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According to our inference, Lily Johnson was likely drugged and raped by her pstairs neighbor.
In addition, the female colleague took out a small sealed bag containing a yellowish-white viscous liquid.
"What a smart girl. Even after realizing what had happened, she didn't clean herself right away — she left this crucial piece of evidence. "
We sent the sample for testing and retrieved the personal information of Lily Johnson's upstairs neighbor .
In fact, for a rape case, identifying the real culprit isn’t usually difficult. Even without the physical evidence Lily left behind , we could have quickly found the suspect based on other clues.
In such a case, the truly difficult part is helping the victim heal from the trauma she has endured.
There was no doubt that for a young girl in her prime, the damage was devastating and overwhelming.
An hour later, the test result of the fluid came back: It was confirmed to be male semen, and the DNA matched that of Lily Johnson's upstairs neighbor .
Without hesitation, we opened a case and prepared to arrest the suspect.
Lily Johnson's upstairs neighbor was named John Miller. He worked at an auto repair shop, at that time, was supposed to be at work
We drove straight to the auto repair shop, but John Miller was nowhere to be seen.
Could he has fled, afraid of being caught, and already gone into hiding?
I spoke with the workshop manager, who told me that John Miller hadn’t shown up for work at all. He had taken a leave a few days earlier and hadn’t returned since.
I reviewed the security footage from the auto repair shop — the manager had told the truth.
That complicated thing. The suspect's actions suggested this was a premeditated crime, not something done on impulse.
Since it had been planned in advance, he had likely already fled — making him much harder to catch.
We had no choice but to take Lily Johnson home first, hoping to find useful clues there — or in John Miller’s apartment. .
My female colleague took Lily Johnson downstairs to help her relax, leaving me to search the place on my own.
I showed my badge at the property management office and got the key to John Miller's apartment . I unlocked the door and stepped inside .
John Miller's apartment was a two-bedroom and one-living-room unit. The two bedrooms faced each other , separated by a corridor less than three meters long. One of them had been turned into a storage room
I walked through the place and didn’t find any signs of a woman ever living there. It seemed this guy was just a middle-aged, lonely and wretched man.
I stepped into John Miller's bedroom. A strong stench of cigarettes hit me the moment I walked in — mixed with something even fouler that I couldn’t place. I coughed hard from the choking air. I quickly opened a window to let in some air, then turned my attention to his bed.
The pillowcase was yellowed with use , the quilt reeked , and the nightstand was cluttered with ashtrays. . This man clearly wasn’t the decent, friendly neighbor he might have pretended to be. I also found two pieces of filthy women's underwear tucked beneath his pillow — both stained with dried semen.
I frowned in disgust and kept searching. Inside the drawer of his nightstand were stacks of pornographic videos and magazines from a certain island country.
How could someone like him have ever offered to help Lily Johnson and her mother? Most likely, he’d targeted them long ago.
The stench in the room was unbearable, so I headed downstairs to Lily Johnson's apartment to continue the investigation.
The mother and daughter’s home were warm and neatly kept — it was clear Lily Johnson’s mother took pride in maintaining a tidy space.
Lily’s bedroom carried a faint aroma of aromatherapy — fresh and soft, like a young girl’s space should be.
On the messy bed sheet, I noticed not only the semen stains, but also a small pool of blood.
That beast! I couldn’t even find the words to express the fury boiling inside me.
Then I rummaged through Lily Johnson's bedside table and found a death certificate tucked inside .
The moment I saw the name on it, I froze.
It was John Miller’s death certificate — he had died three days ago!
A chill ran down my spine. How could someone who had been dead for three days have climbed into the girl's bed in the middle of the night and commit rape ?
