Same motive = same killer

[Harry D]

I don't even read much significance into the coincidence of Eddowes and Stride being killed on the same night, slap bang in the middle of the Autumn of Terror, so I'm unlikely to be swayed by McKenzie and the very, very different torso series.

Fair enough, Sam. I've never doubted the Double Event to be honest with ya. Two women having their throats slashed within a short walk of each other during the height of the Ripper scare is a no-brainer for me. Stranger things have happened, sure, but why eschew the obvious?

I would also contend that these weren't extremely different murders. In both cases the victims were mutilated, and that in itself is a rare paraphilia. It's not exactly a stretch that the killer's circumstances dictated the nature of his crimes. The Ripper series may have occurred more on the spur of the moment, or when the killer did not have access to his kill-house. He couldn't exactly take the Torso victims and dump them in the street a la Ripper, therefore they were dismembered and discarded, almost ritualistically it would seem.

yup-bingo Harry.
add to that that both series end after pinchin and McKenzie. both series end at the same time.
another coincidence?

Yes, that's another coincidence to add to the list. In fact, for those who doubt McKenzie (and I've been one of them) it's an even greater coincidence that a copycat struck around the same time the Torsos re-emerged.

[Joshua Rogan]

Why would the right leg of Jackson be severed in two parts whereas the left was not?.... Why would Jackson right hand be taken off when the left was not?

Where did you get these details from, Fish? I'm pretty sure both Jackson's hands were still attached to her arms, according to ASoLM. Likewise, the legs were both separated at the knee - are you saying one leg wasn't separated at all, or in more than one place?

[Trevor Marriott]

1. The use of a saw would be be a much quicker way of dismembering limbs. Perhaps the dismemberer realised this after first using a knife. Also was the use of a saw noted in any of the other torsos, from memory I dont think it was.

Don´t use your memory, Trevor, use the facts - a sharp knife and a fine-toothed saw was employed in all of the torso cases, according to the medicos.
If the killer inititally tried the knife on the 1873 victim, disarticulating the limbs very neatly, and then arrived at the conclusion that a saw is more efficient, would you not say that it was strange that he afterwards abandoned the idea of sawing the bones off, and went back to disarticulation...?

2. The fact that these limbs were found at different locations might suggest that the person disposing of these was not able to dispose of them all at the same time because of the number of packages there were, and may well have varied the locations where they were actually disposed of.

It might suggest that he had a bet with his granny that he would use these places for dumping the parts. It "might" suggest a whole lot. But the fact of the matter is that a man pressed for time and desperate to dump a torso, would NOT find his way down to the deepest cellar vaults of the New Scotland Yard to do so, scaling walls and subjecting himself to danger in the process.

3. You keep suggesting that JTR and the Torsos were the work of the same hand and you seek to heavily rely on the 1873 Torso. Thats 15 years before the Ripper murders. So why do we not have Ripper like murders in that same time frame? I think you need to forget the 1873 Torso.

Dahmer was inactive for nine years after his first murder, until he started killing again. Shall we forget about his first victim, Trevor? And in Dahmers case, we KNOW what he did during those nine years. How do we know that the Ripper/Torso killer did NOT kill during this time?

It is unbelievable to think that every torso or body part fished out of the thames got there as a result of a murder being committed.

Yes, just as it was unbelievable that every body fished out of the Green River during the eighties, dozens of them, would be a murder victim. It´s not statistically fair, is it?

By the way, Trevor, are you not the one who says it is time to break up the old ways in Ripperology? I am doing just that, and here you are, speaking for returning to the oldschool thinking...?

I am applying a common sense approach based on what facts and evidence is available.

As to the Green River Killer all the bodies fished out of the river were proved to have been murdered. Something you cannot prove with this theory of yours, that all the torsos were murdered, and no matter how you huff and puff until you can prove that your theory is flawed.

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Michael W Richards]

No, it doesn't. There are many people who don't ascribe McKenzie's murder to the Ripper because of differences of detail between what happened to her and the "canonical" JTR evisceration victims, and there are even greater dissimilarities between McKenzie and the torso cases.
Never mind the timings, never mind the overlaps, just look at what actually happened to her. Other murder series have overlapped with one another, and/or have coincided with "singleton" murders, without the same perpetrators being involved.

I would think the majority do not include her, and I don't recall one contemporary investigator including her in his own head count.

And I like your position on the "Double Event".. the fact that a woman has her throat slit once in an area, and on a night, where an assumed serial mutilator was supposedly operating doesn't immediately suggest same killer.

I think its rather the opposite of whats being suggested here, that we have every reason to discount the "single madman" in the area using the Torso murders as a rationale. Its proof enough for me that more than just Jack the Ripper killed women in the immediate area during that Fall. Its just that Jack did it a specific way, and in public.

[Fisherman]

The murder of Alice McKenzie sandwiched between the two Torsos found in 1889 is what does it for me. It's one thing to have several murders in the same city but that sort of overlap has to be more than a coincidence.

I tend to think McKenzie is a Ripper victim, and if that is true, then it seems like both series are winding down, sort of tapering off in a way, together. The Pinchin Street torso was not eviscerated, only opened up, and there are no parts found floating in the Thames. It is almost as if the killer had run out of wind.

But there´s always that "if", isn´t there?

[Debra A]

Where did you get these details from, Fish? I'm pretty sure both Jackson's hands were still attached to her arms, according to ASoLM. Likewise, the legs were both separated at the knee - are you saying one leg wasn't separated at all, or in more than one place?

Perhaps Christer got his incorrect info about the legs from Trow again! Trow includes a diagram in his book showing one leg separated at the thigh only and one at the hip and thigh joint.
As you correctly say, both legs were separated at the hip joint and the knee joint. The knee joints were separated slightly differently on the legs in that the patella was left attached to the left thigh.
The hands were definitely attached to the arms.

[Fisherman]

Where did you get these details from, Fish? I'm pretty sure both Jackson's hands were still attached to her arms, according to ASoLM. Likewise, the legs were both separated at the knee - are you saying one leg wasn't separated at all, or in more than one place?

Trow. I didn´t think he could have made even more mistakes.

Are you saying he could?

I need to trow that book away.

[Fisherman]

Trevor Marriott: I am applying a common sense approach based on what facts and evidence is available.

I really cannot agree with that, Trevor.

As to the Green River Killer all the bodies fished out of the river were proved to have been murdered. Something you cannot prove with this theory of yours, that all the torsos were murdered, and no matter how you huff and puff until you can prove that your theory is flawed.

Nope, Trevor, a theory is not flawed because it is not proven. It is only flawed when elements in it are proven wrong.

[Fisherman]

Perhaps Christer got his incorrect info about the legs from Trow again! Trow includes a diagram in his book showing one leg separated at the thigh only and one at the hip and thigh joint.
As you correctly say, both legs were separated at the hip joint and the knee joint. The knee joints were separated slightly differently on the legs in that the patella was left attached to the left thigh.
The hands were definitely attached to the arms.

That book needs a death skull marking. I remember that only a few weeks back, John G said that it was a really good book, and I told him it wasn´t.
And here I am, having relied upon it myself. More fool me.

Anyways, Gareths argument that the arms still being attached to the torso in the Pinchin Street case would somehow tell it apart from the other torsos is not very viable. In the end, much as there are very great likenesses inbetween Jackson and the Rainham torso, there are variations inbetween them all.

[Abby Normal]

That book needs a death skull marking. I remember that only a few weeks back, John G said that it was a really good book, and I told him it wasn´t.
And here I am, having relied upon it myself. More fool me.

Anyways, Gareths argument that the arms still being attached to the torso in the Pinchin Street case would somehow tell it apart from the other torsos is not very viable. In the end, much as there are very great likenesses inbetween Jackson and the Rainham torso, there are variations inbetween them all.

yes fish-you need to throw Trows book away. he sucks. sorry if that's harsh but its basically true.

I saw a docu with/by him once-I believe on Mann as the ripper. Not only worse "documentary" on the ripper Ive ever seen, but probably the worse anything ive ever seen proporting to be non fiction.

ditch him and cut your losses.

[Fisherman]

yes fish-you need to throw Trows book away. he sucks. sorry if that's harsh but its basically true.

I saw a docu with/by him once-I believe on Mann as the ripper. Not only worse "documentary" on the ripper Ive ever seen, but probably the worse anything ive ever seen proporting to be non fiction.

ditch him and cut your losses.

A sound enough piece of advice, I´d say.

Basically, I blame Debra for not having written THE book.

[Abby Normal]

A sound enough piece of advice, I´d say.

Basically, I blame Debra for not having written THE book.

LOL! Me too

cmon Debs-the world needs you! : )

[Elamarna]

A sound enough piece of advice, I´d say.

Basically, I blame Debra for not having written THE book.

I don't go as far Blaming Debra, but wish she would write THE book.

In the meantime the book I suggested the other is far better than Trow, but that's because there's no comments, just transcripts.


Steve

[Fisherman]

I don't go as far Blaming Debra, but wish she would write THE book.

In the meantime the book I suggested the other is far better than Trow, but that's because there's no comments, just transcripts.


Steve

Yes, it seems the moment Trow comments, he gets it wrong. It´s mindboggling. He very obviously has read Hebbert, but he equally obviously has not understood him.

And I stand by my blaming Debra - who else is to blame for her not having written that book?

[Joshua Rogan]

Yes, it seems the moment Trow comments, he gets it wrong. It´s mindboggling. He very obviously has read Hebbert, but he equally obviously has not understood him.

If he'd read Hebbert's words on the torsos, the following line may have led to his misunderstanding;

"The joints in each case, with the exception of the left knee, were exactly opened, and the limbs neatly disarticulated."

In isolation, this could be read as saying that the left knee was not opened, but the context and the rest of the article makes clear it was opened, but evidently less neatly.

No idea about the hands though.