Smith thought for a while, shook his head and said, "Let's look for it ourselves first. I don't really trust the police system here."
Two other lawyers seconded the motion.
"We are not familiar with the place here, and we are here specifically to sue the German police system and government departments on behalf of our clients. I think it is better not to call the police for the time being, in order to avoid a misunderstanding and not to make the matter a storm in the city." Smith shook He shook his finger and said, "Let's do this. Let's go to the hotel first and ask for the surveillance video from these ten days to see if we can find anything."
They revealed their identities as lawyers and asked the Hilton Hotel for surveillance video.
Although the management of the Hilton Hotel was reluctant, for the sake of the largest law firm in the United States, they still gave them a copy of the surveillance video of the hotel's front door and back door over the past ten days as a favor.
These surveillance videos do not involve customers' privacy, and it doesn't matter if they are shown to them.
But the four people were certainly not satisfied with the surveillance video outside the gate.
What if Gu Nianzhi was harmed by someone inside the hotel
This is not unprecedented. For example, a very famous case occurred in New York, USA a few years ago, in which a young woman suddenly disappeared and was eventually found naked and dead in a reservoir on the roof of the hotel where she lived. Inside, the reservoir was two meters high and covered with a very heavy cement lid. It took several strong men to lift the cement lid, but it was deemed a "suicide" by the New York police...
These four people are all relatively well-known lawyers in the United States. Because they have seen too much chaos within the police, they do not blindly trust the ability of the police.
Moreover, it was too subtle that Gu Nianzhi suddenly disappeared at this moment, and they couldn't believe the German police.
Smith sternly said to the security director of the Hilton Hotel with a cold face: "If something happens to our colleagues inside your hotel, can you bear the responsibility?! - I can guarantee that if she really encounters misfortune here, you Hilton Hotel It won’t be able to open anywhere in the world!”
The Hilton Hotel's security director's face turned red and then white as he glared at these imposing lawyers, and finally reluctantly asked his boss for permission.
In order to calm the matter, Hilton executives specially agreed to make a copy of the surveillance video of the corridors on each floor of the hotel and show it to the four American lawyers.
With the surveillance video inside and outside the hotel, Smith and the others were confident that nothing would be missed, so the four of them each assigned a part of the video tape and started working overnight.
Everyone watched intently all night, their eyes were red, but they only saw Gu Nianzhi leaving the hotel early in the morning ten days ago.
But they could see clearly that she left the hotel in their business car!
Since leaving that time, she has never been seen back.
The time she left also matched the time her keycard was last used.
Smith cheered up a little, and immediately called the driver of their business charter, pretending to be in a hurry, and asked him to come to the hotel immediately, saying that he needed help with something important, and the price would be extra.
The chauffeur was so happy that he arrived at the Hilton Hotel where they were staying within five minutes.
Smith and the others invited him to the small conference room in the hotel room, quietly turned on the video recording on their mobile phones, and asked him as if unintentionally: "... Did you send Lawyer Gu out ten days ago? Where did you go?"
The driver hurriedly said: "Oh, yes, I remember that Lawyer Gu said she was going to see a friend at King's Lake and asked me to take her there. It's about a two-hour drive from Munich."
After the driver finished speaking, before Smith could continue to ask him, he added: "How did Lawyer Gu come back? Did she call another car? She said she would only stay for one day and call me when she went back in the evening. I was waiting there. She didn’t call for two days. Did she have too much fun and forget to go home?”
As soon as he finished speaking, the driver realized that he had said the wrong thing and immediately changed his words: "Oh, no, it was ten days. I forgot, it was ten days..." As he spoke, he squinted his eyes slyly to avoid Smith. their sight.
He felt extremely remorseful. After so many days, these lawyers asked him about the situation at that time. When he was so excited, he forgot what the people asked him to say and told the truth!
Fortunately, he remembered to make amends, hoping these people wouldn't care about his slip of the tongue.
"Is it ten days or one day?! Can you remember such a thing wrong?!" Smith crossed his arms and frowned at the driver.
"It's been so long, how can I remember it so clearly?" The driver was very cunning and asked cautiously: "Is Lawyer Gu back? You can ask her personally?"
"If she comes back, will we still ask you?" Smith glared at him, "Think about it carefully, did Lawyer Gu tell you for one day, or ten days?!"
When the driver heard that Gu Nianzhi had not come back, his heart skipped a beat and he became a little scared. He weighed it again and gritted his teeth and told the truth: "... It seems to be a day, yes, it should be a day. Really, if you don't believe me, you can ask her. ."
After the four lawyers listened, they all said: "..."
No way
First of all, the text message Gu Nianzhi sent them said that she was going out for ten days, but she personally told the driver that it was only for one day, and she also said that she would be back in the evening and would call him to pick her up!
Is it ten days or one day? This is the first contradiction.
Then after losing the news, Gu Nianzhi's phone calls were also unreachable.
From being constantly forwarded to voice mailboxes, to finally "the phone is not in the service area".
Unusual, so unusual.
At night, the four of them met in Smith's room, all looking grim.
Although they were very reluctant to admit it, they still had to admit that Gu Nianzhi must have disappeared.
It’s definitely not because I got lost, but because I fell into someone else’s trap!
Whose way can it follow
Gu Nianzhi is a citizen of the Chinese Empire and came to Germany specifically to litigate.
If we want to offend anyone, it would only be Seth’s family of lawless local emperors!
The four people looked at each other and saw what everyone meant in each other's eyes.
Although the lawyer only represents the client in litigation and has no direct interest in the other party, because the lawyer's profession is directly linked to the law, it can really attract hatred, so the defendant harms the plaintiff's lawyer, or the plaintiff harms the defendant's lawyer. A common thing.
"Could it be the Seth family? His stepfather York is not a good person." A lawyer said coldly, "We have investigated his background and it is definitely not clean."
"Don't forget, Seth also escaped. Although the hospital report was nine days ago, that was when they discovered that he escaped. If the time of his official escape is pushed back a little, it might be the same time as the time when Lawyer Gu disappeared. It matches." Smith was the first to think of this possibility and shuddered in his heart.
Not because of anything else, but because when he and Gu Nianzhi went to the hospital to see the seriously injured Seth, the way Seth looked at Gu Nianzhi was really abnormal...
"Ah? Is it really related to that perverted bitch Seth?! What should I do?!"
What kind of scumbag Seth is, no one knows better than the team of lawyers who know the details of Li Haiqing’s case...
"Call Lawyer He first. Tell him clearly before calling the police." Smith rubbed his forehead. "We can't delay it any longer. We haven't heard from Lawyer Gu yet. I'm very worried..."
Everyone looked at each other and knew what they were worried about, but no one dared to say that possibility, as if if they said it, their worries would come true.
As long as he didn't say anything, Gu Nianzhi would be safe.
Everyone prayed in their hearts, hoping that such a desperate and terrifying thing would not happen to Gu Nianzhi...
Although they didn't have many personal relationships with Gu Nianzhi, they had been getting along well on business matters for more than a month. They also admired this hard-working and smart female lawyer from the Chinese Empire and really couldn't stand that she would have an accident.
"They even dare to touch the lawyers! I think the German judicial system is really not that bad!"
After the four people discussed it, Smith called He Zhichu on the spot.
But after he dialed He Zhichu's number for a full hour, all he got was messages in his voicemail!
The other three people were very surprised and took out their mobile phones one after another and dialed He Zhichu's number.
He called his personal mobile phone, work mobile phone, work phone, and even the phone number in the professor building of University B in the Chinese Empire. None of the calls were actually answered, they were all left in the message box!
Smith stared at his cell phone and muttered: "...Didn't you say you were going home? Where did you go? Antarctica? Or the North Pole? I didn't even answer the phone..."
"Forget it, Smith." Several colleagues comforted him, "Isn't it the same when we are on vacation? We don't answer or answer work calls or emails."
This is called a vacation, otherwise why take a vacation? Wouldn't it be better to just work overtime
A lawyer added: "Besides, Lawyer He said that he will be back in two weeks at the latest. There are still four days to go until two weeks. We will see then."
Smith thought about it and it made sense, but Gu Nianzhi's matter couldn't wait any longer.
"Let's do this." Smith hesitated for a while, "We still have to call the police. Also, Lawyer Gu is a citizen of the Chinese Empire. If something happens to her, they have to notify their embassy."
If Gu Nianzhi was an American citizen, they would have approached the American Embassy long ago. Unfortunately, she was not. They had to approach the Embassy of the Chinese Empire in Munich.
Several people discussed the order, and finally decided that they would be divided into two groups and dispatched at the same time.
One group went to call the police, and the other group went to the Embassy of the Chinese Empire in Munich to report the news.
Smith had a lot of dealings with the police, so he and another lawyer went to the police station to file a complaint.
There were two lawyers who knew a little bit of Chinese and went to the Embassy of the Chinese Empire in Munich.
…
"What did you say? Your lawyer is missing?!" The officer in charge of missing persons cases at the Munich Police Department looked at Smith and his colleagues with a look like "You seem to be kidding me."
Smith spent time at the Munich Regional Police Station just a few days ago because of Seth's escape from the hospital, urging them to quickly send people to catch the fugitive. Everyone here is familiar with him.
Some police officers understand and sympathize with him, but some police officers hate him and think that he is here to interfere with their work. Moreover, their accusations have smeared the reputation of the German police and are very unfriendly to him.
Now that they saw him coming to report the crime, a few police officers took pleasure in his misfortune and kept making things difficult for them.
Smith was so angry that one Buddha was born and two Buddhas ascended to heaven, but there was nothing he could do.
"Missing? Do you think it is so easy to file a missing case? If she is a minor and loses contact for 24 hours, she can indeed be reported missing. But unfortunately, she is over 18 years old and is an adult, so..." Munich area The people at the police station refused to accept Smith's report in official tone.
Smith sneered, put his hands on the police officer's desk, looked directly into his cloudy gray eyes, and said word by word: "Oh? Now you think that you are an adult at the age of 18? What about the son of your fellow chief? 21 You are calling me a minor even though I am 22 years old?! Your German law says that you have to be an adult at the age of 22?! Tell me, did I file a fake lawsuit! Or did you introduce a fake law in Germany!"
When it comes to flaunting legal provisions, how can this policeman be a match for America's elite lawyers
The policeman's face turned red after being retorted by Smith. He couldn't get off the stage for a moment. He punched the table viciously and said, "When I say she is an adult, she is an adult! As for the lawsuit you are filing, ask the judge! What does it have to do with me?!"
"That's right... the disappearance may be just a misunderstanding. Your colleagues are already practicing lawyers. Why are you so anxious to report the case?" The police colleagues also supported, "Also, cases like disappearance can only be directly investigated. Relatives come to report, which of you is her immediate relative?"
Seeing these arrogant lawyers in court deflated, the policemen felt secretly happy.
Too many times, the suspects that the police worked so hard to arrest were exonerated by smooth-talking lawyers and could not be convicted.
But they also don’t think about it. Lawyers have also helped the police and prosecutors a lot, helping them convict suspects.
It can only be said that some people only remember the bad things others did to them, but they completely forgot all the good things they did to themselves.
Smith was blocked by the police and he was not a vegetarian. He pushed up the gold-rimmed glasses on the bridge of his nose with his hand and said righteously: "Just because you said that my colleague is an adult, so the relevant Her report does not require immediate family members. I think you are also talking nonsense, and any legal provisions are bullshit to you. Whenever you need to use them as excuses, just grab anyone at random, regardless of whether your own words are contradictory. !”
"Eh? Are you trying to reason with us? You don't know that we are the police? We are a violent law enforcement agency, not a reasonable agency?!" The police officers in the office all rolled their eyes, "If you want to reason with us, go to court. —The door is over there, it’s easy to leave without seeing him off!”
"How could you do this?! We abide by the law and follow legal procedures to report the crime, but you have this attitude?!" Smith slapped the table hard, "Have you thought about the consequences?"
"What are the consequences? We also abide by the law and act in accordance with legal procedures. The law has never said that colleagues can report crimes as immediate family members!"
Smith and his colleagues had no choice but to leave angrily and think of a solution.
…
The other two lawyers who went to report to the Chinese Embassy in Munich were treated much better than Smith and his colleagues.
As soon as the two people in the reception room said they were the defense team of the plaintiff lawyer in Li Haiqing's case, the embassy staff immediately invited them in with great enthusiasm.
Arriving at the small reception room of the embassy, the vice consul of the embassy cordially received them.
"Are you members of the American legal team? Thank you very much for your wonderful defense and for seeking justice for the murder of international students in our country. We will remember you." The vice-consul is a middle-aged man in his fifties. He is well-maintained. He looked like he was in his early forties.
The two of them were busy being humble, and then said: "We are here this time for Lawyer Gu from our legal team. She is also a citizen of your Chinese Empire."
"Oh! It's Lawyer Gu! Yes, yes! She is very powerful! I listened to her court defense statement, and her English is really smooth, without any accent! Standard Oxford accent!" The deputy consul laughed. Hehe said, and praised Gu Nianzhi very much.
When the two lawyers saw that the lawyer was showing off his skills, they immediately struck while the iron was hot: "Yes, yes! She is very powerful. Although she is young, she is extremely smart and hard-working. She is the main lawyer who will appear in court this time." , extremely sophisticated."
"Hahaha! The female lawyers in our country are indeed very powerful!" The vice consul was so happy that he couldn't open his mouth from ear to ear. However, he did not forget what the two American lawyers just said, so he asked: "You just said it was for her. Come here, what’s going on?”
"That's it." The two American lawyers became serious, and one lawyer spoke first: "Ten days ago, Lawyer Gu told us that she was going out to meet a friend and said she would come back in ten days. But we couldn't get through to her in the past ten days. Every time I call her mobile phone, it is forwarded to the voicemail. Yesterday when I called her mobile phone, it was even out of service area. We are worried... "
Another lawyer continued: "We felt there was a problem, so we asked some people to investigate the whereabouts of Lawyer Gu, and found our chartered driver. He said that ten days ago, Lawyer Gu personally told him to go to King Lake for a day. She would call him to pick him up at night. But the driver didn’t wait until now for her to call!”
The vice-consul understood what they meant, stopped smiling, frowned and thought for a while, "You mean... Lawyer Gu...?"
"... is missing." The two American lawyers said together, "Our other two colleagues have gone to the Munich Regional Police Station to call the police. The two of us are here to inform you. After all, you are the embassy of Lawyer Gu's country, and we are not responsible for your country. Citizens abroad have a duty to protect them."
"This is natural. Not to mention that she is a lawyer entrusted by Minister Bai to come to Germany to litigate for her compatriots. Even if she is an ordinary international student or labor worker, our embassy has a duty to do so!" The vice consul patted the table, "Please take care of her. Fill in the lawyer's information and I will contact the country immediately to see what their rules are."
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This is the 10th update of 5,000 words, and there will be more to come.