Dagon Shwe Maw - Detective Htin Kyaw

The death of Ms. Nan Sein

The story I am writing about is about a case that U Htin Kyaw and I had experienced in Taungoo before he knew me, when he started working. U Htin Kyaw had written a summary of the incident in his diary, including the date, place, and names of the clients. I wanted to hear the whole story, so I apologized, and since U Htin Kyaw told me, I am writing this as he told me.

The incident took place in Taungoo about seven years before World War II, and it was a bizarre murder that was prominently reported in the English-language Burmese newspapers at the time, attracting public interest.

(one)

I had taken a short leave of absence from work on the advice of a doctor friend and spent about two weeks in Meiktila for my health, and then returned at the invitation of a young police officer friend from Taungoo . There was no unfinished business in Yangon. I felt that I still needed to take a longer leave for my health, so I stayed in Taungoo for about twenty days. The case I have now written in my diary under the heading “Taungoo” is one of the cases that I encountered by chance during my short stay in Taungoo.

After about ten days in the city, one night, around 11 o'clock, I was drinking tea at a tea shop not far from the house where I had been staying after returning from a visit. It was a clear night, but there was very little light because of the snow. In the countryside, people usually stop walking after 9 o'clock at night, and the surroundings are usually quite quiet. In my free time, I sit in tea shops and observe the people who come to the tea shops, make friends with some people I can make, and learn about the city. Sometimes, my hobby helps me a lot in my work.

I left the tea shop and headed home, crossing a wide street and approaching another narrow street. I heard a siren from the alley and saw a policeman coming out onto the street.

The policeman, seeing me, did not recognize me at first, but as he approached me, he realized that I was a freelance detective from Yangon who was staying temporarily at the house of U Lun Maung, a police officer. U Lun Maung had introduced me to some of his students, including some of the police officers, and they already knew me quite well. That is how the policeman got to know me.

The policeman came running, exhausted, blowing his whistle, and stopped when he got close to me.

“Sir, isn’t that U Htin Kyaw, the merchant who lives at the house of U Lun Maung, the assistant?”

Me.. “Okay. Yes.”

"Get ready, teacher."

"Why?"

"Murder, murder. Murder."

"Where are you?"

"The teacher is at the house at the end of this alley. Just now."

"I just killed him."

The policeman continued to blow his whistle two or three times loudly, then led me into the alley, and I followed him without realizing it. On the way, the policeman said...

“My name is Po Sa Say. I was there when U Lun Maung introduced you to the criminal investigator Ko Ohn Lwin. That’s why I remember you well. This is what you’re like. While I was walking down the street, I heard a scream from behind the house of an old man named U Shwe Byung. So I ran across the house and into the alley. As I was coming, “Come here, my lady, "My wife is dead," I heard another voice. It was U Shwe Byung-in's voice. I knew this man well. So I | also went in through the back door, called U Shwe Byung-in's name, and said that I was a police officer. He opened the door for me and said that he didn't know who stabbed his wife, Ma Nan Sein, to death. So I went out of the house to get evidence quickly and help quickly, blew a whistle, and ran down the alley. Now I met the teacher. Here we are. This is the house, sir. The house where the crime happened was a small house, so we turned around and went to the back. We saw a door open at the back, so we went in through that door. When we got to the top floor of the house, a handsome man of about 50 years old was hugging the body of a young woman and...

"What a waste of time, my dear."

• ••etc. I saw her crying. The deceased woman was not older than 30 years old, was a beautiful woman with a well-proportioned body, had fair skin, and her dark hair almost covered half of her face. I spoke as much as I could to the crying woman, and when I looked at the wound on the body, I saw that there was a gash about an inch deep, extending from her chest to her back.

The wound was cut open on one side, indicating that it had been stabbed from the front with a sharp, double-edged weapon.

At that time, we also heard voices from the top of the street and from the middle of the street, so I took Maung Pho Sa out of the front and back rooms of the house for a while and asked him a few questions about how the incident had happened.

Me: "What's this guy's name?"

"Sir, Shwe Hyaing. I have known you for over a year. You are a great person. You drink milk, but you rarely drink alcohol."

"When did I meet you?"

"He always gives me money in interest. Once, when I was in a really bad situation and my salary hadn't been paid, I came to him and asked for 30 baht. He's very kind. His wife seems to be very good to him, though."

"Oh... yes, please tell me."

“U Shwe Byung is a widower, sir. He left behind a lot of property, including fields and streams, from his wife’s time. I think this girl is from Yangon. So when his wife died, they repaired this old house and built a shed below it, along with Ma Nan Sein, who is now deceased. Her job is to rent a rice mill and ship rice to Yangon, sir. Her workshop and warehouse are near the train station. As you know, the girl is pretty, young, a Yangon resident, and has plenty of money, so she is always trying to be nice to the old man and be mean to him. Okay... That’s all I know, sir.”

Soon, the neighbors and civilians arrived, and before long, the police chief, Ko Ohn Lwin, holding a flashlight, ran up to the house with two policemen. When he saw me, Ko Ohn Lwin smiled and greeted me, and then went to the body. The policeman, Maung Po Sa, was telling me everything he knew. The things that Maung Po Sa told me were the same things that Maung Po Sa had originally told me. Then Ko Ohn Lwin examined the deceased’s husband, U Shwe Byung-ah, and U Shwe Byung-ah’s testimony was as follows:

“I closed the warehouse at around 6pm and on my way home, I met a broker named Ko Po Sein and a blacksmith named Ko Lu. After going to a hotel, we had a few drinks. Around 9pm, a man named Khes Maung Nyunt Han came and started playing nine-card poker. -

They played cards until 10 o'clock, but Maung Pho Sein and Pan Thim Sae did not seem to care much and continued drinking alcohol, and they fell asleep in the hotel. Only Maung Nyunt Han and I were playing cards, and Maung Nyunt Han, the broker, was very busy.