Same motive = same killer

[Sam Flynn]

The only proof there is says that you are less likely to be right. Statistically, you are smoked.

Which reminds me: Have you found any figures on how many dismemberment cases there were in the 218 years to which you refer?

I say "how many cases there were", when perhaps I should say "how many cases were reported, happen to be available on the Internet and/or found their way into books"... because isn't that what we're really talking about?

Any true figure is likely to be rather higher, whether we're talking about dismemberment or evisceration, unless - with regard to the latter - your figure of "2 per 218 years" came from a 100% accurate source. What was your source for this datum, by the way? Forgive me if you've already referenced it.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Yes, it works the other way around.

Similarities will not become umimportant on account of dissimilarities, unless these dissimilarities conclusively prove that the similarities are only coincidental.

Dissimilarities will become unimportant if they can be explained and if there are similarities that tell us that the perceived dissimilarities are of no real importance.

So there is a difference. Which is what I have been banging on about for weeks. And which any person with a minimum of insight into these things will acknowledge.

When you can show me that the dissimilaritites of these cases rule out the importance of the similarities instead of going on about how it MAY have been like this and it MAY have been like that, you have a case.

Until that happens, you don´t.

Well at least you dont resort to being insulting! Thanks for that

You say ‘may’ this and ‘may’ that but your attempts at an explaination for the dissimilarities are full of such hypotheses. Coming up with a ‘possible’ scenario works both ways no matter what the likelihood based on the history of murder.
What if, for example, the murderer of Elizabeth Jackson killed her in a drunken rage. What if he was a butcher or a slaughterman and so was used to blood and gore. What if he decided to do some ripper-type mutilations so that if/when the body was eventually found it might have been marked down as a ripper murder and away from him?

[Abby Normal]

Well at least you dont resort to being insulting! Thanks for that

You say ‘may’ this and ‘may’ that but your attempts at an explaination for the dissimilarities are full of such hypotheses. Coming up with a ‘possible’ scenario works both ways no matter what the likelihood based on the history of murder.
What if, for example, the murderer of Elizabeth Jackson killed her in a drunken rage. What if he was a butcher or a slaughterman and so was used to blood and gore. What if he decided to do some ripper-type mutilations so that if/when the body was eventually found it might have been marked down as a ripper murder and away from him?

Hi hs

Of course it’s possible. But I have never heard of a killer trying to make a crime look like another killers work. It’s the stuff of hollywood.

Yes killers stage things so the motive may appear different. But this copy cat idea is mainly fiction. I’ve seen it brought up for victims like McKenzie or pinchin to explain the similarities with the ripper but it’s basically non existent happening.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Hi hs

Of course it’s possible. But I have never heard of a killer trying to make a crime look like another killers work. It’s the stuff of hollywood.

Yes killers stage things so the motive may appear different. But this copy cat idea is mainly fiction. I’ve seen it brought up for victims like McKenzie or pinchin to explain the similarities with the ripper but it’s basically non existent happening.

Hi Abby,

I know that this is one of the things about me that irritates people(mainly Fish) but the idea of something not occurring in the same way before bothers me very little. Why should it? Things happen for the first time (or the first recorded time.)

I cant help looking at the whole thing from a different viewpoint to Fish. The Torso Murders to me are glaringly different to the ripper murders despite any possible similarities in knife-work. The dissimilarities are more numerate than the similarities. To the observer the ripper series show an obvious connection. No amount of appeals to the history of crime or apparent obsessions with ‘flaps’ (such a vague word) will change this.

I guess ill just have to wait until Fish reveals his link between Lechmere and the Torso’s.

[harry]

Fisherman,
Statistics has very little evidential bearing on the crimes.It has even less of an impact in your claim of beyond reasonable doubt,Along with similarities,unlikely duplication,and now statistics,you are scraping the bottom of the barrel.If I am smoked,you are in cinders.
Abby.
And when is belief classed as beyond reasonable doubt? Show me where one killer belief,is greater than a belief in two.Belief equals belief,no more no less.W ould be better if you or Fisherman answered my questions on beyond reasonable doubt.I'll ask again.What element is associated with it?

[Abby Normal]

Fisherman,
Statistics has very little evidential bearing on the crimes.It has even less of an impact in your claim of beyond reasonable doubt,Along with similarities,unlikely duplication,and now statistics,you are scraping the bottom of the barrel.If I am smoked,you are in cinders.
Abby.
And when is belief classed as beyond reasonable doubt? Show me where one killer belief,is greater than a belief in two.Belief equals belief,no more no less.W ould be better if you or Fisherman answered my questions on beyond reasonable doubt.I'll ask again.What element is associated with it?

Hydrogen?

[Fisherman]

Which reminds me: Have you found any figures on how many dismemberment cases there were in the 218 years to which you refer?

I say "how many cases there were", when perhaps I should say "how many cases were reported, happen to be available on the Internet and/or found their way into books"... because isn't that what we're really talking about?

Any true figure is likely to be rather higher, whether we're talking about dismemberment or evisceration, unless - with regard to the latter - your figure of "2 per 218 years" came from a 100% accurate source. What was your source for this datum, by the way? Forgive me if you've already referenced it.

No, Gareth, as I said, I have no idea how many dismemberment cases there were in the 218 years we are speaking of. That owes largely to how I have not gone looking for the information. I was of the impression that since you are so interested in it, you may be ready and willing to do the work yourself.

You are correct in saying that we will not be discussing unreported cases. That is the nature of the beast. So the field is wide open for suggesting that there may have been hundreds of eviscerating serial killer cases that never went into the statistics. The ball lies firmly in your court on that one too.

I did reference the source I used, yes. It was https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...United_Kingdom

[Fisherman]

Well at least you dont resort to being insulting! Thanks for that

You say ‘may’ this and ‘may’ that but your attempts at an explaination for the dissimilarities are full of such hypotheses. Coming up with a ‘possible’ scenario works both ways no matter what the likelihood based on the history of murder.
What if, for example, the murderer of Elizabeth Jackson killed her in a drunken rage. What if he was a butcher or a slaughterman and so was used to blood and gore. What if he decided to do some ripper-type mutilations so that if/when the body was eventually found it might have been marked down as a ripper murder and away from him?

Here´s the thing, Herlock. Dump your interpretations. I promise, I will stand right beside you, dumping mine.

Because, you see, these interpretations are what is allowed to cloud the whole matter.

We should not go "What if the killer was in a drunken rage?", "Surely he only took the uterus out cause she was pregnant?", "the flaps were only narrow strips" and "he cut the neck for this reason but the other guy did it for THAT reason" and regard these free flying phantasies as truths.

We don´t know. Period. These phantasies are nothing but our efforts to explain things. Or to explain them away.

We should strip the flesh from the skeleton and stay with what we KNOW to be true, and then we must decide from that whether it is more likely with one or two killers.

And what do we KNOW. K-N-O-W?

We KNOW this:

In both series, there are examples of:

-prostitutes targetted
-noses cut off
-facial damage
-opened up abdomens
-taken out uteri
-lungs or parts of lungs removed
-hearts removed
-abdominal walls or parts of them being cut away in flaps
-the soft parts of the neck cut through by knife
-parts of buttocks cut away

The less overheated we get about trying to explain or explain away these matters, the better.

These are elements we KNOW were involved in both murder series. We don´t know how they compared in terms of apparition, so we should not work from any presumptions or interpretations. Just the facts, nothing more, is what we should concern ourselves with.

It is rare to have two serialists working in the same town at the same time. In the material I have provided from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...United_Kingdom we can see that there are only one instance reported where this has happened in Britain over the last 218 years, and that involved the acid bath killer Haigh and Christie - who differed totaly in their murders. They would not be mistaken for each other, going by the victims.

Very apparently, we should not expect serial killers to emerge in the same town at the same time on a regular basis. Far from that, it seems to be very rare. That´s not to say that it is in any way impossible. Just rare in the extreme. And of course, if there ARE two serialists working simultaneously in the same town, the much more likely thing is that they will not produce the same type of rare damage on their victims.
Any scenario involving two serialists in the same town and time is highly unexpected. Any such scenario involving two serialists who BOTH answer to the kind of list I provided above is so totally and extremely unexpected as to become virtually impossible. The only opening there is, is an absolutely freakish coincidence.
If somebody wants to prioritize such a thing over common sense, then that is their prerogative. But in my view, it makes for a mockery of the facts and it flies in the face of sound reasoning.

The Ripper and the Torso killer had one thing NOT in common that seemingly threw the police off: the dismemberments.

Once we look beyond them, we get a looooong list of similarities, that points to a common originator in a very clear way.

That is how we should do things. This is what the evidence allows for. All the rest is suggestions based on personal convictions, and let´s be honest, that only amounts to smoke and mirrors.

We may feel all the way into the marrow of our bones that the Torso killer MUST have been a very diferent man than the Ripper. But as long as the evidence is what it is, we owe it to ourselves to understand that we are in all probability wrong on that score. They were not different at all. They were one and the same. The Torso man is more of a risktaker and a more reckless man than what has been suggested for 130 years, and the Ripper is less of a maniac and wildbrain. There is a centre of things where they merge.

[Fisherman]

Fisherman,
Statistics has very little evidential bearing on the crimes.It has even less of an impact in your claim of beyond reasonable doubt,Along with similarities,unlikely duplication,and now statistics,you are scraping the bottom of the barrel.If I am smoked,you are in cinders.
Abby.
And when is belief classed as beyond reasonable doubt? Show me where one killer belief,is greater than a belief in two.Belief equals belief,no more no less.W ould be better if you or Fisherman answered my questions on beyond reasonable doubt.I'll ask again.What element is associated with it?

We are not on a court of law. We are discussing two murder series, and when we say that something is beyond reasonable doubt, anyone can step in and say "I don´t think so".
Regardless if that intervention is called for or not, this is the reality of the boards.

I find that it is beyond reasonable doubt that there was just the one killer. Disagree if you will. It will not change my take on things as long as I know it is grounded in the facts.

[Fisherman]

Hydrogen?

Methane!

[Harry D]

Hi hs

Of course it’s possible. But I have never heard of a killer trying to make a crime look like another killers work. It’s the stuff of hollywood.

Yes killers stage things so the motive may appear different. But this copy cat idea is mainly fiction. I’ve seen it brought up for victims like McKenzie or pinchin to explain the similarities with the ripper but it’s basically non existent happening.

Hello Abby,

Would Jane Beadmore’s murder qualify, I wonder? She was killed and eviscerated on Sept 22 1888 by her lover. Did he share the same paraphillia as the Ripper or was he taking advantage of the recent Ripper scare?

[Fisherman]

Hello Abby,

Would Jane Beadmore’s murder qualify, I wonder? She was killed and eviscerated on Sept 22 1888 by her lover. Did he share the same paraphillia as the Ripper or was he taking advantage of the recent Ripper scare?

We actually know quite well that there have been killers who have been inspired by the Ripper killings and made an effort to follow in his footsteps, so we must allow for that parameter.
It is not copycat stuff, since these cases belong to times when the Ripper was long dead.
Beadmore, though, could have elements of copycatting present. My own conviction is that the reporting about these types of crimes, very graphic and widespread, lies behind a lot of gruesome criminal history. All the morons and idiots who try to trump their predecessors have found inspiration from reading about the stuff.
It´s a sad and complicated business.

[Sam Flynn]

No, Gareth, as I said, I have no idea how many dismemberment cases there were in the 218 years we are speaking of. That owes largely to how I have not gone looking for the information.

But you should be interested, because the frequency of dismemberment cases has a direct bearing on your argument. You can't just focus on one apparent aspect of the the torso cases - a contentious and far from consistent one at that - and ignore the main one.

I did reference the source I used, yes. It was https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...United_Kingdom

A Wikipedia list is nowhere near definitive and by no means complete. I thought you might have scoured the online newspaper archives or something, but no. To make matters worse, the article you used is a list of "major" crimes, indeed "famous" ones in many cases, so it isn't anywhere near comprehensive.

[harry]

Fisherman,Abby,
I'll make it easier then.Discount a court of law .Name the element that justifies beyond reasonable doubt.
Your replies so far only show an ignorance coupled with a lack of knowledge..
STRANGE.

[Fisherman]

But you should be interested, because the frequency of dismemberment cases has a direct bearing on your argument. You can't just focus on one apparent aspect of the the torso cases - a contentious and far from consistent one at that - and ignore the main one. A Wikipedia list is nowhere near definitive and by no means complete. I thought you might have scoured the online newspaper archives or something, but no. To make matters worse, the article you used is a list of "major" crimes, indeed "famous" ones in many cases, so it isn't anywhere near comprehensive.

"To make matters worse..."?

You really need to brighten up.

If you have a beef with the matter, then it is up to you to do the research and to present whatever material you find enlightening. I will read it, I promise - since I am interested. But not interested enough to make painstaking research only to afterwards have it pooped on by you.

I will, however, point out that you have already had this question quantified to an extent, in the article from Huffington Post that you pooped on earlier. In it, it says "Being an extremely rare crime - around 2% of homicides in their part of Europe involve mutilation or dismemberment, while in other parts it's down to one in 500 murders, it's very difficult to perform definitive research, but the authors of this review did report some worrying evidence that this particular kind of murder could be increasing in some parts of the world, such as Germany and Japan."

So, in Finland - which is the country the authors came from - two per cent of the homicides invilve mutilation and/or dismemberment. Two out of a hundred cases, that is.
In other parts it´s down to one in 500 murders - which transcribes to 0,2 per cent, if my maths are working.

But what we need to know is simpler:

Serial killers are very rare.

Dismemberers are very, very rare.

Eviscerators are even more rare. In the Huffington Post article, they are not even mentioned as a category, they seems to have been sorted in under "mutilators".

Try and find examples where dismemberers and/or eviscerators are working the same area at the same time, and you will see what I mean. It amounts to sheer folly not to acknowledge this fact and to admit that this in it´s turn points to the same perp in the Ripper and Torso murders. It should go without saying, but in Ripper country, nothing goes without A LOT of saying - precious little of it worth listening to.

If you are willing to widen our combined knowledge, you are most welcome. But you need to do it yourself.