Julucun Village, Taocheng District, Hengshui City, Hebei Province. On April 26, shortly after 6 a.m., villager Jia got up early to go water his family’s field. Suddenly, he discovered that smoke was coming from his neighbor Zhang Hongying’s house. Jia quickly told his wife to go call Zhang Hongying. She called out several times, but no one responded.

The thick smoke grew heavier and heavier. Sensing that something was wrong, Jia went out to the main street and called several villagers, so everyone went into Zhang Hongying’s yard together to see where exactly the smoke was coming from.

They found that the source of the smoke was in the middle room of the north house of Zhang Hongying’s home. By that time, the cotton stored inside had already caught fire, and most of the fire had spread to the other two rooms of the north house. The roof had been burned through, forming a large hole. The furniture and some electrical appliances in the house had already been destroyed by the fire. When everyone came to the westernmost room of the north house, they made an even more shocking discovery: Zhang Hongying’s youngest daughter, only 5 years old, lay motionless on a wooden bed.

Zhang Hongying’s daughter was usually obedient and sensible, and the surrounding neighbors all liked her very much. Now she had suddenly met with disaster, which made the villagers who had come to help feel deeply regretful and heartbroken.

The man of the house, Liu Chengxu, worked away from home year-round and rarely came back. The older daughter was studying at a boarding school. Usually, only the wife Zhang Hongying and the younger daughter lived at home. However, after such a major incident at home, why was the children’s mother, Zhang Hongying, nowhere to be seen? Feeling that something was odd, the villagers began searching for the woman of the house, Zhang Hongying.

Everyone assumed that Zhang Hongying had gone to work in her family’s field early in the morning and did not know what had happened at home, so several villagers went to the field to inform her.

But the villagers did not find her in Zhang Hongying’s field. This was strange. Usually, apart from going to the field to work, Zhang Hongying stayed at home doing housework and taking care of the child. She would not go anywhere else. So where exactly had Zhang Hongying gone?

Just as the villagers were anxiously searching without success, someone discovered something unusual in an idle small house opposite Zhang Hongying’s home. The door of the small house faced east.

Standing at the gate of Zhang Hongying’s home, one could not directly see inside the house. However, because the house had been out of repair for a long time, a large hole had appeared in the wall at the back. Through the hole, people could see some of the situation inside. One villager unexpectedly noticed through the hole that there seemed to be someone’s clothes in the small house. Looking more carefully, beside them there was also a person lying on their side with bare legs.

The villagers discovered that the woman of the house, Zhang Hongying, had died in the small house, so everyone began to think that this matter was probably not as simple as it looked. Therefore, on the one hand, someone quickly called the police, and on the other hand, the villagers also tried to contact Zhang Hongying’s husband, Liu Chengxu, who was working in Shanxi.

At this moment, one question was circling in everyone’s minds: What exactly had happened to Zhang Hongying? Why had she died in an idle small house?

Zhang Hongying lay naked on the ground, long since without breath. There were scattered clothes around the scene. From the fact that the victim’s body was twisted and deformed, she should have struggled with someone before her death.

The police extracted the victim’s clothes and sent them to the Second Institute of the Ministry of Public Security for examination. Some DNA was extracted from the victim’s clothes and from the victim’s neck.

The police then determined Zhang Hongying’s true cause of death after careful investigation. Zhang Hongying died of suffocation caused by someone choking her neck. Clearly, this was a premeditated murder case.

On the ground at the entrance of the small house, the police found two faint drag marks, which should have been left when the victim was moved there after being murdered. Later, after further autopsy, the forensic doctor confirmed that Zhang Hongying’s time of death should have been around 10 p.m. on April 25. After Liu Chengxu, who was doing field work somewhere in Shanxi Province, received the phone call, he rushed home overnight. The scene before him made him grief-stricken.

Liu Chengxu said that he and his wife Zhang Hongying had married through an introduction in 1995. Because the family had only a few mu of land and low income, in order to live a better life, shortly after marriage he proposed to his wife that he go out to work. His wife readily supported her husband’s idea. For so many years, Liu Chengxu had always worked away from home, and all the housework at home was handled by Zhang Hongying.

In Liu Chengxu’s eyes, his wife Zhang Hongying was a very strong-willed person. Not only did she keep the home clean, she was also skilled at farm work. Although all this was very tiring, his wife had never complained. Liu Chengxu saw it and felt pain in his heart. He had once proposed taking his wife out to work and live with him, but his wife worried that she would earn little and that the family burden would be too heavy, so she stayed at home.

In Liu Chengxu’s eyes, his wife Zhang Hongying was honest and dutiful and rarely quarreled with others, so she should not have made enemies with anyone. Facing what had happened before him, Liu Chengxu could not sort out why any of this had happened. Who had been so vicious to his wife?

Zhang Hongying and her daughter were murdered in their own home. Next, the forensic doctor conducted an investigation. Through the forensic examination, it was found that the mother and daughter had been murdered at almost the same time, only in different places. The daughter was in the bedroom, while the mother died in the idle room.

The technical personnel conducting the scene investigation then carried out a detailed examination of the north house of Zhang Hongying’s home, and at this time the police made a new discovery.

The police found that in the room where Zhang Hongying and her daughter lived, there was a combination cabinet against the north wall, and all the drawers and cabinet doors were open. Although the fire had destroyed many items in the room, the traces of having been rummaged through were still very obvious. This indicated that the murderer had the intention of committing theft.

From this, the police judged that the fire that had started for no reason at Zhang Hongying’s home was not an accident, but had been set intentionally by someone.

The police learned from the villagers that Zhang Hongying was very frugal in daily life. Even when spending 3 yuan to buy a snack for her daughter or 1 yuan to buy some celery, she would record it in a notebook. She usually did not carry much money on her.

Because Zhang Hongying’s family was poor, there should not have been large amounts of cash or valuable items in the house.

After verification, the police found that a mobile phone Zhang Hongying had used during her lifetime was missing.

The police analyzed that it was possible that the criminal suspect, having found no money, became furious and, in that situation, ignited the cotton in the east room of the north house and then fled the scene.

Based on the fragmentary information provided by the scene, the police hoped to find more clues and inspiration for solving the case. However, whether at the fire scene or the scene of Zhang Hongying’s death, both had been severely damaged because too many villagers had entered. The police could extract almost no further information there about the criminal suspect.

In the cupboard in the west room of Zhang Hongying’s home, although there were extensive traces of having been rummaged through, because of the heat and smoke, some criminal evidence could not be extracted and had already been destroyed. In addition, when people were fighting the fire and carrying the little girl out, some evidence could no longer be extracted.

During interviews and visits with the surrounding neighbors, the police obtained some valuable clues.

Some villagers reported that at around 10:10 p.m. on the night of the incident, 8 neighboring households suddenly lost power. The electricity meters and control switches of these 8 households were all in the same electrical box as Zhang Hongying’s electricity meter and control switch.

It was understood that power outages were not common in this village. Even if temporary power outages were needed for circuit maintenance, the village would notify the villagers in advance. That night, 8 households living in this lane lost power at the same time, which seemed somewhat abnormal. The electrical switches of the 8 households were all gathered on a wall at the entrance of the lane, and they were controlled separately by household. The possibility of all 8 households tripping at the same time was very small.

The police extracted trace evidence from the electrical switches. After examination, it was consistent with the trace evidence from the scene. This showed that pulling the electrical switches had been done by the criminal suspect, and it also reflected that the criminal suspect was especially familiar with the location and control of the electrical switches.

After further forensic investigation, it was found that the victim’s time of death should have been within half an hour to one hour after the power outage. According to the villagers’ recollections, on the night of the power outage, the gate and door of Zhang Hongying’s home were naturally open. The police confirmed that Zhang Hongying had also encountered a sudden attack while completely unprepared. Therefore, the police believed that this case had been committed by someone she knew.

So exactly what kind of acquaintance would be so vicious to the mother and daughter?

Zhang Hongying was not a local. Many years earlier, she had married into this place from Shanxi. Although life was somewhat hard, the couple had a very good relationship, and their days were considered happy. Because Liu Chengxu worked away from home year-round, Zhang Hongying lived at home with the two children. Their life was not wealthy.

If the murderer had come only for money, then why would he choose a woman whose family was poor and who lived frugally? This clearly did not conform to logic or common sense.

From the circumstances of Zhang Hongying’s death, she was completely naked. Although she had not suffered sexual assault, the other party’s intention was relatively obvious. It was possible that for some reason, rape was ultimately not carried out.

From this point of view, could there be a possibility of a crime of passion?

Although Zhang Hongying lived alone in the village with her child year-round, her conduct was very proper, and it was not heard that she had any improper relationship with anyone. However, during the investigation, some circumstances reported by the villagers attracted great attention from the police.

The villagers said that because Zhang Hongying’s husband was away from home year-round, some unsavory people in the village, seeing that she was a woman at home alone, had harassed Zhang Hongying. This situation was also confirmed by the police during visits in the village.

It turned out that several years earlier, Zhang Hongying had not lived in the place that caught fire. She had lived elsewhere. A neighbor had once harassed her, and later she moved to the current place where the fire occurred.

So could it be that someone wanted to harass Zhang Hongying while her husband was not at home, but after meeting resistance, ultimately killed her to silence her? The police then investigated the suspicious person reported by Zhang Hongying’s husband, but because that person had no time to commit the crime, his suspicion was ruled out.

So among the people in this village who knew the victim, who could do such a cruel thing?

The police conducted door-to-door visits and screening of the residents of this village, determining each person’s activities and location that night by time.

However, because the village had a relatively large population and the situation was complex, and there were also many people working away from home, after several days of carpet search, still not many clues emerged. The villagers began to become restless. Such a cruel case was the first of its kind encountered in the village, and a atmosphere of terror pervaded the entire village.

In a village with more than 2,000 people, such a homicide had already left everyone panic-stricken. At this time, if the police wanted to carry out large-scale door-to-door screening, the difficulty was very great. But after a large amount of meticulous and serious investigation by the police, a man named Zhang Fengxiang entered the police’s sight.

Zhang Fengxiang was 26 years old and worked odd jobs in nearby Jizhou City. When the case occurred, the police had gone to his home many times to ask about the situation but had never seen Zhang Fengxiang himself. Only over the phone did he say that he had been working at the construction site all along and had not returned to the village during the time of the incident. But later, during the investigation, the police learned that someone had seen him in the village that night.

The police learned that on the day of the incident, Zhang Fengxiang’s wife had returned to her parents’ home, and he lived alone. After work, he found his friends and went to a KTV in the city to sing.

Because the police had previously extracted male skin tissue from under the fingernails of the deceased Zhang Hongying, it was obvious that there had been a fierce struggle when the murder occurred, and the murderer should also have been scratched. At this time, it happened that slight injuries on Zhang Fengxiang’s hands attracted the police’s attention, and through conversation they also discovered some abnormalities in him.

If the case had nothing to do with Zhang Fengxiang, why did he lie when facing police questioning? The police then secretly extracted Zhang Fengxiang’s DNA and compared it with the skin tissue from under the deceased’s fingernails, and the results matched.

Faced with conclusive evidence, Zhang Fengxiang, who had been hiding in the shadows, finally lowered his head and confessed.

Liu Chengxu said that because he worked away from home year-round, he rarely had contact with Zhang Fengxiang and did not know him. He also could not understand why this relatively unfamiliar person had been so vicious to his wife. When the villagers learned that Zhang Fengxiang was the murderer, they were all very surprised, because this person usually seemed very honest. No matter how angry his wife became with him, Zhang Fengxiang did not dare say anything. So for such a person, why would he be so vicious to Zhang Hongying and her daughter?

Zhang Fengxiang said that on the night of the incident he had drunk some alcohol. Because his wife had taken the child back to her parents’ home some time earlier, in order to vent the desire in his heart, he had a wicked thought: he was going to rape Zhang Hongying.

Knowing that Zhang Hongying’s husband was away from home year-round, he went alone toward her house. On the way, afraid that he would be recognized by Zhang Hongying when committing the crime, he ran to the entrance of the lane and pulled down the electrical switches of 8 households including Zhang Hongying’s. After arriving at Zhang Hongying’s home, Zhang Fengxiang knocked on the gate under the pretext of asking about some matters.

After Zhang Fengxiang knocked on the door, he first asked where Liu Chengxu was working. Zhang Hongying answered that he was in Shanxi. Zhang Fengxiang said he wanted Liu Chengxu’s mobile phone number. Zhang Hongying gave it to him. Zhang Fengxiang saved the number in his own phone, then put the phone into his pants pocket, and then he grabbed Zhang Hongying’s neck.

After choking Zhang Hongying to death, Zhang Fengxiang realized the seriousness of the matter. He became afraid and did not carry out the rape. He then ran into Zhang Hongying’s home and began rummaging through cabinets and chests looking for valuable items.

However, in a vest worn by Zhang Hongying, Zhang Fengxiang found only 9 yuan and 50 cents, and found no other valuable items. At this point, in a fit of anger, Zhang Fengxiang set the cotton on fire. He never expected that this fire would also suffocate Zhang Hongying’s youngest daughter to death.

Zhang Fengxiang’s ignorance of the law is hard to understand. Zhang Fengxiang, whose mind had been clouded by a moment of greed, was still dreaming about his future life even when he might face a death sentence. He said that in the future he wanted to be a good person, work hard to earn money, and compensate his family and the victim’s family.

Liu Chengxu said that he worked away from home year-round and could not even return home, hoping to earn more money to provide better living conditions for his wife and children. He had never expected that all of this would lose its meaning.

Perhaps in the future a burned home can be rebuilt, but the ruins in his heart may not be rebuilt for a long time.

Two lives, and a once happy family, disappeared in an instant.