Meanwhile, in the conference room of the Serious Crime Unit of Scotland Yard.
At this moment, there were seven people sitting in the conference room. Besides Sebastian Gray, James Morrison, and Thomas Wilson, there were four new faces.
When James saw that everyone was present, he glanced around and said briefly, "I won't say much else."
Then, he motioned to Sebastian beside him with his hand. "This is Sebastian Gray, the deputy team leader and consultant of the special task force."
Sebastian smiled slightly and said in a relaxed tone, "I'm a bit lazy. I'll have to trouble all of you to put in more effort in the future work. Of course, if you need coffee, I can make a cup for you."
There was a burst of soft laughter in the conference room.
James then pointed at Thomas. "Thomas Wilson, in charge of fieldwork."
Thomas stood up and said crisply, "If there's any hard work to be done in the future, just give the order. However, if it involves moving heavy objects, I might need to take some protein powder first."
Next, James motioned to a middle-aged bald man. "This is Charles Brown, the forensic doctor."
Charles touched his bald head and said humorously, "I don't have the surname Holmes. Are you all very disappointed? But I can guarantee that my scalpel is sharper than his reasoning."
The one introduced next was a young man wearing glasses, with some pimples on his face. His name was Alan Smith, a cyber technology expert.
Alan pushed his glasses and said in a somewhat shy tone, "Hello, everyone. I'm Alan. If there's anything wrong with your computer, you can come to me. But if it's a problem like the printer jamming, I might not be able to help."
After that was a man with a crew cut, looking simple and honest. His name was Jack Wilson, an expert in forensic trace evidence.
Jack smiled and said in a steady tone, "Hello, everyone. I'm Jack. If you need to find a single hair or a speck of dust, I can give you a hand."
The last one was a woman whom Sebastian had personally picked up today. Her name was Goodman David. She had an ordinary appearance but an aloof temperament. She was a psychology expert.
Goodman nodded slightly and said in a calm tone, "Hello, everyone. I'm Goodman. If you need to analyze someone's psychological state, you can come to me. But if you just want someone to chat with, I suggest you talk to Sebastian. He's better at small talk."
Sebastian shrugged and said with a smile, "It seems my coffee-making skills will finally come in handy."
These were all the members of the special task force now:
- Team Leader: James Morrison
- Deputy Team Leader and Consultant: Sebastian Gray
- Fieldwork: Thomas Wilson
- Forensic Doctor: Charles Brown
- Cyber Technology Expert: Alan Smith
- Forensic Trace Evidence Expert: Jack Wilson
- Psychology Expert: Goodman David
After the brief introductions, the meeting got to the main topic.
This meeting had two purposes:
Firstly, to let everyone get to know each other, which would be convenient for future cooperation.
Secondly, James and Sebastian also wanted to see how capable these four new experts really were. If anyone was just famous in name only, they could replace that person as soon as possible.
So, this case analysis was also a kind of test.
"Charles, let's start with you," James motioned to Charles.
Charles nodded and then looked at everyone. "I have completed the autopsies of the two victims in the 'Ghost Butcher Case' within the past two days. Although some of the test results haven't come out yet, it basically doesn't affect the judgment.
Let's talk about David Smith first. Apart from the penetrating wound, there were no other external injuries on the body. At the same time, there was no residue of toxins in his body. It can be determined that the cause of death was massive bleeding caused by a sharp object penetrating the body.
In addition, according to the mucus on the skin surface and the salt and alkali content, the victim sweated a lot before death and had been doing strenuous exercise for a long time. Therefore, I have every reason to believe that the victim walked all the way from London to Camel Hill.
Now, let's talk about John Wilson. My identification results basically match those of my previous colleague.
However, there is one point. Judging from the body, John Wilson was slightly moved within an hour after his death."
As soon as he said this, James perked up. "Is that true?"
Charles nodded. "Yes. When a person dies suddenly, the blood circulation in the body stops immediately, which has obvious characteristics. On the surface, there seems to be nothing wrong with John Wilson's body. But according to the blood concentration in various parts of his body, it can still be seen that he was moved after death, resulting in a significant difference in the blood concentration of his limbs compared to other parts."
After Charles finished explaining, James asked eagerly, "Can we use this as evidence to prove that Margaret is the murderer of John Wilson?"
Charles shook his head. "This is indeed evidence, but it can only be considered as circumstantial evidence and is not sufficient to convict her."
As soon as Charles finished speaking, Sebastian added, "Moreover, Margaret can find an excuse to say that she might have accidentally bumped into John Wilson's body while sleeping, which caused the body to be slightly moved. So, we can't convict her."
Upon hearing this, James was a bit disappointed, but then he regained his fighting spirit. At least, it seemed that this forensic doctor Charles was much better than the previous ones in the team.
"Jack, you're next," James said, calming himself down and looking at Jack.
"The first crime scene was too long ago and has already been destroyed, so it's impossible to conduct a survey. Therefore, I only surveyed the second crime scene, that is, at Camel Hill.
The pit where the victim fell was roughly two meters deep, and there were no traces of mechanical equipment around. Judging from the incision inside the deep pit, it can be determined that the pit was dug out by a person with a shovel and no mechanical equipment was used.
From this, we can infer that the person who dug the pit is over 1.75 meters tall and physically strong.
At the same time, besides the victim's footprints, there were no other footprints near the scene. However, many tiny fibers were found. This indicates that the person who dug the pit was wearing gloves and foot covers at that time.
Oh, and according to the analysis of the soil condition of the deep pit, this pit has been dug for about a week.
That's all I could find. To be honest, this is the cleanest crime scene I've ever seen. That 'Ghost' has very sophisticated anti-reconnaissance techniques."
After Jack finished speaking, James nodded and then turned to look at Alan. "You're next."
Alan took out a laptop and turned the screen towards everyone. "I'll just say one thing.
Margaret's call records, online accounts, social media platforms, etc., are all the same as what everyone investigated before. There's nothing unusual.
However, after I investigated her text message records, I found one text message very suspicious.
For the other text messages, whether they were from overseas scammers or promotional messages, we could always find their sources. But for this text message, when we traced it, there was nothing.
So, I opened the text message, and there was a link in it. After clicking on it, it led to a website. However, that website has been deleted."
"Can you restore the website?" Sebastian asked eagerly, overjoyed.
He guessed that this website was most likely the place where the 'Ghost' communicated with Margaret. If they could find the chat content, it would be a major breakthrough.
Unfortunately, Alan's answer disappointed him.
"It's possible, but I can't do it alone. I need at least a team and a lot of equipment. Besides, restoring it is meaningless. For this kind of temporary website, once it's deleted, the data inside will also disappear and can't be retrieved."
Seeing that Sebastian didn't ask any more questions, Alan continued, "As for the two phone numbers left in the two cases, I've also traced them, but it's useless. This 'Ghost' is an expert. If there's no technical support behind him/her, he/she should have received professional training personally."
Finally, it was Goodman's turn. However, she didn't make an analysis directly. Instead, she looked at Sebastian. "You go first. I already know about the first case, but I know very little about the case of David Smith. So, I need you to sort out this case so that I can make a more accurate analysis."
Everyone nodded. Indeed, it was like this. If a psychology expert didn't have a clear understanding of the whole case, it would be difficult for him/her to play a role.
So, collecting his thoughts, Sebastian slowly began to speak:
"The process of this case is like this..."