Practicality or madness?

[Fisherman]

First, a correction - my list should say same city, same TIME, not town.

Now, any criticism based on things like how we cannot know if Chapman and/or Jackson prostituted themselves at the time they met their killer, or, for that matter, that we donīt know that the killer actually sought out prostitutes, will be thrown out the window. Why? Because I never said that those were the similarities - I said that a background as a prostitute was. And that applies, regardless of whatever wriggling may occur.

The same thing goes for saying that London was big - that does not nullify my claim that the murders/dumpings occurred in the same town (for all we know, the torso victims could have been killed in Oxford and transported to London for dumping, but that is another matter).

Then list goes on and on. How does the idea that someone could have copycatted the cut from sternum to groin nullify that it DID happen in these series, how does the fact that the uteri were not taken out from all victims nullify that it DID happen in these series, how does the fact that cut throats is relatively common nullify that it DID happen in these series, how does ...? On and on it goes, and dumber and dumber it gets.

I responded to the lazy ass lie that I use "one or two" characteristics only to make the call of a common killer. Evidently, that lazy ass lie has not changed a single bit, and the authour of it is more interested in thinking up alternative reasons for the ten characteristics I listed as being there in both the Chapman and the Jackson murder, one from each series.

Now, tell me: How does the fact that a lazy ass poster can think up varying alternative reasons for these inclusions in any way make them go away? Any ideas?

No. And I didnīt think so.

It really has all come to shame now. What a rot, and what a complete waste of time. I do not use "one or two characteristics", I use ten of them. Unless I involve other cases than Jackson and Chapman, in which case the number goes further up.

And all the while, the reasoning that is offered in response keeps probing new depths.

[Michael W Richards]

Now that we have your List of Commonalities, lets see what they add up to....

-Prostitution background (Unfortunate or Seasoned street walker, were they doing that when they met their killer..which is the only thing meaningful that can be determined by that categorization
-Same city (Really? Women killed within the same geographical area can be presumed killed by just one man?)
-Same town (Ditto. If you said within one square mile that might be useful)
-Cut from sternum to groin (Something successive murders could have as a result of publicized descriptions)
-Uterus taken out (How many victims? And how many times is it taken from the scene? How many murders suggest the uterus was the objective?)
-Abdominal wall removed in flaps (How many times? Was it well publicized before the second appearance of it?
-No pre-murder torture (How would you know? In the case of the Ripper victims, its possible Mary was awake and alive when first attacked, and you hav eno idea what was done to the Torso victims before their parts were distributed)
-Rings stolen (How many victims?)
-Throat severed (One of the most common injuries in violent crimes of the area and period...not a very specific element there. Double throat cuts are distinctive though.)
-Reports claim the killer is a skilled cutter with at least some anatomical insights ( That narrows the field to anyone who butchers animals..including women who prepared the foods for consumption, anyone who hunts animals, med students and practitioners, self taught individuals....you have likely narrowed the suspect field to thousands of men in the area.)

Now, help me out, somebody; does the list comprise "one or two characteristics", or does it comprise ten?

Ill help you out...the inconclusive list identifies some women who suffered some similar injuries, and does nothing to explain why we should ever consider marrying 2 distinctive series to one killer)

Of the list above there are presumptions, omissions, deductions and conclusions that are being made about elements that are not common nor are they consistent, thereby nullifying the validity of said theory.

[Fisherman]

-Prostitution background
-Same city
-Same town
-Cut from sternum to groin
-Uterus taken out
-Abdominal wall removed in flaps
-No pre-murder torture
-Rings stolen
-Throat severed
-Reports claim the killer is a skilled cutter with at least some anatomical insights

Those are similarities I have listed, pertaining to the Chapman and Jackson murders.

Now, help me out, somebody; does the list comprise "one or two characteristics", or does it comprise ten?

Maybe people who cannot even tell one from ten should do something else than try to figure things out? Somewhere else, preferably.

Now, is there anybody who is willing and wanting to debate AND stay away from these kinds of sorry ass misrepresentations? Because otherwise, I am not interested to debate at all.

[Michael W Richards]

Fisherman, you pick one or two characteristics of a murder, within one of the 2 series, and with broad strokes apply your theory across the whole of the series, like in the case of cutting of the face. Or the stomach flaps. These are previously publicized acts, and do not occur in most of the murders from either series. Since there has been no real series established anyway, just a presumed Canonical Group, Id object less to comparatives that are based on similar subjects before adding those that are quite obviously not.

[Fisherman]

Also, the Brighton Trunk murders of 1934 are interesting. A dismembered body was found in a trunk at the railway station, but never identified (the feet and arms were found elsewhere, but the head was never recovered). The victim was known as "pretty feet", because she had "dancer's feet", apparently. Suspecion was on a local medical man who was providing illegal abortions (she was 5 months pregnant at the time, though I don't think there were signs of an attempted abortion, so not sure where that link came from).

Anyway, it was while searching places near the railway station they found a 2nd body in a trunk. The victim was identified as Violette Kaye, who was a dancer and prostitute, and her boyfriend Toni Mancini was tried for her murder. He was found not guilty (his defense was she was killed by a client, and he hid the body because he feared police wouldn't believe him as he had a record - years later, in the 70s I think, he confessed she was killed in a row, but was not tried for purgery because there was no corroboration).

Anyway, the murders were unrelated, yet, both in Brighton, both involved bodies in trunks, both victims seemed to be dancers (but I think dancers feet might be a reference to a particular shape of foot, rather than meaning the person was a dancer per se, so not sure if that's similar). Regardless, bodies in the same small area, both in trunks, both female, etc, yet despite those rare and strong similarities, the victims were killed by different people - neither of which knew of the other crime.

- Jeff

P.S. Just did a bit more searching on "dancer's feet", and apparently ballet and such, produces common injuries (broken long bones on the outer side of the foot - called dancer's fracture) so it seems likely that dancer's feet is not just a foot shape, but rather indicates the feet showed characteristics consistent with dancing (as in long hours of practice, ballet in particular it seems is bad for the feet).

Well, Jeff, I think Abby makes a very good point in saying that since the first case you bring up was never solved, it is kind of hard to establish that the killer was not the same in both cases. If anything, it seems that both victims were dancers, and that in itself should arouse some interest, donīt you think?

Are you aware of any circumstances that would rule out a common killer? Was there such a stance from the police, and if so, what was it grounded on? Do you know?

All of this being said, we should of course take a look at how this all relates to the cases we are interested in. Were the Brighton cases part of a series? Or, to be more precise, were they part of TWO series? And how do we establish that...?

Were they evisceration murders?

Did they both involve the same sort of peculiar and rare damage/s?

If you have been reading my posts on this thread, you will be aware that some time back, I said that I do not only allow for, but also expect that sometime in the future, sooner or later, there will be two serial killers and eviscerators active in the same general time frame and the same general geographical area. This I say because that is the nature of things - weird coincidences do happen every now and then. It would of course be an extremely weird coincidence if it did take place, but I am all for allowing for coincidences happening. I am even saying that they WILL happen, they are part of life. The salient point, however, is of course that even if it SHOULD happen, it would not go to prove that it is in any way likely. All it proves is that it is possible - and we have known that from day one.
Anything that is not practically impossible, is by way of nature possible. No matter how unlikely it is. In our case, all we can do is to establish how likely things are - and although some out here like to think it is more likely with two killers than one for the Ripper/Torso murders, that is very, very, very far removed from the actual truth.

In my reasoning, I also took great care to point out that although I allow for two eviscerating serial killers in the same town and time on a theoretical level, I do NOT expect them to inflict the same peculiar and odd kinds of inclusions that we have in the Ripper and Torso series, without the series being connected! The magnitude of such a thing is lightyears away from the magnitude of two trunk murders appearing in the same town and time. Actually, dismemerment murders are quite often so called trunk murders, for reasons of one of the ingredients in the heading of this thread: practicality.
Practical dismemberers are people who kill not for the fun of dismembering but instead for reasons of allowing themselves the opportunity to move a body away from a location to which they are linked, or to even obscure that a murder has taken place (the latter does not apply in the Brighton cases, where the crimes WOULD be detected).
A typical dismemberment trunk murder is one where a man kills a spouse in his own home, whereupon the need to clear away the body arises (you will. ote that this is for example the case for the second Brighton trunk). To that end, he buys a suitcase and stuffs it in there, and disposes of the suitcase, typically by throwing it in the nearest harbor.
This all means that the typical trunk killer is not a serial killer, but instead a one-off killer. I know of no case where a serial killer dismembered bodies and stuffed them in trunks on a regular basis - but I am not in any way adverse to this having happened, of course! If there is a need to get rid of bodies and if putting them in trunks meets that need, then why not? Iīm just saying that I have not yet heard of it happening.

Summing up, it is hard to say what the Brighton trunks were about. Maybe it is two uninked cases of domestic affairs in combination with a timely trunk sale at the local Woolworths, who knows?
Then again, maybe it is a case of a double murderer who did away with two dancers simultaneously - after all, if two dancers are found on the same day, both dismembered and put in trunks in close proximity to each other, surely a guess of some sort of connection is not unreasonable?

At the end of the day, though, and whichever way, it does nothing to prove that two serial eviscerating killers are ever likely to cause the same very odd and peculiar and rare damage to their respective victims in the same town and time. The difference is monumental.

[Abby Normal]

You might find this link on the Cleveland Torso Murders of the 1930s interesting. Eliot Ness (of Al Capone fame) was involved.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_Torso_Murderer

c.d.

yes. facinating case. the dr whom ness suspected was probably the killer.

[Abby Normal]

Also, the Brighton Trunk murders of 1934 are interesting. A dismembered body was found in a trunk at the railway station, but never identified (the feet and arms were found elsewhere, but the head was never recovered). The victim was known as "pretty feet", because she had "dancer's feet", apparently. Suspecion was on a local medical man who was providing illegal abortions (she was 5 months pregnant at the time, though I don't think there were signs of an attempted abortion, so not sure where that link came from).

Anyway, it was while searching places near the railway station they found a 2nd body in a trunk. The victim was identified as Violette Kaye, who was a dancer and prostitute, and her boyfriend Toni Mancini was tried for her murder. He was found not guilty (his defense was she was killed by a client, and he hid the body because he feared police wouldn't believe him as he had a record - years later, in the 70s I think, he confessed she was killed in a row, but was not tried for purgery because there was no corroboration).

Anyway, the murders were unrelated, yet, both in Brighton, both involved bodies in trunks, both victims seemed to be dancers (but I think dancers feet might be a reference to a particular shape of foot, rather than meaning the person was a dancer per se, so not sure if that's similar). Regardless, bodies in the same small area, both in trunks, both female, etc, yet despite those rare and strong similarities, the victims were killed by different people - neither of which knew of the other crime.

- Jeff

P.S. Just did a bit more searching on "dancer's feet", and apparently ballet and such, produces common injuries (broken long bones on the outer side of the foot - called dancer's fracture) so it seems likely that dancer's feet is not just a foot shape, but rather indicates the feet showed characteristics consistent with dancing (as in long hours of practice, ballet in particular it seems is bad for the feet).

first of all the stupidity of some juries never ceases to amaze me. secondly, how do you know mancini didnt kill both?

[JeffHamm]

Also, the Brighton Trunk murders of 1934 are interesting. A dismembered body was found in a trunk at the railway station, but never identified (the feet and arms were found elsewhere, but the head was never recovered). The victim was known as "pretty feet", because she had "dancer's feet", apparently. Suspecion was on a local medical man who was providing illegal abortions (she was 5 months pregnant at the time, though I don't think there were signs of an attempted abortion, so not sure where that link came from).

Anyway, it was while searching places near the railway station they found a 2nd body in a trunk. The victim was identified as Violette Kaye, who was a dancer and prostitute, and her boyfriend Toni Mancini was tried for her murder. He was found not guilty (his defense was she was killed by a client, and he hid the body because he feared police wouldn't believe him as he had a record - years later, in the 70s I think, he confessed she was killed in a row, but was not tried for purgery because there was no corroboration).

Anyway, the murders were unrelated, yet, both in Brighton, both involved bodies in trunks, both victims seemed to be dancers (but I think dancers feet might be a reference to a particular shape of foot, rather than meaning the person was a dancer per se, so not sure if that's similar). Regardless, bodies in the same small area, both in trunks, both female, etc, yet despite those rare and strong similarities, the victims were killed by different people - neither of which knew of the other crime.

- Jeff

P.S. Just did a bit more searching on "dancer's feet", and apparently ballet and such, produces common injuries (broken long bones on the outer side of the foot - called dancer's fracture) so it seems likely that dancer's feet is not just a foot shape, but rather indicates the feet showed characteristics consistent with dancing (as in long hours of practice, ballet in particular it seems is bad for the feet).

[Fisherman]

You might find this link on the Cleveland Torso Murders of the 1930s interesting. Eliot Ness (of Al Capone fame) was involved.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_Torso_Murderer

c.d.

Yes, C.D. , I have already pointed to this case as a potentially very useful comparison, in my exchange with Frank. But some posters are less interested in factually viable comparisons, and more so in trying to get back at posters who have revealed them as being unversed in the facts.

It comes with the territory, sad though it may be. The good thing is that these kinds of people are rarely satisfied with just the one public lashing, but instead come back for a second helping and a third, and a...

If nothing else, that behaviour is extremely helpful in painting a picture of what we are dealing with.

[Fisherman]

Okay, I will explain what is terribly wrong in the three snippets I posted:

1. "In 1874 near Putney a body was found, "the decomposed remains of a woman, lacking head, arms and feet". In 1887 and 1888 similar remains were found in the Thames. That's four for those that are counting, only 1 of which coincides with the alleged Ripper spree. Either that is one man, or more than 1 man. The likelihood is that its more than one man considering the length between kills. That means in the LVP 2 or more people were creating torso's."

Somehow, this ends up in the glaring mistake of claiming that there were two or more people creating torsos in the LVP - and that is of course not any truth at all. Nowehere near it, actually.
It is this exact kind of mumbo-jumbo we should take all possible care to avoid having soiling debates out here.

2. One man??.....kills and waits a year to kill again, then he waits 13 years to kill again,.. then another year.

Unless the killer/s have been identified, I cannot see how we can establish how many murders were committed, let alone establish that the killer/s were dormant for any specific amount of time.
This precise kind of balderdash that does not belong to any intelligible discussion.

3. Its not just the fact that there is no evidence at all to support the contention...

Anybody familiar with the torso cases are aware that the Lancet very clearly pointed out how the dismemberment of the 1873 victim was dexteriously carried out. So we have a skilled and exact cutter at work here. So the same city, a timeframe that allows for a shared identity, the same dumping river and the same skilled and dexterious cutting, plus we have a killer who attacks the face, just as the Ripper did. That is of course evidence pointing in the direction of a common perpetrator, whether we like it or not.
It is this kind of denial of factual realities that smears the boards with evasion and ignorance, and it really must be pointed out when it happens.

[Michael W Richards]

You might find this link on the Cleveland Torso Murders of the 1930s interesting. Eliot Ness (of Al Capone fame) was involved.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_Torso_Murderer

c.d.

Don't mention that cd, now hell have a single Torso Ripper killer acting up from 1873 until the 1930's.....wouldn't surprise me to discover the antagonist believes he's also immortal....

[c.d.]

You might find this link on the Cleveland Torso Murders of the 1930s interesting. Eliot Ness (of Al Capone fame) was involved.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_Torso_Murderer

c.d.

[Michael W Richards]

Read through this and see if anybody can spot the - very obvious - error:

"In 1874 near Putney a body was found, "the decomposed remains of a woman, lacking head, arms and feet". In 1887 and 1888 similar remains were found in the Thames. That's four for those that are counting, only 1 of which coincides with the alleged Ripper spree. Either that is one man, or more than 1 man. The likelihood is that its more than one man considering the length between kills. That means in the LVP 2 or more people were creating torso's."

Then read through this and see if anybody can spot the - very obvious - error:

One man??.....kills and waits a year to kill again, then he waits 13 years to kill again,.. then another year.

Next, this. I hope everybody can see the - very obvious - error:

Its not just the fact that there is no evidence at all to support the contention...

It would feel nice to say that posts like this one takes the term ignorance to hotherto unexplored heights - but they have been explored many times before. And some of them by the same author.

Sorry, I neglected to mention the Thames murder first, 1873...which is followed by Putney in '74, then 1887, then 1888. That's four, yes? And from 1874 until 1887 is 13 years, yes? So the data was correct wasnt it? Only you would think that small omission would be enough to invalidate the general idea.

What is clear is that not only were the Torso murders likely done by 2 different individuals due to the intervening length, its highly improbable that he then takes a break from disarticulating in any fashion, to do the Ripper murders in an entirely different fashion for 2 1/2 months in the Fall of 88.

Stomach flaps indeed. You've succeeded in the creation of some novel fiction...maybe stick to that genre.

[Fisherman]

Read through this and see if anybody can spot the - very obvious - error:

"In 1874 near Putney a body was found, "the decomposed remains of a woman, lacking head, arms and feet". In 1887 and 1888 similar remains were found in the Thames. That's four for those that are counting, only 1 of which coincides with the alleged Ripper spree. Either that is one man, or more than 1 man. The likelihood is that its more than one man considering the length between kills. That means in the LVP 2 or more people were creating torso's."

Then read through this and see if anybody can spot the - very obvious - error:

One man??.....kills and waits a year to kill again, then he waits 13 years to kill again,.. then another year.

Next, this. I hope everybody can see the - very obvious - error:

Its not just the fact that there is no evidence at all to support the contention...

It would feel nice to say that posts like this one takes the term ignorance to hotherto unexplored heights - but they have been explored many times before. And some of them by the same author.

[Michael W Richards]

In the 1873 Thames Torso murder investigation the authorities suggested that "

the “torso murderer” was an organized offender who treated the body parts of the victim not as a problem, but as objects in a game with the authorities."

In 1874 near Putney a body was found, "the decomposed remains of a woman, lacking head, arms and feet". In 1887 and 1888 similar remains were found in the Thames. That's four for those that are counting, only 1 of which coincides with the alleged Ripper spree. Either that is one man, or more than 1 man. The likelihood is that its more than one man considering the length between kills. That means in the LVP 2 or more people were creating torso's. That alone challenges any claims that serial killers could not co-exist in London in 1888. 2 or more did what the agitator on this thread claims are so unique that we must also include victims without dismemberment as well, because the nature of these types of crimes are so rare and therefore must be linked by a single killer. Hogwash.

At least 3 Torso murders happened before that Fall 1888, one may have overlapped that "series". The Torsos took place over a 14 year span. Ripper murders did not include any dismemberment, and were over in a 2 1/2 months.

So...if the antagonist believes that these murder series are so similar and must be linked by a single killer, then he must also believe that only one man made all the preceding Torso's. Only logical, right? Rare crimes, One man??.....kills and waits a year to kill again, then he waits 13 years to kill again,.. then another year. The same man also doesn't disarticulate even one victim in a span that if authorities are to be believed was 2 1/2 months start to finish? Seems reasonable to anyone? Well, of course, to just one person it does.

Its not just the fact that there is no evidence at all to support the contention, or rather, belief,...its also that its an unreasonable premise.

Its a just for the jolly idea, and a folly for anyone actually looking for legitimate avenues to explore.