Suspect Witnesses?

[Wickerman]

This very much sounds like the same couple.

Hi Chris.

That is your conclusion, but conclusions can wash over the details.
Some have drawn conclusions by ignoring details.

What I want to know is, how a girl who told us she was present from 12:00-12:30, but did not stand at the corner, could be the same girl who was present from 12:45-1:05 while standing at the corner?

Explain please.

[Wickerman]

When the alarm of murder was raised a young girl had been standing in a bisecting thoroughfare not fifty yards from the spot where the body was found. She had, she said, been standing there for about twenty-minutes, talking with her sweetheart, but neither of them heard any unusual noises.

A young man and his sweetheart were standing at the corner of the street, about twenty yards away, before and after the woman must have been murdered, but they told me they did not hear a sound.


It is established almost beyond doubt that the poor creature met her death some time between twelve and one o'clock. And yet no one seems to have heard a struggle, or a groan, or the slightest indication of what was going on. From twelve o'clock till half-past a young girl who lives in the street walked up and down, and within twenty yards of where the body was found, with her sweetheart.

"We heard nothing whatever," she told a reporter this morning. "I passed the gate of the yard a few minutes before twelve o'clock alone. The doors were open, and, so far as I could tell, there was nothing inside then." "I met my young man (she proceeded) at the top of the street, and then we went for a short walk along the Commercial-road and back again, and down Berner-street. No one passed us then, but just before we said "Good night" a man came along the Commercial-road; and went in the direction of Aldgate."

Your solution is:

They then walk together along Commercial Road and then back again to the junction with Commercial Road and together they then walk down Berner Street to stand on the corner, where they then remain for about 20 minutes.

Except, that you are ignoring the time window provided by the witness.
She said the whole scenario occurred between 12:00-12:30 am, which must be from when she set off from home (12:00 am) to meet her boyfriend at the top of Berner St., to when she said goodbye to him at 12:30.

Like I said previously, we can all make scenarios work, if we ignore details that do not fit.
The challenge is to include all the known details in any theory.

This proposal also makes it difficult to see the story given by Schwartz playing out in front of them, if they saw and heard nothing.

There is another scenario whereby the couple had stood for 20 minutes at the junction with Commercial Road and Berner St, and just as they said goodnight, a man walks past them heading towards Aldgate as they are standing on the corner of Commercial Road.

The couple then walk down Berner Street as he takes the girl home to her house in Berner St.

So, did they stand for twenty minutes at the junction of Berner and Fairclough? Or at the junction with Berner and Commercial Road?

You're not suggesting Mortimer could see this couple all the way at the top of Berner Street, are you?