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** This is an archived, static copy of the Casebook messages boards dating from 1998 to 2003. These threads cannot be replied to here. If you want to participate in our current forums please go to https://forum.casebook.org **
Amelia Richardson
Casebook Message Boards: Witnesses: Specific Witnesses:
Amelia Richardson
Author: The Viper
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 07:12 am |        | Graziano asked a few questions elsewhere about this witness. Regrettably, time being so short right now, I've just summarised a few thoughts here. Others might want to discuss Mrs. Richardson further...
Since you speak about Hanbury Street, Was it possible for a private yard to be at that hour (for the reason stated above) a site of rendez-vous for prostitutes with clients ?
Yes, most of the old houses in Hanbury Street were let out by the room. To provide access it was common for the front doors to be left open on the latch. This enabled anybody to gain access at any time of day.
Was it possible for Amelia Richardson, such a religious woman ( Jewish ?), to let it for such purpose ? Then to lie at the inquest ?
Nobody here seems sure of what Amelia Richardson’s religious persuasion was. She could possibly have been Jewish, perhaps more likely she was some kind of non-conformist, (maybe a Quaker or a Methodist). Mrs. Richardson was very defensive at the inquest, and with good reason. She didn’t own the property, but she held the main lease on it. I’m sure that at the back of her mind was the fear of eviction, were it to be revealed that she allowed the house to me used for immoral purposes - especially if the landlord’s name(s) ever emerged, giving him/them unwanted bad publicity. There was never any suggestion of Mrs. Richardson running an organised house of ill-repute.
Was it possible for her not to having known it ?
From the evidence, no, she must have known what went on. I think Mrs. Richardson was rather caught out by her son’s evidence, which contradicted her own. Her flawed testimony was given when she was recalled to the witness stand, at a time when John Richardson had been sent out to retrieve the knife he had used to trim his boot.
Regards, V. |
Author: graziano
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 12:59 pm | | Hello Viper,
sorry, I did not know about the existence of Mr or Mrs Alegria/Torquemada burning the heretical messages.
I did not mean to create a special board for my questions since as I told you I am still digging all that thing out but now that you did it, ok, let us go.
What kind of perverse woman should I believe Mrs Richardson was ?
She has a special room in the house she leases for the purpose of having prayers meeting or even if the only purpose of the room is not this one she uses it to gather other people who have the same religious convictions and thus I can imagine that she is respected and trusted.
I can imagine that she often does that because she closes the door of that room at night and this could mean (she says at the inquest that all other doors are left opened) that inside there are quite valuable cult objects that are used for more than only once.
She keeps out of charity an old woman (Sarah Cox) on the top floor of the house.
She is a very industrious old woman not very hard on her employees (John Tyler is often late, he is not fired, Mrs Richardson just sends someone to fetch him).
And then I am told that:
1. She let (against money ?) prostitutes with their clients in the yard of the house.
2. She lies without shame and repeatedly at the inquest under oath.
The first point "against money" should only be seen as a guess but I can say a reasonable one, and even if that was not it does not matter very much, what is important is that I am told that she knows the frequent and regular use of the yard for immoral purposes.
But the yard is also used to go to the privvy (not sure about the spelling).
In the house there are a lot of people and families with I suppose very young children.
Mrs Richardson lives with her grandson of 14 years.
I deduce that had been the yard used by prostitutes there would have been a great likelyhood that someone, grown adult or children, having to go to the yard at night or in the early morning to urinate or defecate (sorry, I do not know other words) could have met with "Jane on her knees in front of Bill with his trousers on his feet " (sorry if I am crude but problems of language here)
Should I believe that this old, respected, religious, compassioned and industrious woman would not have cared if that had happened to her grandson ?
To me,that stinks more than the statements of the three PCs in Buck's Row.
Bye. Graziano. |
Author: graziano
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 01:15 pm | | Hello Viper,
and why should I believe that she was so perverse ?
Because of her son, that not only does not corroborates her but insists at the inquest that she lies.
Oh dear, what a good son (she even gave him work).
He is the only one at the inquest not corroborating her.
This John Richardson who is at the site at a very useful time but that nobody sees and hears.
This John Richardson who knows the house, the cellar, the habits of the people in the house and very likely (his mother has been living there for 15 years) also the habits of the neighbours (Mr Thompson left for work generally at 4.00 and the workers at the packing case maker some yards away began work at 6.00 a.m.).
Of course what he could not be sure of is if someone had seen him or not.
Audacity and luck ?
I prefer planifying and collaboration.
Bye. Graziano. |
Author: graziano
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 11:13 am | | Hello Viper,
if a prostitute is found murdered in a private yard a clear logic suspicion, at least at first, would fall on the owner of that yard or at least on the people who regularly use it.
One way to divert this suspicion is without doubt to state that a lot of people use the yard or as John Richardson put it at the inquest answering the Coroner on the subject: " plenty of them, at all hours ".
Another point about the yard at 29 Hanbury Street.
It has been often stated that the yard was directly under the eyes of the inhabitants of the house.
Since we know that the back floor room was unoccupied at night and closed, this statement is not really correct. So some little noise could have been made without anyone noticing it.
I wonder how many houses in Hanbury Street had this peculiarity.
Jack should have been very lucky.
Of course you could argue that it was for this very reason that Annie Chapman chose this yard.
But I could answer that it was Jack who must have known it to be able to do what he did (and it was the man seen by Long that asked "Will you", not Annie Chapman).
Jack or one of his accomplices.
I suggest (but it is worth only what you put on it) that John Richardson could also have had a key of the back floor room.
Mrs Richardson on the defensive at the inquest after having heard her son ?
What would you think the attitude of a mother could be if she gets aware that something is wrong with her boy ?
I could even imagine that after having heard him she says a little lie about a hammer having been missing from the cellar.
Bye. Graziano. |
Author: The Viper
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 06:02 pm | | Graziano,
The upstair back rooms of 29 Hanbury Street were occupied, as press reports show, including the one in the Eastern Poste. These residents overlooked the murder site. With the housing shortage being as it was in the area it's a pretty safe bet that the neighbouring terraced houses had occupied rear rooms too. In fact, after the murder residents of the neighbouring houses charged siteseers to view the yard of number 29 from their windows. The murderer took a huge chance of being seen at Hanbury Street, especially since it was already light.
Where is the evidence that Mrs. Richardson was making money from allowing prostitutes to use the premises? You stated that it was a guess, and it doesn't look a solid one from here. The authorities don't appear to have persued that line of enquiry. Plus, sources tell us that it was common for these old houses with individually rented rooms to leave their doors unlocked at night. Wily local prostitutes like Annie Chapman were undoubtedly aware of this fact, and would have made use of any facilities offered.
If I have interpreted what you say correctly you appear to be suggesting that John Richardson knew far more about this murder than he was letting on, and that his mother was trying to cover for him. Well, according to the East London Observer, the coroner did give Richardson a hard time of it:- "The Coroner was very severe on him over the story of the knife with which he had cut a piece of leather off his boot before five o'clock on Friday morning, on the stone steps near which the body was found. He wanted to know why he had the knife, why he should put a table knife in his pocket, and altogether made the witness look very uneasy and very uncomfortable." We have to conclude that the Coroner - and more importantly the jury - were eventually satisfied by the outcome. The police also singled out Richardson for particular attention, for we learn from Inspector Swanson's report of 19th October that:- "...it is difficult to understand how it was that Richardson did not see the body when he went into the yard at 4.45 a.m. but as his clothes were examined, the house searched and his statement taken in which there was not a shred of evidence, suspicion could not rest on him, though police specially directed attention to him."
Regards, V. |
Author: graziano
Monday, 30 July 2001 - 05:13 am | | Hello Viper,
yes, the upstair back rooms were occupied at night, but the ground floor back room was not.
This room, as we can see in the pictures of the back of the house at 29 Hanbury street, was the one just fronting the yard.
The one that without doubt represented the greatest danger for Jack(s) to be seen or heard.
What a luck he had to choose a house where this room was not occupied.
You may say that it was Annie Chapman who brought him there right for that reason.
But this is less convincing as we know that it was the man who asked "Will you ?".
My point is that he invited there Annie Chapman (after having previously offered her a meal - still in the stomach at the autopsy) knowing that particular.
So, how could he have known ?
That Mrs Richardson made money from allowing prostitutes in the yard is only my guess but not with the purpose to prove what I believe (because I absolutely believe that not - no evidences and as you said no ill reputation) but just to try to bring water to my adversaries on this point it is to say to you or at least to the classical theory that the yard was used by prostitutes with the consent or at least the knowledge of Mrs Richardson that just adopted an attitude of "laissez-faire".
Why should she adopt such an attitude (risking as you said eviction if the landlord happened to know) if there wasn't any gain for her ?
Out of charity for prostitutes ?
But as I told you I do not believe that a charitable, religious, respected, industrious and so on old woman could consent or know the immoral use of the yard and not doing anything to prevent that and allowing a young child in the house or an old person to met with "Jenny and Billy" in the position explained in a previous post.
And I do not believe she could lie under oath.
The fact that police specially directed attention to John Richardson and that the Coroner made him look very uneasy and very uncomfortable and that Mrs Amelia Richardson was on the defensive after her boy was heard tells me a lot more than the fact that he got out of it.
I remember that Sutcliffe (but I do not know the case very well) was interrogated one or twice by inspectors and that once one of them wrote a report in which he stated that something was wrong with that guy.
But that guy went on killing again and again without being minimally disturbed.
Since my suspicions (but I aknowledge that I would have to bring evidences) are not that John Richardson is Jack but that he could have been only one of the accomplices, it should have been even easier for him to escape detection on whatever after-inquest measures would have been taken against him.
I am nevertheless deeply convinced that each murder site of the case (except probably the one of Mary Kelly murder) has a lot to say not about the habits of the prostitues but about Jack himself.
Centrals of all Hanbury street and Dutfield's yard.
Bye. Graziano. |
Author: Christopher T George
Monday, 30 July 2001 - 10:01 am | | Hi, Graziano and Viper:
I think it is understandable that Mrs. Richardson would be nervous and appear to have been covering up for her son. Not only because of the mystery that he said he didn't see the body, but the fact that he had a knife and an apron probably made her fearful that he could have been believed by the police to be the suspect Leather Apron, for whom they were hunting. No wonder she was fond of holding prayer services! 
Best regards
Chris George |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Tuesday, 31 July 2001 - 04:37 am | | I agree, Chris. People will cover up for others, not always because they think, or know, they have done something wrong. It's often the fear of a case being made against someone, if that person can't prove their innocence.
But I also agree with Graziano that, the fact that the police couldn't find any evidence to make them treat Richardson as a suspect, once they had questioned him, doesn't really mean much. Many believe the ripper probably did come to the attention of the police at one time or another, with the same result - there was never enough suspicion, or enough evidence, to make a case against any one individual.
Love,
Caz |
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