Dr Timothy R. Killeen

[Fisherman]

Hi Michael,

Certainly a head scratcher. Killeen is pretty sure that the sternum injury is from a different blade. He could have been wrong, but we have to assume he knew what he was talking about, and his post mortem in the baby case suggests he did. But no matter what angle I look at it, all the possible scenarios are bizarre. One man with two knives? Two men, but one inflicts 37 lesser wounds before his mate shows him how to do it properly? And why the sternum for a coup de grace? Why not the throat, easier and far less unpredictable than trying to go for the heart? And why was Martha passive during all this? Fainted maybe, drunk likely, both possibly. And the genital stabs, that's specific, intentional, maybe not something you'd see in a frenzied attack?

The two attackers and/or two weapons is certainly not the easy option, but I don't see particularly good cause to doubt Killeen. And if he was so inexperienced, would he have noted a difference at all? So two blades is what we have, but why, we'll never fathom out. Logically, it would be the work of two individuals, but I'll always struggle to reconcile the circumstances.

Can I just say that I like this post very much? Too many posters have a tendency to take it upon themselves to "correct" the Victorian doctors; they note - just like you have - that something is odd and out of the ordinary, but instead of accepting that matters somethimes ARE odd and out of the ordinary, they instead dismiss what a medico said who was there, who saw the damage done and who had extensive training.

The way you go about it is the only correct way: you note that something deviates from the normal, but you accept that we need to rely on the doctor nevertheless unless we have something substantial (NOT meaning "a hunch") to refute him.

Itīs much, much more refreshing than it should be.

[MrBarnett]

Can I just say that I like this post very much? Too many posters have a tendency to take it upon themselves to "correct" the Victorian doctors; they note - just like you have - that something is odd and out of the ordinary, but instead of accepting that matters somethimes ARE odd and out of the ordinary, they instead dismiss what a medico said who was there, who saw the damage done and who had extensive training.

The way you go about it is the only correct way: you note that something deviates from the normal, but you accept that we need to rely on the doctor nevertheless unless we have something substantial (NOT meaning "a hunch") to refute him.

Itīs much, much more refreshing than it should be.

Hi Fish,

Had Killeen had extensive training in PM’s? And in particular in identifying the weapons used in murder cases? What little evidence there is suggests he may not have.

The report he wrote on the infant death reads to me like someone answering an exam question. Which isn’t surprising because he’d only recently left off taking them.

It is quite possible, even likely, that the Tabram PM was the first he had ever personally conducted on someone who had suffered knife wounds. Keeping an open mind to the possibility of any Dr, however experienced, let alone a complete novice like Killeen, having made an error seems to me to be the most sensible approach.

Gary

[Fisherman]

Hi Fish,

Had Killeen had extensive training in PM’s? And in particular in identifying the weapons used in murder cases? What little evidence there is suggests he may not have.

The report he wrote on the infant death reads to me like someone answering an exam question. Which isn’t surprising because he’d only recently left off taking them.

It is quite possible, even likely, that the Tabram PM was the first he had ever personally conducted on someone who had suffered knife wounds. Keeping an open mind to the possibility of any Dr, however experienced, let alone a complete novice like Killeen, having made an error seems to me to be the most sensible approach.

Gary

Timothy Killeen was a trained medico and he performed the post mortem of Martha Tabram. He was qualified and chosen to do this, and he had the opportunity to look closely at each and every wound.

As you may have noted, I commended Al for BOTH keeping an open mind AND accepting that Killeen has the upper hand on anybody who, a 130 years on and with no possibility at all to check any of the wounds, tries to fault him. It is not a sound approach.

Incidentally, although you may perhaps feel like the target of my post, you are nothing even like it. Unless you insist. Your thinking on the case is every bit as good as Alīs, as long as you do not claim that you are more likely than Killeen to be correct on the matter. THAT is the kind of approach I was after when posting.

[MrBarnett]

Timothy Killeen was a trained medico and he performed the post mortem of Martha Tabram. He was qualified and chosen to do this, and he had the opportunity to look closely at each and every wound.

As you may have noted, I commended Al for BOTH keeping an open mind AND accepting that Killeen has the upper hand on anybody who, a 130 years on and with no possibility at all to check any of the wounds, tries to fault him. It is not a sound approach.

Incidentally, although you may perhaps feel like the target of my post, you are nothing even like it. Unless you insist. Your thinking on the case is every bit as good as Alīs, as long as you do not claim that you are more likely than Killeen to be correct on the matter. THAT is the kind of approach I was after when posting.

Hi Fish,

Does being a ‘trained medico’ necessarily mean that Killeen had any experience at all of conducting post mortems on people killed by sword bayonets?

I don’t think he was chosen to carry out the Tabram PM because he was particularly trained to do so. He was called out in the middle of the night to the crime scene, possibly because Dr Swyer couldn’t be arsed to get out of bed, and performed the PM in consequence.

We surely should acknowledge the potential difference in ability in any sphere between an experienced practitioner and a complete novice.

Gary

[harry]

If there is any doubt about how bayonet wounds through the sternum appear,it might be a good idea to study or enquire of the military.

[rjpalmer]

"a short note appended to a Home Office document gives the revised official view that "some of the wounds are so narrow that a bayonet WAS FIRST suspected as the weapon. BUT bayonet wounds are quite UNMISTAKABLE" --Jon Ogan, 1996.

It wasn't a bayonet wound. Killeen, in his inexperience, was simply wrong. The notation by the Home Office suggests someone else was called in to re-examine Tabram. We just don't know about it, since the documentation hasn't survived. It may have been a military surgeon associated with the Tower, but, whoever it was, they concluded it wasn't a bayonet wound.

[rjpalmer]

I don’t think he was chosen to carry out the Tabram PM because he was particularly trained to do so. He was called out in the middle of the night to the crime scene, possibly because Dr Swyer couldn’t be arsed to get out of bed, and performed the PM in consequence.

I think I'm right in saying that, by the rules of the Medical Witness Act, the deceased's regular physician would normally be consulted for the PM, but, being a street person, Tabram didn't have a regular physician, so Killeen apparently got the job by default. One puzzling question is why a police surgeon wasn't called in, considering it was a homicide.

It was also becoming standard practice to have two physicians at an autopsy, along with a competent person to take notes. It all seems rather slap dash. (Sorry, Fish, but that's how it looks to me!)

[Fisherman]

Hi Fish,

Does being a ‘trained medico’ necessarily mean that Killeen had any experience at all of conducting post mortems on people killed by sword bayonets?

I don’t think he was chosen to carry out the Tabram PM because he was particularly trained to do so. He was called out in the middle of the night to the crime scene, possibly because Dr Swyer couldn’t be arsed to get out of bed, and performed the PM in consequence.

We surely should acknowledge the potential difference in ability in any sphere between an experienced practitioner and a complete novice.

Gary


Gary

There is really no need to ask me whether Killeen had extensive post mortem experience and/or training in identifying weapons in murder cases. I think you and me have the exact same picture of that; he was relatively young and likely relatively inexperienced, and so he probably had neither in abundance.

Then again, that is not the point I am trying to get across. The point I am grying to get across is instead that he was a trained medico, and that he DID do the post mortem on Tabram, and as a consequence of this, he would be better suited to make the kind of calls he did than 99,9 per cent of the population in London back then. And certainly he would be a better judge than 100 per cent of those of us who never even saw the wounds in the first place!

Just like you, I would have preferred if a medico with decades of experience, involving murder cases where there was sharp violence involved, did the post mortem on Tabram. But since I cannot have it, I am quite prepared to settle for what I got - a man who would have been trained in how to treat wounds caused by sharp objects, and who would have trained in how to dissect dead people and identify various types of damage caused by various types of dangerous objects in our surroundings.

When such a man, who has that kind of training, does a post mortem and arrives at the conclusion that two weapons were used in an attack, he is of course not as qualified and experienced as the best there are. But he is nevertheless much more likely to be right than wrong, although I would not want to try and put any numbers on it.

[Fisherman]

I think I'm right in saying that, by the rules of the Medical Witness Act, the deceased's regular physician would normally be consulted for the PM, but, being a street person, Tabram didn't have a regular physician, so Killeen apparently got the job by default. One puzzling question is why a police surgeon wasn't called in, considering it was a homicide.

It was also becoming standard practice to have two physicians at an autopsy, along with a competent person to take notes. It all seems rather slap dash. (Sorry, Fish, but that's how it looks to me!)

No need to be sorry - I have myself at times hinted at the possibility that unfortunates were less likely to have a Harley Street physician tending to them at their post mortems than dead prime ministers and members of the Royal family. When I did, I have actually often been reprimanded for that approach!

As I said to Gary, I am not claiming that Killeen was the best they had. But he was in all probability qualified enough, and his verdict of two weapons never had and never will have a 50/50 chance only of being correct. Without putting any numbers on it, the likelihood of him getting it right is much bigger than the other way around.

To prove me wrong on that point, we need either proven statistics telling us that the Victorian doctors didnīt assess but instead guess (did I hear the word Marriott being uttered...?) or clear and useful pictures of the damage done to Tabrams body.

Without any of those commodities, Killeen remains on top of things. It is as simple as that.

[Fisherman]

If there is any doubt about how bayonet wounds through the sternum appear,it might be a good idea to study or enquire of the military.

But we donīt know that it was a bayonet, Harry. It was a long, strong, dagger-like implement, that is all we know. I would say that such an implement will make a large hole when shoved through the sternum, and that in itself is enough to tell it apart from what a small blade would produce.
Some say the sternum is so hard that a blade may get stuck in it, and needs to be wriggled loose, thereby creating a larger hole. I say that such a wriggling will not only be given away by a not very clean hole through the sternum but also by how the underlying heart would be damaged in quite another manner than it would be by a clean stab.

And THAT iis when it is suggested that "maybe Killeen did not check?".

I say he did, and I say he did so all the more carefully becasue of the character of what he said about it. When you are making a claim you full well know is out of the ordinary, you are much more likely to check very carefully.

I accept that we will never know fur sure. But I donīt accept that this would mean that Killen was as likely to be wrong as he was to be right.

[Al Bundy's Eyes]

"a short note appended to a Home Office document gives the revised official view that "some of the wounds are so narrow that a bayonet WAS FIRST suspected as the weapon. BUT bayonet wounds are quite UNMISTAKABLE" --Jon Ogan, 1996.

It wasn't a bayonet wound. Killeen, in his inexperience, was simply wrong. The notation by the Home Office suggests someone else was called in to re-examine Tabram. We just don't know about it, since the documentation hasn't survived. It may have been a military surgeon associated with the Tower, but, whoever it was, they concluded it wasn't a bayonet wound.

Hi RJ,

Where's this little gem from? I can't recall seeing it, if it's from the Home Office but didn't survive, where did Jon Ogan find it?
Interesting connotations.

[Fisherman]

Hi RJ,

Where's this little gem from? I can't recall seeing it, if it's from the Home Office but didn't survive, where did Jon Ogan find it?
Interesting connotations.

You may want to take a look here, Al:

https://www.casebook.org/forum1998/messages/1/341689c3.html?1003324567

[Fisherman]

What of course needs to be addressed here is that the quotation on offer says that "some of the wounds are so narrow that a bayonet WAS FIRST suspected as the weapon. BUT bayonet wounds are quite UNMISTAKABLE".

The claim is that a number of the 38 lesser wounds (plural) could not possibly have been caused by a bayonet, since the wounds made by such a blade is unmistakable. Nowhere does it say that a bayonet could not have caused the sternum wound, though. So when R J Palmer says "It wasn't a bayonet wound. Killeen, in his inexperience, was simply wrong.", he is attributing what was said to the one wound it cannot be attributed to.

On the whole, I think the quotation as such is poorly worded. Why would a bayonet have produced narrow wounds? It is not a very narrow weapon at all, is it? It is a wide and sturdy one!

[Losmandris]

Question? Was the inquest for MT as thorough as later inquests for the other victims? Did they assign a motive to the attack?

Tristan

[Fisherman]

Question? Was the inquest for MT as thorough as later inquests for the other victims? Did they assign a motive to the attack?

Tristan

Itīs on the boards, of course:

https://www.casebook.org/official_documents/inquests/inquest_tabram.html

It is shorter than the ordinary Ripper inquest, and no motive was speculated about.