Did Jack gross himself out..?

[pinkmoon]

If he didn't stop because he grossed himself out than why did he stop death possibly?.Would our killer stop killing without a good reason.

[Mayerling]

I once tried to put myself in Jack's position mentally after Miller's Court (happily nobody was slaughtered while I did this. ). It becomes more difficult recalling the chain of previous murders ascribed to Jack (especially the "Canonical" ones). From a horrendous stabbing attack, he increases the mutilations, then starts departing with souvenirs (like kidneys), and may have even done a double murder within a two hour period. Kelly's horrible death literally reduces her body to a carved up slab of meat as in a butcher's stall (an image not only reinforced by the two photographs, but by the killing being within doors, as would the cutting up of meat be done in a butcher shop).

My next question was simple: "How do I top it?!!"

My suggestive thought was suicidal (not like Druitt by the way). The final killing would have to return to the open and be of some woman in the middle of hundreds of people killed as horribly as the others but totally openly. And the woman need no longer be a prostitute!!

Don't dismiss it so quickly as a thought. Only a year earlier Britain had the Golden Jubilee celebration of Victoria's half century on the throne, and she had been riding in a carriage in the grand procession in her honor. Only six years after Whitechapel the President of France (Marie Sadi-Carnot) was stabbed to death while in the state carriage by an anarchist named Caesario. The anarchist was captured (and subsequently tried, convicted, and executed) so Jack by a similar act would either have been captured or lynched on the spot. But in such a mind as his it would have been going out with a bang...not a whimper.

So perhaps killing the Queen would have been next. But if you prefer Jack sticking to woman of dubious morality (although even Victoria was sometimes so tarred - remember her "ghillie" servant John Brown?) Jack might have aimed at one of the mistresses of the Prince of Wales (like Lily Langtry, or Daisy, Countess of Warwick).

In any case, it might have been possible to out-do the shambles at poor Mary's room on Dorset Street.

[Ginger]

Don't dismiss it so quickly as a thought. Only a year earlier Britain had the Golden Jubilee celebration of Victoria's half century on the throne, and she had been riding in a carriage in the grand procession in her honor. Only six years after Whitechapel the President of France (Marie Sadi-Carnot) was stabbed to death while in the state carriage by an anarchist named Caesario.

There were actually several attempts made on her life in just such a fashion, you know, the last one being several years prior to the Ripper murders.

[Errata]

Serial killers as a habit don't try to top themselves. They have a fantasy and they stick with it. The closer the actuality is to the fantasy, the more satisfying. So it's not about building up to some spectacular event, it's about perfecting themselves to match the fantasy as closely as possible. It's weirdly not unlike my father's quest for the perfect grill spatula. He doesn't keep getting bigger ones, he keeps getting more perfect ones.

[Ginger]

It's weirdly not unlike my father's quest for the perfect grill spatula. He doesn't keep getting bigger ones, he keeps getting more perfect ones.

Not a bit on-topic, I know, but I have to ask - what qualities would the perfect grill spatula have?

[Paddy]

After Millers Court

I personally think he was sent away to some Jewish home for a while.

Totally off topic, Henry Cox (City Undercover Policeman) had an uncle that was in the case of an attempt to kill Queen Victoria. He was a gunsmith and had cleaned and checked the gun for John William bean in 1842. He wasnt charged but just gave evidence at the Old Bailey. Bet Henry didnt tell too many people that !

Pat..............................

[Mayerling]

I personally think he was sent away to some Jewish home for a while.

Totally off topic, Henry Cox (City Undercover Policeman) had an uncle that was in the case of an attempt to kill Queen Victoria. He was a gunsmith and had cleaned and checked the gun for John William bean in 1842. He wasnt charged but just gave evidence at the Old Bailey. Bet Henry didnt tell too many people that !

Pat..............................

Hi Pat,

I heard of Bean's attack (in 1842). There was a weird element of comedy in it. Bean was a hunchback, and after he shot at the Queen he ran into a park.
Constables apparently grabbed not only Bean but other hunchbacks they found in the park.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

There were actually several attempts made on her life in just such a fashion, you know, the last one being several years prior to the Ripper murders.

Hi Ginger,

The attack you are thinking about was in 1882 involving an assailant named Roderick MacLean. He was captured (at the train station at or near Windsor) by a bunch of Eton schoolboys, who belabored him with their umbrellas, etc. I'm not sure of the months involved but either MacLean's attack was influenced by the Phoenix Park Assassinations of Lord Frederick Cavendish and Thomas Burke by the "Invincibles" in May 1882, or that attack may have been spurred on the "Invincibles" to their action. I tend to think the "Phoenix Park" case influenced MacLean, not the other way around.

Jeff

[Paddy]

Hunchbacks

Hi Jeff thanks for that, I didnt know that. Something more to add to my family tree....Really funny ! Where did you read or hear of that ?

Pat...............

[Ginger]

Hi Jeff!

Thanks!

[Errata]

Not a bit on-topic, I know, but I have to ask - what qualities would the perfect grill spatula have?

I swear to god, I don't even think he knows. But it's one of those things we've decided to never give him as a present because we'd just screw it up. If you ever watch the West Wing, President Bartlett choosing a new carving knife is remarkable similar.

[Mayerling]

Hi Jeff thanks for that, I didnt know that. Something more to add to my family tree....Really funny ! Where did you read or hear of that ?

Pat...............

It was in some biography on Victoria (I think it was "Queen Victoria: Born to Succeed" by Cecil Woodham-Smith, the author of the classic account of the Charge of the Light Brigade, "The Reason Why"). If I am not mistaken, Bean was also a dwarf, making the massive arrests even more ridiculous.

Jeff

[RivkahChaya]

So the question we ended with was - could Jack have pushed himself too far with MK's murder? Not only breaking pattern with her, but also maybe crossing some sort of (arbitrary) line within himself, and thus ruining the 'thrill of the kill', leading to the abrupt cessation of the murders?

I'm never glued to a theory, just throwing this out there as a thought.

My thought was that he couldn't go back to killing outside. Having discovered what he could do indoors, he had to keep doing that. Since we don't know what his circumstances were, I can guess that he didn't have a space available to him, and so his life may have become about getting one. He may have sought better employment so he could afford an apartment with a private entrance, and he may have found better ways of disposing of the bodies. His later victims may be women who simply disappeared.

After the Jeffrey Dahmer case broke, I thought more about this, because his whole life for a while really was about supporting his killing habit, like it was a drug habit. Pretty much all his money (and he had two jobs for a while) went into the equipment he needed to pay the rent on the apartment in the location he had, which was in a good "hunting ground," and enough off the regular police beats that they didn't stumble across him investigating something else (at least, for a long time), but not so good, that the neighbors were likely to pursue noise and odor complaints, or get curious about the 20 gallon drums.

Anyway, I thought that after the Miller's Court murder, JtR may have turned his life into making it possible to continue to commit that sort of crime.

As far as getting "grossed out," no, I wouldn't put it that way, but serial killers, and other types of violent offenders, like serial rapists, do sometimes just get old, and outgrow the hobby, if you'll forgive me for putting it in such mundane terms. That's what happened to Gary Ridgway, and it has happened to a few rapists. It takes a lot of energy to do something like that, and people get old, and just want to stay home in the evenings. It happens to people who play pick-up basketball, people who mountain bike, people who go fishing, ER doctors who decide they want to retire to general practice, and people who hurt other people as a hobby. I don't know that it happened immediately after MJK. I don't think JtR had just 4 or 5 victims. I think there are others we don't know about. But it's possible he just hung up his knife one day.

I swear to god, I don't even think he knows. But it's one of those things we've decided to never give him as a present because we'd just screw it up.

There's a SpongeBob episode where he sells everything he has to buy the perfect, fancy spatula, but he misses his old spatula. There's also one where he pulls Neptune's spatula from a rock, because he is the One, True Fry Cook.

[Mayerling]

My thought was that he couldn't go back to killing outside. Having discovered what he could do indoors, he had to keep doing that. Since we don't know what his circumstances were, I can guess that he didn't have a space available to him, and so his life may have become about getting one. He may have sought better employment so he could afford an apartment with a private entrance, and he may have found better ways of disposing of the bodies. His later victims may be women who simply disappeared.

As far as getting "grossed out," no, I wouldn't put it that way, but serial killers, and other types of violent offenders, like serial rapists, do sometimes just get old, and outgrow the hobby, if you'll forgive me for putting it in such mundane terms. That's what happened to Gary Ridgway, and it has happened to a few rapists. It takes a lot of energy to do something like that, and people get old, and just want to stay home in the evenings. It happens to people who play pick-up basketball, people who mountain bike, people who go fishing, ER doctors who decide they want to retire to general practice, and people who hurt other people as a hobby. I don't know that it happened immediately after MJK. I don't think JtR had just 4 or 5 victims. I think there are others we don't know about. But it's possible he just hung up his knife one day.

It sounds logical Rivkah, but then we have the same problem we face about other known serial killers. When they find a formula that works well for them, they "grow fat and careless" resulting in their being caught. It happened with Gacy and Dahmer and Bundy. It happened to Chapman and Cream and Deeming as well. Say that Jack decided after Miller's Court, "Of course, I have to lure them inside so I can fully vent on them!" Fine as far as it goes. But he has to leave the damage available for the authorities and the public to see and be horrified by. If he gets a private residence like Dahlmer or Gacy had, he is trying to keep the horror all to himself (which is not the Ripper's way). If he tried it he would feel let down, especially if the police and the victim's family write off the victim's non-appearance to her moving on to some unknown location.

At best he would have to rent a location, lure a prostitute to it, do a number on the prostitute similar or even (if conceivably) worse than what happened to Mary Kelly, and leave the rented location to be found with the remains of the victim by the landlord or the next renter. But then he leaves a potential trail of living people who may recall, "Oh, that Mr. "X" rented this room where the murder occured." He could use a fake name, but they would be able to produce a description of what he looked like. It's a tricky and dangerous situation for the killer to put himself into.

I think he would have been at a crazy impasse that he would find it impossible to get out of. If that was what happened, I hope it destroyed him.

[Ausgirl]

Some really good posts here. Thanks for them.

Also, cause to revise the quality of my own grill spatula, which I had thought was pretty spiffy. But now... I wonder.

East Area Rapist/ONS - I keep coming back to this guy for comparison because A/ he also was never caught, B/ he also stopped (but started again.. several times..then stopped for good) and C/ he was about obsessive as it gets, even sticking to specific 'script' words and actions, crime after crime..

He did actually escalate over time, and I think change was not comfortable for him, but became necessary for both internal (thrill wearing off) and external (police presence) reasons.

Point being, EAR/ONS was brilliant at the sort of self-preservation you were talking about, Errata. I can see it pretty plainly in his case.

I think (but I am not sure, and it's really worth looking into, cheers for the prompt) that all his major changes of venue and MO came after some sort of cathartic experience.

For JtR, if Mary Kelly wasn't the precipitant to to some sort of drastic change, I'd be very surprised.