WH Bury Problems

[Rainbow]

From Wikipedia:

'Cannibalism is the act or practice of humans eating the flesh or internal organs of other human beings. A person who practices cannibalism is called a cannibal. The expression cannibalism has been extended into zoology to mean one individual of a species consuming all or part of another individual of the same species as food, including sexual cannibalism.'

I tend to believe Jack the Ripper was a cannibal, and that he wrote the 'From Hell' letter too

He eat the uterus of Chapman, the kidney of Eddowes and the heart of Kelly, and many organs from those torso killings too.


Rainbow°

[Fisherman]

Just noticed that you asked me a question, in this context:

Also your point about the abdominal wall cutting is a belabored one. It is not unreasonable to deduce that these forms of mutilation would involve a standard technique to gain ingress to the internal organs. And for that matter, were the Torso victims dismembered for practicality or sexual gratification, in your opinion? If the latter, this poses the question of why Mary Kelly wasn't dismembered at all, rather the killer focused on disfigurement and organ removal, as he did in the previous Whitechapel murder.

Right! So you ask if it would not be a standard technique to gain ingress to the internal organs, to take away the abdominal wall in flaps.

Like I said, searching high and low, I have found one (1) other example, that of a cannibal serialists who dried the meat of his victims before he consumed it. He cut the abdominal wall away and dried it too, then again since he cut away ALL the flesh of his victims and dried it, it stands to reason the abdominal wall would go the same way. There was another reason behind the cut away abdominal walls of the Ripper and Torso cases. Otherwise, I cannot find any other example at all, whereas I know that for example Edward Gingerich, the so called Amish killer, took out all the inner organs from his wife through a seven inch cut to her abdomen - no flaps neccesary.

So taking the abdominal wall away in flaps is anything but "standard procedure". By the way, if it WAS, then why did Bury not do it?

Now to your question: Did the Torso killer dismember for practical purposes or for sexual gratification?
The 1874 victim had one leg taken off at the hip, but the other leg was still in place, whereas both arms were gone. So the killer did not produce a much less bulky object than a body with legs and arms intact. Therefore, practicality seems to have been of little interest. That body was dumped in the Thames, and it would have been indifferent to the killer if there were three more limbs on it, I think - it had the full body lenght anyway, save the head.

Similarly, much as most limbs were disarticulated and skilfully plucked away from the 1873 victim, there was also an example of a leg sawed through.
Why would he do that?
If sawing was quicker, why not saw all limbs, if practicality was the idea? If disarticulating was quicker, why not do THAT in all cases?

I am satisfied that the disarticulation was something that the killer thoroughly enjoyed and that it belonged to the things he wanted to do or even felt an urge to do. For practical reasons, he could not do so to the Ripper victims, where time was an important factor, and where it would be impractical to bring a bonesaw along. On the other hand, he was able to do many of the things he wanted to in those cases to, and to me, the face floating in the Thames, the abdominal flaps, the colon placed beside Eddowes, the flesh cut away from Kellys thigh bone, the cutting of the intercoastals between her ribs, the annihilating of her face - these are all reflections of the mindset of the killer, who was working to an agenda that is very well mirrored in the results in both series.

[Scott Nelson]

What's your temperature, Rainbow°?