Chapter 29: Turning the Tables!

Lawyer: Starting with Legal Revenge Against Infidelity!

Not guilty... Xu De was mounting a not-guilty defense.

Was it even possible?

The outcome remained unknown for now, but... how would you know if you didn''t try!?

Xu De never believed in fate. He only believed in himself. As long as he acted, there was possibility and hope!

An uninterrupted trafficking case plus legitimate self-defense plus self-surrender plus insufficient hard evidence...

These several tricky angles were enough to pry open a sliver of hope in this bleak case!

"No one actually saw Wang Qiang deliberately kill Li Erniu with their own eyes..."

In the gallery.

Zhang Xia repeated Xu De''s words in her mind, her understanding deepening the more she thought about it.

The scene at the time of the incident was far too chaotic. Even with firearms, the police couldn''t control the crowd. Furthermore, the seven police officers never saw Wang Qiang commit murder before the chaos subsided...

Therefore, given that Wang Qiang''s subjective consciousness was clouded and he was swarmed by the crowd...

Anyone present at the scene was suspected of using Wang Qiang to commit the murder!

What? You say only Wang Qiang''s fingerprints were on the murder weapon?

Actually, in a situation like that, you wouldn''t need to hold the knife yourself!

Put it this way.

You''ve arm-wrestled someone before, locking in a test of strength, right?

What if, during that struggle... someone suddenly poked the back of your hand with a single finger... what would happen?

The moment the stalemate broke, that tiny bit of applied force would cause you to uncontrollably slam your opponent''s arm down!!!

At the crime scene, the armed struggle between the deceased and the defendant was exactly the same.

Once they figured this out, the crowd realized something even more terrifying, because the angle the defense presented...

"If this premise holds, then this is an unsolvable dead end!"

"If they want to prove it, they can only investigate the witnesses at the scene."

"But the problem is, everyone at the scene is a murder suspect. In other words, the witness testimonies cannot be entirely trusted!"

"Yet at the crime scene, there were only witnesses, and those witnesses can''t be trusted..."

"..."

A flurry of discussion immediately broke out in the gallery, faces filled with astonishment.

Even at the very back of the courtroom tiers.

Some videographers who had only come to record the proceedings couldn''t help but peek out from behind their cameras, staring down at the judges'' bench.

The defense had presented an impossible-to-prove angle, an endless loop.

Furthermore...

With just these words, without Xu De even needing to prove it himself, the credibility of the statements and witness testimonies submitted by the prosecution dropped by seventy percent!

Without these, what else could the prosecution use as corroborating evidence?

So...

"Could it be... the prosecution is losing ground?"

Someone suddenly spoke up.

Instantly, everyone''s heart seemed to skip a beat. They immediately looked up, staring intently at the trial proceedings.

Good heavens, when had they ever seen a setup like this... Could anyone believe a defense attorney was actually overpowering the prosecutors!?

...

On the prosecution''s side.

At the victim''s legal representative bench.

"Sun Hao... we are irreconcilable!"

Chen Wei cursed inwardly. His hands balled into fists, his knuckles turning white, and the veins on his forehead bulging so much they looked like they might burst.

Truthfully, Chen Wei''s mental state was a bit shaky right now.

He was almost certain he had been set up by Sun Hao and Xu De!

During their phone call back then, Sun Hao had explicitly stated that as long as he had enough testimonies, he could take the defense down. After all, the people providing the statements were villagers from Lijia Village, who would naturally cover for their own.

He had believed that nonsense and only prepared testimonies.

But he never imagined...

Once court was in session, Xu De effortlessly destroyed the only testimonies he had prepared with a single sentence!!!

Compared to Chen Wei''s mental breakdown...

The prosecutors experienced some emotional fluctuations, but they were far from losing control.

Beside them.

"H-how... how could anyone possibly produce this kind of evidence!"

Hearing the opponent''s angle, Wang Wei showed a hint of bewilderment. He sat in his chair for a long time, not knowing how to refute it.

The rookie prosecutor, Zhang Qing, sat frozen in his seat. He stared blankly at Xu De with a look of complete, eye-opening shock.

Hu Guang, however, frowned. He rested his right hand on the table, rubbing his temples as he pondered how to search for new evidence.

While thinking, he glanced at the case files on the table.

After the defense''s series of combos... the materials collected by the prosecutor''s office were essentially useless. They had to find new evidence.

"I misjudged him. This young lawyer... is a tough nut to crack."

Hu Guang exhaled, taking a deep look at Xu De.

Finally, he focused his gaze on the judges'' bench.

As for the direction of the case...

Ultimately, it still depended on those three up there!

Of course, the hearts of those three were also far from calm, clearly rippling with unease.

At the judges'' bench.

"Where did the defendant hire such a lawyer?"

Sun Dong really couldn''t hold it in anymore. With his brows tightly knit, he spoke urgently:

"The angle is so tricky... and there''s more than one tricky point. Is this really someone Wang Qiang could afford to hire!?"

To be fair, Sun Dong had served as a judge in Greenwood City for nearly ten years.

Yet he had never heard of a lawyer of this caliber in Greenwood City!

Setting everything else aside, if the defendant had been a wealthy man... just that performance in court alone was worth at least a million!

And Wang Qiang?

A man who had searched for his family for ten years, someone who couldn''t even bear to spend money on steamed buns and pickled vegetables on a normal day—the lowest of the working class. Where would he get the money to hire a lawyer like this?

"Don''t ask. This is legal aid."

Judge Liu Jianguo only felt a headache coming on.

"Legal aid..." Sun Dong''s temples throbbed as he reached up to rub them.

Wasn''t legal aid supposed to be a bunch of lawyers slacking off on the job, coasting along without any professional ethics? How did such a giant Buddha slip in here...

"Let''s figure out how to handle the case first," Liu Jianguo said, shaking his head and pulling the conversation back on track.

"That lawyer''s angle is incredibly tricky. His claims... must be investigated and verified. Otherwise, even if we close the case, the appellate court will just throw it back to us for a retrial."

But alas.

Serious topics always brought silence. The three of them couldn''t say another word.

This kind of scene was very rare.

Why?

Because when it came to criminal cases, the court had an unspoken rule.

That was, ''You argue your piece, and I rule my way!''

Usually, no matter how hard the defense attorney tried, they couldn''t shake the judge''s resolve. Sometimes the judge had already decided how to rule before the trial even began, so the proceedings flowed smoothly without any silent pauses.

However... that was only true if the defense attorney wasn''t tough enough.

If the words coming out of their mouths could spark a debate in an appellate court, the judges had to treat it with the utmost seriousness!

Could Xu De''s words do that?

Absolutely. If the first trial ended hastily, taking those arguments to an appellate court would be tantamount to dropping a nuclear bomb in a crowd...

So...

The case required the utmost caution.

After a long silence, Zhang Bingxin spoke.

"Defense, do you have anything further to add?"

His brows were furrowed tight, and his fingers were interlaced—a small habit indicating he was taking things seriously.

At the defense bench.

Xu De sat in his chair and shook his head slightly. "Presiding Judge, the defense has concluded its statements. We have no further additions."

Zhang Bingxin then looked toward the prosecution.

"Prosecution, victim''s legal representative, facing the defense''s statements above, do you have any objections?"

The prosecutors remained silent for a moment. Finally, Hu Guang spoke up:

"We... reserve our opinion."

Even though Chen Wei was incredibly unwilling, having made a massive blunder during the trial, he knew that continuing to be stubborn would only drag the case further into an abyss.

He took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the anger in his heart.

"We reserve our opinion."

"Very well."

Zhang Bingxin nodded.

To tell the truth, the court had initially planned to wrap up the Wang Qiang case during this first session, provided no accidents occurred.

After all, the facts of the case were so simple.

But an accident had occurred...

The opposing attorney had single-handedly argued until the entire prosecution side was left speechless!

Therefore...

"Bang!"

Presiding Judge Zhang Bingxin, dressed in his judge''s robe, raised his hand. He hoisted the gavel high before striking it down, the crisp sound echoing throughout the enclosed courtroom.

The next second.

Zhang Bingxin''s voice echoed in everyone''s ears.

"Given that the key facts of this case remain disputed and require further verification, we now announce..."

"Court is adjourned!"

Ad... adjourned?

Wang Qiang wasn''t crushed by the prosecution''s overwhelming superiority, but instead forced an adjournment?

That meant... the defense attorney had held his ground. One man had withstood multiple rounds of relentless bombardment and even turned the tables!

Suddenly.

The spirits of the over four hundred people in the gallery lifted in unison.

Meanwhile.

At the judges'' bench.

Feeling incredibly exhausted, Presiding Judge Zhang Bingxin swept a somewhat complex gaze over Xu De. Then, he shook his head and stood up straight, his judge''s robe flowing around him.

"The date for the resumption of the trial and the verdict will be announced separately."