WMs = "Disguised" Killings?

[mpriestnall]

Hi,

By disguised killings, I just mean JTR killed some more or less randomly selected victims to hide other targeted killing(s) within the series.

I know this is an old idea

Anyway,

1. Any thoughts on this being possible, likely etc
2. Are there any precendents of other serial killers actually doing this or is this only the stuff of crime fiction?

Appreciate your thoughts.

Martyn

[Lipsky]

Every known case of successive homicides conducted by the same hand has to have a pattern: the point of interest can be a fetish, a location ("theatre of operations), the purpose of a mission, an inherent sex motive or subsitute of. Generally talking, killings as distraction/decoy for other killings, can be part of a pattern. It cannot be excluded.

The correlating factors in this case, concerning the VICTIMS, and not only some unsuitable person's "canon" which is one of the plagues of this mess, confirm, or let's say validate, that they were indeed the targets: specific infividuals, bound together (let's say for some "reason").

The space/time narrow window is not by itself the "reason". We roll back to Whitechapel lore if we accept that. It was a hotbed of outcasts, exiles from a collapsing capitalist system which in England had already reached not only its imperialist stage, but its decaying process. Social condition breeds beasts, but those beasts become sociopaths of power (the Third Reich), not shadowy assassins. Serial killers are borne out of personal, intrinsic conditions. This again, as an empirically generalized deduction.

The decaying of the Whitechapel, as the worst part of the most advanced (and most rapidly collapsing) capitalist country of the time, does not explain (1) the time window and (2) the outrageous physical vicinity of the victims (that street just ran on bad luck and bad smell?).

Shadowy Whitechapel was still such when Booth had his poverty map out, so why 1888 and not 1885, or 1899? What defines the narrow time window?

Cracking this nut-cracker can only come from focusing not on the killer's moustache or accent (as if accents can't be faked by someone determined to remove your sick kidney, right?), but on the victims --- their whereabout, who knew whom, who interacted with whom, who shaped an agenda, what was that agenda, and the less "spotlight" characters, though these were the cunning ones (they escaped murder --- well for one of them it's uncertain nut no body means no murder!) --- they set up that agenda which led to the murder of unfortunate women.

Women went down under (in the grave, not Australia! though someone else did go there, it seems? hmm) --- but HERE is the reasoning of a broader morale of that time (reverse to my previous observation) because back then women were even more expendable than today -- and the schemers employed these women for their ends (unsuccessfully, as history proved). The murderer himself, though, was not a misogynist. He was at most someone who wouldn't mind the sacrifice of another human life (or its post-mortem dignity by devising harrowing but coldly and speedily performed acts of mutilation) if the overall purpose was served.

Fits more the image of neither a sex offender nor a "medical fetishist/ripper/cannibal" (though he posed as one in the only public act of terrorism he committed --- aside from the murders themselves), but a --- drum roll --- d i s c i p l i n e d s o l d i e r.

[mpriestnall]

Hi Lipsky, Thanks for an interesting read.

Just a side thought specifically relating to the "double-event": If one of the victims was a distraction from the other, it's logical, to me at least, that the first murder victim, Stride, would be the real target and the second murder, Eddowes, would be the distraction murder (assuming
both were killed by the same hand, of course). Surely, the murder wouldn't commit the distraction murder first, as this woiuld be more risky to the
murderer eg, it could go wrong, he could get caught before he could go after the real target. So maybe Stride was targeted?

I can't but believe that Kelly must have also been targeted, merely because of the risky location for the murderer?

Martyn

[Harry D]

Shadowy Whitechapel was still such when Booth had his poverty map out, so why 1888 and not 1885, or 1899? What defines the narrow time window?

You could pose such a question for any series of murders. While we can use systemic models to identify the dynamics and psychological triggers behind serial killing, there isn't necessarily a single explanation for why the murders began in 1888 (if they did), because there are complex reasons for serial killer behaviour. It is likely that the killer was already guilty of lesser assaults prior to the Whitechapel case, and the lack of punishment only urged him to up the ante.

I don't think we need to look for a link between victims either, as the vast majority of serial killer victims are random and unconnected. Some of them may have been acquainted with one another but this doesn't establish anything. They were targetted because they were casual prostitutes.

[Lipsky]

Hi Lipsky, Thanks for an interesting read.

Just a side thought specifically relating to the "double-event": If one of the victims was a distraction from the other, it's logical, to me at least, that the first murder victim, Stride, would be the real target and the second murder, Eddowes, would be the distraction murder (assuming
both were killed by the same hand, of course). Surely, the murder wouldn't commit the distraction murder first, as this woiuld be more risky to the
murderer eg, it could go wrong, he could get caught before he could go after the real target. So maybe Stride was targeted?

I can't but believe that Kelly must have also been targeted, merely because of the risky location for the murderer?

Martyn

Hello Martyn, thank you for the kind words.

For many years, the Eddowes murder was seen as a "response" of the killer to the unfinished business of the first hit (Strides) that was interrupted.

However if we examine this double hit as one event en bloc, then a more overall understanding is shaped:

One action ("operation") in two chapters --- including the two major Jewish sites of gathering in the area, reflecting the two classes of each capitalist society: the left wingers/political dissents and the well-to-do, business class. Tied in with the convenient "Lipsky" shout and the subsequent graffiti, this operation has for the first time a decoy: antisemitism. The killer's voice was "heard" for the first time, but partially: the graffiti was erased and the "Lipsky" was lost in the noise of the turmoil afterwards. So the perpetrator had to make his taunt heard again, with the Lusk letter -- the only communique with hard physical evidence (kidney) and more antisemitism ("Letters from hell" reference). Another singularity -- this operation allowed the police and less the public to put a face on the killer : each hit had a convenient sighting just before-hand by Jews. Our man now suddenly has a voice and a face. He performs, swiftly, without mistake. The sightings are calculated as the graffiti. And a bloody sink just as well. It is a show-off, a step up in the game of terrorism of both the broader public and the inner group of people where both victims belonged. And it was successful - the frenzy was there, from the very next day.

In such an outlook of the event, both victims were deliberately chosen, and both locations too. This only means that both victims were set up to be there, in earlier meetings. Acquaintance with the killer prior to the attacks made it possible without raising suspicion. The specifics are unknown: they might have known him as a locale chap, "giving money on and off" (that phrase did come up later on at MJK, didnt it?), or if he had let them on in his role a tad more, they might have known him as a liaison between the blackmailing and the blackmailed parties. The latter is more risky, it is possible that via hearsay he wcould claim knowledge of the scheme and proposed ("confidentially") to be able to assist, hence the peaked interest of both victims to "be there" for the meeting.

Any other concept excludes either the fact that the victims were specifically chosen, deliberate targets for extermination, or that the locations were not random.

The second notion is rejected on the grounds of the antisemitism that is directly linked to the double event. And the killer was not someone who couldnt hold his "need for lust" -- this was "in character", necessary to complete a special-ops hit. The locations were both pre-chosen, the double event designated as such, there was no "gratification - generated" need for a random, hasty second attack.

The first notion is rejected on the grounds of geoprofiling of killer's hits and whereabouts, and the physical vicinity of all victims, canonical and otherwise, their guides/"pimps" (who pulled their strings financially) and the surrounding info of blackmail already set in motion since Spring 1888.

Whitechapel was a small world, and people talked. And some, a lot.

MJK was "higher up" in the ladder of the blackmailing group, so the terrorist act of murder and mutilation had to be stepped up even further -- and what a nice day for London to feast!

Conveniently there is total darkness concerning her life --- even her death (wrap up that inquest, chaps, no need to determine hour of death)

But contemporary field reporting around that charming 'hood confirmed that she was younger, more steadfast and determined, a raging alcoholic with a temper (fearless) ...and equally desperate--> an angry split with that lousy fishman, no money and.... way way way way back on her rent (hmm).

(good to have such a generous landlord though, right? and what a coincidence, he just happened to send his aide to see about that darn rent on that same Friday morning? what better morning to collect the bills other than the Lord Mayor's parade...a nice, quiet morning to send the tax boy, and then cause roaring frenzy in the one day when Londoners would go downtown for the festivities)

Dear Martyn: In your approach of events, the decoy , if i understand, is not antisemitism but one of the two kills? One victim as real target and one as distraction?

If that is so, in MJK event, which is the "distraction" kill? I would like to hear a more expanded version of your ideas. Thank you.

[Lipsky]

You could pose such a question for any series of murders. While we can use systemic models to identify the dynamics and psychological triggers behind serial killing, there isn't necessarily a single explanation for why the murders began in 1888 (if they did), because there are complex reasons for serial killer behaviour. It is likely that the killer was already guilty of lesser assaults prior to the Whitechapel case, and the lack of punishment only urged him to up the ante.

I don't think we need to look for a link between victims either, as the vast majority of serial killer victims are random and unconnected. Some of them may have been acquainted with one another but this doesn't establish anything. They were targetted because they were casual prostitutes.

Such action from the serial killer would be correct on the grounds of some "coming of age" --- August 1888 being ripe for him to start his gratification kills. It could not make a difference if his "coming of age" was September 1872 or December 1888, to narrow it down. And in such a scenario, even earlier victims of Spring could fit in, as "work in progress/ the formative hits". Indeed, someone came to age after some early strikes? And being not punished, dared he proceed further?

Problems (as I see it) with such a proposition, logical as it may be (and it certainly is, for other serial homicides):
1. Proponents of this theory have no real answer as to the pre-canonical victims. They remain ignored. Even Tabram.
2. The main problem of this outlook: the motive of the killer is gratification via lust murdering.

Our man does not have (or need, indeed) time for that. This is cold, methodical. "Surgical" one might say (and many have, dwelling on unnecessary debates of medical nature). I would say, disciplined, clinical, but more akin to a special-ops than a medical testbed. The man murders too fast for sadism to be employed (a serious blow to contemporary "Sex fiend" sketches that loaded this case with irrelevant sex offenders, weirdos and asylum residents). Our man is not frustrated or insane: he is worse --- methodical, without inhibitions (and he doesnt need alcohol or whatnot to become a loose cannon), and seriously deranged. He taunts, deliberately stages a crime scene and enters/exits like a ghost.

There is no gratification before murder (sadism) and there is no gratification post-mortem (cannibalism/necrophilia). Our man doesnt indulge. He performs the task and departs. When chosen, he allows for two convenient sightings on the most theatrical operation: the double event. This is the pinnacle of all serial killers' stunning acts. No looney-tooney could pull this.

3. Gratification-borne serial killers chose indeed their victims independently of any correlation they might have , and logically so: why create fuss in a circle of victims who knew each other? After all, correlation was not only not needed (the point of reference was "elsewhere"), but added unnecessary hazard. the Moors Murders: the first victim, a neighbour. Sole point of interest of kills: The fetish with the bleak moors. When madness took over and Brady wanted to expand his disciples beyond his insane valkyrie-bimbo, he drove things home and was exposed and arrested. No correlation between victims. Berkowitz: no correlation --- his madness betrayed the "best" of him and he became known in Yonkers. Loose tied round his throat, bye bye now. Ted Bundy: no correlations of victims, simple puppets for staging a necrophiliac/ultra-sadist playground "here" and "there". His utter insanity/"Cant hold my urges" betrayed him more than once.

If our man followed this "Random" logic, why choose victims living within a dozen doorsteps from each other? This is an outrageous choice for someone who can pull off stunts as the Double Event.

If our man truly defied gratification, random victims, already problematic from the previous point, provide no motive whatsoever. Serial killers however have strong motives. So what is the motive here?

1. This is no sex offender. If he was, the pattern of the murders would be different. If he was, the victims would have been random.
2. No gratification from the MO/signature but still random victims. Incosistent with pains he took and discipline to carry out executions -- needs another logical explanation.
3. No gratification and deliberate victims is consistent with a motive, albeit different than the sex offender lunatic. If we accept that the motive is consistent with the pattern of the victims instead of the pattern of mutilations, then we can explain why we have a serial killer who locks the geography down to the vicinity of a few doorsteps while being lucid (no sex offender lunatic), methodical, and a total stranger to any personal indulgence (clinical style of executions, no sadist torture beforehand, no cannibalism/necrophilia afterwards).
4. It also explains the public exposure of the victims. IF private satisfaction was needed, he could lure them to any private spot and have them as "missing persons" (how many serial killer cases began s missing persons cases when the gratification was sexually-related??)
5. If we accept that the only reason of such a methodical dangerous vicious criminal to narrow things down to a few blocks has to be related to the victims themselve,s then the motive is (1) anything other than sex-fiend lunacy (2) linked to the actions of the victims. JUST the fact alone that they lived within a few doorsteps doesnt cut it -- other prositutes may have resided there and indeed there were. Geographical vicinity narrows it down and excludes random/sex-fiend killer/victim relationship, but it is more than meets the eye why THESE specific women were targeted.
6. Add to that confessed blackmail efforts, relations of these women to their "economic controllers"/"pimps", and all the BS / double talking from seemingly everyone else than the killer, and then you'll see that oddly enough, that the one lying less in this case was the killer (save for the antisemitism and the cannibal, pseudo-illiterate persona he assumed in the Lusk letter).
7. he was totally deranged though. Not because he was masturbating faster than the speed of light or because he was in "asylums". But because he was ruthless, efficient, without any inhibition or remorse or empathy. As I've stated elsewhere, the closest "portrayal" with a name is Reinhard Heydrich.
8. The only glimpse in his coldness inside, the detached abyss, is the "material" he chose for his Lusk letter persona.

[mpriestnall]

Just some idle thoughts on some of the points raised:

The space/time narrow window...

...the victims were specifically chosen

"The space/time narrow windows...":
Mcnaughtan and Anderson etc would explain the timing and duration of the murders by an escaped murderous lunatic at large and then being locked up or commiting suicide to explain the cessation of murders.

Or another series of events were occuring more or less parallel and the murders were a result of these events.
I prefer this to the previous idea. The escaped lunatic idea is plausible but pat. A Great White Man lie?

"the victims were specifically chosen..."

If JTR had one single connection to the victims, why not just murder that one victim. Many people would be connected to the victim, so maybe JTR not necessarily be suspected.

If JTR had, say, was connected to more than one victim, then this would point more greatly to JTR, so perhaps more need to bury their murders within a series.

antisemitism

Dear Martyn: In your approach of events, the decoy , if i understand, is not antisemitism but one of the two kills? One victim as real target and one as distraction?

If that is so, in MJK event, which is the "distraction" kill? I would like to hear a more expanded version of your ideas. Thank you.

"antisemitism":
Maybe just an accidental co-incidence that the murders took place to locations associated with jews/jewish institutions.

"...in MJK event, which is the "distraction" kill?"
Some of the previous ones?

"I would like to hear a more expanded version of your ideas."
I am just pondering the possiblities of decoy murders. No firm ideas or theory.

I'm just curious to see if anyone had precedents for decoy murders outside crime fiction...

Martyn

[DJA]

If JTR had one single connection to the victims, why not just murder that one victim. Many people would be connected to the victim, so maybe JTR not necessarily be suspected.

If JTR had, say, was connected to more than one victim, then this would point more greatly to JTR, so perhaps more need to bury their murders within a series.


Martyn

Hit the nail ...... or nails ...... on the head.

[Lipsky]

Mcnaughtan and Anderson etc would explain the timing and duration of the murders by an escaped murderous lunatic at large and then being locked up or commiting suicide to explain the cessation of murders.

If JTR had one single connection to the victims, why not just murder that one victim. Many people would be connected to the victim, so maybe JTR not necessarily be suspected.

If JTR had, say, was connected to more than one victim, then this would point more greatly to JTR, so perhaps more need to bury their murders within a series.

I'm just curious to see if anyone had precedents for decoy murders outside crime fiction...

Martyn

Thank you for your response, Martyn. Attempting to address your interesting points:
1. Indeed I think the "lunatic" in the sense of some "illogical" "unchecked" individual doesn't hold water. The perpetrator who pulled off the Double Event cannot be reduced to the caricature of the madman.
2. I insist on the Double Event because of its operational logistics, it is the one that can be analyzed the most. More than that, it introduces wanton decoy: antisemitism. The perpetrator implicates the jews via both murder locations, via his "convenient" sighting (in site #1, accompanied by "Lipsky!" for maximum effect [just in case Shwarz was blind] and in Lawende's case by a scathing stare [to drive the point home]), and the Goulston graffiti. The decoy is the final antic of this orchestrated hit.
3. You are correct. If our man was connected to more than one victim, murder would point to him. But what if connection of the victims was not on sheer geographical correlation alone? What if the fact that they were neighbours, "co-workers" and probably friends was the ground on which they devised a scheme out of their misery? On the center of which, MJK, the most important victim (by de facto force of mutilations and climax of terrorism), was a stellar witness of some disturbing incriminating scandal?
4. Our man cannot be, I think, connected to the victims because he was not the target of the blackmail (blackmails are against people "up the ladder" and our man is not). My concept is that our man was hired by the target of the blackmail to "clean house" based on the skills he had: he had lived in the area long enough to know the ins and outs, he had knowledge of prostitutes, as he could not release himself in "vanilla"/normal intercourse and only prostitutes (especially, poor, desperate ones with few clients) would accept his "roleplay" needs (a masochist), disciplined (military/sailor record), unremorseful, and utterly psychotic (not the "disorganized lust murderer" perceived though). He doesn't indulge, he doesnt draw gratification from the murders, he is not a sadist or a sex offender (he has deep sexual issues though, derived from his troubled relationship (lack-of) with his mother).
5. Murder as decoy is common in special-ops/ asymmetric warfare/ secret service operations. Our case can be characterized as "special-ops executions performed in-character" but I am not sure you agree with my outlook as such --- my concept has 10 murdered victims (3 pre-canon, the c5 and 2 post-MJK), all pre-designated and deliberate. Decoys: antisemitism, Irish element, "sex offender" -- and all of them worked, judging how clueless the police name-calling of suspects has been.
6. The other "side" also tried to pull off some decoys after the murder of their stellar witness (MKJ) : two planted testimonies by Maxwell and Hutchinson. These were calculated risks as they knew our man would only assassinate prostitutes so as not to "break character" -- and he didnt.

Please, feel free to expand on your concept as well.

PS. I do not believe in anything coincidential in relation to this case.
PS.2. Anderson and Mac were clueless. Sir Charles was not cut for this job. Munro should have been at the helm, him giving Abberline "Carte blanche" and resources would have a better outcome indeed.

[c.d.]

Two immediate problems with this theory come to mind and I am sure there are more. First, the police investigated EVERY murder which implies that those targeted murders would be investigated as well. Second, the non-targeted murders put the killer at risk of being caught just as the targeted murders would have.

I think this is crime fiction territory.

c.d.

[Lipsky]

Two immediate problems with this theory come to mind and I am sure there are more. First, the police investigated EVERY murder which implies that those targeted murders would be investigated as well. Second, the non-targeted murders put the killer at risk of being caught just as the targeted murders would have.

I think this is crime fiction territory.

c.d.

Though I do not share Martyn's theory that some murders were a decoy (I think there were ten pre-designated murders which were successful), I hardly accept that the police investigated these murders as having any other link than simply the same perpetrator (and that is not even the case in the pre-canonical victims). At the time, though, newspapers considered Tabram to be the first hit.

[Harry D]

Thank you for your response, Martyn. Attempting to address your interesting points:
1. Indeed I think the "lunatic" in the sense of some "illogical" "unchecked" individual doesn't hold water. The perpetrator who pulled off the Double Event cannot be reduced to the caricature of the madman.
2. I insist on the Double Event because of its operational logistics, it is the one that can be analyzed the most. More than that, it introduces wanton decoy: antisemitism. The perpetrator implicates the jews via both murder locations, via his "convenient" sighting (in site #1, accompanied by "Lipsky!" for maximum effect [just in case Shwarz was blind] and in Lawende's case by a scathing stare [to drive the point home]), and the Goulston graffiti. The decoy is the final antic of this orchestrated hit.
3. You are correct. If our man was connected to more than one victim, murder would point to him. But what if connection of the victims was not on sheer geographical correlation alone? What if the fact that they were neighbours, "co-workers" and probably friends was the ground on which they devised a scheme out of their misery? On the center of which, MJK, the most important victim (by de facto force of mutilations and climax of terrorism), was a stellar witness of some disturbing incriminating scandal?
4. Our man cannot be, I think, connected to the victims because he was not the target of the blackmail (blackmails are against people "up the ladder" and our man is not). My concept is that our man was hired by the target of the blackmail to "clean house" based on the skills he had: he had lived in the area long enough to know the ins and outs, he had knowledge of prostitutes, as he could not release himself in "vanilla"/normal intercourse and only prostitutes (especially, poor, desperate ones with few clients) would accept his "roleplay" needs (a masochist), disciplined (military/sailor record), unremorseful, and utterly psychotic (not the "disorganized lust murderer" perceived though). He doesn't indulge, he doesnt draw gratification from the murders, he is not a sadist or a sex offender (he has deep sexual issues though, derived from his troubled relationship (lack-of) with his mother).
5. Murder as decoy is common in special-ops/ asymmetric warfare/ secret service operations. Our case can be characterized as "special-ops executions performed in-character" but I am not sure you agree with my outlook as such --- my concept has 10 murdered victims (3 pre-canon, the c5 and 2 post-MJK), all pre-designated and deliberate. Decoys: antisemitism, Irish element, "sex offender" -- and all of them worked, judging how clueless the police name-calling of suspects has been.
6. The other "side" also tried to pull off some decoys after the murder of their stellar witness (MKJ) : two planted testimonies by Maxwell and Hutchinson. These were calculated risks as they knew our man would only assassinate prostitutes so as not to "break character" -- and he didnt.

Please, feel free to expand on your concept as well.

PS. I do not believe in anything coincidential in relation to this case.
PS.2. Anderson and Mac were clueless. Sir Charles was not cut for this job. Munro should have been at the helm, him giving Abberline "Carte blanche" and resources would have a better outcome indeed.

And when are you writing this novel?

[Lipsky]

And when are you writing this novel?

Why bother myself with a novel when I can write it all here, and receive your warm, heart-felt feedback in real-time