Gambling addict Ming Jiang was a familiar face at the card tables and roulette wheels of Manchester's 235 Casino. So when on the night of October 9, 2016 the 42-year-old took a seat and began placing his bets, few of his fellow players took much notice.
Little did they know they were rubbing shoulders with a cold-hearted killer. Just an hour earlier Jiang had stuffed the headless torso of his friend Yang Liu into a suitcase, drove to a remote lay-by off the Woodhead Pass outside the village of Tintwistle and set fire to it.
When the charred remains were found by hikers the following day, it kickstarted one of the most shocking and high-profile murder investigations in recent memory. READ MORE: It promised a 'carnival atmosphere'.
Instead it was Manchester's worst night of violence Senior investigating officer David Cox was one of the first police on the scene. "I could see straightaway it was the body of a person, there was no doubt about that," he told Secrets of Murder Detective, a new TrueCrime TV series which looks at the case. "But unusually the head had been removed, the arms had been removed and the lower legs had been removed. "I couldn't tell at that stage whether it was male or female.
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