There is no Jack the ripper

[Sox]

but what does everyone think of Andrew Cook's theory that the murders that we know as the c5 and maybe a few other ripper style murders may have been committed by different men and not just one lone killer like we have been told all of these years?

In all honesty? It's yet another author twisting a story to fit another theory that has almost no basis in reality.....and then adding 'Ripper' to the book title so that gullible people will buy it.

[FrankO]

Hi everyone,

In reaction to the thread’s name, here are my two cents.

Not that we should expand our view to all of the Whitechapel Murders and enlarge upon all the differences between them, but who of these murder victims were very likely killed by the same hand? I think that only few will disagree that the answer is: Nichols, Chapman and Eddowes. And it’s the perpetrator of these particular crimes that was dubbed Jack the Ripper. In other words, there very likely was a Jack the Ripper.

Furthermore, why would any ‘normal’ criminal/murderer want to risk his life committing Ripper-style murders outdoors? What would it yield them, besides that risk? Although I think Kelly was probably a Ripper victim, I can imagine that, if she was butchered by someone close to her, he would want to shift blame to the Ripper. But there’s no plausible motive I can think of that would explain an outdoor Ripper-style murder by someone other than the Ripper. Unless of course there were 3 or 4 guys with the same deviant psychological mind set. But I find that very unlikely.

Best wishes for 2010!
Frank

[Limehouse]

Jack the Ripper was almost certainly a literary invention by members of the press who wished to continue selling huge numbers of tabloid papers.

However, that a serial murderer was responsible for possibly six murders within a small geographical area I do not doubt. I would list Tabram and Stride as possible victims odf this killer and Nicholls, Chapman, Eddowes and Kelly as certain victims.

Personally, I do not think it is possible for the damage done to Kelly to have been inflicted by someone who wanted to copy the murderer in order to see Kelly dead. The kind of destruction visited on her body could, in my opinion, only have been inflicted by someone able to divorce themselves from the actual person that she was. It could only have been done by someone who needed to stab and chop and carve and slash, to dissect, in order to satisfy his sexual perversion. The ability and willingness to visit such destruction on another human being is very rare and I find it highly unlikely that several individuals of such habit were roaming the streets of Whitechapel and Spitalfields duyring the same period. However, it is slightly possible that someone so inclined had read about the previous murders, was excited by the said reading, and was driven to travel to the area to inflict the terrible destruction on Kelly.

[DVV]

Hi Limehouse,

agreed until the last sentence.
Mary is definitely canonical to me, mainly because of the two notches in the vertebrae and the 3 detached flaps of skin (just as in Chapman's case, as opposed to Nichols' and Eddowes').

Amitiés,
David

[FrankO]

Personally, I do not think it is possible for the damage done to Kelly to have been inflicted by someone who wanted to copy the murderer in order to see Kelly dead.

Hi Limehouse,

Perhaps I should have expressed myself better. I didn't mean to say that Kelly was killed and butchered by someone who had planned to kill & butcher her in what he thought was Ripper-style. What I meant is that I think she may have been killed on impulse by someone close to her, and who, once he'd realised what he'd done, came up with the idea to try to make it look a Ripper murder, so that he wouldn't be suspected. I haven't completely closed the door to this possibility, although I have very little doubt that Kelly was in fact a Ripper victim.

All the best,
Frank

[Trevor Marriott]

And yet, it is apparently quite correct to say....

Stride - killed by unknown who did not murder anyone else.

Kelly " " " " " " " "

....surely that it a huge contradiction Trevor? On the one hand you are saying widen the net, then in the next breath you dismiss Stride and Kelly out of hand. Please forgive me for saying this, but isn't this twisting things to fit your theories? Something that many people have done, in many many woeful Ripper books over the years.

You seem very quick to discount theories by authors.

Please post your your theory on the ripper then , oh and when you do please make sure that it is corroborated with at least some direct evidence and please dont make it woeful when you do

There are many people like you who are quick to slag off authors etc but never seem to be able to put forward anyhting of an consequence other than wild speculative theories thats of course if you can engage your brain long enough to be able to put forward anything sensible

[Garry Wroe]

And there are many authors, Trevor, who promulgate nonsensical theories based upon a total ignorance of the homicidal paraphiliac offender and the underlying psychodynamics which stimulate his crimes.

Regards.

Garry Wroe.

[Cap'n Jack]

'Furthermore, why would any ‘normal’ criminal/murderer want to risk his life committing Ripper-style murders outdoors?'

The answer to that, Frank, might be that the majority of the Ripper victims were homeless on the night they were murdered.
So it had to be a take-away rather than a home delivery.

[protohistorian]

Indeed Cap'n or that the ripper himself was a gentleman of the road. Respectfully Dave

[Cap'n Jack]

Thanks Dave, for it seems the task of many to ignore the bloody obvious.

[Phil Carter]

Indeed Cap'n or that the ripper himself was a gentleman of the road. Respectfully Dave

Dave. AP,

And we all know WHO was wandering around at night.. "on the road" dont we?
Our resident "Victoria" sponge.

best wishes

Phil

[FrankO]

The answer to that, Frank, might be that the majority of the Ripper victims were homeless on the night they were murdered.
So it had to be a take-away rather than a home delivery.

Thanks for your reaction, AP, but I wasn't referring to just the place. I was referring to what was done out there and the risk involved.

The Ripper did what he did (the mutilations) because that was important enough for him at that point in time to risk his life. Because that’s what he did. Just killing a woman by cutting her throat would just have taken mere seconds. What the Ripper did took a couple of minutes at least. Anybody could have walked into the scene at any given moment. The longer he stayed on the crime scene, the bigger the risk he took. Plus he took rings and body parts that could incriminate him.

So I ask again, why would any normal criminal/murderer take that extra risk, if mutilating and souvenirs didn’t do anything for him? Why would he do that purely for the sake of helping create or maintain the myth of Jack the Ripper? A cut throat, a few slashes in the face and leaving some pre-written notes would also have done the trick, I'd imagine. But as it would have taken considerably less time, the risk would be evenly smaller.

All the best,
Frank

[ditlew]

Personally I believe there was A 'Jack the Ripper'. How many he murderer is an open question. I don't think Polly was his first murder and I'm still on the fence regrading Liz, though I'm more a yay than a nay.

On another note. I joined this forum to discuss and learn facts. I'm not the big joker and I like a serious tone and cold facts. I respect knowledge and I find peoples personal ideas interresting and try my best to be open minded. One thing that has come to my attention is that many of the people that I respect in there due to their knowledge simply can't agree with eachother. It is wicked how the same facts can lead people to have so different opinions. Just an observation.

Best Regards,
Ditlew

[perrymason]

Pure non-sense, Mike,

YOU choose to accept the words of a woman who had exactly the same reason to lie than Ada Wilson.

Amitiés,
David

Ada Wilson didnt die of infection, and Emma Smith was a victim of a terrible assault, and in fact dying from it. That she would worry about what people might think of her at that time is a stretch in the most polite terms.

Its just another case of accepting what fits your own perceptions. When a woman who has been brutalized and is a great deal of pain says three or 4 men attacked her....in an area where gang assaults were common...I personally dont go looking for reasons for her to be lying about the attack.

Even if she was soliciting as you suggest...with the same proof that Mary Kelly was, or Liz Stride was...which is none....she still could have been gang assaulted as she stated. Or are all 4 men now a single Ripper?

Best regards

[Hunter]

... It is wicked how the same facts can lead people to have so different opinions. Just an observation.

Best Regards,
Ditlew

Its what makes us human... and interesting... and not so interesting at times.

Best Wishes,
Hunter