whether in the case of Fang Wenjie or Qin Xuejin, the perpetrator has a habit that remains consistent: he is extremely averse to having blood splatter on him."
Mr. Zhao, looking more serious than usual, moved closer, looked at Zhou Ning, and hesitatingly spoke:
"I remember it was mentioned before that before Qin Xuejin was imprisoned, he worked at Beishan Group. He was implicated and sent to prison not because of corruption or financial fraud, but for harboring a suspect, providing a vehicle and covering up the suspect’s whereabouts. Could it be related to Beishan Group’s affairs?"
Zhou Ning thought for a moment and looked at Mr. Zhao.
"If that’s the case, what about Fang Wenjie?"
Mr. Zhao fell silent, understanding Zhou Ning’s implication.
Fang Wenjie’s resume was very clear, he started out as a financial manager at Guanghai Pharmaceutical Company, then founded the group, and step by step made his way up, becoming a very distinguished figure. Although Guanghai Pharmaceuticals was rumored to be related to Beishan Group, it did not involve them.
"But there must be some connection. If we look at their personal relationship, they were a former husband and wife, one doggedly pursuing, the other completely ignoring, totally unrelated. Even many days after Fang Wenjie’s death, Qin Xuejin didn’t notice anything unusual."
Zhu Xingxing approached, raised her hand, and Mr. Zhao looked at her, then gestured with his chin for her to speak.
"I think it’s not that Qin Xuejin didn’t find anything unusual, it’s that Fang Wenjie had always been like that to him. But leader, there’s something I really don’t understand. Isn’t that Qin Xuejin had been to prison? I remember reading a report that said financial staff members who are released from prison aren’t allowed to work in the same industry for five years, and even their credentials should be revoked."
Mr. Zhao waved his hand, with a look of unwillingness to entertain the question.
"We’re analyzing important stuff here, can you not cause a disturbance with your questions right now? What you’re talking about, it needs a prefix, like embezzling public funds, or falsifying financial records, and so on; it’s not saying that people who go to prison for fighting or wounding others should be treated the same."
Zhu Xingxing realized her mistake and quickly stepped back to reduce her presence.
Zhou Ning stared at the screen displaying the X-rays taken earlier, and then opened the X-rays taken yesterday during Fang Wenjie’s autopsy. He had never expected the two men to reunite posthumously in this manner.
Zhou Ning moved the mouse, and his movement suddenly halted. When he had switched X-rays just now, it seemed he saw a dimly bright spot on Qin Xuejin’s body.
He quickly adjusted the image back, and now the picture had returned to its previous whole state, but from this view, he could not see the bright spot anymore. Mr. Zhao leaned in closer.
"What’s wrong?"
"Help me look, just now I saw a bright spot on this image, square-shaped, but while I was scrolling, I accidentally closed the image, and now I can’t find the exact part."
"Square-shaped bright spot?"
Zhou Ning nodded, and without further ado, everyone gathered around the large screen, carefully examining the enlarged images inch by inch. Suddenly, Zhou Ning spotted the bright spot under the arm of the corpse.
"Quick, get the body back here, check the victim’s left armpit and the inner side of the arm to see if there’s something there."
At Zhou Ning’s order, everyone sprang into action.
Allowing Zhu Xingxing to perform this autopsy was an indication of one thing: little information could be obtained from this victim’s examination, so Zhou Ning dared to let go. At that moment, he truly regretted not having felt it himself.
The staff from the freezer also came along to confirm, after all, it was the first time they had encountered an incident where a body had just been shipped out and then brought back.
Second autopsies were common, but it was rare to divide a single autopsy into a ’first and second half.’
When the body was brought in, Zhou Ning immediately lifted the deceased’s left arm, starting from the edge of the ribs to the armpit, checking for anything unusual; he found nothing. He then examined the inner side of the deceased’s forearm. Just then, Zhou Ning noticed that there was a suture scar on the inside of the upper arm, towards the back.
Though the scab had fallen off, the area still looked quite red. Zhou Ning picked up a scalpel and gently sliced open the surface of the skin, revealing a storage card the size of a green bean.
The card was wrapped in a thin film. Judging by the state of healing, it was about a month after the stitches were removed, plus seven days for stitch removal. So, it would have been around December 22nd when Fang Wenjie was fired, that this card was implanted in the body.
Zhou Ning instantly felt chills. He grabbed the card, ripped off his isolation suit, and hurried upstairs. Mr. Zhao followed closely, dialing Mr. Qu’s number on his phone.
"Mr. Qu, are you in the lab?"
"Yes, I am!"
"Great, we’re coming up. We’ve got an emergency, need help reading the contents of a storage card. Oh, is Mr. Xia there?"
"Mr. Xia left, she had to go back to Qin University this afternoon, seems like she had to sign something, I’m not sure what for."
Moments later, the two men arrived at the lab. Hearing footsteps, Mr. Qu came to open the door and looked puzzled at the two men in a rush.
"What’s wrong? Weren’t you two out at a crime scene? Is there another case?"
"Yes, the ex-wife died first, followed by her ex-husband."
Mr. Qu shook his head, smiling; he was not interested in these matters.
"Hurry up and tell me, which storage card do you need me to recover?"
Zhou Ning handed the card to Mr. Qu, who saw the blood on it and his smile vanished.
"Where did this come from?"
"Pulled it out of a corpse, wrapped in plastic wrap and sewn under the skin. Definitely the work of a ruthless person."
Mr. Qu shuddered, grabbed an alcohol wipe, and cleaned it up, while Mr. Zhao smirked, knowing Mr. Qu was scared.
"You’ve been working in the lab for a while now, haven’t you gotten used to this?"
"I’ve seen autopsies, but who has seen storage cards hidden inside a body?"
Zhou Ning approached them.
"You two, stop it. This card looks much smaller than a regular storage card. Can you see what’s stored on it?"
Mr. Qu, now serious, said:
"These kinds of storage cards are rare; normal card readers can’t detect them, but I can read it."
After saying this, he put the cleaned card into a card reader with numerous slots all over it, looking every bit like a Rubik’s Cube.
As soon as the card was inserted, a dialogue box appeared on the reader, asking for a password. Zhou Ning patted Mr. Qu’s shoulder.
"You can crack it, right?"
Mr. Qu glanced at it, counted the number of digits, and opened a software tool to start the cracking process, a dialogue box with changing numbers and letters appearing alongside.
"Pretty professional setup. Give me ten minutes; I should be able to crack it."
The wait wasn’t long, and the dialogue box began to display a stream of numbers and letters. With a ’beep’, the password was successfully entered, and the page displayed a compressed file taskbar.
Mr. Qu, intrigued, clicked through step by step, and as the decompression finished, a folder appeared with numerous files inside. He randomly opened one, and it was a photograph of accounts, along with some spreadsheets.
After reading the contents, Zhou Ning could not conceal his shock. Inside were mainly two parts: one was the offshore remittance details of the Guanghai Pharmaceutical Group, along with a list of names, amounts, dates, and video numbers corresponding to a series of unsavory surveillance footage. It was obvious that this content was of some officials being filmed while accepting bribes, including some explicit ’performances.’ Zhou Ning did not recognize these officials.
In another file, there was a complete set of accounts, which he truly couldn’t understand. However, from the names marked on it, one could see that these were two sets of books from Guanghai Pharmaceuticals, along with some other documents, all of which were photographs.
He could see the slender fingers of the person taking the photos, especially a faint scar on the right index finger, clearly the hand of a woman.
Zhou Ning recalled his examination of Fang Wenjie’s hands during the autopsy; her hands were not slender, the joints rather large—clearly not Fang Wenjie’s hand. So how did these items come about?
