Chapter 484: Clearing Up Litigation (Part 2)
The red sun sets in the west.
Sun Shaozong reviewed the confession of the incestuous aunt and nephew and found it correct. He handed it back to Sun Chengye and took two sips of strong tea to refresh himself. Then he said loudly, "Next one!"
"Uncle Thirteen."
Sun Chengye hurriedly reminded him in a low voice: "The eleven cases you selected earlier have now all been concluded."
"Are they all broken?"
Sun Shaozong was stunned at first, and then he breathed a sigh of relief. Although he did not encounter any difficult cases during the whole day of trial, the tangled disputes were enough to make him extremely troubled.
Rubbing his aching brow, he stood up and threw away his sleeves. Sun Chengye immediately shouted at the right time: "Retreat..."
Who knew that before he uttered the word "tang" he could hear the beating of the drum outside the door.
These eleven cases have all been concluded, why are there still people beating drums outside the door?
Could it be that another major case happened by chance?
Thinking of this, Sun Shaozong hurriedly sat down behind the desk again and ordered the bailiff to bring the person who beat the drum to appeal for justice to the court.
Not long after, two yamen runners brought in a man with strange looks on their faces . He turned out to be a boy of about eleven or twelve years old.
The young man was brought to the court. Facing dozens of eyes, he was not at all stage-frightened. He knelt down properly, holding up a petition in both hands, and said in a crisp voice: "Your Majesty, I, Li Xian, have a grievance to appeal!"
Sun Shaozong gave a signal, and someone immediately came forward to take the petition and presented it to the desk.
Sun Shaozong picked up the petition and glanced through it without even glancing at it. He saw that the boy not only wanted to seek justice, but also wanted to sue the Wanping County Magistrate Xu Huaizhi!
The story goes like this: the young man Li Xian and his father Li Sheng were originally from Dengzhou, Henan Province. Two years ago, Li Xian's mother died of illness, so he followed his father Li Sheng to the capital to make a living.
A few days ago, the rice shop opened by Li Sheng was in financial difficulty, so he planned to borrow 100 taels of silver from his good friend Chen Xu to tide over the current difficulties.
Originally, the two had agreed to meet at Li's rice shop in the evening.
Unexpectedly, at night, Li Sheng waited in the shop for a long time, but Chen Xu did not come with the silver. In a hurry, he led his men to find Chen's house.
Unexpectedly, only Chen Xu's wife Chang was at home, and there was no sign of Chen Xu - and according to Chen Xu's wife Chang, Chen Xu had already gone out with the silver.
In this way, Li Sheng and Chang searched for three days, but still could not find Chen Xu alive or dead. With no other choice, the two had to report the case to the government, hoping to use the government's power to find Chen Xu.
Who would have thought that Wanping County Magistrate Xu Huaizhi, somehow investigating the case, actually concluded that Li Sheng and Chang had an affair and conspired to murder Chen Xu. He then tortured Li Sheng and Chang in court and forced them to confess.
Putting the petition back on the table, Sun Shaozong raised his voice and said, "Li Xian, you said that your father and Chang were both tortured into confessing by Wanping County. Do you have any evidence?"
"Reply to your Excellency's words."
Li Xian was not at all nervous. He straightened his back and bowed his hands, saying, "If he had not confessed under torture, why has it been four days since my father and Aunt Chen confessed, but Wanping County still not found Uncle Chen's body?"
This is really to the point. Since Li Sheng and Chang have already confessed their crimes, why would they continue to conceal the whereabouts of the body? Therefore, there must be something wrong!
Moreover, this was not the first or second time that Xu Huaizhi made mistakes in solving cases.
Therefore, Sun Shaozong immediately ordered someone to take his name card and go to the Wanping County Court to bring Li Sheng and Chang to the court for interrogation.
After the officer took the order and left, Sun Shaozong was very interested again. He held the petition in his hand and asked, "Li Xian, who wrote this petition?"
"Reply to the master."
Li Xian cupped his hands and said, "This is written by me personally."
"But listening to someone else's narration?"
"No, the above are all what the common people think."
Tsk~
Although there are some problems with the format of this complaint, the content is well-organized. If the boy did not lie, he can truly be called a "child prodigy".
Moreover, Sun Shaozong always felt that the word "Li Xian" seemed to be something he had heard somewhere.
Since Li Sheng and Chang would not be here for some time, Sun Shaozong simply tested the young man Li Xian in the classroom.
Although Li Xian was a little confused, he knew that his father's life and death were now in the hands of Sun Shaozong, so he used all his wisdom and spoke eloquently without any fear.
Eventually even Sun Chengye became interested and took over the conversation to test the young man on his knowledge of Confucian classics, history, and literature. Unexpectedly, the young man was able to answer them all with ease.
In the end, Sun Chengye couldn't help but admire him privately, saying that when he was twelve or thirteen years old, he definitely didn't have such courage and insight.
Let's ignore the comparison of courage for now, this young man's talent is truly extraordinary.
About half an hour passed like this, and then two prisoners were escorted in, one horizontally and one vertically, from outside.
The one lying across was Li Sheng, who was lying on a stretcher. Seeing his emaciated appearance and bloody clothes, one could tell that he had suffered a lot in Wanping County.
The one standing upright was naturally Chang who walked in. He saw that this woman was quite charming and elegant. Although she looked frightened, her movements were still quite agile.
It seems that Xu Huaizhi is still a man who favors boys over girls.
"Dad! Are you...are you okay?!"
When Li Xian saw his father's appearance, he hurriedly crawled forward a few steps and reached out to touch Li Sheng's cheek, but was afraid of hurting him. He was choked with sobs and speechless for a moment, and his tears kept streaming down his face.
Li Sheng was also shocked when he saw his son kneeling in the court. He straightened his neck and said in a trembling voice, "My son... Why is my son here?"
Li Xian wiped away his tears and said seriously, "I heard that the governor, Mr. Sun, was going to the court today to investigate the case, so I wrote a petition and came here to seek justice. Don't worry, father. With Mr. Sun's involvement in the case, it will definitely be solved..."
Pah~
The sound of a gavel interrupted the farewell between the father and son. Sun Shaozong said solemnly behind the case: "Li Sheng, this is not a place for you and your son to chat. What happened on the day Chen Xu disappeared? Tell me the truth."
Then he ordered, "Take Chang away first and we'll try him later."
This practice is of course intended to prevent the two people from colluding in their testimony in court.
Without mentioning how Chang was taken outside, it was said that when Li Sheng heard this, he remembered his grievances and hurriedly said, "Master, Master, I am really wronged, wronged!"
Seeing that he was only concerned with crying out for justice, Sun Shaozong raised the gavel and was about to scold him, but Li Xian beside him hurriedly stopped his father and whispered, "Dad, there is no need to cry out for justice. Just tell me what happened that day and the adults will understand."
Only then did Li Sheng stop crying and tell the whole story from the beginning.
But he said that he had been waiting in the accounting office behind the rice shop since Youzheng (six o'clock in the evening) that day, waiting for Chen Xu to bring the money. However, until Haishi (nine o'clock in the evening), there was still no sign of Chen Xu.
Thinking that someone would come to collect the debt tomorrow, Li Sheng could not hold back his excitement, so he called Zhou Feng, the clerk who stayed behind in the rice shop, and hurriedly found Chen's house.
"At that time, I was afraid that Brother Chen didn't want to lend me the money, so I deliberately broke the appointment. Therefore, I played a trick and asked Zhou Feng to knock on the door."
"Who would have thought that after Chen's sister-in-law opened the door, she actually said that Brother Chen had taken the silver out early in the morning."
"We were very anxious, so we gathered together and searched along the way, but we never found any trace of Brother Chen. We had no choice but to report to the Wanping County Government."
"Who would have thought that the county magistrate would find out something by some means, and he insisted that I had an affair with Chen's sister-in-law, and after murdering Brother Chen, he ran to the county government office and cried thief - and he tortured me so much that I had to confess under torture."
"In the past few days, the county magistrate has been asking me where I buried Brother Chen's body, but I... I have never had any bad intentions towards Brother Chen, so how would I know where he buried his body?"
At this point, Li Shengzhi burst into tears out of grievance.
Sun Shaozong remained calm, pondered his words in his mind, and ordered someone to bring Chang to the hall and asked, "Chang, Li Sheng said that he was tortured into confessing by the Wanping County, but you didn't seem to have been tortured, so how did you confess to the crime?"
"Reply... reply to the master's words."
Mrs. Chang said timidly, "I saw the horrible torture that Big Brother Li suffered, but I really... I really didn't dare to try, so I had to rush to accept it."
For a timid woman, this makes sense.
Sun Shaozong nodded and asked again: "What did you do that night?"
"Reply to the master's question."
Chang continued timidly, "After my husband left with the money that night, I waited at home until I heard someone calling out from outside the door. I went to the door to ask what was going on, and then I realized that my husband had disappeared."
Chang's narrative is too simple, and there is not much information available for analysis.
Therefore, Sun Shaozong first asked Chen Xu in detail about the time he left home and what he was wearing, and then calmly asked, "What did Li Sheng say when he knocked on the door? Go out and see if there is anything strange on his face."
When Li Sheng heard this, he opened his mouth to speak, but Sun Shaozong suppressed him with a fierce look.
Mrs. Chang frowned and recalled for a while, then shook her head and said, "It wasn't Big Brother Li who was calling the door. It seemed like a clerk in his shop was outside calling me over to talk to him. As for his expression..."
"etc!"
Before Chang could finish her words, Sun Shaozong suddenly pressed on: "You said the shop assistant called you over to talk to him? How did he call you? Try to learn it carefully!"
Chang was a little puzzled, but she still lowered her voice and called out in a man's tone, "Mrs. Chen, is Mrs. Chen at home?"
Then he continued, "That's what he called out. I answered the call in the courtyard, and the waiter asked, 'I have an appointment with Master Chen, why is he so late?'"
"I heard that my husband had gone out a long time ago, so it was the eldest brother of the Li family who came to talk to me."
Hearing this, Sun Shaozong looked at Li Sheng again. Li Sheng nodded his head like a chicken pecking at rice and said, "It is exactly like this."
"hehe……"
Sun Shaozong immediately sneered and muttered, "This thief finally revealed his true intentions!"
