Chapter 169

Luke looked around the farm, but didn’t find any new blood.

Instead, he found an interesting situation.

Jefferson’s farm kept a hundred cows, and each of them had a big, scary hole cut into their bodies, so big that they could even see the food directly in their stomachs.

Hasn’t the United States always emphasized animal protection?

What kind of operation is this?

“Buzz ……”

A farm tractor drove by, this one was special, like it had been modified, there was a square pipe on the right side of the car, and the car drove while leaking feed down at an even rate.

Luke stood next to it and watched for a while, the efficiency of farm-based management was really high, greatly saving labor costs.

Driving the tractor is a middle-aged white woman, she alone is enough to feed hundreds of cattle, and the work is not tiring.

I guess that’s why the price of beef is lower in the US.

The white woman finished feeding the cows and got off the tractor.

Luke walked over and asked, “Are you Mrs. Carcieri?”

“If Jefferson isn’t keeping another woman on the side, it’s me.” The woman shrugged and looked at Luke and then at Blackie, “You guys cops too?”

“I’m Detective Luke, I’m here to investigate last night’s burglary and would like to ask you for a statement.”

“OK, let’s talk outside, don’t disturb the big babies eating, they don’t like strangers very much.” Jefferson’s wife led the two men outside the cattle ranch.

Mrs. Cassia took off her gloves, “OK, what do you have to ask?”

Luke turned on the law enforcement recorder, “Did you see the thief last night?”

“No. I’m used to going to bed early. I was already in bed when the thief came.

But I heard gunshots and by the time I got outside the thief was gone.

He was a lucky fellow, and I would have opened his face if I had seen him.

I’ve got a big shotgun that packs a punch.”

Kuro gave an exaggerated look, “Sounds super cool.”

“You’re right, there aren’t many women like me, but some guys just don’t know how to appreciate them.

Men are like that. They never know enough.”

Black asked, “I heard you had a falling out with Mr. Cassia last night and kicked him out to bed.”

“That mean guy deserved it, the dishwasher in the house was broken, I asked him to buy a new one and he wouldn’t.

When I asked him to wash the dishes, he didn’t want to do it either, and in the end the dishes had to be washed by me alone.

Don’t you think I should kick him out?”

Black nodded, “I’m on your side.”

“Thanks, and by the way, the police are now in charge of family conflicts too?”

Luke noticed that Blacky was now fond of asking questions about couples’ relationships, and the conversation got sidetracked, changing the subject, “Mrs. Cassia, what do you think the thieves came to the farm to try to steal?”

“I don’t know, to be honest there’s nothing valuable on the farm except for the cattle.”

“How many vehicles do you have?”

“A pickup truck and an SUV sits in the garage out front.” Mrs. Cassia asked rhetorically, “You think the thieves came to steal the cars?”

Luke asked back, “What do you think?”

Mrs. Cassia thought for a moment, “I don’t think it’s likely, those cars aren’t worth anything. What could they be used for if they were stolen?”

According to Luke’s speculation, what the thief cared about was not the price of the cars, but simply wanted a means of transportation.

Mrs. Cassia didn’t have any positive contact with the thieves and didn’t know much about the situation.

Luke pointed to the cows in the farm and asked the doubt in his mind, “Why do all these cows have a big hole in their backs, don’t they hurt?”

Mrs. Cassia said, “This is called rumen opening, cows have four stomachs, each stomach has a different function, but one of the stomachs will have some gases, these gases, if not eliminated, will have a relatively large impact on the cattle themselves.

In the past, in order to better observe the digestion of cows, researchers did such experiments.

Afterwards, people found that such observation was indeed more convenient, so they followed suit, which solved the problem of exhaustion and also increased the life span of the cows.”

“Thanks.”

Luke knew about cow flatulence, but it was the first time he had seen this solution, which was completely different from the country.

Mrs. Cassia said, “Is there anything else? If not I’ll go to work, there’s a bunch of things waiting for me to do.”

“Be my guest.” Luke signaled that the other party could leave.

Xiao Hei said, “You know what? I’m kinda envious of their lives, having a farm of their own, their own land, being free, that feeling should be superb.”

Luke patted him on the shoulder, “First you have to have the money to buy a farm.”

5:00 p.m. Detective Bureau conference room.

The crowd gathered to summarize the case leads.

Susan started with a presentation on the scene investigation.

“The survey team also concluded that the inside of the Volvo was not the first crime scene, while no suspected murder weapon was found around the scene, nor was the deceased’s cell phone or items that could prove his identity.

It can be proved that there was a premeditated dumping of the body.

The investigation team also found some biological samples at the scene and is conducting further tests.”

After Susan finished her introduction, she looked at Luke who was on the sidelines, “Tell us about the progress of your investigation.”

Luke gathered his thoughts, “After discovering the car under the cliff, we expanded our search in an attempt to find the first crime scene.

With the help of blood search dogs, we found fresh blood at the Jefferson farm.

We learned that there had been a burglary at the farm last night and that the farmer had reported a thief attempting to sneak in and steal from the farm.

Through the farm owner Jefferson’s description, I personally feel that there is a connection between the farm burglary and Darcy’s murder.”

Luke then told the crowd about his speculation.

The lieutenant rubbed his chin and said, “The farm owner saw that the thief was black?”

“Yes.”

The lieutenant shook his head, “Then I’m afraid I’m going to have to disappoint you, the thief is not supposed to be Angela’s murderer.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because I’ve identified some characteristics of Angela’s murder suspect through that blood pattern.” The lieutenant took a comb and gathered his hair, speaking eloquently.

“I mentioned before that the pendant with the blood-colored pattern was sent to a total of ten lucky fans by Angela. Through further investigation, those ten lucky fans were spread across the country.

Among them, there are only two lucky fans in Los Angeles.

It’s not impossible for other fans to come to Los Angeles to commit the crime, but in terms of probability, these two fans are the most suspicious.

I focused my investigation on these two fans.

One of the fans died in a car accident last year, and the pendant is nowhere to be found, so his suspicion can be ruled out for now.

The other fan is called Tom, I have contacted the other party, he is also Angela’s hardcore fan.

Because he was busy during this period of time, he missed Angela’s new album party, which was a bit regrettable to say the least.

After contacting Tom, I gave him a statement and according to him, the pendant that belonged to him had been sold.

The person who purchased the pendant was someone he ran into at a vampire club, and the two were not familiar with each other, nor had they met before. All that is known is that the other person is also a fan of Angela and is very obsessed with her.

Let’s call this fan A for now.

After learning the origin of the silver pendant, fan A especially wanted to get it and kept begging Tom to sell it to him.

Tom originally didn’t want to sell it, he was also a fan of Angela’s and wanted to keep the pendant as a souvenir, but Fan A was very sincere and wanted to buy the pendant for $500.

It was a price that was hard to refuse and Tom agreed.”

Luke laughed, “Looks like this Tom is a ‘fake fan’ too.

Can his word be trusted?”

“Tom has an alibi for the night Angela was killed, in addition, I also got a mold of his teeth impression, which has been sent to the technical section for identification, basically we can rule out Tom’s suspicion.

Then, fan A who bought the pendant is even more suspicious.

According to Tom’s description, fan A is a young white guy, not tall, a little thin, as for the specific looks he can not remember.

From this point of view, the killer of Angela and the suspect of the farm burglary should not be the same person.”

The lieutenant finished, and gave Luke a special look.

Luke didn’t argue any further on this, it was useless to say anything now, everything still depended on the results of the bloodstain identification.

During the time waiting for the identification results, Luke was not idle, he was ready to take August’s case with a bang.

The following morning, the third interrogation room.

August was handcuffed to the interrogation chair, and this time he didn’t seek out Attorney Porter again.

To be honest, Luke was pretty impressed with Porter, and sometimes lawyers could be a positive boost in a case.

For example, if the suspect had a guilty conscience and didn’t want to plead guilty, and the lawyer knew that it was in the suspect’s best interest to plead guilty at this time, he would sometimes persuade the suspect to plead guilty.

Of course, more often than not, they are still on the opposite side of the fence from the police.

This is also the reason why many police officers don’t like lawyers, it’s not about justice or black heart, it’s just a different position.

Luke put down the information and opened the door, “How is August considering it?”

“Inspector Luke, I still want to do a psychiatric evaluation, I hope you can arrange it for me as soon as possible.”

Luke looked at him, “Is this your own idea, or is it Counselor Porter’s suggestion.”

“It’s my own idea.”

Luke frowned slightly, “August, you’ve really thought this through.”

August replied, “There must have been something wrong with my state that day, otherwise I couldn’t have bitten someone.

I really suspect that I was mentally unbalanced at the time.

It’s not that I lied about being mentally ill to escape justice.

Now it’s not just a matter of going to jail, it’s that I feel wronged and innocent.

I don’t know why I did that …… day simply like a different person.”

Luke went along with him, “August, you’re right, you do feel wronged.

You unknowingly took the solo product, that’s why you lost your mind, causing your spirit to hallucinate, thinking of yourself as a vampire all the time, and made the move of attacking the victim.

But that doesn’t mean you have mental problems.”

Seeing that August didn’t say anything, Luke continued to ask, “Do you think that once you are identified as having a mental problem, you will be able to stay out of jail?

Things are not as simple as you think, even if you are identified as having a mental problem and don’t have to go to jail.

But it doesn’t mean that this matter is over, you will likewise have to receive the relevant treatment.

You may even be sent to a mental hospital, where the situation is not much better than prison.

Lie once, you need to cover it up with a bunch of lies, and the situation may be more complicated.

Moreover, you might not be able to get rid of the title of mental patient for the rest of your life.”

Luke took a sip of coffee and continued, “This is still the best situation for you, the way you kill people is special though, it’s very much like having mental problems.

But according to the poison identification, your body is containing hallucinogenic drug ingredients, so both the police, and the prosecution think that it is more likely that you are taking solo products to cause mental abnormality and hallucinations.

The likelihood of you being identified as mentally abnormal is not high.

You may think, “Aren’t I just going to do an appraisal?

I may be able to get away with it if the appraisal is successful, and I have nothing to lose if it is unsuccessful.

It’s actually not as simple as you think.

If you say you are mentally ill, but the result of the appraisal is that you are not mentally ill, then your integrity will be questioned by the police, the prosecution, the judge, and even the jury.

Don’t think it’s a small thing, once integrity is questioned, a whole host of problems come into play.

You said earlier that you didn’t know that the plasma contained a hallucinogenic ingredient in the solo product.

The police are inclined to take your confession, however, once your integrity is questioned, we may re-investigate to confirm whether you actually drank the plasma without knowing.

If it is proven that you knew of the presence of the hallucinogenic ingredient in the plasma as a solo product and drank the plasma of your own volition, the case against you would be very unfavorable and the charges would be much heavier.”

August said, “I really didn’t know, I just assumed it was regular plasma.”

Luke tapped the information on the table with his finger, “But according to our investigation, the plasma sold by Poison Rice is much more expensive than ordinary plasma, and it will also clearly inform the buyer that it’s holy blood with ‘materials’ added to it, which will give you magical powers.

To a certain extent, it’s already implying that it contains substances other than plasma.

You should be somewhat prepared for that or you wouldn’t be willing to pay more, no?”

Augus shook his head, “No, I’m really not sure about that.

He was talking about plasma with real ‘vampire’ blood added to it, and I only bought it out of curiosity.”

Luke said solemnly, “Augus, you have to understand that I am not debating with you about the truth, but I want to tell you.

Once you lie, your integrity will be questioned as it was just now.

This will be detrimental to the later stages of the case at trial, and I feel that Attorney Porter should have told you this.

I was able to question you, as will the prosecution, the judge, and the jury in the same way.

If you had not falsely claimed to be mentally ill, you could have argued against them as a victim, and you could have been justified.

If you falsely claimed to be mentally ill but were identified as sane, you lose that favorable status.

I’ve said enough, think for yourself.”

Luke finished, stood up, and made to leave.

“Wait ……”

August’s lips trembled lightly, “What kind of plea deal can I …… get if I …… plead guilty now?”

Luke paused, “Manslaughter. Considering that you unknowingly consumed the hallucinogenic effects of the solo product, your sentence won’t be too heavy.”

August nodded slowly and said with some difficulty, “I …… am …… willing to plead guilty.”