Chapter 55: Post-mortem Examination
Chapter 55: Post-mortem Examination
Translator: Azza
Editor: Conspiracing
After successfully opening an armed robber's mouth in the interrogation room to confess his crimes and tell them about his accomplices, Lin Qiupu came out to inform everyone to work overtime tonight and hurry to have a meal.
The policemen who have long been accustomed to this kind of life did not complain much, and went out in groups of three or five.
Lin Qiupu called Lin Dongxue, but she didn't pick up. According to his understanding of her for many years, she should be coming back soon.
Lin Qiupu went to the door. Sure enough, Lin Dongxue called several policemen to help move some bags from a car. Lin Qiupu asked as he walked over, “How is the situation?”
“Students are out of school. Only some of the school staff are present. It has not caused too much public disruption. The police have already protected the scene and the surrounding areas.”
“Are the staff contacts registered?”
“Registered.”
Seeing the serial numbers on the garbage bag, Lin Qiupu was about to praise his sister for doing a good job. At this time, Chen Shi came down from the car, smiled and greeted him. “Captain Lin, I haven't seen you for a long time.”
“Why are you two together again?!” Lin Qiupu blurted out.
Seeing the face of Lin Dongxue who looked embarrassed after everyone stopped to look upon hearing Lin Qiupu’s comment. Chen Shi patted Lin Qiupu’s shoulder and handed him a cigarette. Lin Qiupu didn’t accept it and hissed, “Nothing good ever happens when you’re around.”
“It wasn’t my fault this time. I was really just passing by.”
“Why don’t you tell me why there are murder cases whenever you ‘just pass by’?”
“It might be just my luck.”
Lin Qiupu glared at him and guided everyone to move the garbage bags in. Chen Shi also went in without being asked. Upon hearing there was a murder case, Peng Sijue waited in the forensic laboratory ahead of time. When he saw the garbage bags being carried in, he frowned.
Chen Shi stated, “There are six bags in total. The deceased should be a twelve to thirteen-year-old boy. I roughly looked through the bags. All the 'parts' are here. The bottom of the bag has blood due to the oozing, but the mouth of the bag is very clean. The surrounding garbage bags are also stained with blood. The culprit should have deliberately put the bag in the middle.”
Lin Qiupu coughed as if to indicate that he was the captain, not Chen Shi.
“I am just stating my findings. Is there a problem?” Chen Shi asked.
“You standing here is already a problem!”
“Alright, alright! Everyone who doesn’t belong here needs to leave!” Peng Sijue drove out the crowd.
Lin Qiupu needed to stay and watch the autopsy. While he was changing into his disinfected suit, he realized that Chen Shi was also changing. He glared at him. Chen Shi teased, “Captain Lin, why have you been staring at me like that all day today?”
“Who allowed you to be here?”
“No one said I wasn’t allowed to be here though?”
“Then I am ordering you to leave right now!”
Peng Sijue mediated, “Captain Lin, let him stay. We just need to make sure he doesn’t do anything besides watching.”
Lin Qiupu secretly fumed in confusion. When was Peng Sijue bribed by this guy?
After they set up the recording camera, Peng Sijue and his assistant pushed two iron frame beds together to prepare for the post-mortem examination. The two poured out all the bits of the dismembered body from the garbage bags that carried them. In addition to the body parts of the corpse, a thick stack of tissue paper was placed at the bottom of the bags. Peng Sijue took a few of them as evidence samples.
Everyone silently watched Peng Sijue reassemble the body. The process was very long. He arranged the parts in the original order as best as he could. Finally, he declared, “It seems that all the organs are here without any omissions. Based off of the characteristics and the size of the body, we can infer that this is indeed a teenage boy.”
“How could they do this to the poor child?!” Lin Qiupu shook his head. “What is the cause of death?”
“From the edge of these parts, we can tell that a heavy blade was used to separate the corpse. It should be a very heavy kitchen knife. There aren’t any obvious injuries to show that he sustained injuries while he was alive... There is a large area of contusion around the head and eyes. The right eyeball is damaged the most severely. I speculate that the murderer used a blunt weapon to hit the head of the deceased with a lot of strength until the victim was killed.”
Whilst explaining, Peng Sijue used a ruler to measure the length and width of the fatal wound and let the assistant record it.
Lin Qiupu reasoned, “The wound’s angle makes it seem like he was hit from the front.”
“Yes, the heaviest blow is from the front. This should be the first blow. Other injuries and the central axis of the spine have a slight bend of about 15 degrees.”
“Then, it is likely that the murderer hit the victim onto the ground with the first blow, then proceeded to hit him repeatedly while on top of him.”
When the other two were about to reach a consensus, Chen Shi interjected. “Wait, the blood around the neck is obviously a little lighter than the rest. I remember reading a book that described how when a vein is cut, there would be a lot of air entering the blood vessels, saturating the blood with oxygen. The fusion of blood and the excess oxygen turns the blood into a plum-red colour.”
“Are you saying that the cause of death is not the hit on the head?” Lin Qiupu heckled.
“I was just stating my opinion.”
“Xiao Wang, create an arterial blood gas test.”
The assistant took the blood sample and went out. Peng Sijue used tweezers to open the skin and muscle layers away from the neck wound to inspect. “This wound is indeed a bit like an injury sustained while the victim was alive.”
At this time, the assistant came back in and handed the test results over. Peng Sijue glanced at the result and asserted, “He was right.”
Lin Qiupu looked at Chen Shi with the look of a sore loser. Chen Shi smiled back at him and said, “Luck. It was just luck.”
Peng Sijue speculated, “It seems that the murderer thought that the deceased had already died. In fact, the deceased only entered into a coma. Then, when he was dismembered, the slash to his neck was the real cause of death.”
Although Lin Qiupu was a little dissatisfied, he has also handled dismemberment cases before. This kind of thing was possible. Some victims would even sit back up while the murderer was dismembering them.
He glanced at the forehead of the deceased. The entire head was beaten to a pulp and was entirely covered in blood. Since the deceased’s head had all those brutal injuries, anyone would think that it was a fatal wound.
Then, they began to judge the time of death. This time, there were no objections from any of them. From all kinds of signs, the time of death did not exceed five hours.
Lin Qiupu inquired, “Are you able to restore the face of the deceased?”
Peng Sijue responded in turn, “It should be possible given time.”
Chen Shi crossed his arms in thought. “If the first strike is from the front, as the height of the deceased is only about one meter fifty, how tall would the murderer be?”
“Would it be a child too?” asked the assistant.
“From killing to throwing the body away, it took less than five hours. Could a child have done the deed so smoothly? It should be that the deceased was standing at a fairly high place, or because he was lying down.” Lin Qiupu put forward his own point of view.
“Prepare to do the post-mortem examination.” Peng Sijue announced.
Peng Sijue cut open the organs of the deceased one by one and obtained samples from them. When the esophagus was cut, everyone found that there was some food residue inside. The inner wall of the esophagus had signs of corrosion by stomach acid, and the stench of vomit filled the room.
Peng Sijue proclaimed, “There’s acid reflux. It may have been due to the vomiting reflex caused by the blow to the head.”
Then, he took out the stomach as a whole and the assistant used a plate to hold it. Peng Sijue cut the stomach open and noted that there was not too much food residue. From the level of digestion that could be seen, the deceased had not had dinner at the time he was killed, which was consistent with the estimated time of death.
Chen Shi smelled a slightly sweet smell and determined, “It’s coke.”
“We can only know after a test.” Peng Sijue used a cotton swab to sample the contents.
“Is there anything in the cola the victim drank?” Facing Lin Qiupu's unhappy expression, Chen Shi shrugged his shoulders. “I just said that casually! There’s no harm in testing it, right?”