The Investigator's Suspects

[Monty]

Not sure Abberline did favour Klosowski.

Merely laid down reasoning as to why he felt George was a decent suspect.

Monty

[barnflatwyngarde]

yes, abberline favored chapman.
anderson, backed by swanson, was sure it was kosminski
McNaughten favored Druitt
littlechild suspected Tumblty

Bury and james kelly were persons of interest at the time.
hutchinson may have been briefly suspected at first as abberline said he "interogated him".

thats really about it for contemp police suspects that have not been ruled out (like ostrog).

One thing that I will never understand is why none of the top men never mentioned Blotchy as a possible killer.

Mrs Cox's evidence was simple, undramatic and compelling.

There is no evidence that her story was dismissed, so why did none of the senior investigators favour Blotchy?

[The Rookie Detective]

One thing that I will never understand is why none of the top men never mentioned Blotchy as a possible killer.

Mrs Cox's evidence was simple, undramatic and compelling.

There is no evidence that her story was dismissed, so why did none of the senior investigators favour Blotchy?

That is a excellent question

One thing that strikes me about the police officers involved with the case, is that they seem to have favoured some of the worst suspects imaginable.

The case reminds me of the s***show that was the Yorkshire Ripper case.

It's hard to criticise the police at the time of the Ripper case because they had none of the key arsenal that is available today.
However, that said, it all feels a bit of a mess.

There are obviously a lot of aspects of the case that have been lost through the sands of time, and so we will never know why certain decisions were and weren't made.

Our biggest weapon looking at the case today, is the wonderful power and knowledge of heinsight.


I find it odd how the police seem to have deliberately saturated the field of suspects with ridiculous candidates that have still left their mark today.
It's a good diversion tactic when you're trying to draw focus away from the real killer.

Did the police try to flush the Ripper out; by at times appearing inept in their efforts and thus applying a degree of reverse psychology?

I doubt it very much.


RD

[Abby Normal]

One thing that I will never understand is why none of the top men never mentioned Blotchy as a possible killer.

Mrs Cox's evidence was simple, undramatic and compelling.

There is no evidence that her story was dismissed, so why did none of the senior investigators favour Blotchy?

hi barn
agree. but probably because he was unfound and unnamed. but as an unnamed suspect hes up there on my list.

[Barnaby]

Given that the police interviewed Joe Barnett and George Hutchinson extensively, I would assume that they made an effort to identify every man Mary Kelly was with the night of her murder. Witnesses described four men either with Mary or around Miller's Court: Barnett, Blotchy, Hutchinson, Astrakhan Man.

Barnett obviously would be interviewed. Hutchinson came forward arguably because he knew he had been seen. Blotchy did not. That is interesting.

I can understand Astrakhan Man not coming forward because if he existed he probably was the killer.

[Herlock Sholmes]

The thing I like about Chapman as the potential Ripper; is that he remains one of the only "old skool" suspects that still hangs around in the top 10.

Like that Abba album that stayed in the charts for decades.


RD

I can’t recall a poll that I’ve seen that doesn’t have Druitt, Kosminski and Bury in the top 10. The three likeliest of the named in my opinion. I’ve never really understood Chapman as a suspect but in a pool where none are strong…

[Wickerman]

Given that the police interviewed Joe Barnett and George Hutchinson extensively, I would assume that they made an effort to identify every man Mary Kelly was with the night of her murder. Witnesses described four men either with Mary or around Miller's Court: Barnett, Blotchy, Hutchinson, Astrakhan Man.

Barnett obviously would be interviewed. Hutchinson came forward arguably because he knew he had been seen. Blotchy did not. That is interesting.

I can understand Astrakhan Man not coming forward because if he existed he probably was the killer.

And what about the man outside the Britannia?, then there's a character seen by Bowyer in the court around 3:00am - who was that?

[FISHY1118]

I can’t recall a poll that I’ve seen that doesn’t have Druitt, Kosminski and Bury in the top 10. The three likeliest of the named in my opinion. I’ve never really understood Chapman as a suspect but in a pool where none are strong…

I'm amazed you think that Druitt is one of 3 likeliest ( as the ripper i mean if I'm reading you right)

You seem to have gone to great lengths to basically all but exonerated Lechmere as the ripper, even tho he was placed at the scene of and discovered the body of Polly Nichols

But as we all know Druitt has nothing that suggest he was or has anything in the way of tangleble evidence that links him to any of the Whitechapel murders .Unlike Lechmere.

Only that he( Druitt)would make a better suspect than "Cutbush" as mentioned in the MM, which even Simon Wood agreed was nonsense particularly when asked recently about the named suspect in the MM

I'm sure others will make up their own minds, and of course your entitled to your own opinion.

However I'd bet my left nut if you did one of your famous polls titled Who was "more likely" to have been JtR Lechmere or Druitt

Lechmere wins overwhelmingly, even tho I don't think he was the ripper, id have him well above Druitt as a legitimate suspect .lMO.

[Herlock Sholmes]

There’s no tangible evidence for the guilt of any of the named suspects Cross included and if you think that Cross is valid then you would have to include Louis Diemschitz, John Davis, John Richardson, Thomas Bowyer, John McCarthy and George Morris who were all ‘there at the time’ and might have had the opportunity to kill.

I can’t understand why you mention Simon. He doesn’t believe that there was a ripper so he’s obviously not going to consider any suspects.

All I can say is this…if we discovered via a previously unseen document say, that a former Chief Constable of the Metropolitan Police from the 1960’s suggested that he had reason to suspect a particular person (who, on the face of it, seemed an unlikely killer) of being Jack the Stripper and that, 3 years prior to the date of the document we found that an MP had also pointed the finger at the same man, would we… a) assume that the former Chief Constable was simply making it up (as was the MP) and point blank dismiss the suspect or would we b) say “that’s intriguing…I wonder if there was something in his statement?” The difference being of course that a suspect for a more modern crime would be easier to investigate.

I, and not only myself, prefer to leave that question open as opposed to claiming the kind of certainty that none of us can have. No matter what the doubts or gaps in our knowledge both Druitt and Kosminski were named by two of the most senior police officers in the country - this certainly doesn’t make either of them guilty as they both might have been innocent but it should mean that they are worth considering and not dismissing purely on criteria that appears to get applied to them to a greater extent than it does to others. And yet some still get far more ‘annoyed’ about Druitt than they do about Lewis Carroll or PC Endacott or William Gull.

I’m sure that the points for Bury don’t need repeating but lived locally, violent toward women, murderer, left London just after Kelly. On a ripper tick box exercise alone Bury stands above all others imo.

[FISHY1118]

Im still not sure how that all relates to say Druitt v Lechmere as the more likelier to have been JtRipper given the points i mentioned. Thats what i mean ,all those names you mention are in the same boat as Lechmere, so how does that make Druitt a ''better''[ top 3 ]suspect them ? [if they were named as such ] .

I Only pointed out Simons comments which he made in relation to the MM and druitt as a suspect based on very little if any real solid reasoning. [as opposed to what we know about Lechmere]

Im happy for others to make their own judgement call based on what is currently known about Druitt and Lechmere, if i knew how to upload a poll on the question presented , id do it just to see the numbers.

[FISHY1118]

Im still not sure how that all relates to say Druitt v Lechmere as the more likelier to have been JtRipper given the points i mentioned. Thats what i mean ,all those names you mention are in the same boat as Lechmere, so how does that make Druitt a ''better''[ top 3 ]suspect them ? [if they were named as such ] .

I Only pointed out Simons comments which he made in relation to the MM and druitt as a suspect based on very little if any real solid reasoning. [as opposed to what we know about Lechmere]

Im happy for others to make their own judgement call based on what is currently known about Druitt and Lechmere, if i knew how to upload a poll on the question presented , id do it just to see the numbers.

[FISHY1118]

Sorry for the double up , not sure what happen there.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Everyone has their own opinions on suspects Fishy. The only point that I was making is that if a very senior police officer names a suspect then that suspect is worthy at least of consideration and that we shouldn’t simply assume that senior officer must have been lying because that suspect might not seem a likely one to us 135 years later. We have no way of knowing what information was available at the time. Could Macnaghten have seen evidence that he felt was compelling but Druitt wasn’t actually the killer? Absolutely. Personally, I take Farson’s point when he said that it’s Druitt’s apparent unlikeliness that makes him an intriguing suspect. Why did Macnaghten name him when he had the choice of any number of dead violent criminals or lunatics (whether dead or permanently incarcerated as ‘hopelessly insane’ to choose from that would have been ideal fall guys for his list?

[bernadette]

Everyone has their own opinions on suspects Fishy. The only point that I was making is that if a very senior police officer names a suspect then that suspect is worthy at least of consideration and that we shouldn’t simply assume that senior officer must have been lying because that suspect might not seem a likely one to us 135 years later. We have no way of knowing what information was available at the time. Could Macnaghten have seen evidence that he felt was compelling but Druitt wasn’t actually the killer? Absolutely. Personally, I take Farson’s point when he said that it’s Druitt’s apparent unlikeliness that makes him an intriguing suspect. Why did Macnaghten name him when he had the choice of any number of dead violent criminals or lunatics (whether dead or permanently incarcerated as ‘hopelessly insane’ to choose from that would have been ideal fall guys for his list?

I could offer a reason: the perpetrator of the whitehall murders was a sexual sadist murderer. These people dont start out freely expressing such a fantasy. they would be afraid of backlash so they work up to it. there would be women he has been very abusive to, tending to restrain them, torture them, humiliate them. While these women may have made it clear they wanted nothing further to do with him, they would have kept these humiliating occurances to themselves. perhaps one of these earlier victims is McN's inside informant and protecting her from the public exposure is why he never said who his informant was.

[c.d.]

Welcome to the boards, bernadette.

c.d.