Chapter 376 - 376 343 Poisoning Case

Words : 1594 Updated : Oct 11th, 2025

376: Chapter 343 Poisoning Case 376: Chapter 343 Poisoning Case Song Jinyou suddenly realized that he had encountered a great opportunity. Jiang Yuan’s strength was beyond doubt, evident from the fact that he had his own team and young people from the Changyang City Criminal Police Detachment were willing to join him. It was extremely difficult to get a position in Changyang City. Having secured a position there and then willingly following Jiang Yuan to Ningtai County, when such trust was based on ability, how strong must that ability be? Song Jinyou hadn’t originally thought that he could make use of Jiang Yuan’s strength. He had heard about the high price Jiang Yuan commanded when he offered his services to Changyang City. Unexpectedly, Jiang Yuan now took the initiative to offer to work on a case, which effectively meant using a wish-granting bottle for free. Why be polite? The first case that crossed Song Jinyou’s mind was an unusual one, so he said, “Speaking of complex and bizarre cases, we really do have one here. How about a poisoning case?” In Song Jinyou’s expectation, it was more like inviting someone to work on the poisoning case together. Jiang Yuan nodded and said, “Let’s take a look.” Police substations don’t handle homicide cases. Theoretically, larger cases are handed over to the detective squad. Therefore, the most common cases at the substations are fights, thefts, and small-scale crimes. Of course, cases in the town’s substations are somewhat more complex, and especially when the detective squad is busy, some cases are dealt with by the substations themselves. Song Jinyou cleared his throat twice and said, “This case is from Lanzhu Village, and it hasn’t been filed yet.” There had been a report but no case filed, which was a current sore point in police-citizen relations. Both the police and the public have their own grievances. On this matter, various government levels had already established multiple auxiliary means. Normally, if ordinary people encountered a situation where the police wouldn’t file a case, the simplest method was to request a notice of refusal to file from the police officer involved. In cases where this demand is made and adhered to, the police officer will usually reconsider whether to file the case and give a serious reply. In big cities, unless the situation was such that a case could not be filed, like certain civil disputes, people normally received relatively satisfactory responses. The Lanzhu Village mentioned by Song Jinyou clearly didn’t know how to navigate this aspect well. Jiang Yuan became somewhat curious and said, “You haven’t filed the case, and yet you still keep it in mind?” There was no need for false modesty; a detective like Jiang Yuan, who had handled more than a dozen homicide cold cases, was considered first-rate nationwide. With a growing reputation in Shan Nan Province, Song Jinyou offered him this case at once, even though it hadn’t been filed yet, indicating there must be some special circumstances. Song Jinyou sighed and said, “This poisoning case in Lanzhu Village is a bit unusual, even peculiar. The first report was made last year, concerning the death of their village livestock, including chickens, ducks, geese, pigs, cattle, and sheep, which had been happening for several years. This time they reported because fish in the pond died, and the loss was estimated to be around ten thousand yuan, prompting them to file a police report.” “So, you mean the poisoning has been ongoing for several years?” Jiang Yuan asked. “It appears so. The problem is, we haven’t confirmed the poisoning,” Song Jinyou said with a sense of helplessness. “Lanzhu Village is the most remote and isolated village in our township, deep within the mountains. The roads are bad, and it used to take over ten hours to reach there. They actually didn’t like coming out to report to the police. It is only in the past two years, as the roads improved, and more villagers went out to work, that they became aware of the possibility of poisoning.” Jiang Yuan nodded. “After the report, we called for experts from the township’s agriculture technical station to join us in checking, but too much time had passed. They came out on the third day after the fish died, and reported on the fourth day. By the time we arrived, it had already been a week, and no poisons were detected in the water samples we collected. The matter was left at that.” Song Jinyou said, scratching his head, “In the following few months, two more pigs died in their village. We got there quickly this time, but just like before, we couldn’t detect any poison. Then came this year, and a donkey died. We arrived on the third day, but still, no poison was found.” “And it’s not just that, in the span of over a year, three incidents occurred. Chickens, ducks, and geese also died in the meantime, but no one reported those cases.” “Another issue is that some of the villagers in Lanzhu Village aren’t very supportive of our investigation. They believe it’s evil spirits or that they’ve offended a mountain god or something. In short, they would rather solve problems by resorting to shamans. If it weren’t for a few younger villagers who have stepped forward, they probably wouldn’t even want to report these incidents.” Listening to Song Jinyou’s story, Tang Jia’s impression of him changed significantly, and she couldn’t help saying, “Chief Song, you’re still concerned about them? Cases like these are indeed troublesome if the victims themselves are not interested in solving them...” “Not all victims are unwilling to report,” Song Jinyou said a bit sheepishly. “This year, about the family whose pig died, even though they haven’t had any more large livestock die, their chickens, ducks, and geese have continued to die. Their son has come to find me at the station a few times. I’ve been to Lanzhu Village twice as well, but to be honest, I really don’t have any clues about this case.” Poisoning cases are very difficult to investigate, especially those that are not targeted at specific individuals. In urban environments, they mostly rely on surveillance cameras. Occasionally, a case can be solved by tracing the source of the poison, but this method is actually very difficult. It requires very accurate identification of the poison, which generally can only be done in provincial-level laboratories. In rural areas, both of these methods are very limited. As for surveillance, it’s needless to say that rural areas hardly have any. And if there is any, it’s certainly not of much use. As for relying on the source of the poison, unless it’s a very special kind of poison, the pesticides and insecticides commonly used in rural areas are already excellent sources of poison. Moreover, they’re often similar in variety and batch, making them almost impossible to trace. However, Jiang Yuan’s approach to solving cases rarely relied on surveillance and physicochemical analysis. So, he directly asked Song Jinyou, “Chief Song, what evidence do you currently have?” “We took photographs of the dead fish in the pond, the dead pigs, and the dead donkey in these three incidents. I’ve already asked someone to get them. Additionally, we’ve recorded some statements. I believe the perpetrator must be someone from the village, but with hundreds of villagers...” Song Jinyou shook his head. “Is the village that far away still home to several hundred people?” “Locals live on the mountain resources, so their income is actually quite good. More than half of them commute between the village and outside. When it’s time to harvest mountain goods, they come back to do some work, digging bamboo shoots, catching bamboo rats, picking mushrooms, and collecting herbs. They also grow medicinal herbs in the village. And there are these pig and chicken farmers... none of them have been doing well these past two years...” Song Jinyou seemed to have really studied the case, speaking with authority. “What were your previous considerations?” Jiang Yuan continued to inquire, as it was important to know which paths had been dead ends for the predecessors. Song Jinyou, having opened up, spoke frankly, “At first, I made a list of suspects and tried to find someone based on the time they were not present, as the locals all have roughly fixed times for going out to work and rhythms for returning. But I didn’t discover anything significant...” “As for the victims, they are scattered throughout the village. I tried to find commonalities among the victims, but found none.” “The main issue is the poison. Initially, my idea was to wait for a while and see if the next case would provide a breakthrough. But even with the last incident involving the dead donkey, we found no opportunities.” As they were speaking, the photographs were brought over, and Jiang Yuan began to look through them one by one. From the photos alone, it was evident that Song Jinyou had been diligent. It made sense, considering he had been the one to bring up the case. He had clearly given it quite some thought. However, it was also apparent from the photos that Song Jinyou’s ability to solve cases was not strong. He had simply taken as many photos as possible. So, the photos included the corpses of the dead fish and pigs, the crime scene, and also photos of the spectators.

Chapter 376 - 376 343 Poisoning Case

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