Criteria for plausibility

[Wade Aznable]

I absolutely agree.
What I really find interesting is that in respect to the "police suspects" and the "press suspects" (both contemporary and later), we have almost no clue about the "people's suspects", except maybe for Leather Apron / Pizer - where with "people's suspects" I mean the names on the local gossipmongers' mouths out of the pubs, in the streets, in the shops. Probably useless in respect to the big picture, but tremendously fascinating from a social point of view: therefore, I automatically jump in excitement each time I stumble on such tidbits as the graffiti on the slaughtermen's door!

Best regards,
W

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Wade,

Thanks for the kind words. I want to look into it a little more, and while I think Tomkins might have been a popular suspect even in to October, among some of the lodging house women, I personally do not think he murdered anybody.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Wade Aznable]

Tom, now you've got me curious (again!): as soon as I get out of the office I'll run home to check my Begg / Fido / Skinner / Sugden and so forth on good ol' Tomkins.
The fact prostitutes suspected him implies that he was abusive towards them? Or maybe that he was a "rougher-than-average" john?

As usual, a great pleasure to talk with you,
W

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Wade,

I'm also coming to think that Tomkins, the slaughterman, was a rather strong suspect among the prostitutes of the area, quite possibly even Pearly Poll.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Wade Aznable]

Hi Wade,

Following the press building up the slaughtermen as suspects in the murder, graffiti was left on their door to the effect of 'The Murderers are here'. I don't have a source to give you this second, but it was in the papers. I wouldn't put it past Jack to have done it himself!

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

A fascinating bite of info, thank you very much!
Best regards,
W

[Fisherman]

Miss Marple:

"Fisherman, as we know now, serial killers don't come fully matured [ with no previous history of criminal behaviour ] out of a normal life."

To be perfectly honest, miss Marple, "we" do not know this at all. Statistically, serial killers are people who have normally had problems with the police, yes, but a man like Dennis Rader also belongs to the statistics.
Apart from this, the fact that we have no criminal record on Lechmere, does not mean that he had not perpetrated criminal offenses, does it? He may well have done so, but been able to stay undetected.

"Serial killers often have a history of petty crime,[ Haigh, Heath, Christie, Brady] and a disfunctional background."

Yes? And ..?

"The crimes of Jack the Ripper appear to be that of a sociopath, his hatred of women, seems to suggest an inability to form relationships, lack of empathy, sense of superiority and other markers of the sociopath would fit the ripper crimes."

Ah! That was where you were going with this! A sociopath? Quite possibly - but sociopaths also marry. They generally are very good at "imitating" the lives of the people surrounding them, they cry when somebody is hurt because they are aware that it is expected of them etc. Therefore they are often quite able to form relationships.

"Charles Lechmere was married with four children ..."

Four? You need to count again!

"... so could sustain a normal relationship with a woman"

Do we know this? Do we know anything but from the fact that he was married and had children? Does that ensure "normality" relationwise?

"...he appeared to have a normal family life, and supported his family..."

Look at Rader, miss Marple. Look at Kürten, who was very affectionate about his wife. Look at Collins. Look at Ridgway, the perfect husband according to his wife.

"...he had a policeman stepfather who was probably a strong role model."

Do we know this too? Could he not have been a very oppressive man? Or a weak man? If so, why?

"If you have any evidence that Lechmere had an intense hatred of women, led a life of petty crime, or violence that would help towards his candidacy."

...and if I go by that description, I lock myself to a picture that may not have applied.

"What we know about him does not fit the profile.."

It does not fit YOUR profile, no. But it fits Raders, it fits Ridgways etcetera.

"...the fact that is route as a cabman was near ripper sites is hardly surprising."

We don´t know that he WAS near all of them - we only know that his working route was close to them and would potentially take him there at the approximate times of the killings. That is striking, to say the very least. Not all carmen lived in Doveton Street, miss Marple, and living in or close by that street is what makes him viable in this context.
Not all carmen had their mothers and daughters living in 147 Cable Street, and THAT is what makes him viable for the Stride killing.
There is nothing undramatic in the fact that this all falls in place. On the contrary, it is very much more specific to Lechmere than some will admit.

"I still find the use of' alias' a bit dramatic, he could call himself Cross, it was a name he had a right to use."

Aha. But I believe you stated that he used the name Cross all the way up to his marriage? Where´s the evidence for this?

"whatever the ripper was, he was not 'normal'"

Let me assure you, miss Marple: if Lechmere was the killer, then he was satisfactoraly unnormal.

The best,
Fisherman

[miss marple]

Fisherman, as we know now, serial killers don't come fully matured [ with no previous history of criminal behaviour ] out of a normal life. we understand psychological causes for serial killers,
Whenever suspects are discussed the the profile of the killer is least discussed, that is as important as other clues
Serial killers often have a history of petty crime,[ Haigh, Heath, Christie, Brady] and a disfunctional background.
The crimes of Jack the Ripper appear to be that of a sociopath, his hatred of women, seems to suggest an inability to form relationships, lack of empathy, sense of superiority and other markers of the sociopath would fit the ripper crimes.
Charles Lechmere was married with four children,so could sustain a normal relationship with a woman, he appeared to have a normal family life, and supported his family,he had a policeman stepfather who was probably a strong role model. He appears to have led a normal life apart from discovering the body of a ripper victim.
If you have any evidence that Lechmere had an intense hatred of women, led a life of petty crime, or violence that would help towards his candidacy.
What we know about him does not fit the profile, the fact that is route as a cabman was near ripper sites is hardly surprising.
Spitalfields is a very small place and most Eastenders if you analysed their movements would be close to ripper sites, as for example Joe Barnett was.
I still find the use of' alias' a bit dramatic, he could call himself Cross, it was a name he had a right to use. Eastenders changed names easily, names were more flexible .My own East End ancestors had name changes ,
I think the background of a candidate is very important for plausibility, whatever the ripper was, he was not 'normal'

Cheers Miss Marple

[Jonathan H]

Hi DRoy

To use Occam's Razor, eg. the simplest line, and so on, can lead to the argument that the Churchill quote -- about the Soviet Union -- is not applicable to Jack the Ripper because it is not a mystery.

It was solved in the Victorian era and revealed to be solved in the late Victorian and/or Edwardian eras.

That it was not solved is a notion, or theory, developed post-WWI in the 20's and, according to the razor, it is a myth because secondary sources are claiming to know more than people who were there.

Certain secondary sources such as Tom Cllen's 'Autumn of Terror' (1965), Paul Begg's 'Jack the Ripper--The Facts' (2006) and Stewart Evans and Paul Gainey's 'The Lodger (1995) argued this revisionist line; that it was solved as far as it could be without a trial at the time, or very soon after.

Because these authors favoured the veracity of different and competing primary sources (by different policemen) there is not a consensus about the, or an [alleged] Victorian police solution and probably never will be.

But that there were contemporaneous police who thought, or at least claimed -- three in public -- that there was a solution, about suspects whom we know really existed, is not in doubt.

[Hunter]

Not that it is necessarily the correct method, but personally I try to use Occam's Razor. In it's simplest form it means "the simplest answer is most often correct". This way instead of finding criteria that fits, I can at least filter out those that obviously don't (such as celebrities or suspects who's whereabouts are plainly documented to be elsewhere than London, etc).

Sound approach, DRoy.

Welcome to the forums.

[Bridewell]

Welcome

Hi DRoy,

Welcome to Casebook. Dismissing the Impressionists & Post Impressionists in your first post shows great promise. I look forward to reading your input in the future.

Regards, Bridewell.

Bridewell:

" (I've agreed with Fisherman again!)."

This is becoming increasingly unsettling ...

Fisherman

I know. (Actually I think we agree more often than we differ)

[Fisherman]

Bridewell:

" (I've agreed with Fisherman again!)."

This is becoming increasingly unsettling ...

Fisherman

[Fisherman]

Miss Marple:

"Just to remind you of Chris Scott's research, Cross was his stepfather, a policeman, and Cross used his name until he married, when he reverted to his birth name Lechmere."

I think all we have, Miss Marple, is a census listing signed with the name Charles Cross at the time when Charles was eleven. After that, we have no other signings with this name, and it seems very plausible that the person who did that actual signing was Thomas Cross, Charles´stepfather.
Surely we cannot take such a thing as any certain sign that Lechmere signed HIMSELF Cross up to his marriage? Is it not true that we have no other signatures on him as "Cross" between the census listing signature and the marriage license ditto? I know of no such thing. Do you?

"I don't sense he was the ripper, because he pulled down Mary Ann's skirt, the ripper shamed his victims by displaying them and pushing the skirts up to the waist."

Who says Lechmere pulled the dress down? It was Paul that did so, and witnessed about it. As for Lechmere, yes I do believe that he made the initial pulling, but that would have been in order to conceal the gashes in Nichols´s abdomen. He surely did bnot witness about it, at any rate!
And if you put two and two together, Miss Marple, and if we work from the presumption that he actually DID pull the clothes down, then you must realize that the were initially pulled UP instead, "shaming" Nichols as you put it. So that intention would quite possibly have been there - but self-preservation would have prevailed when Lechmere heard Paul approaching. That, at least, is how I see things.

"Lechme appears to be a respectable family man"

He does. And that would have conned the police, the inquest, the press and 124 yers of Ripperology. And this IN SPITE of how often we assert ourselves that the Ripper may well have been a typical nobody, an ordinary man on the surface - and then we scuttle off and look for a madman. You know, there is rather a full measure of irony built into that...

The best,
Fisherman

[DRoy]

Not quite sure how to ask this with out being too vague, but if you were to establish general bullet point rules for your own personal opinions on what makes a suspect viable, or even remotely plausible what would they be?

This question is too difficult to answer because the entire case including what is fact and what is fiction...is a “riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma” (Winston Churchill).

Not that it is necessarily the correct method, but personally I try to use Occam's Razor. In it's simplest form it means "the simplest answer is most often correct". This way instead of finding criteria that fits, I can at least filter out those that obviously don't (such as celebrities or suspects who's whereabouts are plainly documented to be elsewhere than London, etc).


ps: Thank you to Admin for giving me the opportunity to post and hopefully contribute something to this mystery. I am also really looking forward to having discussions with all who post here

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Wade,

Following the press building up the slaughtermen as suspects in the murder, graffiti was left on their door to the effect of 'The Murderers are here'. I don't have a source to give you this second, but it was in the papers. I wouldn't put it past Jack to have done it himself!

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Bridewell]

Going back to the original point of the thread, I think Fisherman makes a really good point. Being contemporarily suspected might add to the plausibility, but it is far from the only criterion that should be used. After all, many of us believe the police never were close to catching the Ripper.

Personally, I think the hallmark of a good candidate is two-fold. First, there must be some rational reason (contemporary or otherwise) to suspect him. This would exclude suspects like Van Gogh, but this is admittedly subjective. Given that a reason exists to suspect someone, a worthwhile person to investigate is one whom we can at least potentially rule out with further research. Science advances by falsification. That is why the research on Ostrog was so valuable: now we don't have to consider him. To the extent that further research does not rule the suspect out - and in fact raises more suspicions - then, inductively, the candidate grows in strength as a suspect.

Great post, Barnaby. Very well argued. (I've agreed with Fisherman again!).

Regards, Bridewell