Most ridiculous suspect

[The Rookie Detective]

Merrick is far and away the most ridiculous name ever mentioned in conjunction with the Ripper murders.

It is statistically more likely that Stride cut her own throat, Chapman was murdered by a 14 year old and Kelly was actually a Russian Jew.

Merrick was not the Ripper



RD

[John Wheat]

That Louis Diemschutz anarchic conspiracy nonsense.

You mean like the Lechmere conspiracy nonsense?

[Fiver]

That Louis Diemschutz anarchic conspiracy nonsense.

Technically that's not a suspect, but it is complete nonsene.

[Tani]

That Louis Diemschutz anarchic conspiracy nonsense.

[Lewis C]

Ostrog, Prince Albert Victor, Thomas Cream, and I believe Vincent Van Gogh can all be proven to have been somewhere else at the time of the murders, so there's zero chance that it was any of them. Other than those four, Joseph Merrick, Queen Victoria, the Churchills, Lewis Carroll, Arthur Conan Doyle, Helena Blavatsky, William Gladstone, and William Gull could all take the title for most ridiculous suspect.

[FISHY1118]

1. Maybrick .

2. Druitt.

3. Lechmere.

[Holmes' Idiot Brother]

Agreed on Druitt, he comes first in my list of the most ridiculous suspects, followed by Lechmere, a man who was framed to be the Ripper and the Torso killer based solely on the fact that he found the body of a single victim on his way to work.


The Baron

While I agree that Lechmere is an unlikely suspect, at least we can actually place him on the scene; that cannot be said of anyone else. But where they got Druitt from....! McNaughten couldn't even get the man's profession right, let alone give a good reason for putting him on that list. If you want a good laugh, read "Jack The Ripper, Light Hearted Friend," by Richard Wallace. But get it at the library because I would hate to see him profit any further from his drivel. Same with the pathological Patricia Cornwell's book and character assassination of Walter Sickert!

[The Baron]

For me, the top 3 most ridiculous suspects are:

1. Lewis Carroll

2. Michael Ostrog

3. Druitt, tied with Walter Sickert.

Two of these came from Sir Melville (I didn't even work there yet) McNaughton's ridiculous list. This man and his opinions can be safely ignored.

I saw a documentary some years back where this guy tried to tie the locations of the murders to some type of pentagram or pentacle. I don't know who his suspect was, because it was so ridiculous that I switched it off.

Agreed on Druitt, he comes first in my list of the most ridiculous suspects, followed by Lechmere, a man who was framed to be the Ripper and the Torso killer based solely on the fact that he found the body of a single victim on his way to work.


The Baron

[Holmes' Idiot Brother]

Since we've all done speculating on who the Ripper may have been, I was just curious to see who everyone believes to be the most ridiculous suspect ever put forward as being Jack the Ripper. I will provide with my top 3 and see if you all agree or disagree and let me know who you think is the most ridiculous.

1. Lewis Carroll

2. Prince Albert Edward Victor (tied with William Gull)

3. "Jill the Ripper"

For me, the top 3 most ridiculous suspects are:

1. Lewis Carroll

2. Michael Ostrog

3. Druitt, tied with Walter Sickert.

Two of these came from Sir Melville (I didn't even work there yet) McNaughton's ridiculous list. This man and his opinions can be safely ignored.

I saw a documentary some years back where this guy tried to tie the locations of the murders to some type of pentagram or pentacle. I don't know who his suspect was, because it was so ridiculous that I switched it off.

[Holmes' Idiot Brother]

Elephant Man. Queen Victoria. Winston Churchill.

I believe Winston was at Harrow at the time of the murders, and was barely a teenager. Who proposed him as a candidate???

However, in the Sherlock Holmes vs. Ripper novel, "The Whitechapel Horrors," author Edward B. Hanna makes Winston's father, Sir Randolph Spencer Churchill, a strong suspect. A good read, by the way.

[caz]

Hi Caz.

When you posted this back in March, I dismissed it as a strange joke, but I still wondered about it.

Now that you have made a nearly identical statement on another site, I'm no longer so certain this is a joke, and had to take another gawk.

Are you suggesting that the diary, with handwriting that is obviously not Maybrick’s (sorry, Ike!), was deliberately constructed to 'protect' Maybrick from suspicion?

No, RJ, I was suggesting no such thing.

I was merely suggesting, just as I posted, that:

If anyone wanted to protect a friend or relative from being implicated in a serious crime, a faked confessional diary in someone else's handwriting would appear to be a most effective way of doing so.

I very clearly didn't suggest that anyone had actually tried to pull off such a stunt. It merely struck me as rather amusing to think that the unintended effect of this diary on so many people appears not to have put the real person at the heart of it in the frame for the ripper murders at all, but to have prevented him ever entering the picture, or coming within a million miles of it.

In fact, I would only need to tweak the wording a bit in order to reproduce what you believe was achieved. Let's call it the Anne Graham effect:

You believe that Anne effectively protected herself, by accident rather than design, from being implicated in the fairly serious crime of fraud, by having composed an intentionally fictional story, which was then copied into Mike's old scrapbook, making no attempt to forge Maybrick's handwriting.

Love,

Caz
X

[rjpalmer]

If anyone wanted to protect a friend or relative from being implicated in a serious crime, a faked confessional diary in someone else's handwriting would appear to be a most effective way of doing so.

Hi Caz.

When you posted this back in March, I dismissed it as a strange joke, but I still wondered about it.

Now that you have made a nearly identical statement on another site, I'm no longer so certain this is a joke, and had to take another gawk.

Are you suggesting that the diary, with handwriting that is obviously not Maybrick’s (sorry, Ike!), was deliberately constructed to 'protect' Maybrick from suspicion?

That the whole point was for the diary to be inept and unconvincing—which I suspect most would admit is the case. (Sorry again, Ike!)

And presumably, the only reason Maybrick would need protecting is that his family believed he was Jack the Ripper?

Thus, this fake confession points to Maybrick’s actual guilt?

If this is correct, the Maybrick Hoax was placed under the floorboards as a sort of time capsule to the future. Whenever it was eventually found—even in the belated month of March 1992—it was calculated to draw attention away from someone who was never suspected in the first place.

A truly proactive scheme.

I can only imagine that Ike must be deeply torn whether to support this breakthrough or to find the courage to denounce it.

But perhaps I'm wrong and he's delighted.

If the diary is fake, Maybrick is the Ripper.
If the diary is real, Maybrick is the Ripper.

Heads I win, tails you lose!

[GBinOz]

Hi George,

It's interesting that you mention those two elements of the book.

Yeah, Patterson mentions them, but not in any great detail.

I would have thought that these were two of the stronger aspects of his arguments, however relatively little space is dedicated to them.

Instead, he seems to focus on Thompson's supposed obsessive search for the prostitute who dumped him.

IIRC this was based on a comment which Thompson made to his publisher / mentor / friend, but whilst he had stated that he was looking for her, I saw no evidence that his search was particularly obsessive or unnatural.

And then there's the rippy poetry.

Always, the rippy poetry!!

A lot is made of Thompson's interest in the occult and there are more pages devoted to his interest in numerology (FIVE apparently being a particularly significant number in that field) and a fascination which he had with triangles (this relates to the murder sites).

By that point I was losing the will to live, as you can well imagine!

Hi Ms D,

Thanks for the review. I also find Patterson to be a little obsessed in the areas you have nominated.

Patterson has dominated the discussion on Thompson recently, but there is an interesting archived thread here: https://www.casebook.org/forum/messages/4922/10360.html.

I am particularly interested in sightings near the C5 murders of men with strange eyes, which was apparently one of Thompson's physical attributes. As with all persons of interest, there is a lot of speculation, but I can't see that there is any more actual evidence for (say) Druitt or Kosminski than for Thompson.

Cheers, George

[Ms Diddles]

Hi Ms D,

Thanks for the feedback on the book. I haven't read the book but from the author's you-tube presentation and his posts I also got the impression that some of his evidence contained assumptions and presumptions.

Did the book contain mention of the rarely taught Virchow surgical method, or a physical description of Thompson, particularly of his eyes?

Cheers, George

Hi George,

It's interesting that you mention those two elements of the book.

Yeah, Patterson mentions them, but not in any great detail.

I would have thought that these were two of the stronger aspects of his arguments, however relatively little space is dedicated to them.

Instead, he seems to focus on Thompson's supposed obsessive search for the prostitute who dumped him.

IIRC this was based on a comment which Thompson made to his publisher / mentor / friend, but whilst he had stated that he was looking for her, I saw no evidence that his search was particularly obsessive or unnatural.

And then there's the rippy poetry.

Always, the rippy poetry!!

A lot is made of Thompson's interest in the occult and there are more pages devoted to his interest in numerology (FIVE apparently being a particularly significant number in that field) and a fascination which he had with triangles (this relates to the murder sites).

By that point I was losing the will to live, as you can well imagine!

[GBinOz]

Interesting, Mr B!

The author certainly appeared a bit desperate for Thompson to have been accommodated in Providence Row (owing to it's location).

The logic appeared to be that he was catholic / had initially trained as a priest and would therefore inevitably gravitate to such a place.

I hadn't realised that this presumption that he stayed there was based on just one quotation, but can't say I'm surprised.

That was the overall vibe that I got from the book.

Hi Ms D,

Thanks for the feedback on the book. I haven't read the book but from the author's you-tube presentation and his posts I also got the impression that some of his evidence contained assumptions and presumptions.

Did the book contain mention of the rarely taught Virchow surgical method, or a physical description of Thompson, particularly of his eyes?

Cheers, George