The name's Bond

[Observer]

Interestingly, Dr Biggs asks whether Eddowes' kidney and uterus were surgically removed or simply hacked out by an unskilled person. On the other hand, Ian Calder comments that Annie Chapman's pelvic organs "appear to have been removed skilfully without damage to adjacent tissue." ( Marriott, 2015)

Without damage to surrounding tissue? Organs removed skilfully? Two thirds of the bladder being removed with the uterus, and the top section of the vagina. A portion of the stomach lying by the right shoulder.

[Wickerman]

I think people might have the misconception that if the killer had medical experience that the corpses would have a more "cleaner" or neat appearance.
I could see (some of)the doctors at the time, knowing what their corpses looked like after similar procedures and looking at the bloody mess left behind by the ripper, might conclude he obviously had no medical experience. Then of course there could be the (unconscious?) reason that they wanted to distance themselves and their profession from this savage beast.

Right Abby, that seems to be what we are dealing with here.
How could slicing large sections of flesh off a corpse be made to look surgical?
There is no specific target, no limits - internal or external, no correct or incorrect methodology. It's just carving meat, (as crude as it sounds).
Even the placement of the organs appears intentional, not thrown around the room, etc.

[Wickerman]

What person with more than basic anatomical knowledge would create a narrow, practically rectangular, tongue of skin to avoid the navel, when with significantly less effort he could "slightly curve" around it, as per the description of the Virchow technique?

Why avoid it at all?

[John G]

kind of what I was trying to say. he could have been under the influence of alcohol also, as you say, as many serisl killers are when they attack. And also, extreme anger also comes into play-another motivation for serial killers-which also could have something to do with the apparent ferocity of the attack and sloppiness of the wounds.

like I said we are dealing with a serial killer here first and foremost-not a surgeon conducting an operation in a laboratory.

You make some very good points Abby. What strikes me as very odd is that Kelly appears to have been eviscerated with considerably less skill than, say, Chapman and Eddowes. But, assuming they were murdered by the same killer, you would surely expect the opposite: because the killer was under far less time pressure than in the earlier murders, and probably had far better lighting conditions with which to operate than at the Eddowes murder scene, I.e. on account of the light provided by the fire.

One possibility is that Kelly was killed by someone else, but I don't consider that very likely. A more likely possibility, therefore, is your suggestion that he was either intoxicated or something made him extremely angry, resulting in a loss of self control and a frenzied attack. Of course, another possibility is declining mental state, i.e. if the killer was suffering from some kind of mental illness.

[elmore 77]

[URL="phinnweb.blogspot.co.uk/2004/10/right-man-and-fear-of-losing-face.html"]

[Abby Normal]

On balance, I would say it is far easier for a medical man to randomly slice away to his hearts content, than for a layperson to correctly & surgically remove an organ.

Why should a medical man, clearly unbalanced, perhaps even to some degree drunk at the time, even act like he is sober and in the operating theatre, when he is mutilating a victim?

I don't see the need to type-cast the killer.

It's like saying that drunk driver swerving down the road couldn't possibly be a policeman, they would know better, and yet...

"A Durham police officer has been charged with impaired driving and failure to report after fleeing the scene of an accident in Bowmanville on Saturday."

The fact Bond deduced the slashing betrayed no sign of experience, does not mean that swerving car showed no signs of an experienced driver.
Both could be equally wrong.

I assume we are not arguing the killer was sober and in complete control of his faculties?

kind of what I was trying to say. he could have been under the influence of alcohol also, as you say, as many serisl killers are when they attack. And also, extreme anger also comes into play-another motivation for serial killers-which also could have something to do with the apparent ferocity of the attack and sloppiness of the wounds.

like I said we are dealing with a serial killer here first and foremost-not a surgeon conducting an operation in a laboratory.

[Abby Normal]

Not at all, Jon. ANYONE could judge whether the builder of that shed knew roughly how to hang a door so that it didn't implode - I mean, even I can tell that, and I'm no builder.

Ditto with Kelly. It doesn't take a forensics expert to look at that carnage, or read the objective medical reports (as opposed to subjective medical opinions and/or distorted reportage of same), to conclude that very little surgical experience was required, or evidenced, at Miller's Court.

Hi Sam
let me start off by saying that on the question of medical/surgical skill, I lean toward the ripper having some, and in terms of at least anatomical knowledge that he probably did., though Im not married to it. Hunter, yourself, Ben and others have made strong arguments against and of course some contemperanious drs also didn't think so either-though in varying degrees.

However, most modern experts do believe the ripper must have had some skill in these areas-I think because being so removed and with a hundred years of serial killer history-todays experts are not only more objective but more knowledgable.

Which brings me to the main point which I think you(and others-including the contemperanious drs) might be missing.

We have to remember we are dealing with a serial killer first and foremost.
Not a doctor or a surgeon. If mutilation of the female body was one of his sigs (along with organ removal) and I think that its obvious it was-then that could be misleading people into just looking at the overall end product and thinking it was just wanton savagery-smash and grab-with no medical skill whatsoever.

The medical/surgical experience is obscured by another sig (motivation)of the serial killer-further mutilations

I think people might have the misconception that if the killer had medical experience that the corpses would have a more "cleaner" or neat appearance.
I could see (some of)the doctors at the time, knowing what their corpses looked like after similar procedures and looking at the bloody mess left behind by the ripper, might conclude he obviously had no medical experience. Then of course there could be the (unconscious?) reason that they wanted to distance themselves and their profession from this savage beast.

[Wickerman]

On balance, I would say it is far easier for a medical man to randomly slice away to his hearts content, than for a layperson to correctly & surgically remove an organ.

Why should a medical man, clearly unbalanced, perhaps even to some degree drunk at the time, even act like he is sober and in the operating theatre, when he is mutilating a victim?

I don't see the need to type-cast the killer.

It's like saying that drunk driver swerving down the road couldn't possibly be a policeman, they would know better, and yet...

"A Durham police officer has been charged with impaired driving and failure to report after fleeing the scene of an accident in Bowmanville on Saturday."

The fact Bond deduced the slashing betrayed no sign of experience, does not mean that swerving car showed no signs of an experienced driver.
Both could be equally wrong.

I assume we are not arguing the killer was sober and in complete control of his faculties?

[Sam Flynn]

What slash & grab artist would even avoid the umbilicus, be it precisely or hastily, in order to open the abdomen?

What person with more than basic anatomical knowledge would create a narrow, practically rectangular, tongue of skin to avoid the navel, when with significantly less effort he could "slightly curve" around it, as per the description of the Virchow technique?

[elmore 77]

Perhaps we're supposed to think Mary's killer had no skill.The way the various pieces are placed implies an orderly demolition rather than a frenzy to me.
If Bond had said he thought there was more than one killer or the perp might have had the skill of a butcher and transferred those skills to the victims,it would be hard to argue.But he doesn't.He says he is totally unskilled and that to me is an error.Who is he to dismiss the opinions of Brown and Phillips,so casually?It seems very disrespectful,arrogant even. And why are his estimates of TOD so awry?

[Wickerman]

(Interesting, also, that this description of the Virchow technique mentions the abdominal incision curving slightly around the umbilicus... so not the rather pronounced "tongue of skin" seen in the Eddowes murder, then?)

What slash & grab artist would even avoid the umbilicus, be it precisely or hastily, in order to open the abdomen?

It shouldn't even enter their head.
Accidental or intentional, and how to distinguish?

[Sam Flynn]

I know what you are trying to say, the difference is, "indications" of architectural skill is still the opinion of someone who is not (I assume?), an architect?
Whereas, "indications" of anatomical knowledge, came from the voice of experience.

Not at all, Jon. ANYONE could judge whether the builder of that shed knew roughly how to hang a door so that it didn't implode - I mean, even I can tell that, and I'm no builder.

Ditto with Kelly. It doesn't take a forensics expert to look at that carnage, or read the objective medical reports (as opposed to subjective medical opinions and/or distorted reportage of same), to conclude that very little surgical experience was required, or evidenced, at Miller's Court.

[Wickerman]

There's no problem, Jon. There are indications of architectural skill in the shack - in the clear sense that certain basic principles of construction must have been adhered to if the shack were to remain standing, which it clearly does.

"Indications" of architectural skill?, as opposed to what, millions of sticks erected upright over thousands of years, until something finally stood up by itself?
How to distinguish trial & error, or pure luck, from "indications" of architectural skill?

I know what you are trying to say, the difference is, "indications" of architectural skill is still the opinion of someone who is not (I assume?), an architect?
Whereas, "indications" of anatomical knowledge, came from the voice of experience.

[Sam Flynn]

[Dr Ian Calder] observed, "It is a very difficult and skilled undertaking to remove these organs carefully even by today's methods, especially as the comment is that they were cleanly cut and the cut missed the rectum." (Marriott, 2013).

Indeed, John. Too bad the Ripper only achieved only one (allegedly) clean-cut uterus and failed to avoid damaging the colon in securing it.

[Michael W Richards]

It is inconceivable to me that Bonds opinion of the skill exhibited is in fact a valid contradiction of a medical expert who actually conducted the examinations firsthand. Reading a summary isn't conducting the exam.

In the case of Annie, I believe he was way off. On Mary, I think he was correct...since its the only Canonical he examined.