Hanging the Ripper.

[spyglass]

HI ALL!
If JTR had of been caught, charged and found guilty,

1. would he have been hanged ?

2. would this depend on whether he was classed as insane.

After all, many sadistic killers were hung in those times, and so this brings me on to Kosminski (or the so called suspect incarcarated )
were there laws in those days that would make some suspects involved in dreadfull crimes unfit to stand trial on the grounds of mental illness or the like?

[The Grave Maurice]

JtR could only escape hanging by bringing himself within the protection of the M'Naghten Rules.
My guess is that he would have been unsuccessful.

[Adam Went]

Wouldn't mind betting that if caught, JTR would have had done to him what "Il Duce", Benito Mussolini, had done in 1945....

Cheers,
Adam.

[spyglass]

HI,
So on a serious note then, it would be unlikely that if caught he would just be locked away somewhere and the key thrown away..insane or not ?

[The Grave Maurice]

Oh, he may well have been insane, but I don't think he would meet the requirements of the legal definition of insanity. If caught, tried, and convicted, I think it's a pretty safe bet that JtR would have been hanged.

[c.d.]

Fleeing the scene of the crimes in order toavoid being caught would seem to indicate rational thought. I can't see anything but a rope for Jack.

c.d.

[The Grave Maurice]

c.d.,

Flight might indicate rational thought, but it would certainly, at least in my view, indicate knowledge that his actions were wrong. That would probably be enough to get him hanged.

[spyglass]

HI ALL,

So we can rule out Kosminski then, But just for arguments sake, what if Prince Eddy was indeed the ripper..what would his fate of been ?

[Little Nell]

JTR wasn't caught or tried so we can't know what - if any - signs of insanity he might have demonstrated.

FWIW my gt x 3 uncle William Mealing cut his fiancee's throat with a razor in 1862. He immediately told his neighbour what he'd done and then handed himself in to the village constable (who happened to be William's godfather). He was tried and found "innocent on the grounds of insanity" and sent to Broadmoor. Fortunately for William, the villagers collected money to pay for a defence lawyer who called expert medical witnesses to testify to William's insanity - and the Gloucestershire jailer said he was "off his head". If he'd been found guilty he would have been hanged in public. As it was he lived over 40 years in Broadmoor.

Interestingly Queen Victoria, after an assassination attempt, was outraged that the man who tried to kill her could be found innocent, so you can now be found guilty but insane.

[smezenen]

Fleeing the scene of the crimes in order toavoid being caught would seem to indicate rational thought. I can't see anything but a rope for Jack.

c.d.

How do we know he "fled" the scene? For all we know he skipped away whistling "Little Tillie's Grave".

"Little Tillies Grave" is a folk song from 1860 by Benjamin Russell Hanby, here is a link to an instrumental for anyone interested. http://www.pdmusic.org/1800s/60ltg.mid

[Rubyretro]

[

"Little Tillies Grave" is a folk song from 1860 by Benjamin Russell Hanby, here is a link to an instrumental for anyone interested. [url]http://www.pdmusic.org/1800s/60ltg.mid[/url

][/QUOTE]

Thank you for this. I love traditional folk music -I love singing it (but am petrified of finding myself singing whatever MJK did on the night she died -I've blotted it out !!!)

[KatBradshaw]

As has been stated the issue really is 'was Jack mad'? Now this in itself is very subjective. We are living in a time of growing interest in madness and psychiatry in general. There certainly would have been attempts to discover the validity of any claim of madness.
On the other hand if we try to compare him to modern killers such a Bundy we see that he was tried and executed as a sane man. The pressure may have been such that there would be no chance of a commital for Jack.
Interestingly this may give creedance to the idea that Jack died in an asylum. If the authorities were scared that an already volitile East End would errupt if it was perceived that Jack had 'got away with it', they may have hushed up any incarceration.
Just a thought...

[Graham]

Wouldn't mind betting that if caught, JTR would have had done to him what "Il Duce", Benito Mussolini, had done in 1945....

Cheers,
Adam.

You mean machine-gunned and then hung upside-down in a burned-out gas-station? Can you please tell us just where the nearest gas-station to Whitechapel was in 1888?

Yours pedantically,

Graham

[spyglass]

Kat,
Equally, they could have hung him in secret.
No one has yet been able to answer my earlier question on this thread...If the Ripper had been Prince Eddy, would he have been hanged..mad or not ?

[Robert]

Spyglass, if the Ripper had been PAV he would not have been hanged, for (whether sane or insane) he would not even have been tried. He'd have been quietly put away in a very exclusive asylum or home.