Chapter 64 — Clues to the Robbery Case

In any case, although Gu Pengzhan said Uncle Qing was a man to be trusted, Wei Zhao still felt that Gu Pengzhan was holding something back from him. Bringing him here to stay with Gu Mengyao was not simply a matter of finding her a study companion, nanny, and bodyguard all in one. There seemed to be some deeper meaning behind it.

But Gu Pengzhan had not said what it was, and Uncle Qing probably did not know either. Most likely Gu Pengzhan alone knew the truth. "Mr. Gu, I've parked the car. May I come in?"

"Come in. Xiao Yi and I were just talking about yesterday." Gu Pengzhan said.

Uncle Qing pushed the door open and came in, then sat down on the sofa beside Wei Zhao.

"Just now we were discussing why the kidnappers chose the bank. Xiao Yi mentioned that the school required every student to open a bank card for paying tuition and fees..." Seeing Uncle Qing come in, Gu Pengzhan picked up the earlier topic. "That suggests there may be someone inside Yao Yao's school tipping them off. Otherwise the kidnappers could never have picked that exact moment to rob the bank."

"Yes," Wei Zhao nodded. "That's what I think too, and I believe this person must be a faculty member, not a student. Only the staff would have known about this in advance. By the time the students heard of it, school was almost over, and it would have been far too late to warn the kidnappers then!" "Excellent!" Gu Pengzhan nodded with approval, clearly very pleased with Wei Zhao's quick thinking. "I will investigate the school side as well... Still... forget it, let's not speak of that..."

"What is it, is there some difficulty? Aren't you a board member of the school, Uncle Chu?" Wei Zhao asked in puzzlement, Gu Pengzhan at the school

"What is it, is there some difficulty? Aren't you a board member of the school, Uncle Chu?" Wei Zhao asked in surprise. It should be fairly easy for Gu Pengzhan to look into anything at the school, shouldn't it?

"I am a board member, that's true, but the school has three board members, each holding shares in the school, so there are many of their people inside. You can imagine the resistance any investigation would meet..." Gu Pengzhan made no attempt to hide this from Wei Zhao. It was hardly a secret.

"I see. Then I'll keep an eye out once I'm at school." Wei Zhao said after hearing Gu Pengzhan's explanation.

By this point Wei Zhao had roughly sorted out the logic. The kidnappers had not seized Gu Mengyao for money or to take her life, but to use her to force Gu Pengzhan into concessions in a business deal.

Moreover, the reason the kidnappers had not chosen to strike elsewhere was entirely to confuse the police and buy time. If Gu Pengzhan's daughter were kidnapped, one could imagine what a massive force the police would throw into a frantic hunt for the kidnappers.

In that case, Gu Mengyao might well have been found by the police before their goal was even achieved.

...

Indeed, as soon as Yang Huaijun returned to the criminal investigation team, he took over the bank robbery case, and once it was in his hands, everything proceeded with remarkable ease!

With a single call to the urban management command center, Yang Huaijun obtained surveillance footage from all the streets around the bank from the day before! Only then did Qiu Lingshan realize how foolish she had been!

Although "Digital Urban Management" had been in use in Songshan for less than a month, Yang Huaijun had keenly remembered this useful resource! The so-called "Digital Urban Management," also called "Digitalized City Management," refers to the use of information technology and mobile communications to process, analyze, and manage information on all urban management components and incidents across the city, an information-based measure for modernizing city administration.

The Urban Management Bureau had installed surveillance cameras on all the main streets, keeping each section under all-day

The Urban Management Bureau had installed surveillance cameras on all the main streets, keeping each section under round-the-clock watch to monitor sanitation, traffic flow, and the like.

At the time, Qiu Lingshan had also thought of requesting footage from the traffic police, but unfortunately their recording equipment only activated on red lights, capturing nothing but violations, and remained switched off at all other times.

So Qiu Lingshan had been forced to give up, yet she never imagined Yang Huaijun would think of borrowing the urban management department's surveillance footage to crack the case.

Although it looked simple, it proved one thing: she had not been attentive enough! Matters that seemed irrelevant to the job often played an unexpectedly decisive role at critical moments.

With the footage in hand, everything became much easier, for the urban management's round-the-clock cameras had only recently been activated and were still in trial operation. Few people knew about them, so the kidnappers could not possibly have known of it.

In fact, they clearly did not. On the stretch under Zhang Xiaohang's responsibility, not long after the first car with the plate Song A74 passed, a second commercial van bearing the plate Song A74 drove through. That had to be the vehicle the robbers had ridden in!

What followed was a matter of following the trail, narrowing down the approximate area where the kidnappers' vehicle was located! It could only be approximate because the urban management's round-the-clock cameras were installed solely on downtown streets, with no need for them on remote roads, so the robbers' general whereabouts could only be judged from the final footage.

Even so, it was enough. Once the area had been narrowed to a certain extent, the search became much easier...

Zhong Yongliang had spent the whole day in fear and dread. He had never expected a transfer student who looked like a country bumpkin to be so fierce. After offending him yesterday and beating Zou Ruoming, one of the school's leading figures, that very morning, he had assumed the boy would meet a miserable end, only to find that Brother Black Panther, whom he himself had called in

He had assumed the boy would meet a miserable end, only to see Brother Black Panther, whom he had brought in himself, beaten to a pulp by him!

At this moment Zhong Yongliang finally understood what a difference in strength meant. Even with a gun in his hand, Brother Black Panther had been no match for Wei Zhao. What could he himself possibly do to such a man?

Still, he could not afford to look too cowardly in front of Zhang Naipao and Gao Fu. By now his hatred for Wei Zhao had sunk to the bone, yet so had his fear!

Ordinary methods would certainly never settle Wei Zhao. If he wanted to avenge his past humiliation, he would have to make other plans.

"Brother Liang, how come this Wei Zhao is so tough..." Gao Fu said with some displeasure. "But that Brother Black Panther is such a coward, isn't he? I thought he was really something, but he was hardly any better than we were yesterday!"

"Exactly. Fancy being so useless with a gun in his hand. If I were him, I'd have put a bullet in that punk Wei Zhao!" Zhang Naipao said indignantly.

Gao Fu and Zhang Naipao had never run with the underworld. They had only heard from Zhong Yongliang about how formidable Brother Black Panther was, and seeing him today, he seemed nothing special, so they did not find it particularly shocking.

The one who was truly shaken was Zhong Yongliang. Only he knew in his heart just how skilled Brother Black Panther was, and yet now he had suffered repeated losses at Wei Zhao's hands...

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