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Robert Charles Linford
Inspector
Username: Robert
Post Number: 428
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, July 16, 2003 - 5:41 pm: |       |
Hi Monty and Joan
Monty, I can't think of any scenario that would adequately account for the cachous. They don't seem to have been clutched during a convulsion. I'm totally lost and bewildered!
Joan, you might be right about the scarf. It may not explain the cachous, but it might explain the bonnet.
If Liz was strangled by hand while standing up, wouldn't her bonnet have fallen off? And if it did, isn't it odd that her head ends up a few inches from where it fell? The same would apply if she was yanked backwards by the scarf.
But if the killer simply strangled her from behind, grasping the scarf, then the killer's own body may have prevented the bonnet from falling off her head.
The trouble with this is that the doctors seem not to have found any marks on the neck which may have been due to a tightened scarf, paricularly the knot. And the knife cut wouldn't have obliterated such marks, as the knife seems only to have frayed the edge of the scarf.
Maybe he pushed Liz by the shoulders to the ground, and very quickly knelt on her chest and strangled or partially strangled her? Then maybe the hat need not have moved very far, and it might explain the blueish discolouration on her chest.
Robert |
Robert Charles Linford
Inspector
Username: Robert
Post Number: 429
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, July 16, 2003 - 6:31 pm: | |
Hi folks
Can anyone point out to me where it says that Stride was cut by a knife different from that used on the other victims? I can't find it.
Robert |
Jeff Hamm
Police Constable
Username: Jeffhamm
Post Number: 2
Registered: 7-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, July 16, 2003 - 7:36 pm: | |
Hi Bob,
Stride is the hardest one. And, your three points are good ones, but I'm not sure they are as definitive as I would like them to be.
1. Different weapon.
I'm tredding on weak ground here in terms of my knowledge, but from what I gather about Stride's throat wound is that it looks like the knife was drawn across her throat, not stabbed and dragged. If that's correct, then doesn't this suggest a sharp knife, rather than a dull one? And can one really tell if such a wound was made by a pointed or round tipped blade? And, does such a wound actually indicate the length of the knife?
If my understanding of the type of wound is correct and indicate a sharp knife, and the latter questions become "unanswerable" (i.e., any length, rounded or pointed), then aren't we left with being unable to assert "different knife". If I'm wrong, which I fully admit I could be, I would appreciate it if you could point to my errors.
2. Geographical area.
This is probably the strongest indication of "non-Ripper". However, it's not definitive by itself. If the rest of the evidence were to argue for inclusion, we might want to look at this location in terms of what it might tell us about the Ripper's habits/work place, etc. By itself, this could be a "clue about the Ripper" or a "clue that it wasn't the Ripper".
3. Murder site.
I'm not really convinced the other locations were really any less public. For example, Nichols is in the open street, down which at least 2 people came on their way to work when they discovered Nichols, so it's not really a deserted or unused street. Given one fellow thought she might still be alive, it appears the Ripper may have been interrupted here as well. Chapman was in the back yard of a house when the sun was starting to come up, and people in the area would be known to be starting their day. The neighbor was in the back yard when he heard the assault (note, I'm assuming she was killed around 5:30 am), etc. So Chapman's location seems even more public than Stride's location in many ways. Mitre Square was patrolled every 15 minutes (or was at least supposed to be), and there was the watchman in the building with his door open. Mind you, apart from inside Kelly's room, this is probably the most "deserted" crime scene: perhaps this selection of a dark and relatively more secluded area, indicates he was interrupted that night in the more open area of Stride, a reoccurance of what happened with Nicholls?
Anyway, it seems that with Stride the evidence can fit both "yes" and "no" equally easily. As such, I think Stride is best left as "unknown". If not the Ripper though, I fully agree that Kidney would be the best suspect for the "not Ripper" possibility. I just don't think there's quite enough to be sure it was him though.
- Jeff |
Caroline Anne Morris
Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 214
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 7:01 am: | |
Hi Bob,
Yes, I see what you mean, and one might have thought that a harmless looking ripper-as-punter would have had little difficulty encouraging Stride to go further with him into the yard.
Of course, this still assumes that the ripper would not have feared being trapped in there and caught while in the act, or emerging with goodness knows what incriminating substances. Even if doing it in the yard would have appealed to him at the outset, he could have changed his mind when push came to shove, and instead of working on an impromptu change of location for himself and Stride, decided to cut and run.
It also assumes that Stride had originally been standing in the gateway for the purpose of offering her services to allcomers (when it's at least possible she had been waiting for someone specific, and may have been telling everyone else "Not tonight, maybe some other night").
The Kidney theory always bothers me a bit. While I can accept that the ripper may not have murdered Stride, it would be much easier if I could see a bit more evidence pointing to Kidney as her killer. If he didn't do it, and if I accept that the ripper didn't do it either, I'd have to accept another apparently motiveless murder in 1888, same victim type, same area of London.
Yes, I'll be at the conference, Bob. Hope to see you there.
Love,
Caz |
Monty
Inspector
Username: Monty
Post Number: 179
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 7:57 am: | |
please delete/ignore
Monty
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Monty
Inspector
Username: Monty
Post Number: 181
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 7:58 am: | |
Robert,
Neither can I.
The only thing I can offer is that death was instant.
Would that rule out the attack Schwartz witnessed ??
Her scarf. Could it have been used more as something to drag her around with rather than a ligature ? I mean after death. Thats my view anyway.
Monty
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Leanne Perry
Chief Inspector
Username: Leanne
Post Number: 518
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 8:30 am: | |
G'day Andy,
There's a photograph of the actual death statistics report for Whitechapel 1887 in Bruce Paley's 'Simple Truth'.
Not a single homicide occured in Whitechapel, out of a total of 80 for all of Metopolitan London.
Many of the deaths were because of diseases,
59 were from old age,
4 were from accidental drownings,
2 were suicides,
17 were fractures,
11 were burns,
8 were from childhood accidents,
34 were accidental suffocation.
Whitechapel 1888 was a 'hotbed' for assaults and robberies, but not for actual murder!
LEANNE |
R.J. Palmer
Detective Sergeant
Username: Rjpalmer
Post Number: 101
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 9:15 am: | |
Leanne--A footnote. Paley's "1887" statistics must actually represent the year 1886, because there was, of course, Miriam Angel, found but a stone's throw away from Berner Street at No. 16 Batty on June 29, 1887. Beaten about the head and face, and with nitric acid poured down her throat---this was the murder that inspired the infamous cry of "Lipski", and, some might even say, the Whitechapel Murders themselves.
Yet the general point is valid; murder was relatively rare in London, even in the East End. Always a good thing. All the best, RP |
Andrew Spallek
Detective Sergeant
Username: Aspallek
Post Number: 51
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 10:34 am: | |
Thanks, Leanne. That was the source I was remembering. I read a copy of Paley borrowed from a library but I don't own the book.
Andy
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Gary Alan Weatherhead
Detective Sergeant
Username: Garyw
Post Number: 112
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 10:37 am: | |
Hi Robert
Is the Idea of the use of a different, shorter knife an inference from the fact that the cut did not extend down to the vertebral column: Such as was the case with most of the other victims. I don't see mention of a different weopon in the A-Z or Sugden but I may be missimg something, I will keep checking.
All The Best
Gary |
Robert Charles Linford
Inspector
Username: Robert
Post Number: 430
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 1:08 pm: | |
Hi Monty and Gary
Monty, I tend to think the cachous rule out Schwartz's man. I can't see her going into the yard with him after he attacked her. And I don't see how he could have somehow taken her by surprise. Surely she wouldn't have taken her cachous out if he was still around. Instead, she'd have cleared off and only come back when he'd gone.
Could you expand on the scarf? Why do you think he might have dragged her around by it after she was dead?
Gary, I don't see any reason why the knife does have to be different. Re the cut, could he have been about to do a second throat cut when he was interrupted?
Robert |
Leanne Perry
Chief Inspector
Username: Leanne
Post Number: 520
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 6:07 pm: | |
G'day Andy and R.J.P.,
On page 70 of Paley's book, he writes about that report on death statistics for Whitechapel: 'According to statistics collected in the 'Annual Report on Sanitary Conditions of Whitechapel' by John Loane, the Medical Officer for Health there were 71 violent deaths in the district in 1887, of which 69 were accidental. Most were the result of suffocation, fractures and contusions, and burns and scalds. The remaining two deaths were classified as suicides, one by drowning the other by poisoning.....Nor were these statistics a fluke. There hadn't been any murders in Whitechapel in 1886 either, out of 68 committed in London, while the reports for 1889 and 1890 show one murder per year in the district, out of totals of seventy-nine and seventy-four respectively for all of London.'
I'll look up 'Mirium Angel'. Was Batty Street in the Whitechapel district? I can't see it on this map.
LEANNE |
Gary Alan Weatherhead
Detective Sergeant
Username: Garyw
Post Number: 114
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 9:46 pm: | |
Hi Leanne and all
The frequency or lack thereof of homicide in the years in question for London is an important point.
I don't see where the Victorian Thames Torso murders are accounted for, however.
Best Regards
Gary |
Gary Alan Weatherhead
Detective Sergeant
Username: Garyw
Post Number: 116
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Friday, July 18, 2003 - 12:27 am: | |
I should add that Elizabeth Jackson, the only Torso victim to be identified was an East End prostitute and it seems logical to assume that this killer was taking his vicims from the pool of East End unfortunates. The coronors were not doctors and it is impossible to say how many East Enders' deaths were classified as natural through a sloppy investigation when foul play could have been involved. A prostiutes death would have been given much less consideration by the very nature of the victim as opposed to say a property crime. These crimes were dealt with nore severly than cases of assualt and attempted murder.
It is also worth noting that the infant mortality rates for Whitechapel would likely have been greatly underreported and under scrutinized"...(T)MANY CASES OF INFANTICIDE...ALSO REACHED EPIDEMIC PROPORTIONS."
(THE THAMES TORSO MURDERS OF VICTORIAN LONDON: R.M. GORDON)
It was also popular to ignore crime in the East End by those who did not wish to recognize that there may have been a moral duty to ameliorate conditions in this area.
|
Gary Alan Weatherhead
Detective Sergeant
Username: Garyw
Post Number: 117
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Friday, July 18, 2003 - 2:41 am: | |
Leanne
Paley was wrong about 1887. In addition to the "Lipski" murder there was also the Rainham Mystery of 1887.
Batty Street is to the right of Berner Street, one street over beside the "C" on Paley's map that designates where Stride was found.
Best
Gary |
Bob Hinton
Detective Sergeant
Username: Bobhinton
Post Number: 107
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, July 18, 2003 - 7:47 am: | |
I'm speaking from memory here so am quite prepared to be told I'm wrong - but wasn't Paley referring to Whitechapel and doesn't Batty Street come under St George's in the East?
Bob
|
Leanne Perry
Chief Inspector
Username: Leanne
Post Number: 524
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, July 18, 2003 - 7:54 am: | |
G'day Gary,
Ah...hang on a minute, you'll have to correct the 'Annual Report on Sanitary Conditions of Whitechapel' collected by John Loane, not Bruce Paley!
LEANNE |
Gary Alan Weatherhead
Detective Sergeant
Username: Garyw
Post Number: 118
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Friday, July 18, 2003 - 9:56 am: | |
Hi Leanne
You're right John Loane was the source of the document not Bruce Paley. I have it here in front of me now.
Ignore the following if you have already commented on Paul Harrison's "JACK THE RIPPER; THE MYSTERY SOLVED." (1991) Which also posits Barnett as the Ripper. I was curious to know if you had read it and what you thought of it I plan to reread my copy. I am pretty sure the book was never released in the U.S. I was lucky and got my copy via import from Britain while I was visiting relatives in Canada.
All The Best
Gary |
Monty
Inspector
Username: Monty
Post Number: 184
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Friday, July 18, 2003 - 12:17 pm: | |
Robert
Copy of an private Email sent to me.
"The clinched fingers of a corpse are known to forensic investigators as cadaveric spasms. These spasms are also known as instantaneous rigor, the death grip, and cataleptic shock or cataleptic rigidity. It is one of the three tell tale signs of instant death. The other two signs are open eyes and the coagulation of blood in the body, near the wound."
These are the reasons why I feel death was instant.
The dragging by the scarf after death was a supposition really. You try to drag a struggling victim ? (I hope not, but you know what I mean) Matched up with how quick I feel Strides death came, this is a scenario I think may have happened.
But its only my thoughts.
Monty
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Andrew Spallek
Detective Sergeant
Username: Aspallek
Post Number: 52
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Friday, July 18, 2003 - 12:39 pm: | |
That makes sense about the clenched hand, Monty. The (French) decription of Marie-Anne Mignonneau also makes mention of a clenched hand, if I remember correctly. It was one of the details the caught my eye.
Andy
|
Gary Alan Weatherhead
Detective Sergeant
Username: Garyw
Post Number: 121
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Friday, July 18, 2003 - 1:09 pm: | |
Hello
The cadaveric spasm would explain the breath fresheners being found in Strides' left hand. The right hand which was resting on the body had blood on it which could have splashed on the hand upon the severance of the corotid artery, as she would have had no time to try to bring her hands up to protect her throat as might be the case with a strangulation.
Best
Gary
The |
Robert Charles Linford
Inspector
Username: Robert
Post Number: 437
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Friday, July 18, 2003 - 4:35 pm: | |
Hi Monty, everyone
It looks as if we do have to have some sort of spasm. (I mean, Stride has to have it!). It's the only way to account for the cachous. Blackwell must have underestimated the severity of the throat wound.
It looks as if partial strangulation is ruled out, because of the cachous.
I suppose if the body was dragged by the scarf to a position beside the wall, that could either have been to gain a slightly more private position in which to do the mutilations (if the killer was Jack), or just to slightly hide the body and allow a few more seconds escape time (if the killer wasn't Jack).
Do folks feel that her throat was cut standing up or on the ground?
Robert |
Joan O'Liari
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 9:15 pm: | |
Robert, Monty and all;
The death certificate shows that the death was violent, Haemorrhage from severance of blood vessels in the neck by a sharp instrument.
At the inquest they discuss the scarf and how it may have been used in the murder;
"A Juror: Can you say whether the throat was cut before or after the deceased fell to the ground? - I formed the opinion that the murderer probably caught hold of the silk scarf, which was tight and knotted, and pulled the deceased backwards, cutting her throat in that way. The throat might have been cut as she was falling, or when she was on the ground. The blood would have spurted about if the act had been committed while she was standing up.
The Coroner: Was the silk scarf tight enough to prevent her calling out? - I could not say that."
The cut was sort of J shaped, perhaps that indicates that she slumped downward as she was passing out.
Monty: Death was not instant, just the unconciousness. The cachous are also mentioned in this context;
"My impression is that the hand gradually relaxed while the woman was dying, she dying in a fainting condition from the loss of blood."
"Dark brown spots were on the anterior surface of the left chin" This is the indication of "petechia", they can be seen in a living person who had been strangled, (but not to death), but after death the red spots in life turn brown, and they indicate the pressure of the blood being forced into the surrounding tissues.
Robert; Thanks for reminding me about the bonnet!! So this fits with my theory: Liz went to use the "water closet" in the yard for the obvious reason, and to fix herself up from the altercation. There were two water closets in the yard, one being locked, and one open. This gave the murderer a chance to get in the yard unseen. Since she was found with feet toward the gateway, she must have been on her way back out of the yard to go back to the street, when she was accosted. If the mud indicates dragging her, then it would have been to drag her back into the yard more, but then the horse and cart came along and interrupted the act.
I really don't know if Michael Kidney had anything to do with this, he is a good suspect, but I will reserve judgement on that for now. If this was Jack the Ripper, perhaps he did bring some chalk along, and was planning to do his graffiti on the side of the Jewish Club to implicate the Jewish men, but he had to change locations due to the interruption.
Thanks Leanne for answering my old post and bringing Long Liz back!
Joan
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Mick Lyden
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2003 - 6:21 pm: | |
Hello all,
Has anyone considered the possibility that Stride was wearing the scarf purely as some sort of protection,should she encounter the Ripper?
Maybe Stride herself,had tied thing so tightly around her own neck.
The jagged cuts found around the lower edge of the scarf might indicate that the killer had to hack through the material,thus producing a messier cut which might have given the impression that a different sort of knife had been used.
All this would have slowed the killer down of course,giving him no time to open Stride up as Diemschutz approached.
Mick Lyden
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Phil A.
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Wednesday, July 16, 2003 - 4:23 pm: | |
If you read up on Bruce Paley's books, "Jack the Ripper: The Simple Truth", you will find out that the district in the "killing" aspect wasn't all that bad as people might think. I think that's why these killings caused so much comotion. |
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