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Donald Souden
Inspector
Username: Supe
Post Number: 182
Registered: 10-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 3:21 pm: |       |
Caz,
I think the discussion is beginning to get circular. That is, was the graffito itself inflammatory or was it only inflammatory because of its close conjunction with a Ripper victim artifact? A "One king, one crown, etc." message scrawled in Belfast would be one thing, but that same message cheek to jowl with a murder victim's bloody vest would be quite another in terms of riot inciting potential.
And, whether the apron-half had been removed or not, the massive police presence around the area on a night when there were possibly two Ripper murders might have ignited trouble if people saw the message. At least that is what I presume to have been the thinking.
We are back to the beginning: the apron-half was most assuredly unique, but how unique was the graffito? Don't ask me, I still can't figure out the chicken and egg conundrum.
Don. |
Frank van Oploo
Inspector
Username: Franko
Post Number: 237
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 4:34 pm: | |
Hi Monty,
a) Why not put the graffito above Kates body or on the pavement nearby ?
b) Why be so cryptic ?
c) Why hide it away ?
a) Like Caz suggested, in the end he might not have (felt he) had time to write it on or near the crime scene, and - although important - it might not have been something that urgent.
b) If he was suffering from a (mild form) of paranoid schizophrenia, he might have written a thing like the graffito. Such people (no disrespect) are known to say and write strange things sometimes and they think other people or organizations are after them, putting them up to do whatever they do sometimes.
c) I don’t necessarily see it as hiding ‘it’ away, but rather like hiding ‘himself’ away, if you will, like stepping out of the street and into a dark passage where he wouldn’t easily be seen.
All the best,
Frank
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Andrew Spallek
Inspector
Username: Aspallek
Post Number: 473
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 4:42 pm: | |
Sarah wrote:
You example with the marker is irrelevant I feel because you know that it is fact that you did that and you are right the probability doesn't matter because you know it occured, but we co not know for a fact that the apron was dropped there out of chance and so cannot be proven as 100% likely.
My point is that probabilities don't tell us about past events, they tell us about the likelihood of future events. Let's say the probability of my marker landing on its end is 1/1000 or 0.1%. That probability tells you that if you drop the marker again there is only a 0.1% chance that it will land on its end. But it does not tell you anything about whether the marker landed on its end or not the last time it was dropped. In my example, if you try to use probability to verify the historicity of the event you will be led to a false conclusion. You will interpret probability to tell you that the event is unlikely and thus probably did not happen. But in fact it did happen. Probability gave you the wrong answer.
Probability is a poor determinant of historicity.
Andy S.
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Mark Andrew Pardoe
Inspector
Username: Picapica
Post Number: 225
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 5:52 pm: | |
Whatho all,
Yes, but if he was stepping into the dark to hide whilst he wrote his little message, how did he see what he was doing?
It was too dark for Jack to write anything NEATLY!
But there is a hole in my argument. Perhaps Jack wrote the message earlier that day in day light and remembered to throw the piece of apron there later. He would need to hide then.
No, I still think the graffiti has nothing to do with Jack. Had the apron landed somewhere else in the East End, we might be looking for a West Ham United supporter.
Cheers, Mark |
Paul Jackson
Detective Sergeant
Username: Paulj
Post Number: 63
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 8:53 pm: | |
Hey Everybody,
Man, this debate will be a hot one from now till eternity. All the prografitto folks make good point, but the antigraffiti do as well. So, where does that leave us?
Regarding the Chalk... he could have picked it up off the street or something...I dont know that he necessarily had it in his pocket. What the hell was he doing in between the kill and the apron incident. I know, he was strolling around thinking of the most arbitrary, confusing,
meaningless piece of nothing that he could write to confuse everyone.
Best Regards
Paul
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Monty
Chief Inspector
Username: Monty
Post Number: 896
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 4:32 am: | |
All,
Why waste time nicking the lids ?? yeah, yeah, I know, all part of his agenda. How convenient. Oooh Caz has covered that I see.
Frank, yeah great but the point, or rather Jacks point is what ? OK I concede Cazs point about time ect and I see and understand your views on b) & c).
Its just that he makes such an open and outlandish display with Kates body then, when the opportunity arises to hammer home this supreme act he pushes it away into the recess of a dark doorway. Hardly a ‘Zodiac’ moment is it ?
But like I said earlier….his agenda, not mine, yours or anyone elses
Monty
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Sarah Long
Chief Inspector
Username: Sarah
Post Number: 921
Registered: 11-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 4:44 am: | |
Andy,
We do not know for a fact that the apron was dropped there by chance so the only way to guess the likelihood of it being dropped by chance is to work out a rough probability. The reason I find your example with dropping that marker irrelevant is because you saw it happen with your own eyes but we didn't see whether the apron was dropped there by chance or placed there deliberately.
Sarah |
Alan Sharp
Chief Inspector
Username: Ash
Post Number: 528
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 5:06 am: | |
Monty,
Do you have a reference that says that the graffito was on the south side of the doorway. I was under the impression that there was no reference as to which side it was on.
RipperHistorian
I have never really seen a problem interpreting the message. The double negative is common in east end speech. How often have you heard someone of cockney extraction say something like "I didn't do nuffink" when they really mean "I didn't do anything". Even a triple negative sometimes appears, such as "I ain't not done nuffink". To me the graffito clearly says "The Jews don't take responsibility for their actions." Of course that doesn't help in interpreting why the Ripper, if it was indeed he, would have written such a thing. |
Monty
Chief Inspector
Username: Monty
Post Number: 898
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 6:03 am: | |
Alan,
Long states he found the apron/graffito just before the stairs leading up to the tennament.
The stairs that lead up are on the right hand side of the doorway as you look in fron the street.
Ergo the graffito would be on the south side of the doorway.
Oui ?
Monty
(Message edited by monty on March 18, 2004) |
Sarah Long
Chief Inspector
Username: Sarah
Post Number: 924
Registered: 11-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 6:21 am: | |
Alan,
That's interesting how you interpret it. I always took it to mean one of two things. Either, the Jews shouldn't be blamed for anything or, the Jews should be blamed for something. Depending on whether the double negative was deliberate or not. Since, back then, I should imagine that many of the inhabitants of Whitechapel spoke with a double negative, I am leaning more towards the fact that it actually seems to be clearing the name of the Jews which I find intriguing and makes me believe that it wasn't just normal graffiti because, if you've ever read graffiti as I have, then you will know that it is 99% of time slanderous of someone.
Sarah |
Christopher T George
Chief Inspector
Username: Chrisg
Post Number: 659
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 11:38 am: | |
Hi, Sarah and Alan:
Alan wrote: 'To me the graffito clearly says "The Jews don't take responsibility for their actions."'
One of the two options Sarah gave was: "the Jews should be blamed for something."
Looking past the graffito's double negative and trying to assess the meaning, to me, the meaning is a combination of these two explanations:
"The Jews don't take responsibility for their actions, they should be blamed for something."
All the best
Chris |
Sarah Long
Chief Inspector
Username: Sarah
Post Number: 927
Registered: 11-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 12:09 pm: | |
Chris,
I would agree but I think the mistake of using a double negative would have been very common and saying that the Jews were to be blamed for something would mean that he deliberately wrote in the double negative and would, in my mind, mean that whoever wrote it was well educated and intelligent as even today some people still use the double negative accidently and anyway I wouldn't have thought many people would have used the double negative on purpose when it can be said in an easier way, for example, instead of "The Juwes are the men who will not be blamed for nothing", he could have just said "The Juwes are the men who will be blamed for something" which is what it means with the double negative but I just don't think he meant it like that necessarily. I personally think that he meant to say "The Juwes are the men who will not be blamed for anything".
Hope that made sense as I think I started to waffle.
Sarah |
Christopher T George
Chief Inspector
Username: Chrisg
Post Number: 660
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 1:08 pm: | |
Hi, Sarah
If written by the murderer, and I think we have to admit that is a big "if", or even if it was not written by the killer, I think the writer would have used the double negative unconsciously not deliberately. To the writer, the statement would have made sense, but to us it does not quite make sense. Does that make sense? 
All the best
Chris |
Frank van Oploo
Inspector
Username: Franko
Post Number: 238
Registered: 9-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 3:24 pm: | |
Hi Monty,
“Frank, yeah great but the point, or rather Jacks point is what ?”
I haven’t got the foggiest idea. Like you said, it was his agenda.
By the way, like I said much earlier on this thread, I doubt if the graffito was his. I try to look at both possibilities with a critical eye and continue to try and find reasonable answers to questions of a practical nature like the ones you posed until I come across one I really can’t answer. The question above is obviously one regarding Jack’s mind.
Like Alan, I never had a problem with the meaning of the graffito either, but perhaps that’s because I’m Dutch and in Dutch ‘not for nothing’ means ‘not without good reason’. So, we get: the Jews are the men that will not be blamed without good reason, or, blaming the Jews will prove not to have been done without good reason.
All the best,
Frank
|
Richard Brian Nunweek
Chief Inspector
Username: Richardn
Post Number: 750
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 3:33 pm: | |
Hi,
I believe 'Jack' Had a hatred of Jews, and the graffito, was purely a way of blaming the jews, for becoming the person he had become, in other words, if it were not for certain people of that race, I Would not have become the person I am.
Leanne and myself have found, that motive within Barnett, and because of that , and obviously other factors, we are co writing this book.
Regards Richard. |
RipperHistorian
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 3:46 pm: | |
Where is the evidence from which you have deduced that Jack had a hatred of Jews?
Seems kind of unfounded considering that he was busy killing non-Jew prostitutes!!!!!!
In my personal opinion, if you really want to develop a working suspect to be Jack the Ripper, you have to EXCLUDE any evidence that has not been DEFINITIVELY PROVEN to have done by him when considering shaky evidence. For example, it is pretty easy to accept that he killed several prostitutes with a similar MO, common sense tells you that he owned and was familiar with a knife, he was familiar with the area, etc.
But, when you start to base suspects on a hatred of Jews due to graffiti on a wall that has no direct connection to the killer, was not signed by him, and contains no information that would suggest he wrote it, you are entering the realm of CREATIVE WRITING. You are making deductions from the wrong end of the rope.
Tim |
Sarah Long
Chief Inspector
Username: Sarah
Post Number: 931
Registered: 11-2003
| | Posted on Friday, March 19, 2004 - 5:19 am: | |
Chris,
That's my point. If his didn't mean to use the double negative then you have to remove one of the negatives to understand it so either "The Juwes are the men who will be blamed for nothing" or "The Juwes are the men who will not be blamed for anything".
Think of it this way. What do people mean when they say "I didn't do nothing". They mean that they didn't do anything.
I hope that makes more sense now.
Sarah |
John Ruffels
Inspector
Username: Johnr
Post Number: 195
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Friday, March 19, 2004 - 7:07 am: | |
For a time there, it looked as if the near- apoplectic reaction by senior police to the finding of the fresh graffiti, almost overshadowed the (to my mind) more concrete discovery of the torn, bloody, et cetera apron.
If the graffiti was written by JTR to create some kind of local riot, thus causing a diversion whilst he made good his escape...it very nearly worked.
This makes me think, he was cool, cunning and with an understanding of the stews of East London.
But why was he carrying chalk?
Were the murders premeditated? He carried a knife/knives; carried off the apron to clean his knife, and perhaps to transport body parts.
Did he pre-plan the whole thing?
Even down to the graffiti?
As Ricky would say in "The Young Ones" -"OOO-ERRR" |
Rodney Gillis
Sergeant
Username: Srod
Post Number: 29
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Friday, March 19, 2004 - 9:03 pm: | |
John,
Your question concerning the chalk has always interested me. Could this be a clue towards Druitt who was a teacher? Could the Ripper(whoever it may be)have carried chalk because it's a great drying agent after messing up his hands in the murders. Ofcourse the most plausible answer is that he just planned ahead. I fully believe the Ripper wrote the graffito. The apron piece is there. If the writing were old it would have worn in the weather. Percentages say Jack wrote it. |
Paul Jackson
Detective Sergeant
Username: Paulj
Post Number: 69
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Friday, March 19, 2004 - 9:12 pm: | |
Hi All,
at least he didnt make it something totally screwed up like..."The Jewes are not the men that will not be blamed for nothing" I guess that would be a triple negative. Im just messing around.
Paul |
John Ruffels
Inspector
Username: Johnr
Post Number: 196
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, March 20, 2004 - 6:28 am: | |
I suppose, given Paul's previous remark, I should not be too negative in my following remarks.
(Even though photographs were- or nearly were- taken of the graffiti/ graffito).
I have read local East-Enders used chalk in a street game called "Shove Halfpenny".
Did costermongers or Stall holders or small business shop owners use blackboards in Whitechapel to announce their daily specials?
Fruit barrow prices: were they in chalk?
Did children use chalk to mark out Hop-Scotch pitches or other games in the street?
Someone once asked on Casebook, "how common was graffiti in the East end at that time?".
Who could read it anyway?
And most important, just how many other Ripper murder sites had graffiti scawled nearby?
As for Rodney's suggestion above chalk as a good drying agent. I can see where you're coming from Rodney, but I think Old JTR would have needed a lot of chalk, he washed his hands (or did he?) at a sink on route...No mention of chalk-dust on the apron...
Sorry to be multi-negative. |
Natalie Severn
Inspector
Username: Severn
Post Number: 488
Registered: 11-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, March 20, 2004 - 11:01 am: | |
Sgt Steve White who said he saw a rubber soled shabby genteel youngish man coming out of what Donald Rumbelow thinks must have been Mitre Square immediately after the murder there said he noticed the mans hands which were "SNOW WHITE" with fingers thet were long and tapering.Interesting.
I wonder whether then the murderer did take the chalk with him intending it to absorb the liquid
and cover other stains.
The other matter that interests me is the position of the graffiti.It seems it was written on the black glazed brick section of the wall of the "passage way leading to the staircase"ie it was situated inside the building in this passageway but could be seen from the street.It was at shoulder height.
The apron was "just underneath the writing"......
...and although the police searched all the stairwells and staircases of the building of which there were about six they could find NO MARK or other sign of the murderer.
So that leads me to think that the piece of cloth in the passageway and the writing were linked.
The police added that the placement of the graffiti at shoulder height was what made them think the murderer had written the words on the wall bcause if they had been written before hand they would have been rubbed out by the numbers of people living in the building rubbing their shoulders against it.
This isnt to say there wasnt other graffiti in Whitechapel but that this particular graffiti was
written in an unusual place for graffiti and no other such graffiti was found that night/morning nearby
Natalie
|
John Ruffels
Inspector
Username: Johnr
Post Number: 197
Registered: 3-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, March 20, 2004 - 7:26 pm: | |
Good spotting about Steve White's suspect's hands Natalie.Well done.
And congratulations on a concise summation of facts. Clear and brief.
Wish I could be concise!
The only weakness in your argument, I think,..I had a teacher once who kept chalk in his pockets, and it got all over his clothes! |
RipperHistorian
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, March 20, 2004 - 7:40 pm: | |
Keep in mind that the decription of the guy coming out of the alley by Sgt. Smith does not match the description of any of the other winesses. You can't just use sightings to support your case when it suits you, but not take into account major flaws.
Nice find though, it is possible that other descriptions were wrong, and that Sgt. White was correct.
Tim |
steven tavani
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Friday, March 19, 2004 - 11:24 pm: | |
Why do so many of you seem to dismiss the possibility that the murderer lifted the chalk from Eddowes. He was still disturbed by his interruption during Strides murder and scrawled his message and disposed of the apron piece once he had a solitary moment. |
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