Chen Baogang is an artist. He paints portraits but never uses a model. He never even actually sees people's faces before he draws them.

Chen, 45, is a police artist, and along with his partner, Yu Yafeng, 47, he produces pictures of suspects based on descriptions from people who often only caught a quick glimpse of the subject.

Working at the Public Transport Division of the Beijing Public Security Bureau, Chen and Yu are the backstage heroes responsible for cracking numerous crimes over the past 15 years. Recent accomplishments include helping ferret out the prime suspect in a stabbing.

On June 28 this year, a young man robbed and stabbed a high school student at Beijing's Yonghegong (Lama Temple) subway station. Apart from the victim, only one other person caught a brief glimpse of the suspect.

It seemed an impossible mission no physical clues had been left at the scene.

But from Chen and Yu's drawing, police in Hebei Province's city of Langfang identified the suspect living in a village nearby and arrested him just 44 hours after the stabbing was committed.

The man later confessed, saying he was shocked by the accuracy of the drawing. It looked like a copy of his photo, he said.

According to Chen, Yu and he interviewed the victim and the witness separately, before jointly working out a composite drawing.

"First we needed to calm down the people involved and make them comfortable," Chen said, "and then graphically jog the victim's and the witness's memories.

"We drew an initial sketch and shared it with the witness and the victim to get feedback. Then we made changes to the sketch until the figures looked more like the people they were describing.

"We do so in every case. Our goal is to help police pick the person out of a crowd with our pictures."

More than just skilled artists, they are highly trained interviewers.

"We must word questions carefully and ask open-ended questions so that we don't mislead the witness," Chen said. "We should bring witnesses back to the scene mentally, and let them give the information rather than ask for it."

Chen said he generally starts with head shape, and then other important features including hair, eyebrows, eyes, noses and lips.

"Sometimes I ask a victim or a witness: 'Does the person remind you of anyone?' or show them a book of drawings of facial features," Chen said. "Looking at drawings of heads, noses, lips, and eyes of different shapes can help witnesses describe the features of the people they saw."

Chen said he had lost count of the number of cases he and his partner have helped solve in his 15 years on the job.

"Yu and I now face an increasing number of cases after our drawings helped solve several tough crimes," Chen said, adding that at present, he usually draws three to four pictures a week for police investigations.

Dong Keqin, a senior police officer with the public transport division, said police artists play a crucial role in solving cases of robbery and theft on buses and subways as these crimes usually do not leave any evidence other than witness statements.

"It's fantastic, especially when you consider they've never seen these people they draw," Dong said. "They've really helped us solve quite a few criminal cases."

(China Daily November 3, 2005)