Just jack, or others?

[Sam Flynn]

How likely is it that two violent throat-cutting murders of prostitutes took place within a 15-minute walk from each other within 45 minutes?

I make it roughly 40,000:1 - the sort of odds that are realised several times in each draw of the UK's National Lottery, and probably hundreds (thousands?) of times daily on a global basis, whenever a poker player gets a straight flush. It's of that order.

[kensei]

Sam,

Forty thousand to one? Wow. I think you might be implying a few different things, but I feel I should thank you for that. But for now, I'm in America, it's 7:30 in the morning, I've been up all night and I'm going to bed. Cheers.

Kensei

[Dan Norder]

He only cuts into them after they have been dealt a death blow.

I dont think that says Sadist.

I think that when the professionals in psychology and criminology say that Jack the Ripper was a sadist (specifically a necrosadist), their opinion on the matter should probably get more weight than whatever you think the word means.

[sdreid]

I could certainly be mistaken but I think it's most likely that Jack and Torso were two different killers and that most, if not all, of the non-canonicals were single murderers. Until I'm proven wrong, I think I'll stick with that.

[perrymason]

I think that when the professionals in psychology and criminology say that Jack the Ripper was a sadist (specifically a necrosadist), their opinion on the matter should probably get more weight than whatever you think the word means.

Hi Dan,

Since the operative part of the word above is "necro", it is considerably different than hurting someone who is alive and conscious.. so that the killer can "experience" their pain.

I would think Mary Kelly, by her defensive wounds, and the medical opinion on her attack commencement, was not granted the lack of consciousness before the first cut, that the others seems to have been.

Before you suggest that I am ill equipped to have an opinion on some matter Dan, I never said my professional opinion is Marys killer was a Sadist, just that I thought he was one. And I believe that he is therefore different from Jack in that respect, from delivering a lethal throat cut while they are likely unconscious and cutting them further only post mortem, to using the knife while the victim can still fight back.

It would seem that the Necrosadist Jack is believed to cut sadistically when the victim has been dealt the mortal blow already...when they are effectively dead. Can you say Mary was dead when her face was cut for certain? Cause Kate effectively was.

My best regards.

[Dan Norder]

Before you suggest that I am ill equipped to have an opinion on some matter Dan, I never said my professional opinion is Marys killer was a Sadist, just that I thought he was one.

And you can think the moon is made of green cheese for all I care. Whether you claim to be a professional or not you are still 100% wrong. And the problem is that you insist upon trying to claim that you are right despite being proven wrong... and this happens time and time again.

Can you say Mary was dead when her face was cut for certain?

For certain? No, but I can't say for certain that the sun won't explode into a supernova tomorrow. It's as certain as we can get , though. You apparently are trying to claim that she wasn't dead when her face was mutilated despite having no evidence to support it just so you can try to claim a difference between her killing and Eddowes. Use your head. If those cuts were made on a living person she would have screamed so loud that the whole of Miller's Court and the lodging houses across the street would have heard it. There'd have been hundreds of people showing up to see what was going on. And that's exactly why a sadist doesn't always torture his victims before killing them: they don't want to be caught.

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Mike,

I would think Mary Kelly, by her defensive wounds, and the medical opinion on her attack commencement, was not granted the lack of consciousness before the first cut, that the others seems to have been.

It would seem that the only cuts inflicted before death amounted to some wounds to the backs of Kelly's hands and a small cut in her thumb. This little defensive flurry (if such it was) complete, it would appear that the fatal wound to the throat was inflicted pretty swiftly afterwards, death being almost instantaneous with such a rapid loss of blood. So, a few superficial wounds to the hands, followed by the mother of all carvings-up. If "Ripper-style" crimes are to be defined as necrosadistic, then the murder of Mary Kelly sure looks like 99.999% necrosadism to me (on a scale I've just invented ).

Incidentally, this thread is about more than the "Canonical Five" - non-canonical Whitechapel Murders, as well as the torso murders are up for discussion too - so let's try to avoid making this another "Somebody else killed Kelly" hobby-horse, please.

[Fisherman]

Stan writes:

"I could certainly be mistaken but I think it's most likely that Jack and Torso were two different killers"

Won´t argue with you on that point, Stan, since I agree. One of the things I use to come up with that decision is that the Torso killer (killers?) knew how to sever a head from the body, whereas Jack failed to do so when he apparently tried.

The best, Stan!
Fisherman

[perrymason]

Hello again,

I'm really not sure whats the cause for your attitude Dan, but I can assure you, I never said I was a professional, and you've proven nothing I said wrong with your insinuation and insults. Maybe you just hate not being able to prove a new guy wrong in this case..who knows, but there are ample reasons to suggest that Mary Kelly likely knew her killer, and that her killer need not be Jack the Ripper.

For the records, anything Ive suggested is based on accepted evidence submitted by accredited witnesses. You want to back Hutchinson, or Maxwell, and claim Im wrong because of their statements...thats just the kind of back peddling I see you do all the time...you back all the officials until they conflict with your own opinion, and use data that has already been played out as your proof. You back Bond because he says Mary was killed by Jack, but then you say that Hutchinson did see Astrakan, despite their dropping his description completely within 3 days. If someone makes a case for something that has not been accepted widely, but remains within known evidence, does that make it incorrect? Arent all of these cases classified as unsolved, or did you Bond and a few others already figure out exactly what killer killed which woman? Spitting bile at me answers nothing.

On the torsos, I think its most likely they are connected to a killer or killers, but I dont see a man who has shown a proclivity towards abdominal mutilation and abdominal organ extraction and removal from the scene, being interested in de-engineering a woman "just for the jolly", and the only case where the victim is being disassembled in the Ripper lore, is Mary Kelly.

So since I think Kelly wasnt a Ripper victim, I could see that same killer doing, and having done, more complete severing.

My best regards all.

[Debra A]

I rather think it does, Kensei. Lopping the head off a body smacks of somebody wanting to ensure that the corpse isn't identifiable - very probably because the perpetrator had a relationship of some kind with the deceased. Slashing a woman's throat and ripping her entrails out, whilst leaving the corpse in a situation by which it could be easily identified, betokens an entirely different approach and, arguably, a totally different motive.

Hi all,
I wish some of you who mention the torso's here would come onto the torso thread (I mean apart from Stan who has ...nothing aginst you Stan btw, glad for the interest and input! )
I'm dying to know what people think of a torso victim with abdominal mutilations...and flaps of skin and uterus removed...and stuff!
Kensei, the 'first' torso victim you mention as being between Eddowes and Kelly may actually be nearer Nichols in a timeline.

[detective abberline]

Mjk

Hi Mike


Can you say Mary was dead when her face was cut for certain? Cause Kate effectively was.



You are absolutely right. Mary had defence wounds on her forearms so she had to have been trying to defend herself. The idea she was peacefully asleep is absurd. What pro finishes with a client in her own digs and slumbers. Only the stupid ones.

Cheers

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Mike. You are absolutely right. Mary had defence wounds on her forearms so she had to have been trying to defend herself.

The defence wounds, if such they were, were discovered on the backs of her hands and her thumb, not her forearms. The cuts to the hand and thumb blood showed that blood had oozed under the skin, indicating that she was probably alive when they were inflicted, but the same can't be said of the vast majority of wounds she suffered - including the slashes to the face. They were inflicted after Mary was dead.

[detective abberline]

Mjk

Where should I look to find that there were no defence wounds on her forearms but only marks on her hands and thumb.

Cheers

[Sam Flynn]

Where should I look to find that there were no defence wounds on her forearms but only marks on her hands and thumb.

Dr Bond's post-mortem report on Kelly:

http://www.casebook.org/official_documents/pm-kelly.html

Note that the "extravasation" of blood in the skin is noted only in respect of the wounds to the hand and thumb.

[kensei]

Just wanted to pop in here with some input to the Kelly debate, on two points- defensive wounds and was she asleep when attacked. There are what look like some fairly severe wounds to her left forearm clearly visible in the photograph. Too severe, I think, for them to be defensive wounds, but more likely just one more spot on her body where the killer decided to remove skin while taking her apart. And as to whether she was asleep- I don't think there was any mention of her neatly folded clothes having any blood on them so she was at least undressed for bed. But there's also the fact that witness accounts (depending on which ones you believe) make her out to be progressively more and more drunk as the night went on. How about the idea that she didn't actually go to sleep in the presence of her killer, but passed out? Just food for thought.