What makes Druitt a viable suspect?

[Sam Flynn]

and I cant understand why you cant understand just what it takes for someone to become a real suspect. You keep banging on about MM thought he was a good suspect

You're equating "real suspect" with "good suspect". They're not the same thing.

[Sam Flynn]

Trevor is like one of those dolls with a string in its back that recites one of half a dozen stock phrases every time you pull it - pull: 'History is there to be challenged and not readily accepted.' Pull: 'You need to take a trip to Specsavers...' Pull: 'You have your head stuck in the sand...'

Pull: "Do you want your lawn mown, missus?"

[PaulB]

Hi Paul,

I understand your frustration. It's "reviewer 2" comments. But seriously, as I see it, this all boils down to definitions, you are insisting suspect means "those who have been suspected" and Trevor means "those form who guilt is likely", and the two definitions clash because the same word is being used for two very different concepts. Those definitions reflect very different ... "starting points"? ... in terms of backgrounds. In the end, though, it boils down to the same thing, everyone admits the MM is not gospel, it has demonstrably been proven to have factual errors. But, everyone also knows it expresses MacNaughten's beliefs, and so reflects his suspicions at the time, or to be even more cautious, what he was willing to state as his suspicions. After that, we're arguing about whether or not the word "suspect" applies, and that depends entirely on things other than the evidence we have, it depends upon the concept we hold the word "suspect" to mean. Trevor, as one example, holds it to mean something very different from what you hold it to mean. You appear to hold it to mean "one against whom suspicion has been laid", and Trevor appears to hold it to mean "one for whom guilt appears likely", and those are not the same concept. The argument reflects differences that arise from the complexity of having a common language.

- Jeff

Hi Jeff,
I don't think it arises so much from the complexity of the language, as it does from Trevor's insistance on applying jargon. 'Suspect' only means 'one for whom guilt seems likely' in modern police parlance. It's not what you or I mean by 'suspect', and I'd submit that it wasn't what Macnaghten meant when he wrote that 'many homicidal maniacs were suspected' either. There also isn't any great purpose in trying to categorise suspects into 'person of interest' and 'suspect'; for Macnaghten Druitt was self-evidently a cast-iron suspect, and since we don't know on what evidence that conclusion was based, who are we to say Druitt was merely a 'person of interest'? Trevor is happy to call Druitt that because Trevor has already made up his mind, but those who think he's wrong will reject that.

[The Baron]

He was a man with no police or investigative experience, his role when joining the police would not have been an investigative role, but administration as it is still the case today with officers of senior ranks. That lack of experience in policing would perhaps have made him innocently vulnerable to being fed a story and leading him to believe what he was told without question, or further investigation. In fact in the memo he makes no mention of the results of any investigations into the "suspects" he names

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

Begg would have known this, but he started to ignore the obvious in favour of his "suspect".

I think its a mankind thing that we cannot avoid.


The Baron

[PaulB]

But you cant conclude it was evidence, it might just have been idle chit chat as I have said before, and that doesn't amount to evidence. You seem hell bent on upholding the belief that what he was told was valuable and potentially damaging evidence, and it might well have been, but again as it seems he did nothing with what he was told, or told anyone about this evidence or abiut his suspicions that might have identified the ripper we can infer that it was nothing of any consequence, because if it was we would be here discussing it in a sensible manner.

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

I'm not concluding that it was evidence. You are concluding that it wasn't. That's the difference. As far as I am concerned it could have been evidence, it could have been idle chit-chat, or it could have been a reading of the leaves in his morning cup of tea. The point is that we don't know. However, there are lots of things upon which we can base an educated conclusion, a simple one being the type of man we can believe Macnaghten was, how his contemporaries regarded him, whether or not their is evidence that he reached conclusions hastily, prematurely, or on gossip, and so on and so on. All that suggests that Macnaghten was not likely to have concluded that Druitt was the murderer on something so insubstantial as an inconsequential bit of gossip expressed over a glass of sherry, or that Macnaghten was such a dolt as to have expressed his beliefs in a report possibly intended for his superiors. You, on the other hand, seem hell bent on presenting Macnaghten in that way and with no evidence. But I honestly don't think you listen or care; you don't want Druitt to be in the frame, so you just repeat the same old arguments, even the same words and phrases, over and over, never taking anything on board.

[PaulB]

I've told you, but you chose to ignore this, Ostrog!

Read what the historian Sugden wrote about Macnaghten suspecting Ostrog, and tell me if you can find the word Misleading somewhere.

There was absulotely nothing, and please don't tell me that you can judge and evaluate the case now better than Abberline.



The Baron

And I told you that Macnaghten didn't suspect Ortrog, so what's your argument?
And instead of trying to be clever, why don't you answer the questions I asked about Abberline? You need to know when the Abberline investigation happened and when the information Macnaghten talks about was received by the police. Then you can talk about Abberline.

[JeffHamm]

Hi Jeff,
I don't think it arises so much from the complexity of the language, as it does from Trevor's insistance on applying jargon. 'Suspect' only means 'one for whom guilt seems likely' in modern police parlance. It's not what you or I mean by 'suspect', and I'd submit that it wasn't what Macnaghten meant when he wrote that 'many homicidal maniacs were suspected' either. There also isn't any great purpose in trying to categorise suspects into 'person of interest' and 'suspect'; for Macnaghten Druitt was self-evidently a cast-iron suspect, and since we don't know on what evidence that conclusion was based, who are we to say Druitt was merely a 'person of interest'? Trevor is happy to call Druitt that because Trevor has already made up his mind, but those who think he's wrong will reject that.

Hi Paul,

Jargon is language though, it's just specialized. And yes, Trevor has drawn his line in the sand pertaining to a particular ... suspect. I too have drawn my line, but my line is more of the nature of avoiding "suspect solutions" because I'm not convinced the evidence gets us that far. I do enjoy hearing/reading about people's ideas, but I always find myself noting where "solutions" fail to consider alternative forks in the road, so to speak. That aside, categories like POIs, etc, serve a communicative purpose for sharing ideas in that they convey complex concepts combining various amounts of suspicion and just need to clear; as in, a white truck was spotted near the scene of the crime, the driver is a POI because we want to know who it was for no other reason than they were spotted, and family members are POIs because most crimes involve someone close to the victim - these are incidental reasons to cast "suspicion", but not the kind of "suspicion" that makes a person "suspect". You and I, and others, use "suspect" to describe people more than just those sorts of POIs, people that need to be cleared "Just because". Others think of "suspects" as closer to the end of the spectrum that becomes the "accused", which requires more evidence against them than is required if suspect is applied closer to the POI end. This difference in criterion is, I think, at the heart of it. If you think "suspect = accused" then the MM is not sufficient, but if one takes "suspect" to be closer to the POI end, then the MM is all you need. That criterion difference, or semantic definition if you will, changes how one will read and interpret a post/message/text, etc. For those like me, who don't place the holy grail at the "solution" but more at the "what's the clearest picture we can derive", then "suspect" is a term that can be used how ever one wants to use it, because it is in the end, irrelevant.

- Jeff

P.S. Did I mention we came 6th in the pub quiz? ha ha

[PaulB]

and I cant understand why you cant understand just what it takes for someone to become a real suspect. You keep banging on about MM thought he was a good suspect but that was only on what he had been told, and that was the family believed him to be, he got it all indirectly which must weaken what he subsequently wrote years later.

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

'and I cant understand why you cant understand just what it takes for someone to become a real suspect.' What it takes for someone to be suspected is suspicion.

That's it, Trevor. No great mystery.

Now, you were a policeman and you are using police definitions and police terminology. But they don't apply in the real world. Ordinary people don't draw a distinction between a 'person of interest' and a 'suspect'. In fact, I have never heard anyone who is not a policeman use the term 'person of interest' in general conversation. And, as said, Macnaghten clearly made no such distinction. So why don't you just drop the jargon.

[PaulB]

He was a man with no police or investigative experience, his role when joining the police would not have been an investigative role, but administration as it is still the case today with officers of senior ranks. That lack of experience in policing would perhaps have made him innocently vulnerable to being fed a story and leading him to believe what he was told without question, or further investigation. In fact in the memo he makes no mention of the results of any investigations into the "suspects" he names

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

And he might not have been 'innocently vulnerable to being fed a story'. Perhaps he was acutely aware of his vulnerabilities and was hyper-vigilant to make sure that he didn't take any old story on trust. Or maybe he was an educated and intelligent businessman who was able to distinguish between good and bad evidence.

You seem to assume that such possibilities as you suggest don't occur to anyone else and get taken into consideration. The first thing one does is try to establish the stort of person Macnaghten was, who he was writing for, how gullible he was, and so on. Those and lots of other questions are asked in an effort to determine whether Macnaghten's conclusions about Druitt were likely to be based on good or bad evidence.

You are speculating. But you have no evidence to support your speculation. You haven't produced a jot of evidence or argument to show that Macnaghten was the sort of man who'd get suckered into believing Druitt was Jack the Ripper on zero evidence. And that's why you are biased.

[Trevor Marriott]

I'm not concluding that it was evidence. You are concluding that it wasn't. That's the difference. As far as I am concerned it could have been evidence, it could have been idle chit-chat, or it could have been a reading of the leaves in his morning cup of tea. The point is that we don't know. However, there are lots of things upon which we can base an educated conclusion, a simple one being the type of man we can believe Macnaghten was, how his contemporaries regarded him, whether or not their is evidence that he reached conclusions hastily, prematurely, or on gossip, and so on and so on. All that suggests that Macnaghten was not likely to have concluded that Druitt was the murderer on something so insubstantial as an inconsequential bit of gossip expressed over a glass of sherry, or that Macnaghten was such a dolt as to have expressed his beliefs in a report possibly intended for his superiors. You, on the other hand, seem hell bent on presenting Macnaghten in that way and with no evidence. But I honestly don't think you listen or care; you don't want Druitt to be in the frame, so you just repeat the same old arguments, even the same words and phrases, over and over, never taking anything on board.

Well the conclusions to suggest it wasn't far outweigh the ones that say it was.

I have no agenda, I have investigated all what is known about the known suspects, and have written up the results of those investigations for all to see and read in totally unbiased fashion. As to Feigenabum he is what I would define as a likely "suspect" based on what is known, he could have been responsible for one, some, perhaps all, or maybe even none, due to the passage of time we will never know, but he is a better suspect than Druitt.

I think it is time for all to now draw a line under this thread, days of constant bickering have achieved nothing but hey whats new.

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Trevor Marriott]

And he might not have been 'innocently vulnerable to being fed a story'. Perhaps he was acutely aware of his vulnerabilities and was hyper-vigilant to make sure that he didn't take any old story on trust. Or maybe he was an educated and intelligent businessman who was able to distinguish between good and bad evidence.

You seem to assume that such possibilities as you suggest don't occur to anyone else and get taken into consideration. The first thing one does is try to establish the stort of person Macnaghten was, who he was writing for, how gullible he was, and so on. Those and lots of other questions are asked in an effort to determine whether Macnaghten's conclusions about Druitt were likely to be based on good or bad evidence.

You are speculating. But you have no evidence to support your speculation. You haven't produced a jot of evidence or argument to show that Macnaghten was the sort of man who'd get suckered into believing Druitt was Jack the Ripper on zero evidence. And that's why you are biased.

Well if MM`s line of thinking, and the formulation of his memo is anything to go by the answer is yes, he was vulnerable, he readily accepted the information he either gathered, or was put before him when asked to pen the memo.

If anyone has an agenda and a reason to support the MM it is you. You have in your book as I recall Kosminski as your favored suspect. So you have every reason to prop up the MM. Because if you reject the MM doesn't bode well for your early research and findings into Kosminski does it ?

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Herlock Sholmes]

Begg would have known this, but he started to ignore the obvious in favour of his "suspect".

I think its a mankind thing that we cannot avoid.


The Baron

1st. I’m not aware that Paul has ever said that anyone was Jack The Ripper? Perhaps you’re confusing him with some other Paul Begg (maybe a 41 year old doctor?)

2nd. If it’s a ‘mankind’ thing then it’s good to see that you stand outside of mankind in your perfection and so aren’t capable of being wrong. Only those that disagree with your childish arguments.

[Herlock Sholmes]

As to Feigenabum he is what I would define as a likely "suspect" based on what is known, he could have been responsible for one, some, perhaps all, or maybe even none, due to the passage of time we will never know, but he is a better suspect than Druitt.

Yes, we know your opinion and how you arrive at it. Like you Trevor I don’t mind repeating myself.

You state that Mac might have been misinformed or that he was simply gullible in accepting any old rumour or that his information might have come from an unsafe source. Fine. Those of us that are open-minded also accept the possibility.

Its strange though that things ‘change’ when we consider Feigenbaum.

We have no one to corroborate the fact that Lawton heard Feigenbaum’s confession. He might have lied to get his 15 minutes of fame. Feigenbaum might simply have mentioned that he’d been in London in 1890 so Lawton either connected the dots or made up a story.

You say that Macnaghten didn’t investigate the claim. He might have done so off the record. We might fairly ask why Lawton didn’t go to the police instead of the Press?

We don’t know for certain Mac’s source but we do know Lawton’s source. It was Feigenbaum who, in your own words, a compulsive liar. And a compulsive liar who must have been aware of the overwhelming likelihood that he was heading for the gallows. How do we usually treat the words of a compulsive liar? You believe them without question obviously. Yet you are happy to assume the worst of a man that was roundly respected and admired.

This is not an honest approach. Druitt is a better candidate than Feigenbaum. We know for certain that he was in the country at the time for a start (quite an important little consideration wouldn’t you say?’ But no, you would focus on the triviality that Druitt can’t be placed in Whitechapel.

Its very obvious who of us are taking an honest unbiased approach.

[Trevor Marriott]

Yes, we know your opinion and how you arrive at it. Like you Trevor I don’t mind repeating myself.

You state that Mac might have been misinformed or that he was simply gullible in accepting any old rumour or that his information might have come from an unsafe source. Fine. Those of us that are open-minded also accept the possibility.

Its strange though that things ‘change’ when we consider Feigenbaum.

We have no one to corroborate the fact that Lawton heard Feigenbaum’s confession. He might have lied to get his 15 minutes of fame. Feigenbaum might simply have mentioned that he’d been in London in 1890 so Lawton either connected the dots or made up a story.

You say that Macnaghten didn’t investigate the claim. He might have done so off the record. We might fairly ask why Lawton didn’t go to the police instead of the Press?

We don’t know for certain Mac’s source but we do know Lawton’s source. It was Feigenbaum who, in your own words, a compulsive liar. And a compulsive liar who must have been aware of the overwhelming likelihood that he was heading for the gallows. How do we usually treat the words of a compulsive liar? You believe them without question obviously. Yet you are happy to assume the worst of a man that was roundly respected and admired.

This is not an honest approach. Druitt is a better candidate than Feigenbaum. We know for certain that he was in the country at the time for a start (quite an important little consideration wouldn’t you say?’ But no, you would focus on the triviality that Druitt can’t be placed in Whitechapel.

Its very obvious who of us are taking an honest unbiased approach.

As you are obsessed with Feigenbaum might I suggest you go back and read the chapter on Feigenbaum because you are misinformed

Feigenbaum never confessed to any murders, not even the one he was found committing. The lead to follow up on Feigenbaum came from his lawyer in an article published in The National Police Gazette May 16th 1896 which he gave to the press outside Sing Sing prison, the same morning Feigenbaum had been executed in the electric chair and not at the gallows as you suggest.

Then his lawyer spoke:

"I have a statement to make," he said, "which may throw some light on this case. Now that Feigenbaum is dead and nothing more can be done for him in this world, I want to say as his counsel that I am absolutely sure of his guilt in this case, and I feel morally certain that he is the man who committed many, if not all of the Whitechapel murders. Here are my reasons, and on this statement I pledge my honor:

"When Feigenbaum was in the Tombs awaiting trial I saw him several times. The evidence in his case seemed so clear that I cast about for a theory of insanity. Certain actions denoted a decided mental weakness somewhere. When I asked him point-blank, 'Did you kill Mrs. Hoffman?' he made this reply: 'I have for years suffered from a singular disease, which induces an all-absorbing passion; this passion manifests itself in a desire to kill and mutilate the woman who falls in my way. At such times I am unable to control myself.'

"In pondering over this statement of Feigenbaum's I began to wonder whether the sensation he described might not form an explanation of other cases. I already knew that he had been working for many years as fireman on the Atlantic liners, sometimes on the Bremen boats, sometimes on the White Star, and at others on the French and Inman lines. He ceased to follow the sea about six years ago.

"On my next visit to the Tombs I asked him whether he had not been in London at various times during the whole period covered by the Whitechapel murders. 'Yes, I was,' he answered. I asked him whether he could not explain some of those cases on the theory which he had suggested to me, and he simply looked at me in reply. When I asked him again whether he was or was not guilty of Mrs. Hoffman's murder, he said: 'I'll affirm when I go on the stand and God will believe me just as well.'

"You will remember the cases of murder and mutilation of women in Wisconsin some years ago. On the trial we had some evidence that this man had frequently been in Wisconsin. The long knife with which Mrs. Hoffman was killed, and the whetstone produced at the trial bore the marks of a Wisconsin firm at Madison, I think. These both belonged to Feigenbaum, and he had carried them for some time"

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[PaulB]

Well if MM`s line of thinking, and the formulation of his memo is anything to go by the answer is yes, he was vulnerable, he readily accepted the information he either gathered, or was put before him when asked to pen the memo.

If anyone has an agenda and a reason to support the MM it is you. You have in your book as I recall Kosminski as your favored suspect. So you have every reason to prop up the MM. Because if you reject the MM doesn't bode well for your early research and findings into Kosminski does it ?


www.trevormarriott.co.uk

Well, it's really easy to say that about the memorandum, but as usual you don't support your case with evidence.

No, Kosminski isn't my favoured suspect. I don't have a favoured suspect. And Macnaghten doesn't make much difference to Kosminski anyway. So, sorry, you'll have to work harder to manufacture an agenda for me.