Mort à Claybury

[Ben]

did this man insert himself into the murder investigation for no reason?

No.

If he was the killer, he came forward to legitimize his presence at a crime scene and deflect suspicion in a false direction. His motivations for this pre-emptive move would probably have included fear (at the prospect of being recognised by a witness and dragged in as a suspect) and a certain thrill at the opportunities presented by a direct communication with the police under a false guise.

Your suggestion that he came forward for "no reason" is circular reasoning at its most annoying, stemming as it does from the pre-decided conclusion that he can't have killed anyone. If he did, he obviously had a "reason" for coming forward.

If you think there is anything extraordinary about the above premise, then you ought to research the subject of serial crime in greater depth, as examples of perpetrators approaching police under false guises aren't difficult to come by.

Again, given the ignorance to cockiness ratio you've displayed here, it shouldn't be surprising if nobody invests much stock in your condemnations.

My apologies to everyone else for repeating this again, but this person is clearly looking for a scrap, and here of all places.

[caz]

so he kills Kelly, and decides to put himself at risk by assuming an alias and coming forward to the police with an elaborate account, even though the police weren't even looking for him. the "ridiculous" part is not that someone would use an alias. the ridiculous part is that someone would come forward for no reason, using an alias.

Well I would certainly agree with that, Pontius, but I suddenly thought: what the heck is Ben doing arguing for his pet suspect in Creative Writing? And then I answered my own question - at least the ridiculous belongs here.

There was a mad killer called Fleming
Who went to the cops like a lemming
He pretended to be Hutch...
This is all a bit much
So I won't even bother trying to rhyme the last line.

Look, the witness wanted the cops to take his account seriously. And they did - at first. They even got him to take them round the area looking for the man he claimed to see entering Mary's room long after Blotchy, which would have been the last sighting of any man with Mary that night. They'd have made bloody sure they could keep tabs on this witness in case he would be needed to testify in court, so he'd have been an idiot to feed them a bogus identity or false contact details - unless he knew he could easily give them the slip at any time, in which case he'd have done that and not come forward at all.

When they took his suspect out of the equation it meant taking Hutchy Boy out too, or he would effectively have become their last man with Mary, having admitted to a conversation with her and following her back to the court. There is no way on earth they'd have left themselves with no means of getting hold of Hutch's arse again in the future, if they weren't 100% satisfied that he couldn't help them with their enquiries in any capacity.

Love,

Caz
X

[Ben]

Oh, no...

This is exactly what happened last year, and the year before.

Someone decides to take me on, and this incredible chain reaction happens. A sort of lost sheep mentality. The end result, of course, is that everyone ends up wanting a go.

And I oblige.

And then round and round in entertaining circles we go.

“And then I answered my own question - at least the ridiculous belongs here.”

But you’ve done such a terribly bad and unconvincing job of showing it to be “ridiculous" - that's the problem, and it’s not even a theory I’ve nailed my colours to. I’ve even acknowledged that the height issue could cast serious doubt upon, if not demolish, the theory. But all this gets overlooked ‘midst the cherished pursuit of pissing Ben off.

“so he'd have been an idiot to feed them a bogus identity or false contact details - unless he knew he could easily give them the slip at any time”

Or unless he knew there was a far better than average chance of his real identity not being discovered, which considering the era in which the police were operating, was almost guaranteed to be the case, even if he was kept under surveillance. Fleming had moved into the Whitechapel district as late as September 1888 and the indications are strong that he worked at the docks as a labourer. If he used an alias from the outset and/or generally kept himself to himself, there was very little chance of being “exposed” by a putative surveillance team. The likelihood is that Fleming was not well known in an area he had only recently moved into.

“When they took his suspect out of the equation it meant taking Hutchy Boy out too”

As a witness, yes.

That’s precisely what happened.

As a suspect? No. Hideously unlikely. There’s not a scrap of evidence to suggest he was ever suspected, and in the unlikely event that he was, it’s even less likely that the police were ever in a position to convert those suspicions into a concrete conclusion of either guilt or innocence. Of course, none of this means that the police “left themselves with no means of getting hold of Hutch's arse again”. At least, this isn’t something I’ve ever suggested.

Best regards,
Ben

[Pontius2000]

Well I would certainly agree with that, Pontius, but I suddenly thought: what the heck is Ben doing arguing for his pet suspect in Creative Writing? And then I answered my own question - at least the ridiculous belongs here.

Love,

Caz
X

I appreciate your support here Caz.


to me, there are suspects who the police had grounds for at least reasonable suspicion...types like Kosminski, Druitt. even Tumblety, "mad" Russian doctors, doctors collecting specimens, etc.

then there are those whose circumstances made them reasonable suspects...like James Kelly, Bury, George Chapman, etc.

then there are manufactured suspects, like Maybrick and Sickert.

and then there are suspects based on wild speculation, like Robert Mann, George Hutchinson, etc.

This whole thing about someone with a "George Hutchinson" alias is very much a stretch. To me, the only difference between him and Sickert or Maybrick here appears to be that we don't have an envelope that he supposedly licked or a diary that he supposedly wrote.

I choose to believe that the police, while overwhelmed and not perfect, were not the mindless dolts that people make them out to be. They were on the right trail, and based on what we now know about serial killers, JtR was probably someone like a Kosminski or Druitt if not them specifically.

Pick whatever suspect you want. If you want to believe Hutchinson was the killer, fine. But show some proof please.

I'm going to look at the supposed expert's opinion. Because to me, it's quite clear that the signatures are the same, allowing for subtle differences considering they were written 23 years apart.

As for why this is in "Creative Writing", I don't know. I just clicked on "new posts" at the top of the page and this is what I found.

[DVV]

Bhoù !
Caroline et Ben sur le même thread.....
Je remballe mon M-16 et je me casse !
Des dommages collatéraux sont si vite arrivés !
....et dire que ce n'était que de la (mauvaise) poésie au départ....

Amitiés ALL
David

[Pontius2000]

Bhoù !
Caroline et Ben sur le même thread.....
Je remballe mon M-16 et je me casse !
Des dommages collatéraux sont si vite arrivés !
....et dire que ce n'était que de la (mauvaise) poésie au départ....

Amitiés ALL
David

tres bien.
ont un beau jour!

[Roy Corduroy]

Why do you think that Flemming and Hutch are one and the same ?

Because I don't think there were two diffenrent guys dossing in the VH who would both have known Mary for 3 years and used to give her money at times.

Hold everything, David. If suspicion is cast on Hutch, it begins with not believing him. So everything he said is suspect. Such as he knew Mary Kelly at all.

In contrast, Joe Fleming is a known factor. Modern research has made him knowable to us, as we have seen unfold here on Casebook, summarized in Fisherman's article.

Joe Fleming as a suspect stands on his own now. Why he has to be combined with anything Hutchwise is a mystery to me. I thought we were past that.

Roy

[DVV]

Hi Roy

can't get rid of Flemchinson. But look, I put it on the artistic thread !

Amitiés mon cher
David

[Ben]

“I appreciate your support here Caz.”

I’m sure you do. It was sorely needed in your case.

Now, I will leave it up to everyone else to decide whether or not they want to persist a discussion over the identity of George Hutchinson, but your categorization of suspicion-value in the case of known suspects is just risible in the extreme. If we don’t examine the suspects in terms of modern knowledge of serial killers acquired over the decades since the ripper murders were committed, then we are guilty of bad creative writing and nothing more. You are regrettably ignorant about a subject you purport both knowledge and an interest in. Don’t feel disheartened by this - we all have to start somewhere, but at the same time, try and tone down the overconfident brazen pronouncements a bit.

The fact that you decry certain theories as “wild speculation” doesn’t make them so, especially when you don’t bother to explain your reasoning. What we get instead is an appallingly vacuous grading of suspicion in which “doctors collecting specimens etc” are included amongst those at the top of the tree. The senior police officials had no experience of serial crime, and when it came to the identity of the killer, they disagreed. This doesn't make the contemporary police in any way "foolish", but it does make delightful mincemeat of your bold assertion that they were "on the right track".

“and based on what we now know about serial killers, JtR was probably someone like a Kosminski or Druitt if not them specifically.”

But it’s statements of this nature that announce your cloying ignorance on the subject. You honestly think that the killer was “probably someone like Druitt” on the basis of what we now know about serial killers? Look, you really must educate yourself a lot better if this is a subject you wish to spend time and energy discussing. One of the age-old criticisms of the case against Druitt is that its key particulars are vastly at odds with “what we now know about serial killers”. I’d be hugely entertained to see a list of the number of serial offenders who commit suicide after the “awful glut” that constituted their last murder, for example.

Most students of the case accept that the killer was in all likelihood an unknown local man, and I submit only that in Hutchinson’s case, we have an unknown local man who was seen loitering outside a crime scene, and who lied about his reasons for being there. You're very unlikely to do much better as far as suspects go, and an increasing number of researchers seem to be in agreement with that suggestion. They know better than to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

“Pick whatever suspect you want. If you want to believe Hutchinson was the killer, fine. But show some proof please.”

So you want me to show you “proof” that Hutchinson was the killer?

Presumably, you’d ask the same of all ripper commentators who have ever argued the case for a given suspect?

Didn't think so.

“I'm going to look at the supposed expert's opinion.”

Yes, for goodness sake, do some reading. There are many, many threads dedicated to the issue of Hutchinson and the signatures, and when you’ve finished reading them, I don’t expect to see the same gauche objections that I’ve seen chundered up many times, nor do I expect anyone to persist in a gobshyting Toppy/signature argument when it was clear that David was only interested in creating a bit of harmless poetry about his views on Joseph Fleming.

Joe Fleming as a suspect stands on his own now. Why he has to be combined with anything Hutchwise is a mystery to me.

He doesn't have to be, Roy.

He's a suspect in his own right, as is Hutchinson.

The only legitimate objection to the putative Hutchinson-Fleming connection concerns the issue of height, which is more than reasonable, and which is why I haven't committed myself to this theory to the extent that I'm currently being accused of. I only find myself riled - rather badly in this case, I don't mind admitting - by the aggressively phrased and highly generalized naysaying emanating from certain quarters.

[DVV]

.....haven't read Fish's article, I was far from the ripper world for months....but I will....
Just remember the time Fish and I were struggling....until he put Him (JF) at the top of his list.

Hutch or not, JtR died in Claybury.

Amitiés
David

[DVV]

when it was clear that David was only interested in creating a bit of harmless poetry about his views on Joseph Fleming.

Thanks Ben, indeed, I'd like that to be taken as a recreation.

Amitiés
David

[Ben]

Indeed, Dave.

I just hope we can now revert to the creative and light-hearted spirit that inspired this thread.

Back to the poerty, everyone!

Unless?

(Can you imagine if anyone really wanted to keep fighting on a "creative writing" thread?)

[DVV]

Well, Ben, we would have to give up and cry on the mountain...

[Roy Corduroy]

Hutch is Hutch and Joe is Joe and n'er the twain shall meet
Because to make it FlemingGeorge is rather no small feat
The proctor at ye Olde Vic House would have a hopping fit
To follow Joe no George I mean as bed to bed he flit

Roy

[DVV]