Ripperology: Questioning the Dogma

[Sam Flynn]

I also happen to think it far more productive to move in this direction to understand such killers motivation rather than getting bogged down in half baked analogies with tigresses mating habits and the like.

What was "half-baked" about it, Nats? The analogy was only meant to show that it's possible for an observer to interpret the same behaviour extremely differently, depending on the descriptive method used. Adopting a given framework, believing that it has any great claim to legitimacy because it has an "-ology" on the end, does not necessarily make it correct - especially if the basis of that framework is fanciful or incomplete.

[Natalie Severn]

False dichotomies between blue and white collar serial killers

Hi Ben,
I have read your argument before here on casebook and I think the distinction you make between white and blue collar workers is a FALSE DICHOTOMY.All these killers are,by definition, SERIAL murderers.So when trying to understand the psyche of these killers,which is the subject matter of this particular thread as I understand it , a hugely significant part of both blue and white collar killer"s psyche--by that I mean here the mind on all its levels- appears to be the COMMON DENOMINATOR--- of POWER and CONTROL.They may not be the sole factors,but they appear to be very significant ones in both cases.
Best
Norma

[Natalie Severn]

Sam,well it was like going off on a tangent of comparison before we had even established base---
Best

[Sam Flynn]

a hugely significant part of both blue and white collar killer"s psyche--by that I mean here the mind on all its levels- appears to be the COMMON DENOMINATOR--- of POWER and CONTROL.

But how does that sort of stuff help us, Nats, except descriptively and in retrospect? It's not as if there are columns in the Census returns with a tick-box for "Organised vs Disorganised", or entries on living people's passports or medical records that state "Controlling personality", is there? The inner workings of a killer's mind can never been known for certain, unless one has a chance to interview him, and even then it's open to interpretation. All of which calls into serious question the alleged usefulness of the strictly psychological elements of any given profile.

[Ben]

Hi Norma,

I'm not suggesting that poisoners and mutilators don't share the same desire for power and control. It's one thing to recognize a common behavioural trait, but quite another to wheel in doctor suspects and implicate them in the JTR murders purely on that basis. There have been serial-killing doctors, but they have tended, in the main, to be poisoners rather than violent attackers, which is why we shouldn't be at pains to "look-out" for doctor suspects in the Whitechapel series just because Shipman was one. That doesn't invalidate the "power and control" angle common to other serialists; it just takes on a radically different form where doctors/poisoners are concerned, albeit still homicidal.

Best regards,
Ben

[Simon Wood]

Hi All,

That the C5 were solely the work of a lone serial killer was and still is an assumption, and you can't profile an assumption.

Regards,

Simon

[Limehouse]

Excuse me,Limehouse...

I had asked on another thread for a demonstration of what you mentioned just now....an example of someone arrested for fulfilling the perception or envisionment of what the police assumed the Ripper would look like. Specifically: "How many Ripper suspects were arrested on this basis? A poor, muttering, wandering, Jewish-looking guy ?

Unless I have been reading the wrong books or material, there did not seem to be a practice of detaining or arresting any individuals within a specific group or entity simply because they had the right look. Each person I found who happened to be arrested and was Jewish...or even Irish... also happened to be indulging in some strange behavior...and that goes for the other ethnic entities in the area as well.

So, when you or I say "How many..." as you mentioned above... people may get the impression that there is evidence of a pattern from the period for such behavior or protocol on the part of the police. Certainly had that happened as some may think today, there would be evidence in Jewish archives or newspapers or personal memoirs that discuss this "sweeping up" or rounding up of those who had this "look" you referred to. I'm glad you mentioned what you did, don't get me wrong,Limehouse. Its just that I've been trying to find an example of a pattern and cannot. Thanks again.

Hi Howard, thanks for replying to my post. I do have some examples (I could not call them evidence) of such people being detained. I will have to dig them out of my research material and I'll get back to you.

regards

Limehouse

[Dan Norder]

That the C5 were solely the work of a lone serial killer was and still is an assumption, and you can't profile an assumption.

Not only can you profile an assumption, but that's kind of the entire point in doing them in the first place. If you were at a point where you didn't have to make informed conclusions and guesswork based upon the evidence because all of the evidence was already there, the crime would already be solved and no profile would be necessary.

And profilers who are concerned that any assumption might not be valid run a separate profile without that assumption. The only one of the Macnaghten Five that has any even remotely plausible chance of not having been committed by the same killer is Stride, and profiles have been run whithout her included in the set. The end results of those profiles are virtually identical to what they concluded when they did include her. It's not like her inclusion or exclusion makes any sort of major difference in how we look at the killer: he's still mutilating and disemboweling prostitutes on certain nights in certain places in the same way. Adding in Tabram and Coles doesn't change things at all, really. I don't think even something drastic like throwing in some of the torso cases would make an appreciable difference either, as all the core indicators would still be present.

[Simon Wood]

Hi Dan,

Thanks for that.

What I cannot agree with is how, if there were two killers [Stride plus whoever did the other C4], the profile could be virtually identical to that of one person killing them all.

Stride's exclusion [and I firmly believe she should be excluded] makes a huge difference to how we look at the killer(s) and also throws tremendous doubt on the provenance of certain non-crime scene evidence which pointed to the C5 being the work of one person.

Regards,

Simon

[Dan Norder]

Hi Simon,

I guess I just don't follow what you are driving at.

How does it change how we should think of the Ripper if he wasn't interrupted with Stride but had nothing to do with Stride at all? It changes nothing about the acts and locations of the other murders, and those are what were used to form the bulk of our understanding of the killer.

If you have examples of what you mean, maybe then I could at least see where you're coming from.

[DarkPassenger]

The Ripper did not mutilate Stride because he was interrupted before he could get the chance - so he went off and killed Eddows instead. This suggests strongly that he kills in order to rip - it's hardly rocket science.

Doctors in the UK who are serial killers target (almost exclusively) the elderly, and are almost exclusively poisoners. They do not go out at night with a butcher's knife and slash prostitutes up. Not in the UK at least.

Why are people so keen to question truisms about the Ripper case, throw logic out of the window in favour of crazy theories?

[Natalie Severn]

Dark Passenger,
Lets be quite clear here.The recent British serial killer,Dr Harold Shipman, was NOT a poisoner.He killed his 300+ victims by lethal injection,under the cover of his General Practice.
Most people understand from the reports of the police surgeons,that the ripper used a very specific method of strangulation that caused his victims to lose consciousness quickly,probably bringing about immediate death, either by a swift tourniquet-type compression of the carotid artery ,or by using an arm lock or possibly just by his bare hands.
Nothing particularly different then about the initiation of death for either set of victims.
As a practising and very experienced doctor, Shipman was able to judge the amount of morphine needed to bring about a painless and perfectly quiet death.What he did was to control and witness the passage from life to death -ultimately on a daily basis of hundreds of his patients.
The ripper was not in the same safe environment as Shipman when he was engaged in killing, so an equally swift throat cut followed the state of anaesthesia,and happening directly after death or blood blockage via the compression of the carotid artery,there was little blood spurt.
And this was why several doctors,at the time, believed the ripper may have been a doctor and why at first the police themselves were tracking doctor suspects in Liverpool,France and America.The method The Ripper used to bring about death,which was anaesthesia in his victims prior to throat cutting, was considered to be a technique that only a person who was medically trained could bring about.So lets be absolutely clear about one more thing:Stabbing was NOT what brought about the death of his victims[the C5].
So we have a reasonable similarity between the two methods of inducing death,ie Shipman"s method and the Ripper"s----both were swift,reasonably painless,quiet and producing anaesthesia in the victims.

You refer to Shipman"s victims as being elderly.Well actually,except for Mary Kelly so were the Ripper"s victims considered elderly in 1888 being between 44 and 48. They were actually both elderly and frail----just as Shipman"s were.
By the way,I dont think he had to therefore be a doctor.Possibly he was an assistant to a doctor or even a soldier trained in the method of killing the ripper used,he may have learnt about the significance of the carotid artery and suppression of blood spurt in the army----or possibly just from medical text books.

[Sam Flynn]

You refer to Shipman"s victims as being elderly.Well actually,except for Mary Kelly so were the Ripper"s victims considered elderly in 1888 being between 44 and 48.

I'm not so sure about that, Nats. Of the 3,386 adults (aged 20 and over) I've logged in my spreadsheet of Whitechapel Infirmary patients, fully 1,514 (45%) were aged over 50 and 934 (28%) were aged over 60. That's not bad going, even by today's standards.

[Ben]

Most people understand from the reports of the police surgeons,that the ripper used a very specific method of strangulation that caused his victims to lose consciousness quickly

I'd love to meet these "most" people, Norma.

I don't think I've heard one person argue for a "very specific method" of strangulation, let alone one involving a torniquet. Many aren't even sure if the ripper did strangle some, most, or any of the victims.

I'd also think it's acceptable to consider Shipman's methods to be form of poisoning.

And this was why several doctors,at the time, believed the ripper may have been a doctor and why at first the police themselves were tracking doctor suspects in Liverpool,France and America.

Only one doctor - not "several" - specifically implicated a member of his own profession (the same doctor who attributed Chapman and Eddowes to different killers), and it had nothing to do with the method of strangulation or suffocation. In the Kelly and Stride cases there is no evidence of strangulation, and as far as the others go, a cut that severs the entire region of the throat is guaranteed to sever whatever needed severing to cause death. We haven't anything like sufficient data to determine how "swift" the throat cuts were, and in at least one case, the carotid artery was only partially severed; that can't have been by design.

The method The Ripper used to bring about death,which was anaesthesia in his victims prior to throat cutting, was considered to be a technique that only a person who was medically trained could bring about.

By who?

It's wrong.

If he strangled his victims, it was more than likely done to prevent screaming before he commenced his "knife-work". We can't make any bold assertions as to how "The Ripper" cut and strangled if it clearly varied between victims.

So we have a reasonable similarity between the two methods of inducing death,ie Shipman"s method and the Ripper"s----both were swift,reasonably painless,quiet and producing anaesthesia in the victims

Sorry, absolutely no way. "Painless"? What about Kelly and Stride? Doesn't it hurt getting strangled? "Quiet"? It depends which victims you're talking about. I'd respectfully submit that the Shipman-Ripper comparison is a flawed one, and that there are better serial killer comparison studies out there - plenty of them.

Best regards,
Ben

[Limehouse]

I have read several reports that the Ripper is said to have strangled his victims before cutting their throats and that this accounts for the relatively small amount of blood (or spirting anyway) at the scene of the outdoor murders. If it is true that he strangled his victims first, then the stabbing and slashing become particularly important - being post mortem and definitely something the killer 'needed' to do in order to satisfy his aims.

With Shipman, there seems to be a strong element of needing to 'control' the situation. It has been said that he gained a sexual release from these killings, but I have a feeling that the sexual thing came after he had performed a number of killings. I feel that his initial need was for control - to satisfy some deep-seated anxiety he held. It seems he may have become addicted to the act of killing to satisfy this anxiety.

What is clear to me is that both killers chose a method that was easily available to them and victims that were easy to access. They were not so much choices based on class but on opportunity.