A case (Number I)

[Holmes]

Here's something, instead of a Riddle a Satsujin Jiken(Murder Case).
I call it - "Strangers in the Night"

Enjoy!

Here it goes ...

The midnight train goes under the far, far mountains of the Ulrals. Sitting on his seat, the millionare Art Farnanski seems to be sleeping. But somebody knows that this isn't true.
   The journy has finished and every passenger descended, but suddenly a scream is heard. Inspector Soto quickly, that was near, went to the train and found Art Farnanski as still as rock with his wife crying before him, he was poisoned.
Hours later, the four people that got near the corpse are being questioned.

These people are - Jaquelyne Krostoff, age 41, the dead man's wife.
                          Mr. Hovorsk, age 43, the dead man's business manager.
                          Mr. Kelbaum, age 40, the dead man's company vicepresident.
                          Victorya Farace, age 20, the dead man's secretary.

Everyone has a motive for the murder.

These are their statements...
The Manager --- " I'm inoccent. Ask his wife that has been talking with the president."
The Wife --- " I'm inoccent. I didn't speak with my husaband. "
The Vicepresident --- " I'm inoccent. I think the secretary killed him."
The Secretary --- " I'm inoccent. I think one of the men killed him." 

After some time of reasoning and deduction Inspector Soto said --- " Four statements true and four statements false. If I'm correct, you killed Mr. Farnanski."

HINT! - THERE IS ONLY ONE CULPRIT.

[blurfbreg]

This would have taken forever without the hint.
Because of the hint, the

Spoiler:

wife

is the killer.


Reasoning:

Spoiler:

Because there are 8 statements in total, only 1 murderer, and 4 false statements, only one of those "I'm innocent" statements is false. This means that for the second statement, the murderer said the truth while everyone else lied (who knows why they lie if they haven't done anything suspicious).

Spoiler:

If one of the men is not innocent, then the secretary's second statement is false. However, the secretary's second statement says that one of the men committed the murder. Therefore, the murderer is not one of the men.

Spoiler:

If the secretary is not innocent, then her second statement is true. However, the secretary's second statement says that one of the men committed the murder. Therefore, she cannot be the murderer.

Spoiler:

If the wife is not innocent, then her second statement is true. Her second statement is also backed up by the manager who is lying in his second statement as to whether the wife was talking with the president. The vice-president is also lying by saying that the secretary is the murderer (who isn't the murderer). Finally, the secretary is also lying in her second statement if a women killed the husband.

This was a nice logic exercise 

[Holmes]

That is a really amazing reasoning, your answer is correct, and thanks for answering with the spoilers.
Let's see if somebody else resolves it.

[GinRei]

Looking at this case, we're not being given proper information.  You have to make some assumptions, which obviously isn't good for things that are supposed to be solvable through logic alone.

Spoiler:

I can obviously agree on one part of the reasoning though: three of the "I'm innocent" are true, while one is false.  However, this is where I part ways, and instead begin just poking holes in this case all together.

• First, why is the wife's last name different from her husband's?
• Second, who is the President?  Are we to assume it's the murdered man?  All we're told about the victim is that he's a millionaire.
• Third, how do we know the Inspector is right?  How does the Inspector know that four statements are right and four are wrong?

Now, as for the statements.  As we know, of the second half statements, one is true and three are false.  However, unlike blurfbleg said, there's no guarantee that the person who murdered the man stated the truth in the second statement.  It's also possible that the murderer lied here as well.

Unless the President is the murdered man, then the Manager's second statement has no purpose at all.  If the two are the same, though, then either the Manager or the Wife is lying and the other telling the truth.

Since one of those two must be lying (again assuming the President is the victim), then the other two statements must be a lie.  This would remove the men from the suspect list, as well as the secretary.  This leaves only the wife, who lied.  Though theoretically she could be telling the truth, having just been near him rather than talking to him when she killed him, that's just semantics.

Now, since we cannot assume the President is the victim, as we are not told this, we cannot use this line of reasoning.  Therefore, we must move onto the next set of supplementary statements.  The Vice-President states that the secretary is the murderer, and she states that one of the men is the murderer.  If one proves to be true, then the other must be false.  However, both have the potential to be false if the wife is the culprit.  Since we aren't told who the President is however, we're left with four potentially false statements and four potentially true statements.  No combination of these statements with the given information can negate any of the other statements outright.  This means if we're meant to solve this with the given information, we have to make the assumption jump that the victim is the President.

Btw, blurfbleg, your reasoning is wrong:

Spoiler:

• You said if one of the men isn't innocent, then the secretary's second statement is wrong.  However, if one of them were not innocent, then her statement would actually be true.
• You also said that the murderer told the truth in their second statement, which isn't necessarily true.  It comes down to semantics.  If the Manager lied, it was because he thought the wife was talking to the victim, whereas she may have not been talking.  However, in all likelyhood they were talking as he was being poisoned, so the wife did not tell the truth.
• If the secretary is not innocent, then her second statement is false (rather than true as you say).  If she commit the murder, then how could one of the men also commit the murder?  It would make the Vice-President's statement true, falsify hers, and by elimination make the other two liars as well.

[blurfbreg]

This mystery seems like it came out of a book,

Spoiler:

making this a logic problem and making the last statement, "4 statements true and 4 statements false", seems like everyone said one true thing and one false thing.

I was hurrying myself through the problem so I can make dinner for myself.

Thanks GinRei; I stand corrected.

Spoiler:

I haven't thought of that; The fourth true statement can be any of the 2nd statements that the four said, which means that you can't tell who is the murderer out of the four. Therefore it didn't really matter what I said after the part you agreed.

It was fun nonetheless. Thanks for putting up these riddles Holmes!

[karitaru]

I would have to admit that blurfbreg gave a very satisfying reasoning.
I didn't even bother to think about it, but it is really a nice excercise.
Can't hardly wait for (Number II).

[Holmes]

Well, first of all I`m glad that you liked it and I´ve already found a Case Number II, I´ll just say that Case Number II will need Maths.

Secondly, I agree with you Ginrei, that the problem has its own mistakes and I had wondered them myself but I forgot to put them.

And thirdly, before Case Number II, I put a Topic called "Lateral Thinking I", they´re also mini-problems with logic.

[bash7353]

[...]

Spoiler:

[...]
Since one of those two must be lying (again assuming the President is the victim), then the other two statements must be a lie.  This would remove the men from the suspect list, as well as the secretary.  This leaves only the wife, [...]

[...]

Spoiler:

I don't agree with you here: We can conclude that these two statement are false, but both, the vicepresident and the secretary, started their statement with "I think". Therefore the only information we have is these two suspects actually don't think the secretary or one of the men did it, which does not necessarily mean they didn't do it.

[sstimson]

Using the way the problem is stated  ( and a little imagination ) I Come up with this
It is possible none of them did it ( The killer could be Inspector Soto ).
That means all the first statements are true and all the late statements are false
I know you are thinking the manger and the wife are saying opposite statements, but that is
only true if the dead man is the president. if he is not then both statements could be false.
second statements truths:
Manger: said : Ask his wife that has been talking with the president. Truth : The wife was talking to her husband.
Wife said:  I didn't speak with my husband.  Truth : She did speak with her husband.
Vice President said: I think the secretary killed him Truth : I have no idea who killed him.
Secretary said: I think one of the men killed him. Truth : I have no idea who killed him.

See how all first statements can be true and all second statements could be lies

Also the last statement of  Inspector Soto who said If I'm correct. That could mean he is wrong and it could be anywhere from 8 lies to 8 truths. It is also possible this was suicide.

Like GinRei stated this logic problem needs more information.

Later