Los Angeles Legendary Sleuth

According to the identification card's estimation, the person who made this footprint should be a boy between the ages of 8 and 12.

Right in front of him was a suitable candidate, Pek.

Pek originally lived in the same house as the victim, so his presence at the crime scene was not a problem.

But the problem was, why would he wear adult shoes, and leave behind bloody footprints.

Luke had observed that he had his own shoes, so the possibility of not having shoes to wear was out of the question.

Moreover, if he really wore the wrong shoes, there should have been bloodstained shoes found at the scene, but the technical team did not find any.

This meant that Pek had thrown away the shoes that left the bloody footprints.

He was deliberately falsifying the crime scene.

Putting himself in that position, Luke wondered why Pek would want to fake an adult's bloody footprints?

He wanted to prove an adult had been there.

Conversely, this also implied that no adult had actually been at the scene.

Luke thought back to the conclusions from the earlier crime scene investigation; no property had been stolen and it wasn't a case of burglary, plus it was very likely an inside job.

Previously, based on Pek's description, the murderer was likely a member of the counterfeit currency organization, but now it seemed that Pek was suspected of lying.

Assuming Pek lied and no one from the counterfeit currency organization had come, who had the most motive to commit the crime?

An image of the murderer began to form in Luke's mind.

Pek.

From Pek's words, Luke could sense he didn't like Jamie very much.

He also did not know, or did not think, that Jamie was his father.

As for whether the two were biologically father and son, Luke felt it was still open to question, and Maria's words could not be entirely trusted.

The case of knowing one's mother but not one's father was not uncommon in the Black community.

No matter by what means Jamie had done it, or what their relationship was, he had restricted the freedom of Pek and Martha, that much was certain.

In such a situation, Pek was undoubtedly resentful, and acting out in extreme ways was not impossible.

This could be seen from the fact that he had taken the car to find his mother; he was bold and recklessly unconcerned with consequences.

Luke had his suspicions, but he did not disclose his thoughts publicly.

After all, Pek was just a ten-year-old Black boy, and he had a natural protective coloration.

Luke could conduct his investigation following his own reasoning without the need to reveal it prematurely.

Ultimately, an investigation is always about the evidence.

Earlier, Luke had speculated that the murderer could be part of the fake currency production organization, and he had reasoned about the modus operandi from an adult's perspective.

If his current speculation was correct and the murderer was a ten-year-old child, then his thought process might be different.

From his act of faking adult bloody footprints, it was clear that he had some counter-surveillance awareness, but compared to an adult, his experience was ultimately lacking.

Luke began to theorize, if Pek really was the murderer, what would he have done after committing the murder? And what evidence might he have left behind?

The gun?

The bloodstained leather shoes?

The gunpowder residue on his body after firing a shot?

Luke began to search the house carefully to see if there were any places where the murder weapon and shoes could be hidden.

The investigation team had already searched, meaning if the murder weapon was indeed hidden in the house, it was in a very concealed, hard-to-find location.

After a careful look, Luke didn't find any such place.

Then, he checked the yard to see if there were any signs of digging, but again, he found nothing.

Luke carefully recalled, thinking of places Pek might have gone or hidden something.

Suddenly, he remembered the scene of Pek driving the car.

Luke had seen that car, and it had a dashcam.

Using his authority in the investigation, Luke obtained the dashcam video from the precinct.

After reviewing the content, the car had started up and shot out directly, zigzagging onto the road.

From the driver's skills displayed, the subsequent collision was by no means accidental.

The car left the Morleyville neighborhood and continued driving forward…

Luke watched the video all the way through, until the car crashed into the crowd of protesters.

During the drive, the car stopped once, not for long, just about one minute or so.

Why did he stop?

Luke replayed the dashcam video and could see from a distance that there was a trash can near the stopping point.

...

A few minutes later, Luke and Will arrived at the spot where Pek had stopped the car.

Will was somewhat puzzled and curious, "Where are we going now?"

"I've found you another chance to shine."

"What kind of opportunity?"

"This time it might be a bit tricky…" Luke trailed off.

"I'm not afraid. I've been waiting for this day for a long time," Will said with a resolute expression on his face.

"That's the spirit. You're truly my partner," Luke said, rolling down the window and pointing at a black trash can not far from the car, "If I'm not mistaken, that trash can should contain evidence left by the murderer.

Our chance to shine has arrived."

Marcus had a bad feeling, "Do we need to dig through the trash?"

"Quit the chit-chat and start searching," Luke urged, worried that the trash might be cleaned up or already have been cleared out, or contaminated and destroyed.

Will got out of the car reluctantly and walked over to the trash can.

"Are you going to help me search?"

Luke rubbed his nose and tossed him a pair of gloves and a mask, "I don't need to become a Detective Chief."

"Detective Chief?" Will seemed inspired, put on the gloves and mask, and started searching through the trash can, complaining as he did, "Why didn't you call Jackson?"

"Do you want him to be Detective Chief Jackson?"

"No, better be Detective Chief Marcus," Will said, no longer complaining, and began to take out the trash one piece at a time from the trash can.

In Los Angeles, trash has to be sorted, and the items in this trash can were not very dirty, mostly just dry waste without kitchen leftovers.

After a thorough search, Will found a black plastic bag, and upon opening it, there was another white plastic bag; opening that, he discovered a black gun and a pair of leather shoes with blood on the soles.

With the corresponding evidence found, Luke's speculation found some basis.

However, Luke still didn't make a fuss, handing over the evidence that he and Will had found to the technical team for analysis.

At the same time, Luke suggested that Pek undergo gunpowder residue testing.

According to Pek's statements, he had never fired a gun or handled gunpowder, so there shouldn't be any residue on him.

If gunpowder residue were found on his body, it would prove he was lying.

Of course, the key would still be the fingerprint analysis on the gun.

If it was an experienced adult, they would likely wipe off the fingerprints on the gun, but whether Pek would have done the same, Luke wasn't sure…