National Forensic Doctor

Jiang Yuan took Sun Jianyu’s profile in hand, meticulously reviewed it multiple times, and then had his hand and foot prints reproduced for comparison against the strangulation marks on the deceased’s body.

Sun Jianyu was less than 170 cm tall and weighed just over 40 kg, with a slim waist, thin legs, and narrow arms—a pure skinny figure. The victim, Sun Xiuwen, weighed about the same as Sun Jianyu. Despite being female and slightly weaker in terms of physical strength, it would be relatively difficult for Sun Jianyu to smother her to death on his own.

It wasn’t surprising that there were strangulation marks on Sun Xiuwen’s neck; presumably, Sun Jianyu or Liu Mingxue had assisted in the act. However, the victim’s hyoid bone was not fractured, which also indicated insufficient force in the strangulation.

Certainly, analyzing merely from the perspective of insufficient strength, Sun Jianyu’s girlfriend, Liu Mingxue—who was also Sun Xiuwen’s close friend—would be even less capable. By conventional reasoning, for Liu Mingxue, a young woman, to actively resort to a violent method such as smothering to kill Sun Xiuwen, the likelihood seemed quite low.

"From what we know so far, the two of them likely conspired, with Sun Jianyu taking the lead and Liu Mingxue assisting, jointly killing Sun Xiuwen," Jiang Yuan stated at the crime scene after briefly perusing his PAD, delivering a conclusion that wasn’t particularly surprising.

One of the most critical tasks for a forensic doctor is discerning the actual perpetrator in collaborative murder cases. An example would be a group of teenagers engaging in mutual assault, resulting in a death; in such instances, the one primarily responsible is not necessarily the person who strikes the most blows, but rather the individual who executes the fatal action.

Suppose the victim’s occiput was hit by a bottle, the heart suddenly stopped, and the thigh was punctured... The forensic doctor must determine the exact cause of death—whether it was the bottle, the thigh wound, or... in the case of cardiac arrest, it might result in collective liability and shared punishment.

Jiang Yuan identified Sun Jianyu and Liu Mingxue as co-perpetrators, and once submitted for trial, the verdict would very likely not differentiate between a primary and secondary offender.