Chapter 29: How Could an Elementary School Student Not Be a Witness?

Page (1/3)

There had always been one thing Ji Yi could never understand.

Conan kept emphasizing that anything children said would be treated by the police as a prank.

What exactly did they think the crime rate in Beika was? Did they have no idea?

With things already this bad, they still dared to discriminate against witnesses based on age?

Just look at the country across the Pacific. Its crime rate might also be among the highest in the world, but its attitude toward underage witnesses was far more reasonable.

There might occasionally be situations like, “My house doesn’t have a basement,” but problems like that could be completely avoided during testimony—for instance, by mixing a photograph of the suspected killer among other photographs and having the witness identify it.

Instead of telling elementary-school students, “Stop fooling around.”

What was even more outrageous was that the Metropolitan Police Department in Detective Conan often had the Junior Detective League identify criminals face-to-face.

The children might not understand, but did the police not understand either?

So now you understand why Beika Town was paradise for law-enforcement officers, right?

In another timeline, with procedures like these, everyone from Inspector Shiratori to Takagi would have to commit ritual suicide.

In other words, it was no wonder that the unfortunate Kujo was doomed the moment he ran into Eri Kisaki. Forget about what kind of detective she was—your own law-enforcement agency had turned itself into this kind of mess. Did you have no shame?

It was almost as if, had Ji Yi not intervened, they had originally intended to let Conan and the other elementary-school students come over and give their statements entirely on their own that day.

Yes, this country was not as rigidly regulated as the one across the Pacific. When questioning minors, that country required the protection of children’s rights, meaning that a guardian or a child-protection agency had to be present. But were they really planning to let elementary-school students go through the procedure by themselves?

The children might not care, and their guardians might not care, but could they guarantee that the judge and the jury would not care?

Suppose the opposing lawyer had even the slightest bit of skill.

“Were the underage witnesses questioned by the police without anyone else present?”

“Yes.”

“Why were the guardians of the underage witnesses not present?”

Would they dare answer, “Because the law does not explicitly require it”?

Perhaps it was not technically illegal, but did they think the jury would not come away with the impression that the police might have coerced the minors into giving their testimony?

When one side had prepared while the other had not, even Gin could not escape the effects of preconceived notions. Was a jury more formidable than Gin?

If the parents had something to do, then the teacher would have to come. If no one was willing to take responsibility, they could simply visit the home and compel cooperation with the investigation. In short, the children could not be the only ones present.

That was why Sumiko Kobayashi and Professor Agasa had ultimately come along.

Page (1/3)

Page (2/3)

The children’s own parents were not especially suitable, but as long as there were adults present, that was enough.

Speaking of which, Professor Agasa really was an exceptionally kind old man.

Ji Yi felt that if he had encountered someone like Professor Agasa when he was a child, it would truly have benefited him for the rest of his life.

“Shiratori, you handle the statements from those children.” Since Sumiko Kobayashi had come, Ji Yi simply handed the task over to Shiratori.

He was giving Shiratori a helping hand and urging him to get back on the right track sooner. The man was not particularly bright to begin with, yet he spent all day preoccupied with jealousy and romantic rivalry. How could he possibly do his job well?

“What? Wasn’t Inspector Higashino coming personally?” Genta sounded a little displeased. That was perfectly normal, really. In his eyes, giving a statement as a witness was a very serious matter. Since Ji Yi had not come in person, he felt that he was being looked down on.

“The inspector has other matters to attend to.” Shiratori was very good-natured about it. No one would get angry over a child’s little fit of displeasure.

“Hello…” It was Sumiko Kobayashi’s first time at the Metropolitan Police Department. Unlike the three children, who were completely at ease, she was extremely nervous. “I’m the homeroom teacher of these children…”

“Hello, Ms. Kobayashi.” Shiratori paused. Why did she look so much like Sato?

“May I ask… um… is there a female police officer here who looks rather similar to me?” Sumiko Kobayashi gathered her courage and asked. “I was mistaken for her several times when I came in just now.”

“Oh, yes.” Shiratori nodded. If they looked alike, they looked alike. It was not something that needed to be denied.

“Hey, Shiratori. Are these the elementary-school students Higashino said discovered the body last night?” Sato happened to arrive just then. “Why didn’t he come himself?”

“They really do look alike…” Sumiko Kobayashi was astonished as well.

“I’m not sure. I think he went to the archives and brought out a pile of old case files.” Shiratori thought for a moment before replying. “It seems he’s been looking through old files lately. Quite a few of them involve cases handled by the inspector’s father in the past…”

Sato did not reply. She merely greeted the children, then glanced curiously at Sumiko Kobayashi, who looked so much like her. Without saying anything else, she returned to her own desk.

Shiratori certainly had no problem taking the statements, so Ji Yi did not ask any further questions. He simply began sorting through the materials in his hands.

“As expected, I still haven’t found anything.”

Ji Yi raised his head and rotated his neck.

At first, he had thought that since his father had investigated someone so dangerous, his death probably could not be separated from that person. But the more he investigated, the stranger things became. He increasingly failed to understand why the other party would want to murder his father.

The Curtain Man truly was completely “beyond the reach of the law.”

Since he had committed no crime, why would he be afraid of being investigated by the police?

Even if Ji Yi’s father had really uncovered his identity, what could he have done?

Publicize it?

Wouldn’t that amount to free advertising?

Page (2/3)

Page (3/3)

Since the police were completely powerless against him, why would he take the risk of orchestrating a murder?

Putting himself in the other man’s place, Ji Yi felt that if he were the Curtain Man and thought about things rationally, he simply would not care whether anyone investigated him.

And Ji Yi did not believe that someone capable of reaching this point could be irrational.

So perhaps he had been looking in the wrong direction?

Perhaps the key was not that his father had been investigating cases related to the Curtain Man, but that among the other cases his father had handled, there happened to be one involving a crime committed by the Curtain Man during his immature years—back when he was not yet the Curtain Man. That might be the other man’s true weak point.

If that was the case, the investigation would become even more troublesome.

Only by investigating cases connected to the Curtain Man could he uncover the man’s identity. It was not necessarily the cases committed by the Curtain Man himself that would enable them to catch him…

Besides, any crimes the man had committed before becoming the Curtain Man had probably passed the statute of limitations long ago, hadn’t they?

The more Ji Yi thought about it, the more irritated he became.

He also had no idea whether Yusaku Kudo’s promised assistance would turn up anything useful.

With that thought, Ji Yi began looking through cases from other regions that might have been connected to the Curtain Man.

Considering the Curtain Man’s clients, he focused on cases in which the victim was an heir to an inheritance, a business magnate, or someone whose death would bring enormous financial benefits to others—while the killer happened not to be one of the beneficiaries.

“Shikoku, four years ago?”

Ji Yi found a report.

“The young heiress of a villa hanged to death in a locked room?”

“Detective solves the locked-room mystery; killer commits suicide out of guilt?”

The fact that the detective remained unnamed was strange as well. He needed a reputation in order to get work, didn’t he? Solving a case like this would have made excellent publicity. Why be so low-key?

Still, it was possible that the person simply enjoyed solving cases, preferred to keep a low profile, or already had a steady clientele and did not need publicity.

What caught Ji Yi’s attention was that the young heiress had been the sole heir to the old master’s fortune. After her death, the old master and his wife, whose health had already been poor, fell into prolonged depression over the loss of their beloved daughter. The enormous inheritance, including the villa, consequently fell into the hands of distant relatives.

This really did seem like the Curtain Man’s style…

Page (3/3)