Chapter 148 - 148 144 Footprints

Words : 1612 Updated : Sep 17th, 2025

148: Chapter 144 Footprints 148: Chapter 144 Footprints In the office. The computer hummed loudly, and the desktop was a mess. Wang Zhong aggressively searched for cases, but his actual efficiency was not high. Primarily because cases were not categorized by footprints. As a form of evidence, footprints were relatively useful. Imagine in a case, a footprint matched the pattern and wear on the suspect’s shoe—it could corroborate that the suspect had been at the crime scene. However, footprints as clues were sufficient for active cases but somewhat inadequate for cold cases. Unlike DNA and fingerprints which have corresponding databases, footprints do not have a database. At this stage, the police database only contained footprints collected from the crime scenes, basically only usable on a case-by-case basis. Jiang Yuan watched Wang Zhong’s operation and soon lost his patience, saying, “How about this? Just extract the images of the footprints; I think I saw that was possible earlier?” “You mean just look at the images of the footprints? Directly view the image library?” Wang Zhong didn’t quite understand. Jiang Yuan nodded, “Exactly, just display the images of the footprints.” “This... Is it okay to not look at the cases?” “I’ll find a footprint I like first, then look at the cases,” said Jiang Yuan. “Alright.” Wang Zhong, not understanding what kind of footprints Jiang Yuan preferred, found the footprints image gallery and began flipping through them. Jiang Yuan stood nearby, studying the footprints in the images, as a flood of information came to mind. Height! Weight! Age! Foot characteristics! Gait characteristics! Wear patterns! Jiang Yuan wanted to find a unique footprint. Using footprints to solve cold cases was rather difficult, and Jiang Yuan didn’t aim to solve a case with every footprint; that was unrealistic. However, Jiang Yuan believed that in such a large image library, with so many crime scene footprints, there must be one or two peculiar footprints to find. “I’ll do it myself,” Jiang Yuan said upon seeing that Wang Zhong wasn’t performing any other actions; there was no need for him to keep pressing keys and interfering with Jiang Yuan’s process. Taking Wang Zhong’s place, Jiang Yuan leisurely continued scanning through the images. Wang Zhong was pleased with this. He just watched Jiang Yuan’s actions, wondering to himself: Could it really just be at the level of homework after class? Probably something he just learned on the spot, otherwise, he wouldn’t have never used it before. So, a newly learned skill couldn’t be that great, right? Just as Wang Zhong thought about stepping away, with a squeak, Jiang Yuan pushed back his chair and stood up. “Bring up this case to have a look,” Jiang Yuan moved aside, signaling Wang Zhong to operate the computer; he was not very familiar with the software here. Wang Zhong glanced at the footprint image and with a look of surprise, said, “Blood footprints?” Yes, the image in front of him contained a set of blood footprints. As is well known, it’s not easy to leave a blood footprint with minor injuries. And with severe injuries and homicides, plus the complexity of a cold case, it definitely wouldn’t be easy to crack. Even if it was solvable back then, now it’s probably difficult as well. Wang Zhong returned to his seat, opened the case, read a few details, and quickly gave the place back to Jiang Yuan. Yan Ge, also in the office, heard “blood footprints” and got up to come over and take a look. Jiang Yuan, without any hesitation, sat down and began to read the case. The case wasn’t complicated, in a Yang family household at Shanghe Village in the suburbs of the city, the male head of the family, who was in the prime of his life, was found dead at home, the murder weapon being a sickle from his own house. The sickle had bloodstains on it but no fingerprints. Furthermore, no usable fingerprints or DNA were collected at the scene, but there were a large quantity of footprints. During the initial phase of the investigation, it was suspected to be a dispute among villagers, so all villagers were questioned, and their statements recorded. Footprints of the entire village were also collected and compared, but nothing was found. Latterly, the direction of the investigation shifted to a burglary, hypothesizing that the thief, when discovered, panicked, escalated to murder, and fled. The responsible criminal police then swept all nearby thieves and paid special attention to thieves who had been active initially but disappeared later on, yet the case still remained unsolved. Jiang Yuan looked at a series of bloody footprints, and then, opened up the analysis on the footprints. Unsurprisingly, the analysis of the footprints was also over a hundred words long, obviously the work of an expert. “Our trace evidence analyst from Qinghe City Bureau, Chen Wenming, has quite a reputation for footprint analysis. He handled this one.” The case wasn’t even ten years old, and Yan Ge remembered it clearly, having been directly involved with the footprints. Jiang Yuan gave a grunt of acknowledgment and first skimmed to the conclusion: Height: 178-185 centimeters. Age: Between 18-23 years old The direction of the footfalls was consistent; the imprints of the forefoot and the imprint shapes on the heel were basically the same. There was no estimate for weight, but the language regarding age determination was quite extensive: In a full stride, the step was large, moving energetically and nimbly, with small step angles and consistent step widths... The pronounced pressure points were on the inner side of the forefront, with imprints leaning toward the front... estimating the age to be between 18 to 23 years old. The height was estimated by the length from the front edge of the toe imprint to the back edge of the heel imprint, in other words, based on the length of the foot. This was at odds with Jiang Yuan’s own determination of the footprints. However, it was appropriate that there were discrepancies; if they perfectly matched, then Jiang Yuan’s own analysis wouldn’t theoretically contribute anything new to the case. “Check who the responsible officer is. I’ll give them a call to inquire,” Jiang Yuan humbly suggested. Wang Zhong saw through Jiang Yuan’s “humility” at a glance. As he found the phone number, he cautiously reminded him, “It’s Captain Wu Junhao from the first squad. Captain Wu is known for having a bit of a temper; try not to be too blunt.” “Alright,” Jiang Yuan replied, having a deep impression of the burly Captain Wu Junhao. As soon as he dialed, Wu Junhao’s loud voice came booming out from the handset, “Doctor Jiang, do you have some good work for your brother here?” Frowning at the screen, Jiang Yuan switched to speakerphone before saying, “Captain Wu, I came across a cold case that you handled before, and I’d like to discuss it with you.” “Oh, talk... just go around that son of a turtle!” Wu Junhao bellowed, before his voice shifted to a laugh, “I’m in the middle of catching someone, go ahead.” Jiang Yuan said, “Do you remember the murder case of Yang Gan from Shanghe Village?” Wu Junhao was visibly taken aback, “Why bring up that case all of a sudden, did you find something related?” “I’ve examined the footprints from that case, and I believe the murderer’s height is quite peculiar. My judgment is that the murderer could very well be 193 centimeters tall—an exceptionally conspicuous height.” This was the reason Jiang Yuan had chosen to pursue the case. In Shannan Province, the average height was quite tall, with men over 180 centimeters being a common sight on the streets. Nevertheless, a height of 193 centimeters would still stand out from the crowd, significantly narrowing down the range of possible suspects. Over the phone, the panting sound of running abruptly ceased. Wu Junhao inquired, “193 centimeters is pretty tall. Chen Wenming estimated between 180 and 185. How confident are you...” Jiang Yuan replied, “The length and width of sports shoes are usually slightly larger than those of leather shoes, though this is not a fundamental difference...” “But starting from this point, I believe the sports shoes the murderer wore that day were a bit small...” “Moreover, the actual size of the murderer’s foot might be smaller than normal proportions...” Jiang Yuan paused for a moment, then directly asked, “When you worked on the case, did you have any suspects who were around 193 centimeters tall?” Wu Junhao seemed to sink into his memories for a while. After a long pause, amidst the noise in the background, Wu Junhao said, “I have to go back and check my notes.” Jiang Yuan reminded him, “If they were 193 centimeters tall, you should have a distinct memory of them.” “Yeah, I’ll check my notebook and let you know,” Wu Junhao suddenly became serious in the face of the specific case details. Jiang Yuan could only agree, and then, as he recalled those moments in movies and TV shows where the characters going to retrieve crucial evidence were always killed just in time, he quickly added a word of caution, “Please be careful.” “Alright,” Wu Junhao replied loudly, moving the phone away and shouting, “Catch that little bastard, don’t bother coming back for dinner if you can’t catch him!” “This kid runs faster than a rabbit.” “Then you guys had better learn from dogs and corner him for me!”

Chapter 148 - 148 144 Footprints

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