Dr Timothy R. Killeen

[Fisherman]

I really donīt know why I have this pathological need to engage in discussions with somebody who seemingly has no intention whatsoever to keep to the truth. It could perhaps lay in my upbringing...?

[Trevor Marriott]

From my post:

"I will help you out nevertheless and produce a suggestion. Mind you, I am not claiming this as a fact, I am SUGGESTING a scenario. And I pray that you know the difference, although I do not bank on it."

Boy, did you miss out royally on that one!!!

I mentioned two (2) things as proven facts in my SUGGESTION:

"Many of the sexual serial killers we have recorded over the years have killed prostitutes - fact.

Many of these sexual serial killers who killed prostitutes were also users of prostitutes - fact."

Are those the facts you believe are "easily rebuttable", Trevor...? Becasue I stated no other facts. I learnt how to handle these things by reading "A Beginners Course in getting Things you write Correct". Maybe you never took that one?

My apologies I did misread your post in haste but let me ask you then

Do you agree that :

There is no evidence that any of the murders were sexually motivated other than the victims may have been soliciting!

There is no evidence that Tabrams killer was responsible for any other murders!

There is no evidence that Lechmere was the killer of Tabram or any of the other murders, or had any connection to the Torsos

And that any sugestions to the contrary are nothing more than wild speculative uncorroborated personal opinions?

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Trevor Marriott]

Letīs see how long it takes before Mr Marriott returns to his old ways of claiming that I am wearing rose tinted spectacles and that he has no further wish to engage with me. My money is on it turning up quite soon, judging by how things are going for him.

Dont be so self-opinionated

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Fisherman]

My apologies I did misread your post in haste but let me ask you then

THANK YOU, TREVOR!!! Much, much appreciated, and of course accepted! :) May I suggest a little less haste fortwith?

Do you agree that :

There is no evidence that any of the murders were sexually motivated other than the victims may have been soliciting!

No, I really cannot do that. The positioning of the Ripper bodies, for example, is normally of a character that seems sexually oriented. I would agree that there can be no certainty of a sexual connotation, but that is not the same as no circumstantial evidence being present. Furthermore, there were stabs to the private parts in more than one murder, and the uterus was removed in three Ripper cases - and the uterus is an organ of reproduction. Likewise, Kellyīs breasts were cut away, and so on. The main focus of the Tabram attack was the breast area. The clothing was thrown up over some victims, exposing them. All in all, there is plenty of evidence that speaks of a likely sexual connotation.
We should also pay a lot of interest to what researchers of sexual serial killers say, in particular about the category of power/control killers.

There is no evidence that Tabrams killer was responsible for any other murders!

Once again, there is no proof, but a lot of circumstantial evidence.

There is no evidence that Lechmere was the killer of Tabram or any of the other murders, or had any connection to the Torsos

The same answer. One has to put the evidence together before Lechmere becomes the likely torso killer, but the evidence is there do allow for it.

And that any sugestions to the contrary are nothing more than wild speculative uncorroborated personal opinions?

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

It follows from the above that I do not agree at all with your last point.

But letīs keep the thread a Killeen one!!

[Fisherman]

Well, as I recall more people did so I‘m not sure who you’re thinking of. But apparently I‘m mistaken so who was it?

Sorry for letting you wait, Kattrup. It was George Bagster Phillips.

[Fisherman]

Dont be so self-opinionated

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

Iīm more of an empirically guided person, Trevor.

[Michael W Richards]

The next newsworthy kill is Polly, and there are substantial fundamental differences with just these 2 murders. The killer of Martha would have had to change dramatically to have then killed Polly, if only based on the temperament displayed. Let alone the manner of kill. This is why virtually all students of the crimes exclude her, as did almost all the contemporary investigators, from the list that Jack made or any so called Canonical Group.

The fact that its quite probable by the known evidence that 2 people were involved in killing Martha, and theres no credible evidence in any of the other cases to suggest that Jack didn't work alone, make a pretty sound defensible position that the "series" began with Polly and Martha died by someone using a bayonet style weapon that killed her after she had suffered dozens of stabs by a pocket pen-knife first. If it was 2 weapons and they were quite different on overall size,....and I believe the testimony of the attending physician on this, then the only real question is whether the large stab was the last. If it was, then I think its highly improbable pen-knife man finally resorted to a bayonet he forgot he was carrying. Which means someone else introduced it to the crime scene.

[John G]

Iīm afraid this is not the Tabram case. We have no indications or reported incidents of any mistakes on Killeens behalf. Why the doctor in the Wallace case initially mistook 11 strikes for 4, I cannot say. But I CAN say that he was nevertheless the expert with insight into the case, and basically, the one we should rely on. If he goofed up, that does not mean that we may rule out the entire medical profession as useless and unreliable. We may in fact not even rule Killeen out as incompetent on account of what a medico said half a century after the Tabram case.
As an aside, I have read about the case, but it is some years ago, so I donīt have it fresh in memory. I seem to remember that the husband was accused of having battered his wife to death, and if so, blows to a body are much less distinctive than stabs, not least if many blows are directed towards the same general area of the body. Counting stabs is a lot easier.

It's a bit difficult for anyone today to evaluate Dr Killeen's conclusions as he didn't take precise measurements of the wounds, or photographs etc. For instance, was he able to exclude the possibility that the larger wound was a multiple strike In the same area?

Was he an expert? Did he have any forensic training? What experience did he have of this type of case?

[MrBarnett]

Half an hour?

According to the ELA, Killeen ‘first said he was called about 5 o'clock, and arrived on the scene at half-past, when he found the woman was dead.’

Half an hour to attend to an obvious emergency such a short distance away seems a long time. Whoever called Killeen up was presumably not medically qualified, so the doctor could not have been sure that he was being called to examine a corpse. Half an hour to reach what could have been a seriously injured but living patient is a very long time. A patient who was alive but seriously injured at just before 5 could have died in the time it took Killeen to arrive.

Unless the numbering has changed since 1888, 68, Brick Lane was roughly on the corner of Heneage Street, which was around 350 yards from GYB. (I think. If someone could check that, it’d be useful.) How long does it take to rush 350 yards? 4/5 minutes?

Bear in mind that the whole process of Reeves finding the body, alerting PC Barrett and then someone calling at the surgery in Brick Lane apparently took only 15 minutes, why did it then take half an hour for Killeen to turn up at GYB?

There’s also the contradiction between Hewitt saying that he saw blood ‘flowing’ from the heart wound and Killeen saying that Tabram had been dead for 3 hours when he examined her. Either Hewitt meant ‘had flowed’ rather than ‘flowing’, or Killeen’s TOD was well out.

[John G]

Half an hour?

According to the ELA, Killeen ‘first said he was called about 5 o'clock, and arrived on the scene at half-past, when he found the woman was dead.’

Half an hour to attend to an obvious emergency such a short distance away seems a long time. Whoever called Killeen up was presumably not medically qualified, so the doctor could not have been sure that he was being called to examine a corpse. Half an hour to reach what could have been a seriously injured but living patient is a very long time. A patient who was alive but seriously injured at just before 5 could have died in the time it took Killeen to arrive.

Unless the numbering has changed since 1888, 68, Brick Lane was roughly on the corner of Heneage Street, which was around 350 yards from GYB. (I think. If someone could check that, it’d be useful.) How long does it take to rush 350 yards? 4/5 minutes?

Bear in mind that the whole process of Reeves finding the body, alerting PC Barrett and then someone calling at the surgery in Brick Lane apparently took only 15 minutes, why did it then take half an hour for Killeen to turn up at GYB?

There’s also the contradiction between Hewitt saying that he saw blood ‘flowing’ from the heart wound and Killeen saying that Tabram had been dead for 3 hours when he examined her. Either Hewitt meant ‘had flowed’ rather than ‘flowing’, or Killeen’s TOD was well out.

Some very good points, which raise serious questions. For instance, how did he estimate time of death? Did he just guess?

Half an hour to walk 350 yards is far too long. I'm in my mid fifties but can walk 1.2 miles in 18 minutes. So that's about 2112 yards in 1080 seconds. By my calculations, at that pace it would take me about 3 minutes to walk 350 yards.

[MrBarnett]

Some very good points, which raise serious questions. For instance, how did he estimate time of death? Did he just guess?

Half an hour to walk 350 yards is far too long. I'm in my mid fifties but can walk 1.2 miles in 18 minutes. So that's about 2112 yards in 1080 seconds. By my calculations, at that pace it would take me about 3 minutes to walk 350 yards.

And Killeen was in his early twenties and on his way to a potentially life or death medical emergency.

[rjpalmer]

How long does it take to rush 350 yards? 4/5 minutes?

In High School I could run the 300 meter high hurdles in under 65 seconds. Now it takes about twenty minutes, unless I stop for a pint along the way.

[rjpalmer]

Hi Fish.

No offense, but I’m a little put off by the liberal use of quotation marks in Post #163. Who are you quoting? You earlier wrote that the wound to the sternum was “radically different” than the other wounds. You now (in quotes) write that it is “by far the largest wound” and “by far the largest and deepest of them”. But these are your own words, are they not, and not Dr. Killeen’s?

Let’s return to what Hewitt actually states in the piece from the Daily Telegraph.

“I saw the poor woman lying on the stone staircase, blood flowing from a great wound over her heart.”

“There were many other stab wounds of a frightful character upon her.”

That’s it. That’s the extent of his descriptions of the wounds. Entirely subjective—and from a layperson.

And then, the journalist:

“The wounds on the deceases appear as if they had been inflicted by a bayonet plunged into the body with great force.”

I don’t mean to be a smart-arse, Fish, but what is the difference, using millimeters, between a “great wound” and a “frightful stab”?

Or between a “great wound” and other wounds that were made with “great force”?

These remarks are descriptive, but they are utterly worthless from our standpoint.

It appears to me that Dr. K’s conclusion is not primarily based on the size of the wound, or its shape (which is nowhere described in detail), or its depth in relationship to other wounds (which did, after all, enter the lungs, the spleen, etc.) but because it broke through the sternum and entered the heart.

In short, I think you are over-stating the difference between the various wounds. It seems to me there is a very real likelihood of error.

Anyway, here is something to ponder; among the many things left unexplained is the pool of blood found between Martha’s legs.

Puncture wounds have very little external bleeding unless they strike a major artery. Why is there so much blood down below? Swanson describes Tabram having been 'pierced.'

If there was that much blood, it sounds like one of the lower wounds must have been very large, or had cut through the femoral artery, etc.

[MrBarnett]

Hi Fish.

No offense, but I’m a little put off by the liberal use of quotation marks in Post #163. Who are you quoting? You earlier wrote that the wound to the sternum was “radically different” than the other wounds. You now (in quotes) write that it is “by far the largest wound” and “by far the largest and deepest of them”. But these are your own words, are they not, and not Dr. Killeen’s?

Let’s return to what Hewitt actually states in the piece from the Daily Telegraph.

“I saw the poor woman lying on the stone staircase, blood flowing from a great wound over her heart.”

“There were many other stab wounds of a frightful character upon her.”

That’s it. That’s the extent of his descriptions of the wounds. Entirely subjective—and from a layperson.

And then, the journalist:

“The wounds on the deceases appear as if they had been inflicted by a bayonet plunged into the body with great force.”

I don’t mean to be a smart-arse, Fish, but what is the difference, using millimeters, between a “great wound” and a “frightful stab”?

Or between a “great wound” and other wounds that were made with “great force”?

These remarks are descriptive, but they are utterly worthless from our standpoint.

It appears to me that Dr. K’s conclusion is not primarily based on the size of the wound, or its shape (which is nowhere described in detail), or its depth in relationship to other wounds (which did, after all, enter the lungs, the spleen, etc.) but because it broke through the sternum and entered the heart.

In short, I think you are over-stating the difference between the various wounds. It seems to me there is a very real likelihood of error.

Anyway, here is something to ponder; among the many things left unexplained is the pool of blood found between Martha’s legs.

Puncture wounds have very little external bleeding unless they strike a major artery. Why is there so much blood down below? Swanson describes Tabram having been 'pierced.'

If there was that much blood, it sounds like one of the lower wounds must have been very large, or had cut through the femoral artery, etc.

Obviously Hewitt wasn’t present at the PM. All he had to go on was the external appearance of the heart wound and he singled it out for special mention. In one report it was described as a ‘great gaping wound’.

I think only one wound to the ‘lower part’ was mentioned. Again, it was singled out for special mention, presumably because of its location. If there had been more than one wound to that part of Martha’s body - or an internal wound there, as has been suggested - I feel we would have heard about them.

[Fisherman]

Hi Fish.

No offense, but I’m a little put off by the liberal use of quotation marks in Post #163. Who are you quoting? You earlier wrote that the wound to the sternum was “radically different” than the other wounds. You now (in quotes) write that it is “by far the largest wound” and “by far the largest and deepest of them”. But these are your own words, are they not, and not Dr. Killeen’s?

So far, I have not taken up the habit of quoting myself. The wording is from the Star of the 8th, as I have pointed out before, giving the source and all. Here it is again:
"The wounds on the body are frightful. There are about eight on the chest, inflicted in almost circular form, while the probably fatal one - certainly much the largest and deepest of any - is under the heart. The wounds appear to be the result of sword or dagger thrusts, rather than that of a knife."

Let’s return to what Hewitt actually states in the piece from the Daily Telegraph.

“I saw the poor woman lying on the stone staircase, blood flowing from a great wound over her heart.”

“There were many other stab wounds of a frightful character upon her.”

That’s it. That’s the extent of his descriptions of the wounds. Entirely subjective—and from a layperson.

And then, the journalist:

“The wounds on the deceases appear as if they had been inflicted by a bayonet plunged into the body with great force.”

I don’t mean to be a smart-arse, Fish, but what is the difference, using millimeters, between a “great wound” and a “frightful stab”?

I wouldnīt try to answer that, R J. It takes actually seeing the wounds and measuring them before you can do such a thing. Like Killeen did.

Or between a “great wound” and other wounds that were made with “great force”?

These remarks are descriptive, but they are utterly worthless from our standpoint.

"Our" standpoint? Which is "our" standpoint? My own standpoint is that when various sources tell a wound apart from other wounds in terms of size in so dramatic a fashion as is the case here, we are likely looking at one quite large wound and 38 small ones. Killeens verdict only serves to underline it.

It appears to me that Dr. K’s conclusion is not primarily based on the size of the wound, or its shape (which is nowhere described in detail), or its depth in relationship to other wounds (which did, after all, enter the lungs, the spleen, etc.) but because it broke through the sternum and entered the heart.

In short, I think you are over-stating the difference between the various wounds. It seems to me there is a very real likelihood of error.

On which exact measurements do you base that? There is a POSSIBILITY of error, but it cannot be gauged in any way at all for the simple reason that we do not know the measurements of the wounds! Any assessment of a likelihood of Killeen having gotten oit wrong MUST be accompanied by that kind of evidence, and not simply by a totally baseless hunch.

Once more, letīs speculate that the wounds were of a reasonably similar size, meaning that Killeen, as you suggest, didnīt base his take on things so much on the size of the wounds as on how the heart blade, if you will, was able to pierce the sternum.
If this was so, and the stabs WERE reasonably similar in size, why would not Killeen think that the 38 non-heart stabs were made by the same blade that pierced the sternum?
In my world, any take on Killeens behalf of a stronger blade MUST have been led on by a difference in size, unless he was a complete idiot.

Anyway, here is something to ponder; among the many things left unexplained is the pool of blood found between Martha’s legs.

Puncture wounds have very little external bleeding unless they strike a major artery. Why is there so much blood down below? Swanson describes Tabram having been 'pierced.'

If there was that much blood, it sounds like one of the lower wounds must have been very large, or had cut through the femoral artery, etc.

Any stab delivered with great force will compress the underlying structures and thus enable even a relatively short blade to reach deeper situated vessels. Also the term "much blood" is relative. Plus much blood can come in a short time from the cutting of a large vessel only, whereas it may also come from the cutting of a number of smaller vessels that are allowed to bleed over time.