My Calling Is Profiler [EN]: Chapter 31

“Excuse me? Why do you need the population of that village?”

“It’s necessary for the investigation. Just a rough number will do.”

“It would be about ninety people.”

“Ninety people, huh… I understand. My interrogation is over.”

“Is it really over? Aren’t you going to accuse me of being the culprit?”

“As I’ve said repeatedly, I believe in Mr. Kim Woo-chang’s innocence.”

At those words, Kim Woo-chang lowered his head once more and sobbed. Park Do-joon closed the file for the last time and stood up, and Jung Yi-yeon packed up the recorder and followed Park Do-joon outside.

“What do you think, *sunbae* [senior colleague]?”

“Hey, you’re not asking me to hand over investigation materials, are you?”

“Eyy, this isn’t investigation material. I’m just asking for your opinion.”

“If I’m speaking strictly from my personal opinion, he’s innocent.”

“I thought so too.”

“You believe that?”

“*Sunbae*, you’ve always had a really quick intuition about these things.”

At those words, Park Do-joon gave a bitter smile.

‘Well, that’s true.’

Profiling has clear limitations in the realm of what can be learned. Just like how you can practice singing hard and become a good singer but not a famous singer, profiling also requires a natural instinct to see through lies, which falls into the realm of genius.

“Then I can just trust your word and prepare for the defense?”

“We need to finish it before then.”

“Finish it before then?”

“I mean we need to catch the real culprit. In this state, he’ll get the death penalty no matter what I say.”

At Park Do-joon’s words, Jung Yi-yeon frowned. But she didn’t deny it. The circumstantial evidence was too clear.

“Well, the only thing that can prove Mr. Kim Woo-chang’s claim right now is the five million won [Korean currency] in the safe.”

But even that five million won can’t be seen as evidence, because the fact that he took it out now doesn’t prove that there was always five million won there.

So there’s a high possibility that the court won’t believe his claim itself.

“Ugh, I thought this would be an easy case…”

“What’s easy about it?”

“I got pretty famous last time thanks to you, *sunbae*. The rumors about that case spread far and wide.”

“The suicide case?”

“Yes.”

Proving such a case is never easy. But Jung Yi-yeon proved it, and that’s why she’s being recognized within the company despite being a new lawyer.

“They told me to do well this time too… Ah… Woo…”

“Do well.”

Park Do-joon chuckled and said.

“I’ll do my job.”

# Local Thugs

“Why are you taking the side of a criminal?”

At Park Do-joon’s words, the police officers looked uncomfortable.

“He’s not a criminal, he’s a suspect. And profiling doesn’t lie.”

“People lie, but evidence doesn’t, does it?”

“It’s evidence that’s open to interpretation.”

In fact, Kim Woo-chang’s words also make sense circumstantially. In such cases, the evidence cannot be clearly proven. In the end, the answer depends on how you resolve it, and that’s the problem.

‘People don’t realize that evidence can change depending on the interpretation.’

They just think it’s right because the court interpreted it that way.

In reality, videos are often open to interpretation depending on the situation.

“Well, I don’t know if the court will believe the profiler’s words.”

The local police shrugged.

‘That’s the problem.’

They won’t believe it.

The Korean prosecution and courts ignore even scientific investigations to protect their power.

Even when a murderer’s DNA was found at the crime scene, the prosecution didn’t even indict him for murder, claiming there was a one in eight hundred million chance it could be someone else.

The murderer wasn’t someone with money or power either. Nevertheless, they made such a ridiculous claim.

Why? Just because the prosecutor was too lazy to work.

As a result, the criminal was arrested only after murdering an entire family, and the prosecutor who had released him on suspicion at the time because he was too lazy to work was promoted to chief prosecutor.

Will the Korean judicial system, which doesn’t even recognize scientific investigations that have been proven effective for decades because of their pride and interests, believe the words of a single profiler?

‘No way.’

Park Do-joon felt a sense of despair at the thought that he would have to investigate this case on his own.

Of course, he’s not alone. He does have a partner.

“Hey! Park Do-joon, are you crazy? Why do you keep causing problems with the local police? Do you think I’m easy to deal with right now? Huh? Do you think you can ignore your superiors just because you have some power?”

‘What am I supposed to do when this kind of guy is my partner?’

Park Do-joon couldn’t help but sigh when he saw Han Sung-gi.

“Haa…”

“You son of a bitch, did you just sigh at your superior? Huh? Huh?”

“Yes.”

“What?”

“So, are you going to report me? What crime does sighing fall under?”

Of course, it doesn’t fall under any crime. It just scratches the other person’s nerves.

“You goddamn bastard.”

Han Sung-gi’s face turned red. But Park Do-joon has a reason for ignoring Han Sung-gi like this.

‘He saw it with me.’

He clearly saw Kim Woo-chang testifying from beyond the interrogation room of the police station. And as a profiler, he should know the language of the body.

‘But does he not know? Or is he pretending not to know?’

Either way, it means Han Sung-gi is worthless as a profiler.

Why bother trying to go with such a person?

“You son of a bitch…”

“Mr. Kim Woo-chang is innocent. That’s what I see.”

“So you’re saying someone without investigative authority is going to investigate?”

“Why don’t we have investigative authority? We’re also police officers dispatched here, aren’t we?”

“That’s not what I mean!”

“Identifying the culprit and investigating isn’t an investigation.”

“You son of a bitch! Fine, do whatever you want!”

In the end, Han Sung-gi, who had been screaming in anger, stormed off, and Park Do-joon smiled bitterly as he walked out of the police station.

“Now what do I do?”

It’s not that he doesn’t have investigative authority, but there’s no way the local police will help him. Of course, they’ll give him basic information since he’s dispatched as a profiler, but that’s about it.

“First of all, the murder weapon has been clearly identified.”

As expected, pesticide ingredients were detected in the spicy fish stew, and the people who ate it died.

Two more people died yesterday, resulting in a total of seven deaths.

“Should I go to the village first?”

As Park Do-joon was about to leave the police station, he saw Jung Yi-yeon at the entrance and smiled bitterly.

“I knew it.”

“What do you mean, ‘I knew it’?”

“I knew you wouldn’t give up.”

“Hee? How did you know?”

“Are you the type to give up easily?”

Park Do-joon said that he clearly needed to finish this case before it went to court.

Knowing Jung Yi-yeon’s personality, she wouldn’t be the type to sit still and pick up the scraps. She would either try to resolve it before then or gather related evidence.

“As expected, you’re really quick on the uptake, *sunbae*.”

“You wouldn’t go even if I told you to, so are you going to follow me?”

“Of course.”

With that, she tapped the vehicle next to her, making a thumping sound.

“You’re not planning on driving your *sunbae’s* car around the countryside, are you? You’ll cry blood if it gets scratched, you know?”

“I wouldn’t fix it for that much, so there’s not much to cry about.”

“Still, isn’t this better? It’s going to be rough terrain, right?”

“That’s definitely better.”

Park Do-joon’s car is a luxury sedan, while Jung Yi-yeon’s car is a used SUV. A diesel one at that.

“It’s not a car that suits a woman’s taste.”

“When I drove around femininely, they told me to go home and drive a *sotttukkeong* [a large, heavy pot lid, implying she should be doing housework].”

But with this kind of used SUV, it would be hard to tell that the driver is a woman. Moreover, the inside was even more invisible because of the tinted windows.

“Get in, customer.”

“I can’t ride with you.”

“Excuse me? Why?”

“What would it look like if a current police officer was traveling with the lawyer in charge of the case?”

“Ah.”

“So you follow me. They can’t stop a lawyer from following, so that’s all I have to say.”

It’s like covering your eyes and saying ‘aung’ [a childish game of pretending not to see], but sometimes that’s necessary.

“You’re not saying you don’t want to go together, *sunbaenim* [term of respect for a senior colleague]?”

“It’s better than ruining an innocent person’s life.”

Park Do-joon started driving, and Jung Yi-yeon’s car started following behind him.

As they were driving for a while, Park Do-joon’s phone suddenly rang.

“Why?”

Park Do-joon asked indifferently after checking the name. The person calling was none other than Jung Yi-yeon.

-Sunbae, but why did you ask about the number of villagers earlier?

“That? I have something to check.”

-What is it? Tell me. We’re in the same boat anyway.

“It’s nothing much. In some ways, those dead people may be other perpetrators.”

-Excuse me? What does that mean?

“When profiling, there’s no answer if you only analyze the perpetrator. Especially in cases like this one where resentment is involved.”

-Resentment?

“Yeah, resentment. People died. And someone, I don’t know who, killed them using the method of poisoning. But would someone plan to kill people simply because they’re bored?”

-Aha!

‘Of course, there are guys who kill people because they’re bored.’

But at least from what Park Do-joon saw, this wasn’t it. Someone had a grudge against the deceased and tried to kill them.

-But what does that have to do with the number of villagers?

“Do you know what ‘drunk thugs’ or ‘neighborhood thugs’ are?”

-I’ve never heard of them before.

“Drunk thugs are people who commit violence when they’re drunk. Usually, they’re fine when they don’t drink, but they act like that when they’re drunk. Neighborhood thugs are guys who commit violence in the neighborhood. It’s a bit different from organized crime. Instead of pursuing groups or interests, they literally use violence when they don’t like something.”

-So?

“But from what I see… these deceased people are neighborhood thugs.”

-Excuse me? Why? There were no traces of that, were there? There were no reports of that either.

“There wouldn’t be any traces or anything like that. But you can tell by their actions. Maybe the police know that too, but they must have been in cahoots with them.”

-How do you know?

“There was a refrigerator in the village hall.”

-Excuse me? That’s the only reason?

“It’s not the only reason. Why is the village hall a village hall? All exchanges in the countryside are based on the village hall.”

So the village hall has almost everything. There are pots, rice cookers, refrigerators, and water purifiers.

In fact, the village hall has everything a person needs to live.

“The police said that the pesticide was put in while everyone went home to get side dishes because there were no side dishes in the village hall.”

-I heard that too.

“That’s the problem. There are usually side dishes in the village hall.”

There are already all the tools to make spicy fish stew and rice in the village hall. But there are no side dishes?

It’s strange when you think about the typical scene in the countryside where people share food at the village hall.

The police seem to have casually overlooked that.

“But there’s everything else, but there are no side dishes. Why would that be?”

-Uh…? I don’t know?

“You can just buy things and be done with it, but the villagers have to do the rest and fill it up.”

In fact, when you go to the countryside, there are quite a few people who make extra side dishes and bring them to the village hall.

That’s the generous heart of the countryside.

“But there was none of that here. That means no one comes to the village hall.”

-What does that have to do with neighborhood thugs?