Chapter 3 Chapter two

"If it's really a fugitive who committed the crime, then this case may only become an unsolved case." Robert and I said this while drinking in the bar. I don't quite agree with him, and I always feel that this murder case cannot be a random isolated case.Not long after that, two youths found a second naked body while walking in the woods near the road in Clearwater Town. The deceased was 40-year-old prostitute Becky Darnell. The scene of Becky's case is still for me to do the autopsy. This dead woman is obviously more pitiful than Wendy of the previous month.She had been dead for at least a week or more when she was found.When I arrived at the scene, I found her body decomposed, so there was no way to find any valuable evidence.In calculating the time of Becky Darnell's death, my basis is that after death, body heat will stop immediately, which is what we often call corpse cold.From the moment Becky Darnell stopped breathing, her body would radiate heat to the surrounding environment until the temperature of her body was the same as that of the environment.Of course, the progress of general chills depends on the temperature of the environment and the clothing of the corpse, as well as the internal heat of the corpse and the cause of death.

For example, when the dead body of an adult is found in spring and autumn, when the indoor temperature drops by about 0.83°C per hour, the dead body in the water will drop by 3°C to 5°C per hour.If it is a corpse outside during the high temperature season, its body temperature will continue to rise within a few hours after death. I once read this text in an expert's research report on body temperature: within 4 to 5 hours after death, the heat generated in the body has not completely stopped, and the temperature of the body at this time drops by an average of 0.58°C per hour.From 5 to 16 hours after death, after the complete cessation of heat production, the body temperature dropped by an average of 0.97°C per hour.Between 16 and 24 hours after death, because the temperature difference between the body temperature and the environment has begun to shrink, the body temperature drops slowly, with an average drop of 0.54°C per hour.

As for the decay of Becky Darnell's corpse, it has passed the two links of plaque and rigor, which belongs to the change of late corpse. Now, her body has decayed. To be precise, this decay should have started between the second and third days and nights after her death.At this time, the corpse produces a large amount of gas, such as hydrogen sulfide, methane, and ammonia, and emits an extremely unpleasant rotten smell.Corpse decay generally begins in the large intestine, which is mainly caused by bacteria in the intestine. First, green plaques will appear on the skin of the lower right abdomen, and then spread to the whole body. Between 12 and 14 days, the rotten gas It has entered the subcutaneous tissue, the face began to swell and turn black, the eyeballs protruded, the lips became thicker, the tip of the tongue protruded, and the abdomen swelled.Because the rotten gas in the deceased's abdominal cavity acts as a pressure, bloody foamy liquid will flow out of the mouth and nasal cavity of the deceased, and the feces accumulated in the body will be discharged from the anus. During the decay process of the corpse, all soft tissues will decompose and disappear, exposing the bones.

In the air, the time it takes for a corpse to turn into a bone varies with the seasons. For an adult corpse like Becky Darnell, it takes half a month to more than a month in summer.Therefore, the time of death can be roughly estimated according to the degree of corruption and development of the corpse.I also think that when the rapid decay of the corpse occurs, it will not affect the identification of bone injuries, but it will cause great difficulties in the identification of scars during life and fatal injuries, as well as the cause of disease and death, or even cannot be identified.The body of Becky Darnell was generally of this kind, but her neckbones were markedly scarred, and the cause of death could still be determined to be strangulation.

"The two murders should be committed by the same murderer, but I think we still need to check some previous cases." In the office, I said this when I reported to Robert. "You and I think the same, you should look at this first." Robert threw a file bag in front of me, "This is also an unsolved case, I found it in the archives." According to the file, sixteen months ago, a woman named Ladonna Jean Steller was found dead in an open space in Qingshui Town. She was also strangled to death, and her body was naked. The three cases have striking similarities. From the method of committing the crime, the place where the corpse was abandoned, and the age of the victim, etc., they are all related to this place called Qingshui Town. It seems that the criminal is quite familiar with Qingshui Town. The customs and people's work and rest time are well known.And the women who were injured by the murderer have one thing in common, that is, they are all prostitutes or drug addicts.La Donna, a former model who worked as a waitress at a local sports bar and was arrested for prostitution, was a single mother of two at the time of her death.

"It now appears that there is a murderous demon lurking in Clearwater Town, Tampa, and his atrocities are always one step ahead of our investigation. God, this is the last case I want to touch." Robert scratched his head in distress. "Yes, it appeared to the criminal that he had wiped out all evidence that might have connected him, that the bodies were taken to distant places, and that all the victims were stripped naked. He did this to prevent us from finding him, It seems that the criminal is very alert, and he has formed a serial murder pattern, what we can do now is to wait for him to commit another crime."

This conclusion is very frustrating, but there is nothing we can do at this time.Due to the continuous local murders, the residents of Qingshui Town have become "frightened birds" one by one, and their sense of self-defense has become stronger and stronger. The Tampa City Police Department has received several reports of accidental injuries and had to warn those door-to-door salesmen and Those who go to the homes of local residents for help should remain vigilant in case someone shoots from the window. We are under great pressure, and the murderer may continue to commit crimes. Three women have been murdered in Clearwater, Tampa, and their naked bodies were abandoned in the wilderness.If the case is not solved, this place will be in chaos.

I work day and night in the lab with my colleagues.According to my thinking, two of the naked bodies in these three murders have been unrecognizable, so we can only start with the pink fibers found on the first naked female body for in-depth investigation.It is a kind of nylon polyester fiber, which is mainly used to make cloth or cloth bags and carpets, and even socks that people wear are made of this material.This kind of items that are only available at home, generally tourists from other places will not bring these items here. In order to confirm that the judgment of the fiber type is correct, I have done experiments on the combustion characteristics of various fiber fabrics, taking cotton, hemp, bamboo and other plant fibers and viscose fibers respectively. Their main component is cellulose, which is easy to burn and will produce It emits yellow and blue flames, and people can smell a paper-like smell.Its ashes are gray in color but fly easily.I have also experimented with wool and silk. These materials contain protein and burn very slowly. Broken.

I have also done similar experiments with synthetic fibers, nylon fibers will melt while burning, no smoke or slightly white smoke.The flame is small, blue in color, and has a burnt vegetable smell. The ash is some light brown hard beads, which are not easy to crush.When the polyester fiber is burning, it will curl up and melt while smoking. The flame is yellow-white and has a fragrant smell. The ashes are brown beads, which can be crushed by hand. The acrylic fiber burns slowly and melts at the same time. Its flame is bright white, sometimes with a little black smoke, but it has a fishy smell. After ash, it turns into black beads, which are brittle and easy to shatter.

In addition, the characteristics of the three fibers also need to be explained.When the vinylon fiber burns slowly, it will shrink rapidly. The flame is small and red, with black smoke and a special smell. The ashes are brown beads, which can be crushed by hand.Chlorine fiber is not only difficult to burn, but also burns while shrinking when it is close to the flame, but it goes out when it leaves the fire source. It has the smell of chlorine gas, and the ashes are black lumps.When the polypropylene fiber is burning, it will melt while curling up. The flame is bright and blue, with a smell of burning wax. The ash is hard, but it can be crushed.Finally, there is a kind of glass fiber, which does not burn, does not change color when melted, and ash is the original color, showing a small glass bead shape.

But when I got this exact information through my experiments, it didn't take me in time to save another life.On January 18 of the following year, a fourth victim appeared in Qingshui Town. Cindy Puxie, 27, who had recently moved to Clearwater from Maine, was strangled to death before she could enjoy the beauty of Tampa, and her body was dumped next to a garbage dump in an industrial area. Before her death, she was also severely beaten. I noticed the horror of the fourth victim, Cindy Puxie, being strangled to death by the criminals.In these four cases, the crime methods of the criminals were basically the same, they were all naked corpses. Of course, two of them had already rotted. The difference was that the places where the criminals chose to dump the corpses were different. "Man, look what I found?" I said to Robert, who seemed a little impatient because he hadn't solved the case for a long time.This time, with the help of the strong light of the Luma lamp, I found pink fibers on Cindy's body again.This fiber is the same type that appears on Wendy. However, for me, this is not good news. The pink fibers on Cindy Puxiu are like a mystery, which triggers my thinking and research on it every day.It can be concluded that the fibers I found in Wendy's and Cindy's similar cases may have had the same source. After all the verification work, I have come to the conclusion that the fibers found in these cases are a very important piece of evidence.However, although I have done experiments on fibers and grasped some rules in theory, I think fibers can only prove that the two dead people may be killed by the same murderer, although some detectives in the police station call it It is "the ironclad evidence to solve the case". I had to find a way to prove that the fibers came from the same place, and how were they related to the dead?