The Lechmere/Cross "name issue"

[Fisherman]

>>Thatīs nine minutes. He should have been out of Bucks Row.<<

How do you know, by Xmere's clock, he wasn't "out of Buck's Row", as you put it?
Once again you fudge the figures to produce a result you want.

No, I am saying that IF the 3.30 departure time applies, than he should have been out of Bucks Row at 3.39. I do not state, and have never stated, as a fact that the timings are spot on. You need to realize that.

[Fisherman]

David Orsam: There is no arrogance.

Do you think it is even remotely likely that Scobie was given different facts in his briefing note to those in the documentary?

Don't try to bluster this out Fisherman. We know that Scobie was wrongly told that Lechmere said he left his house at 3.30.

We know that he held a paper in his hand where it seems to be stated that Lechmere said he left at 3.30.

We donīt know what the rest of the material stated. It could be that there was a later passage saying that the timings must be looked upon with less than certainty.
Even if Lechmere said "at around 3.30", the timings would nevertheless be hurting him.


We know that he was told that the Lechmere appears to have initially given another time when this is speculative assumption.

My belief is that Lechmere said that he normally left home at 3.20 but that he was late and left at around 3.30 instead. Not around 3.35 or 3.40.

Just on what we do know for a fact about what Scobie was told it is enough for us to conclude that we cannot rely on his opinion as to whether there was a case against Lechmere. Scobie is a barrister not an historian and he cannot be expected to be making assumptions about the facts presented to him.

Yes, he is a barrister. But there was a also a murder squad leader who saw a very good case. And Scobies main point was the same I generally make. When the coincidences mount up - and Scobie said that they did in Lechmereīs case - it becomes one coincidence too many.

The departure time from Doveton Street thus was a small detail in the overall guilty picture for Scobie. I saw more material with him, where he spoke very harshly about how criinals seet to believe that a court of law will believe in any amount of circumstances, which they donīt.
You base your ruling out of Scobie on a lot of assumptions tied to a very minor detail, and you conveniently brush the rest aside.

Thatīs your choice. I disagree. Thatīs mine.

[Fisherman]

Thanks David.
But they noticed each other when they were about 30 yards away on bucks row. So aren't we back to the 20-30 seconds Paul behind lech? Isn't that distance/time one would expect they would have noticed each other before bucks row?

Yes, of course we are - and it is likely 11-15 seconds. Paul was not 130 yards away when Lechmere stepped into the street. Lechmere said that this was when he noted Pauls presence, and that he was 30-40 yards away.

[FrankO]

A quick walking pace is around 2,5 meters per second, and a yard is 91, 44 centimeter, meaning that we are looking at a distance of about 2,7 yards per second, roughly speaking.

I would like to see you actually walk at 2.5 meters per second, Fish, because that’s 9 km or 5.6 miles per hour. That would be either running or heel-and-toe walking and I’m quite confident Paul didn’t do that. A quick walking speed is about 6.3 km/hr or 1.75 m/s. Even if we’d round that off to 1.8 m/s, Paul would cover 30 yards or 27 meters in 15 seconds and 40 yards or 36 meters in 20 seconds.

Whether Paul continued “hurrying along” after he saw this man in the middle of the street is open to discussion, as he seems to have become cautious when he saw Lechmere.

No certainties,of course - but 20 seconds sounds a bit rich to me.

No certainties indeed, Fish. I was only reacting to the "mere seconds", which give an incorrect picture of the dimension/time involved if they would mean, say, 1 to 5 seconds.

[Fisherman]

Before I respond to Abby's post, I note that articles on the internet suggest that anywhere between 1 and 1.68 metres per second is quite fast. i.e.

"Those who walked 1 meter per second (about 2.25 mph) or faster consistently lived longer than others of their age and sex who walked more slowly, the study showed."

http://www.livescience.com/10406-fast-walk-predict-long-youll-live.html

AND

"Londoners in the morning had a study-high walking speed of 1.68 meters per second"

http://www.citylab.com/work/2012/03/why-people-cities-walk-fast/1550/

At 1 metre a second this is the equivalent of 1.09 yards a second meaning that a distance of 40 yards would be covered in just over 36 seconds. At 1.68 metres a second it would be covered in 25 seconds.

This was what I used:

Wikipedia: The preferred walking speed is the speed at which humans or animals choose to walk. Many people tend to walk at about 1.4 m/s (5.0 km/h; 3.1 mph).[1][2][3] Although many people are capable of walking at speeds upwards of 2.5 m/s (9.0 km/h; 5.6 mph), especially for short distances, they typically choose not to.[4] Individuals find slower or faster speeds uncomfortable.

However, I have looked further and found that one site says that 2,5 meters per second is the borderline between walking and running. Of course, we donīt know exactly how Paul moved down Bucks Row, but we do know that he said that he was hurrying along. Maybe he was close to the running borderline, and maybe he was not - I think anybody will have a hard time trying to establish that. It does, however, remain that we MAY be talking about a significantly shorter time than 20 seconds.

Frank, I agree that "mere seconds" can be interpreted as a couple of seconds. But we all know that was not the case. However, if it was 15 seconds only, then how should it be worded?

[Fisherman]

And I do want to repeat the quote from the documentary, as stated by the voiceover:

"Robert Paul was in Bucks Row for a full minute before he noticed Lechmere."

That must mean that he was a full minute behind Lechmere at least.

Or does Fisherman want to say that this is another thing that the documentary got wrong?

Where does it say that Lechmere was a full 130 yards ahead of Paul, David?

If you walk at similar speeds on soundless soles in darkness, you can be in a street 40 yards away from a person for an indefinite amount of time without ever noticing the other person.

Effectively, when commenting on the docu wording you speak of, it could have been a case of Lechmere walking soundlessly 30-40 yards in front of Paul, who never heard his fellow carman and never saw the silhouette of him against the supposedly burning gass lamp up at the cap factory.

It could not be a case of Lechmere stepping out into the street as Paul entered Bucks Row, though, since we know that Lechmere said that it was when he stepped out into the street that he heard Paul approaching, estimating that the latter was at that stage 30-40 yards off.

The distance of 30 yards you cannot find is in the Echo of the 4:th, together with when Lechmere noticed Paul:

I walked into the centre of the road, and saw that it was a woman. At the same time I heard a man come up behind, in the same direction as I was going. He was about thirty or forty yards behind then. I stepped back to await his arrival.

[caz]

The timings are hurtful for Lechmere. There is seemingly an overall pattern that is not flattering at all for him.

Again, this is Lechmere supposedly hurting himself, or at least saying something that is not helpful to his cause if he has just killed Nichols and wants to go on killing.

He also admitted to seeing and hearing nobody as he came across the victim, which was also unhelpful to his cause if he needed people to believe the real killer had just managed to flee the scene in time before his own arrival. Your familiar argument was that he dared not claim he saw or heard anyone departing the scene in case a nearby policeman, or some other witness, could have contradicted him. This makes no sense if he was confident enough that nobody was nearby when he set about attacking Nichols. Why could he not have said he 'thought' he heard departing footsteps as he spotted what he initially 'thought' was a tarpaulin? If he was lying about the latter (which he must have been if he was the killer) he could have lied about the former with no possible comeback. Yet here he is again, telling the truth about something unhelpful to himself as the killer (he saw and heard nobody leaving the scene before he got there) and he still can't win, can he?

Love,

Caz
X

[Abby Normal]

Hi Frank and Fish

I timed myself walking at a slightly faster than normal walking pace and I got roughly 2 yards a second. One of my steps covered about a yard and It was taking about 1 second to take two steps.

does that seem right?

[Fisherman]

Hi Frank and Fish

I timed myself walking at a slightly faster than normal walking pace and I got roughly 2 yards a second. One of my steps covered about a yard and It was taking about 1 second to take two steps.

does that seem right?

Yes, it does. So 15 to 20 seconds, if we have 30 to 40 yards.

[Fisherman]

Again, this is Lechmere supposedly hurting himself, or at least saying something that is not helpful to his cause if he has just killed Nichols and wants to go on killing.

He also admitted to seeing and hearing nobody as he came across the victim, which was also unhelpful to his cause if he needed people to believe the real killer had just managed to flee the scene in time before his own arrival. Your familiar argument was that he dared not claim he saw or heard anyone departing the scene in case a nearby policeman, or some other witness, could have contradicted him. This makes no sense if he was confident enough that nobody was nearby when he set about attacking Nichols. Why could he not have said he 'thought' he heard departing footsteps as he spotted what he initially 'thought' was a tarpaulin? If he was lying about the latter (which he must have been if he was the killer) he could have lied about the former with no possible comeback. Yet here he is again, telling the truth about something unhelpful to himself as the killer (he saw and heard nobody leaving the scene before he got there) and he still can't win, can he?

Love,

Caz
X

How would he know that there was nobody about, Caz? How could he tell that there was not a night watchman around the corner?

Use BOTH eyes, and you will see further!

[Fisherman]

For David Orsam:

You claim that Scobie said "The timings really hurt him" because he had been unrightfully told that Lechmere left home at exactly 3.30.

However, letīs take a look at the WHOLE quote - it actually involves a "because", explaining WHY Scobie thought the timings were hurtful.

Here it is:

"The timings really hurt him, BECAUSE she could have been very, very recently fatally killed.
You can inflict injuries, as I am sure a pathologist will tell you, with a knife in seconds.
And the question is: Where were you? What were you doing?"


So, far from believing that the nine minutes offered if the timed path to Bucks Row from Doveton Street (7 minutes, 7 seconds) is weighed against Robert Pauls claim to have entered Bucks Row at 3.45, was a prerequisite to be able to committ the murder, Scobie is instead talking about how Nichols seemed to have been very, very recently killed - offering no real alternatives to Lechmere as the killer. Whether Scoboe grounded this on the bleeding details I cannot say, but it is the subject that springs to mind.
It is very obvious that he does not feel any need for nine minutes at the other end of the strike, since he acknowledges that the knifing could have been overwith "in seconds".

That clears away your suggestion effectively, and makes for a fuller and more factbased background.

[Fisherman]

Expanding on my answer to Caz:

If you are going to lie, it is always better with a lie that leaves all opportunities open, just in case. You say that if he was bold enough to kill in Bucks Row, he would be bold enough to say that he heard retreating steps.

But in such a case, he would need to tell the inquest from WHERE he heard them. And if he said, for example, up at Bakers Row, he could not know if there was a PC - or somebody else - standing there at the relevant time. Somebody living there could have been awake, window open, and been able to tell that there was not a soul passing by.
You see, fixing a lie like this in time and space will always involve the risk that somebody is able to contradict you - and then you are immediately in trouble.

Leaving all opportunities open as Lechmere did, clears that risk away and is by far the smartest thing to do. Looking at how you seem to protest every time I say that this killer would have been a risktaker, it is kind of odd how you suddenly prefer him to have taken an unneccesary risk this time?

[David Orsam]

When I think about how long lech was stopped because of the lump in the road, I think the upper limit is 20-30 seconds, but I think it could also have been as low as 5-10 seconds. He's walking, sees the lump, stops, looks, takes a few steps toward and recognizes the figure as a woman, here's Paul. That description could IMHO also happen very quickly, seconds.

I tend to agree with the upper limit of 20-30 seconds which is why I used a scenario of 30 seconds but also factored into the equation the possibility that Lechmere's estimate of 40 yards is wrong and he actually heard Paul when he was further away in the street. So perhaps he stood looking at the body for 20 seconds and Paul took 40 seconds to walk up to him from first being heard.

But also at 1 yard a second - if we take 40 yards as the absolute gospel truth - it might have taken Paul 40 seconds to walk that distance. Is there any evidence about the speed Paul was walking?

I certainly don't think there is anything implausible about 20 seconds as being the time it took for Lechmere to slow down, look at the body, think about it, then walk into the middle of the road. But we are on ludicrously fine margins here.

Given the uncertainty, surely the first question one has to ask is: are the timings consistent with Lechmere's innocence rather than are they consistent with his guilt.

[David Orsam]

When I think about how long lech was stopped because of the lump in the road, I think the upper limit is 20-30 seconds, but I think it could also have been as low as 5-10 seconds. He's walking, sees the lump, stops, looks, takes a few steps toward and recognizes the figure as a woman, here's Paul. That description could IMHO also happen very quickly, seconds.

I also think it would be a bout 2 yards a second a man covers walking briskly give or take.

So 30-60 seconds or 15-30 yards behind. Still seems that its close enough that they should have noticed each other sooner than just at bucks row.

However, with approximations, not knowing if Paul varied his walking speed, or simply that they did see or hear each other sooner and simply didn't register and or mention it, of course could render this all moot. But just going by what they said seems they were pretty close.

Without knowing the relative walking speeds of Lechmere and Paul it's impossible to draw any firm conclusions. For example, as Lechmere turned into Bucks Row, Paul could easily have been a full two minutes behind him. But if Lechmere was walking slowly and Paul was walking quickly, that alone would explain why Paul could have caught up to within 40 yards of Lechmere in Bucks Row. I mean, perhaps Paul would have overtaken him before the end of the Row had they both continued walking without stopping. So how is it possible to say that "Lech and Paul should have seen each other" prior to this?

Out of interest Abby, what do you say is the minimum distance (in both yards and seconds) that the two men needed to be apart where, on the dark streets, they would not be expected to have seen or heard each other?

Do you agree that if there was 60 seconds walking distance between them then they would not be expected to have seen or heard each other?

[David Orsam]

If you can prove that he did not have the time, it becomes critical. If you can not, it becomes a pointing out of the fact that we do not have the exact timings - and that has been pointed out hundreds of times before.

It's not about proving that he did not have time to commit murder. It's about whether the timings "really hurt" Lechmere and whether he failed to answer questions about where he was. Because that is what Scobie says. So it has to be proved that there is a missing period of time for which Lechmere has not provided an explanation. If there isn't, then how is Scobie's opinion worth anything?