Diary of a Criminal Investigator-Chapter 286: Traffic Accident

Several people gasped.

"Damn, aren’t they too bold?"

"Who wouldn’t say so? And I heard that back in the day, it wasn’t just the coal mine hiding it, someone else lent a hand too."

"To help with this kind of thing, the level can’t be low, right?"

"Heh, it’s not just low, it’s ridiculously high."

"This time, Tianzhou City will be quite busy."

In front of a case like this, one or two lives might not even count as much.

Among the few, Lu Chuan has the shortest time in the force, and since joining, he’s just been focused on the case itself.

But in fact, compared to this case in Tianzhou City, a homicide seemed trivial.

No matter how hard it is to solve a case, it’s just that the suspect thought a bit more and played a game of hide and seek with the police.

If they hid well, they might not be discovered so quickly; if not, there are plenty who get caught right after their crime.

However, the case in Tianzhou City is the kind where you know they’re criminals, but you don’t necessarily dare to arrest them.

To counter the state machinery, only it itself can.

This time in Tianzhou City, it’s not just a single case that’s so simple, and if it relies solely on the police bureau, there’s no way this case can be handled.

"I heard the provincial department has sent a special task force there."

Ren Qiang’s information is more well-informed than others, knowing a bit about everything.

"Forget it, it doesn’t have much to do with us anyway. Just a pity for those wrongful souls buried in the mine, sigh..."

Old Bai sighed. Police are people too.

The unjust things in the world are too many to handle or understand.

Not to mention anything else, just talking about kids going to school, with schoolhouse apartments costing millions, which proper police officer can afford that?

Yet, without buying a house, kids can’t go to a good school.

A few years ago, wasn’t there something about developers bribing police with schoolhouse apartments?

They chatted about cases from all over the country. The longer you are a police officer, the more you know about such gossip. There’s nothing new about it.

Lu Chuan listened with great interest.

Crime is generally quite private.

Usually, except for gang activities, individual crimes are self-studied and researched behind closed doors.

This leads to first-time criminals having very little experience and easily being caught by the police.

After being caught, there are often two outcomes.

One is they become honest after being released and never commit a crime again.

Because they don’t want to lose their freedom again.

The other is they meet many people inside and have plenty of opportunities to exchange information.

By learning and communicating with different people, they master new skills and methods they didn’t have before. Once out, when committing crimes again, because of their experience, it’s hard to catch them.

Listening to Ren Qiang talking about interesting things from other departments is also a way to broaden one’s horizons.

Buzz buzz, the phone vibrated.

Ren Qiang looked; it was Qin Yong.

"Captain Qin... Mm, okay, no problem, I’ll head over now."

After hanging up the phone, Ren Qiang got up and dusted himself off: "I thought I could be lazy for a couple of days without any trouble, but another case has come up."

"Is it a big case?"

"Hit-and-run, a person got hit and died. Captain Qin wants us to go over and take a look."

Ren Qiang drank his last cup of tea and was about to leave: "Lu, do you have anything? Want to go to the scene and take a look?"

Lu Chuan glanced at Liu Guodong. The other nodded: "We don’t have much going on either. You go with Old Ren and check it out, lend a hand."

"Yes."

Lu Chuan indeed didn’t have much going on, so it wouldn’t hurt to check out the scene.

Binzhou Road and Yingbin Road intersection.

This stretch isn’t a main road, and usually there are not many cars. The scene has already been cordoned off by the traffic police, with the area marked by police tape.

The car involved in the accident was by the roadside flowerbed, clearly having crashed hard.

The body lay on its back not far away on the roadside, with limbs in awkward positions.

"Move along, move along, no photos allowed."

The traffic police responsible for maintaining order dispersed the crowd of onlookers.

"Everyone, please delete any photos and videos. This kind of thing can’t be posted online; there will be related reports to follow."

It’s not like the cyber police are doing nothing; even if such a thing is posted, it would be deleted immediately.

"Push the police line back a bit."

When Ren Qiang arrived at the scene, there were already about ten people from the traffic police team there.

"How is it?"

"The car was going fast, and by the time we arrived, the person was already gone."

In traffic incidents, most are accidental deaths.

If the vehicle wasn’t speeding or running a red light at the time, it’s usually considered as bearing partial responsibility.

A criminal sentence is unlikely, but there would be accompanying civil compensation.

Of course, if there was drunk driving, or the car hadn’t passed an inspection, that would be a serious issue.

"The driver is a woman, we’ve checked, she wasn’t drunk, and the car was normal, having just gotten full insurance last month..."

The traffic police are very experienced in handling this kind of thing.

It’s just a matter of responsibility allocation.

"Have you checked the surveillance?"

"We have, the pedestrian ran a red light."

Ren Qiang frowned slightly. The number of people dying from running red lights isn’t small each year.

It’s not the first or second time Ren Qiang has seen this.

"Have the family been contacted?"

"We called them, they’re on their way."

While Ren Qiang was talking with the colleagues responsible from the traffic police team, Lu Chuan was already surveying the scene.

Compared to regular homicide cases, traffic incidents occur much more frequently.

In Haizhou City, at the very least, there are hundreds of traffic incidents each day.

Most of these are simple scrapes and the proportion involving personal injuries is small; fatalities are even less common.

Typically, there are only about a dozen or so each year.

Ren Qiang has also handled many similar scenes; it’s basically just a formality.

The traffic police determine the division of responsibility, and Ren Qiang’s side rules out the possibility of intentional vehicular manslaughter, then it’s just about civil compensation.

It doesn’t concern criminal investigation much.

"Lu Chuan, how does it look?"

At this moment, Lu Chuan was squatting next to the body, conducting some external examinations.

"Didn’t find anything unusual."

The impact distance and point of impact were very clear, and with his intermediate crime scene investigation skills, Lu Chuan could tell with one glance that it was a very ordinary traffic incident scene.

Moreover, the driver was still there crying, and it was the driver who called the police.

The possibility of a problem seemed low.

Ren Qiang let out a breath: "Alright, if there’s nothing wrong, we’ll just file a report and get out of here."

As long as it wasn’t homicide, there was no need for the criminal investigation team to get involved.

In the vast Haizhou City, accidental deaths are not uncommon daily.

Jumps, traffic accident deaths, deaths from drinking — all sorts of ways of dying. 𝓯𝙧𝙚𝒆𝙬𝙚𝒃𝙣𝙤𝒗𝓮𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

The criminal investigation department issues an accidental death certificate, then it can go to cremation.

"Brother Qiang, hold on a second, there’s still a small doubt here, let me double-check."