Two days after the public inspection, the rumors surrounding the Pearl Street mall had begun to change.
Videos showing the independent engineers collecting samples directly from the structure had spread across the internet. News outlets that had published the false photographs were forced to issue corrections after Tang Yichen identified their original source.
The three men caught planting defective concrete samples also remained in provincial custody.
One had already admitted that they were paid to make the mall fail its public inspection. However, he claimed that all instructions came through an encrypted messaging account and that he had never met the person who hired them.
The bribery accusations had not been completely cleared, but the initial forensic examination produced favorable results.
