Nanjing Police is an efficient bunch of cops. Last year, the force solved no less than 13 outstanding murder cases, one dating back as far as 2002. But the city still must wait for closure in the most famous of all; a gruesome case of dismemberment from 1996.
In early December of 2002, a group of criminals broke into the residence of a migrant worker, surnamed Li, at a former meat factory in Nanjing’s then Xiaguan District that is now part of Gulou. After murdering Li, the group pried open a safe and took more than ¥170,000 in cash.
Although the police extracted much trace of material evidence at the scene, technical limitations of the time meant that no breakthrough was made. But then, in the first 10 days of December last year, one of the main culprits, surnamed Lin, serving a prison sentence in Fuzhou City of Fujian Province, was successfully identified in a group investigation of homicide cases organised by Jiangsu Provincial Public Security Bureau.
With Lin as the fulcrum, the group conducted a thorough investigation and found several accomplices who had committed robberies, a loose criminal gang formed by fellow villagers and relatives, and a case of ¥30,000 in cash stolen from a pig slaughterhouse, reported the Yangtze Evening News on 24 January.
After Lin was released for reinvestigation, the task force made a breakthrough, going to Fujian and Hubei Provinces, among other places, to make the arrest of three of Lin’s accomplices.
Also last year, police solved the case of a woman’s strangulation dating back to 2003. The suspect, a Zhu Mouyi, was arrested on 6 August and successfully brought to justice.
Going back even further, in a robbery and homicide that occurred in Gulou District on 24 March, 2000, Nanjing coppers arrested a man surnamed Lu from Chengdu City of Sichuan Province, successfully cracking the 20-year-old murder.
It all boils down to 2020 being a bumper year for Nanjing Police in the clearing of their homicide backlog. Of the 13 cases solved last year, more than half were the result of advancement in technical processes.
But the most gruesome murder remains unsolved, the dismemberment of Diao Aiqing in the “Nanjing 1-19 Incident”.
Diao Aiqing (刁爱青) was a 19-year-old student in her first year at Nanjing University’s Adult Education College.
On 10 January, 1996, following an argument with her roommates, Diao stormed out of her dormitory saying she was going for a walk. Some 9 days later, a street cleaner came upon a package lying in the heavy snow. Inside, the woman discovered some freshly butchered meat. It was part of Diao.
Eventually, over 2,000 pieces of the body would be found, each wrapped in plastic and deposited in various locations around the university. Police deduced that given the precision of the cuts, they must be looking for a professional, a surgeon or a butcher perhaps.
Most troubling was also the fact that some parts of Diao’s body had also been cooked for several days, including her head.
But key organs were never found; her heart, liver and spleen, giving rise to countless theories as to what really happened. Among them, spy rings, organ farming and a black market for body parts.
The case remains Nanjing’s, and one of China’s, greatest unsolved mysteries.
