The crackdown on organized crime began with the arrest of the mother-in-law.

Chapter 1048 Audio Evidence

Outside the window, night fell, and the city lights gradually came on. The members of the special task force, without taking a break, threw themselves into a new round of investigation. They knew that only by meticulously piecing together the clues and leaving no stone unturned could they uncover the truth behind Zhang Guijun's death.

Li Ming played the recovered recording repeatedly. Zhang Guijun's furious roars echoed in the conference room, the background noise of vehicles and the clamor of the crowd intertwined like an unsolvable tangled mess. "Technical department, isolate the background noise and analyze it frame by frame." He heavily circled the word "recording" on the whiteboard with a red pen, the tip denting the paper. "Even a single useful sentence could be a breakthrough."

Technician Liu's eyes were bloodshot as he stared at the audio spectrum for 36 consecutive hours. When an abnormal fluctuation appeared in the waveform, he suddenly slammed his hand on the table and exclaimed, "Here! There's an overlapping voice at 2 minutes and 17 seconds, with a frequency between 200 and 300 Hz, clearly male!" After noise reduction, a blurry voice gradually became clear: "Yuanda's old... old rules..." The words were swallowed up by the sound of an engine before they could finish. Xiao Zhou immediately pulled up a photo from Zhang Guijun's belongings. The handwriting on the back of the photo, "2010, with Lao Chen at the Yuanda construction site," eerily echoed this statement.

The task force quickly identified the "Yuanda Construction Site" lead. Investigation revealed that Zhang Guijun had indeed undertaken transportation work for Yuanda Construction ten years prior, and the project manager at the time was Chen Yongqiang. When the officers found Chen Yongqiang, the gray-haired man was watering his flowers on his balcony. Upon hearing the name "Zhang Guijun," he abruptly sprayed water onto his prized orchids. "We haven't been in contact for a long time," he said, his fingers gripping the watering can handle tightly, his Adam's apple bobbing violently. "I heard he lost money in business, what does that have to do with me?"

But in the safe in Chen Yongqiang's study, investigators discovered a shocking secret. A dusty notebook detailed how, in 2010, Yuanda Construction Site embezzled project funds by inflating transportation mileage. Zhang Guijun was responsible for forging transportation documents, and afterwards, they shared 37 yuan. More importantly, the last page of the notebook contained a note scrawled in red ink: "Guijun said he has new evidence and is ready to fight to the death."

Faced with irrefutable evidence, Chen Yongqiang's psychological defenses completely collapsed. "He was killed by his own greed!" the nearly sixty-year-old man suddenly sobbed, covering his face. "Three months ago, he suddenly came to my door, saying he had old transfer records and recordings, demanding 500 million yuan as hush money. Where would I get that much money?!" He trembled as he pulled a USB drive from deep within a drawer. "This is part of the evidence he used to threaten me. I initially wanted to pay to settle things, but his appetite kept growing..."

However, when technicians conducted a deep scan of the USB drive, they discovered that all files were created after Zhang Guijun's death. Upon learning this, Chen Yongqiang suddenly jumped up from his chair: "Impossible! He clearly played the recording for me!" Li Ming stared at his suddenly pale face and suddenly realized that there was a deeper conspiracy behind the case—someone was deliberately fabricating evidence to shift suspicion onto Chen Yongqiang.

Meanwhile, while analyzing Zhang Guijun's call records, Xiao Zhou discovered that an unknown number had been frequently contacting him before the incident. The number's base station location data showed that the signal last disappeared in an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of the city. When the search team broke down the door, the warehouse reeked of gasoline. The word "traitor" was spray-painted in large red paint on the wall, and torn shipping documents were scattered on the floor, one of which had the words "Wangjialiang Construction Site" visible in the corner.

In a metal cabinet in the corner of the warehouse, the police found an old-fashioned voice recorder. Pressing play, Zhang Guijun's voice was filled with obvious fear: "You can't do this! This batch of building materials doesn't meet the standards at all, it will kill people!" Another voice, altered, coldly replied: "Knowing too much won't do you any good. Do you think nobody knows about what happened to Yuanda back then?" The recording stopped abruptly, and the background noise was the dull thud of a heavy object falling to the ground.

Through voiceprint comparison, the technical department discovered that the voice altered in the recording had an 87% similarity to that of Liu Dahai, the project manager at the Wangjialiang construction site. When Li Ming led his team into Liu Dahai's office, this usually dignified man was burning documents, the flames casting a crimson glow on his distorted face. "He brought this on himself!" Liu Dahai laughed maniacally, soot staining his expensive suit. "Zhang Guijun discovered we were using substandard building materials and tried to blackmail us for a cut. Did he think he could get away with it like he did ten years ago?"

The incandescent light in the interrogation room cast a blinding spot of light on Liu Dahai's head. His gold-rimmed glasses sat askew on his nose, his expensive custom-made suit was wrinkled beyond recognition, and his tie hung loosely around his neck, making him look like a dying snake. Li Ming slammed the crucial recording pen on the table with a "bang," the sound of metal hitting the surface echoing in the small space: "Tell me, why did you kill Zhang Guijun?"

Liu Dahai's Adam's apple bobbed violently. He reached for his glasses, but the movement was awkward and comical due to the handcuffs. He lowered his head, his voice sounding like it was being squeezed from the depths of his chest: "He...he's a bottomless pit, trying to drive me to the brink." The interrogation room fell into a brief silence, broken only by the regular ticking of the digital clock on the wall, as if counting his remaining chances of survival.

“Three months ago, he suddenly came to my office.” Liu Dahai looked up, his eyes filled with a complex mix of fear and anger. “He had a recording pen with him, saying he had overheard my conversation with the supplier and knew we were using substandard steel bars and cement. He also said that if I didn’t want things to be exposed, I had to give him half of the profits.” Recalling the scene, Liu Dahai’s shoulders trembled uncontrollably. “That was a business worth millions, how could he just sit back and reap the benefits?”

Li Ming opened the folder and pulled up Zhang Guijun's bank statements: "After he contacted you the first time, 50 yuan was transferred from your private account. Was that hush money?" Liu Dahai's face turned bright red, as if someone was choking him: "I thought giving him some money would be enough to get rid of him, but after he got the money, he became even more demanding. The second time we met, he directly asked for 500 million yuan, and said he had more evidence that he could ruin my reputation at any time."

"So you decided to kill him?" Xiao Zhou's voice was as cold as a knife, echoing in the interrogation room. Liu Dahai suddenly became agitated, leaning forward, the handcuffs dragging on the table with a harsh sound: "I had no choice! He threatened that if I didn't agree, he would hand over all the evidence to the quality inspection department. If Wang Jialiang's project collapsed, I would lose everything and go to jail!" A hint of madness flashed in his eyes, "Rather than be forced to my death by him, I might as well strike first."