Broad Shoulders, Elizabeth's Killer ?

[The Rookie Detective]

Hi Chris, thought I would duck in to attempt to answer some of your questions.

Regarding your proposed time windows, the latest window would seem to be incompatible with the observed extent of blood flow at the time of discovery. The murder must have occurred several minutes earlier, just prior to Mortimer coming to her doorstep, or shortly after. Thus the popular theory of another man (other than BS) coming along to commit the murder, does not have a 15-minute window within which to work, but only about 5.

Where did Parcelman go? One minute he is there, then according to Schwartz, apparently not. If Schwartz's story is to be regarded as at least partially true, the seeming disappearance of Parcelman has to be accounted for. Consider this snippet from the Star:

The Hungarian ... crossed to the other side of the street. Before he had gone many yards, however, he heard the sound of a quarrel, and turned back to learn what was the matter, but just as he stepped from the kerb a second man came out of the doorway of the public-house a few doors off, and shouting out some sort of warning to the man who was with the woman, rushed forward as if to attack the intruder.

The second man appears as Schwartz steps off the kerb and onto Fairclough St. The public house referred to is almost universally regarded as being the Nelson. There's just one problem with that - the Nelson is not a few doors off, it's a few yards across Berner St. I suggest that the real location of Pipeman has been lost in translation, and what the doorway a few doors off really refers to is the entrance to Hampshire Court, which, relative to Schwartz, is indeed a few doors off. Walking through the court to Batty St would take one right to the Red Lion public house.

Now consider what PC Smith said about the location of Stride and her male companion.

She stood on the pavement, a few yards up Berner-street, on the opposite side to where she was found. I noticed the man who was talking with her. He had a parcel wrapped in a newspaper in his hand.

For all intents and purposes, the couple were seen standing at the Berner St entrance to Hampshire Court. So, to answer the question - where did Parcelman go? - with another question; Well, where did Pipeman go?

Why didn't Mortimer hear other footsteps? Eagle's footsteps, for example, may not have sounded like the characteristic plod of a bobby on a beat. She may or may not have heard Eagle returning to the club, but in any case, she only recalls hearing the measured, heavy tramp of a policeman.

Why didn't Mortimer see Eagle, Lave, Stride or Parcelman? Lave only seems to have gone as far as the gateway, so there is probably nothing to be explained for his case. Eagle presumably arrived back just after Smith had passed the club, but prior to Mortimer again observing the street from her doorstep. It is more difficult to account for Mortimer not seeing Stride. However, I cannot help but think that the following is relevant.

Eagle: I came back about twenty minutes to one, and, finding the front door closed, I went through the gateway and got into the yard, and thus through the back door into the club.

It is conceivable that Stride witnessed Eagle trying and failing to go in through the front door and resorting to enter the club by heading up the dark passageway to the side/back door. I think this is relevant to why Stride herself, ends up in the passageway. Perhaps her intention was to deliver the parcel.

Why wasn't Smith back at the same spot, close to when he said he was? This is possibly related to the handover of responsibilities from the fixed-duty officer to the beat officer. Smith probably should have been at the top of Berner St at 1am but was 'behind time'. At the inquest he bent the truth a little.

Some excellent points there, great post!

Good to see you back NBFN

[Jon Guy]

Disposing of Schwartz also doesn't require you to take a position on any other issue of contention in the case. Traditionally, Schwartz skepticism is taken up by those who see Stride as a Ripper killing and want to get rid of BS man because his MO seems so unlike the Ripper. But there have been notable Schwartz skeptics from all camps - Lynn Cates thought BS man was just that and he didn't believe that either Stride or Eddowes were Ripper killings.

Disposing of Schwartz is not an option
He`s in the Police Files, it is History. That was what was recorded and that is what we have to go with. We can`t drop witnesses and invent characters to make sense of what happened.

[Wickerman]

The only problem with this - it wasn't quite loud enough.

We can`t drop witnesses and invent characters to make sense of what happened.

[The Rookie Detective]

Disposing of Schwartz is not an option
He`s in the Police Files, it is History. That was what was recorded and that is what we have to go with. We can`t drop witnesses and invent characters to make sense of what happened.

I agree that we shouldn't initailly discard Schwartz.

That would amount to preemptive subjective bias and go against the ethos of objective investigation and impartiality.

Instead; we should take what he said he saw, and then after logical indepth analysis and serious consideration; we should then discount him afterwards.


The 2 concepts are completely different.


It's reminiscent of the age-old phrase...

"It's better to have loved and lost, than to never have loved at all."

That's precisely how Schwartz should be dealt with.

Accept he was there.
Accept he deserves as much acknowledgement as any other alleged witness.
Accept he may have seen the Ripper.

But beyond that;; it's a question of putting things into context and applying logic to determine who was credible, and who wasn't.

[c.d.]

Instead; we should take what he said he saw, and then after logical indepth analysis and serious consideration; we should then discount him afterwards.

Agree with the first part but not the conclusion. Schwartz never said he saw a murder. If he was going to lie why not go all the way?

c.d.

[Jon Guy]

I agree that we shouldn't initailly discard Schwartz.

That would amount to preemptive subjective bias and go against the ethos of objective investigation and impartiality.

Instead; we should take what he said he saw, and then after logical indepth analysis and serious consideration; we should then discount him afterwards.


The 2 concepts are completely different.


It's reminiscent of the age-old phrase...

"It's better to have loved and lost, than to never have loved at all."

That's precisely how Schwartz should be dealt with.

Accept he was there.
Accept he deserves as much acknowledgement as any other alleged witness.
Accept he may have seen the Ripper.

But beyond that;; it's a question of putting things into context and applying logic to determine who was credible, and who wasn't.

Hi Chris

Evaluating witnesses was the job of the Detectives in 1888.
Sure, we can discuss it, but all we can do now in regard to the murder of Liz Stride, is find Schwartz in the records.
Unless he came into the UK on an inflatable he`ll be recorded somewhere.
Maybe, there are more photos, like the discovery of the Berner Street murder site, or newspaper articles with extra details.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I respond from the other side - the side that says that we don’t have a single reason to doubt Israel Schwartz…not one. This doesn’t mean that he couldn’t have lied (because we can’t prove that he didn’t and people do lie [though they usually need a reason for doing it and as yet no one has assigned an even remotely believable one to Schwartz]) and it certainly doesn’t mean that he couldn’t have been mistaken, or that he may have misjudged the situation in some way. So from my own point of view I’d ask..

Why is it that some of us still treat perfectly normal, everyday occurrences as if they are weird, billion-to-one coincidences? If you could look down on any street, in any town, in any country for 24 hours you would be treated to a literal floor show of thousands of the type of instances that occurred in Berner Street (without the throat-cutting of course); would we treat them all as if someone had claimed to have seen a unicorn? So why do some of us look on events in Berner Street as if they’d happened in Narnia? People exit buildings at the second that someone that they know enters another one so that they just miss seeing each other - unbelievable!. Someone shouts to a friend just as a car revs its engine so the call is drowned out - unbelievable!. Someone falls in the street as everyone else in the street is walking in two directions so that no one sees it happen - unbelievable!. A car crashes into a lamp post a minute after a mother pushing a pram had moved away - unbelievable!. People see someone and are certain that it was someone they know but they later find out that it wasn’t - unbelievable!. People estimate times incorrectly. We find poorly synchronised clocks. All normal, everyday occurrences. And yet…

BSMan has an interaction with a woman. As it occurs, Israel Schwartz, who has walked behind him along Berner Street, crosses over the street, sees Pipeman, then disappears into Fairclough Street. We have no way of getting an exact time of course but the time from BSMan first confronting the women to Schwartz exiting the street can’t realistically been more than around 30 seconds (very possibly less). Then if BSMan was indeed the killer he could have pulled her into the yard, killed her and exited in another 30 seconds. Or even a minute. And so what remarkable, extraordinary, simply unbelievable thing that we are being asked to believe is that Fanny Mortimer, who we have absolutely no way of knowing when she was or wasn’t on her doorstep, or for how long (but we do know that she wasn’t there all of the time) was indoors when Eagle passed (at an approximate time) and the 30 seconds tops Schwartz incident occurred (at yet another approximated time). How can these events even enter the same territory as unlikely? Why are we determined to create a mystery where none exists?

Let’s ask ourselves which is likelier - 1. A very short incident occurs in a backstreet at some put during a 30 minute time span. One man walks the street and enters the club. One woman goes onto her doorstep at a time that we don’t know and then goes back indoors at a time that we don’t know. Both the man and the woman miss the short incident. Or - 2. A random man hears about a murder by throat cutting at a time when the whole of the country is talking about this ‘monster.’ The police are doing everything to catch him. No one can be unaware of what’s going on. So this random man decides to lie and place himself at the scene of this murder, really? - a) he has no one to confirm this, b) he has no one to back him up against any suggestion that he himself was the killer, - c) he has no way of knowing that the killer might have been found and it turned out that he looked absolutely nothing like fake BSMan exposing him as a liar, - d) he has no way of knowing that some witness wouldn’t have showed up saying “I was looking out of my window from 12.30 until 12.50 and I had a clear view of the gates and I saw absolutely nothing.”

Herlock’s Maxim No 2 - “ A theory is usually weakened if it relies on the suggestion of acts of egregious stupidity by those involved at the time.”

Schwartz falsely placing himself at the scene would have been an act of egregious stupidity.

For me, it’s obvious which is the likelier. And I’ll ask a final question…why are some people so comfortable about calling Schwartz a liar and claiming that he made up his story to get some attention but they wouldn’t countenance any suggestion that Fanny might have been a bit of a busybody who liked to be the centre of attention. I’m not saying that she did lie but I can’t prove that she didn’t lie or exaggerate. Or that she badly estimated how long she had spent on her doorstep? No one can. Her testimony is so vague as to times. How can a witness this vague be used to dismiss another witness. The answer is that she shouldn’t be. By far the likeliest is that Schwartz saw just what he said that he’d seen; it was a very short occurrence and no one else saw it. For me that’s a huge so what. At what time?

[Jon Guy]

Good points, Michael.
Of course, we have to allow for the possibility that Schwartz was mistaken or lying but we just can`t take him out of the equation to make things fit. That would be wrong as we know Schwartz`s statement fits perfectly with all the activity on Berner Street.

Regarding his timing of 12.45. There was that clock in the window of Harris`s Tobacco shop at the top of Berner Street.

[c.d.]

By far the likeliest is that Schwartz saw just what he said that he’d seen; it was a very short occurrence and no one else saw it.

And if what he saw was a simple street hassle and nothing more, keep in mind that this is at a time right after the pubs had closed and rough working men were on the street after having imbibed a few pints. Hardly a unicorn event.

c.d.

[Jon Guy]

By far the likeliest is that Schwartz saw just what he said that he’d seen; it was a very short occurrence and no one else saw it.

And if what he saw was a simple street hassle and nothing more, keep in mind that this is at a time right after the pubs had closed and rough working men were on the street after having imbibed a few pints. Hardly a unicorn event.

c.d.

Hi c.d.

Inspector Reid agrees with you.

In his summary, Swanson thought Schwartz`s man to be more likelier than PC Smiths man to be the murderer, but adds " I understand the Inspector to suggest that Schwartz` man need not have been the murderer. But the suggestion is that Schwartz` man may have left her, she being a prostitute then accosted or was accosted by another man and there was time enough for this to take place and for this other man to murder her before 1.0. "

I`m guessing the Inspector was Reid.

[Sunny Delight]

By far the likeliest is that Schwartz saw just what he said that he’d seen; it was a very short occurrence and no one else saw it.

And if what he saw was a simple street hassle and nothing more, keep in mind that this is at a time right after the pubs had closed and rough working men were on the street after having imbibed a few pints. Hardly a unicorn event.

c.d.

It needn't have been a simple street hassle. The event took maybe 40 seconds all in? Maybe a minute? If BS man was the Ripper then I don't see his actions as neccesarily out of character. This is a man who never really seemed all that concerned about his surroundings. Of course it is possible that Stride met someone else after her encounter with BS man. After all she met BS man some 10 minutes after been seen conversing with Parcelman.

However it must be conceded a low possibility for Stride to have met a second violent encounter 10 minutes after meeting BS man. It also goes against Fanny Mortimer's evidence and the young couple she also quoted(granted 2nd hand info is problematic). Two violent encounters on the same woman; at the same location, within 10 minutes must be seen as very unlikely- although of course not impossible.

If BS man was a simple street hassle, Stride has to then meet another man, converse with him and then enter Dutfield's Yard undetected by Mortimer, and the couple at the Board School.

Surely it is much more likely that BS man- who had shown violent intent towards Stride, at the spot where 15 minutes later she is found dead, is a far more likely candidate to have been the culprit. Added to that the description of BS man tallies quite well with the description of Joseph Lawende's suspect of the same night.

[Abby Normal]

i can sum up the whole stride sub mystery in two words:

peaked-cap man.

[c.d.]

Two violent encounters on the same woman; at the same location, within 10 minutes must be seen as very unlikely- although of course not impossible.

This is it in a nutshell. Except how do you know that what Schwartz saw was "violent?" What was the cause? Who was the instigator? What were the intentions of the B.S. man? Or are you seeing it in light of what eventually happened to her?

c.d.

[Herlock Sholmes]

i can sum up the whole stride sub mystery in two words:

peaked-cap man.

Welcome back Abby.

[c.d.]

i can sum up the whole stride sub mystery in two words:

peaked-cap man.

Welcome back, Abby.

"Peaked-cap man" Why it is almost as if you never left.

c.d.