The Mizen scam

[Fisherman]

Not sure, Abby - most people who don´t finger Lechmere as the killer tend to see the Cross name as either a name that followed him from his start at Pickford´s, was given in hommage to his stepfather or was used colloquially, while "Lechmere" was reserved for signing documents and naming kids.

I also think that it would have been an extremely long shot to expect leniency from using a name that was very common, and had only attached to a PC nineteen years earlier.

But it´s good to know that all angles are explored, Abby!

All the best,
Fisherman

[icicle]

Ruby, I can't seem to send you a PM. Perhaps because I am new?

[icicle]

Ah, so he didn’t use the name Cross just to ‘stay off the radar’ generally; he also used it ‘to mislead the police’. Well it may sound simple enough on the surface, but how would it work in practice? How in heaven’s name would changing his name to Cross (while giving his home and work address) have ‘misled’ the police?

This argument, or something like it, has been going on since I first heard of Lechmere, about five days ago. Far as I see, he undeniably told the police his name was Cross, it is undeniably a risky policy if Mr Plod comes calling at his home. No reasoning that starts at the police station can do any better than 'stepson of a policeman gets special treatment which probably falls short of forgiving him for murdering tiny prostututes', therefore the reasoning starts earlier. A tribute to his stepfather? Hmmm.. Iffy. The stepson of a policeman was probably ostracised by his peers growing up. Plus 'murder witness name change' is a dubious tribute.

So its none of these reasons, and, as the name change wouldn't protect him from the neighbours reading his address in the papers and his wife finding out from them anyway, it wasn't to protect his wife.

No, he was forced into it. Possibly.

Forced by a mistake he made. Consider this scenario.

He might be standing there, contemplating the last bit which is lifting her skirt way up, or, more likely I think, he might be at the body, knifing it - knifing the disease out that he caught when he was going through a rough patch with his wife - a disease he thinks might have caused the sickness of his last child. (Speculation there based on the timings of his children's births).

He turns around to check no-one has crept up behind him while the later than expected train is going by, and in the streetlight at the east end of Bucks Row he sees a figure. 'OMG' he thinks, 'its the rozzers, PC Plod is early, I'm done for'. He steps away from the body while Robert Paul is still dazzled by the pool of light he is in - but all Lechmere can think of is coppers.

And what happens next is well discussed, but at some point, as they walk west, Paul will have introduced himself, and Lechmere with his psychopathically attuned social sucking-up reflex turns to shake his hand without thinking, and automatically lies with the first name that comes to mind.

Then he has to stick with it?

[Cogidubnus]

I know the passenger trains take half an hour or more, but that is because the pesky passengers insist on getting on and off all the time. 3.30 suggests a journey time of 23 minutes for a goods train and that might sound reasonable, but thinking about it - its still not right. It shouldn't take 23 minutes for a goods train from New Cross to Whitechapel. Assuming they go 20 miles an hour in a city, like my Dad says, or even faster.. (start around page 49)

http://books.google.com/books?id=j2s...cident&f=false

..at least till 1885 when they got restricted to only 15 mph through the Thames Tunnel part, I make it about 16 minutes from New Cross to this side of Whitechapel.

Harriet should have heard that train about 3.23. She might well have called that half past, but it wasn't.

Now if she is fixing the time by a train, there can't be too many trains - otherwise I'd say she had the wrong train or perhaps mistook it for a coal train heading for the south coast.

I'm thinking the train was late that night.

[Edited to add] And that link said something about trains from New Cross often being late setting off - some technical reason I didn't understand.

Sorry, I can't make your link work...which is a shame because I'd be interested in learning that technical reason...

But either way, with respect, without the 1888 routing diagrams you don't really know what regular signalling or other delays this train was subject to...not to mention any shunting movements which might've applied...and if the trains from New Cross WERE regularly late setting off then who knows...

Facetiously I suppose I could ask if the 0307 from New Cross WAS due at 0323, and as you say, ran late that night...then what's wrong with 0330?

But I won't do that..and why? Because my paternal grandmother lived in Dyke Road Drive Brighton, right under the embankment wall of the main Brighton to London Railway, throughout the 1950s/1960s and swore blind that she could tell the time by the trains...to my knowledge she could certainly do this fairly accurately at night because I stayed there on numerous occasions and saw her doing so...so I'd guess if the good lady reckoned the train went by at 0330 then it probably fairly regularly did...

All the best

Dave

[icicle]

Sorry, it cut the link short. Try this. Go to Google books search, type in '"new cross" east london accident'

Choose 'Annual Reports, Returns, Etc*By Great Britain. Railways' then read page 49 onwards. There is lots of detail, including likely stop signals up ahead.

All that was really wrong with 3.30am was I could not explain the presence of the train. It didn't feel right. Now I realise you can place the 3.07 from New Cross on the scene any time you please after 3.23am so there is no need, far as I can tell, to exclude Harriet Lilley's account on grounds of timing.

It was quite interesting, reading all about railway accidents and watching all the finger pointing. Human nature never changes. Plus learning the history behind the place I lived in. I was up till 5.30am last night reading that. Fascinating to hear about your relative too. I heard about a guy you could stand, blindfolded, on any street corner in London, and he could tell you where he was by the sound the busses made. Even more amazing he found a woman who thought this was very attractive and married her.

[Mr Lucky]

Hi Fisherman,

I'll get back to you in the next day or so, I'm really busy RL

All that was really wrong with 3.30am was I could not explain the presence of the train. It didn't feel right. Now I realise you can place the 3.07 from New Cross on the scene any time you please after 3.23am so there is no need, far as I can tell, to exclude Harriet Lilley's account on grounds of timing.

Hi Icicle

Yes that's pretty much the conclusion I'd come to, and though everyone today assumes the 3.7 passed at exactly 3.30, the press at the time said it was approximately 3.30

'It has been ascertained that on the morning of the date of the murder a goods train passed on the East London railway at about half-past three - the 3.7 out from New-cross' Lloyd's 9th Sept. 1888

[Lechmere]

Icicle
The Cross-Paul evidence makes it fairly clear (in my opinion) that they did not exchange names.

However I think it is quite likely that when Charles Lechmere went to the police station and gave Cross as his name he did not appreciate that he would be roped into the inquest nor that he would have to give his address and workplace.
As it is it seems probable that he avoided giving his address in open court.

Once he turned and faced Paul it set in train a series of events that followed on almost inexorably.
But when he did turn and face – rather than flee – he could hardly have anticipated it, not least because he would not have known whether Paul was a policeman or not and what sort of person Paul was.
As it turned out Paul was the ideal type for his purposes.
I share some of your views of the type of person we are dealing with.

A braggart, but also a wimp (Paul says that when Charles Lechmere approached him he thought he was going to be mugged – Charles Lechmere even though he had just discovered a body was not perturbed about Paul approaching him – I wonder why?) with a guttersnipish attitude to the police born of petty villainy or more likely wanna-be petty villainy. The type who would call the police ‘the filth’ nowadays. Some one who was naturally guilty (hence his emphasis that Polly had been dead a long tom - useful for Charles Lechmere) but also suggestable (he took his timings for the early death from the first lurid press reports). A weak willed character. The sort who would abandon a woman in the street who may have fainted after being raped. Yet would want to be seen to be decent by pulling her skirt down a bit.
Anyway once Charles Lechmere was with the easily manipulated Paul, everything went OK. Charles Lechmere got him to touch the body and then abandon it. He got him to walk off together and then breeze past the first policeman they met – inconveniently close to the murder scene. Then he established where Paul worked and they went their separate ways with Paul knowing next to nothing about Charles Lechmere.
Then the braggart Paul goes running to the press.

This pushes Charles Lechmere to go to the police where he had to give his details and then to the inquest.

It was a question of Hobson’s Choice for Charles Lechmere. But I suspect that the main person he wanted to keep in the dark was his wife who will have known him better than most. It looks like he succeeded in this.

On a different note, it would seem that the reason I successfully avoided the attentions of the Filth, I mean the Rozzers, when I strayed south under or over the water, was because you seem to have been monopolising their manpower.
I can only be thankful that I must have been in the Albany (for some reason pronounced Al-bany instead of Awl-bany) while you were in Dun Cow or I might have joined poor Dixie, spark out on the cobbles.

[Fisherman]

Mr Lucky:

"I'll get back to you in the next day or so, I'm really busy"

Fine, fine. I´ll keep an eye open!

The best,
Fisherman

[Mr Lucky]

It´s a good thing when people demand absolute proof for things, but it is also good when it is accepted that in the absence of such proof, the indications and circumstantial evidence can be enough to draw valid conclusions from anyway. Different people will call for different amounts and differing quality when it comes to circumstantial proof - but in this case, I find it totally uncontroversial to lay down that what Mizen says establishes that Lechmere was not one of two men that spoke to him - he was the only man who spoke to him.

Hi Fisherman,

You have a good argument about this, and I agree that not all is what it seems, but I’ve come to a different conclusion about what happened. My explanation includes Cross telling Mizen that there was a policeman at the scene and Paul hearing every word of this ! And both men talked to Mizen.

But going back to your interpretation, why does Paul say that he spoke to Mizen if he didn’t ? you have this argument based around Paul character, that he’s claiming the starring role for himself in the Lloyd’s article, ok then why does he mention Cross at all. If the big story is finding the body, and if he wanted to exaggerate his role in the mornings events then why doesn’t he claim that he found the body, talking to Mizen isn’t the big news here, it’s finding Nichols. Why would Paul exaggerate his role talking to Mizen but not about finding the body ? He is after all, only talking to the press, why not claim he was there first and grab all the limelight ?

Rather than Paul being a small time criminal or an egotist or having any sort of negative label attached to him, to explain his behaviour, I think he’s basically a good man and someone who is just taking a passing part in the events, and he’s actually trying to be helpful !!

Btw, We know Paul was fetched up in the middle of the night. It’s quite difficult to explain why this has happened without Cross incriminating Paul somehow, no one else appears to have been subjected to a nocturnal raid by the police. but the elephant in the room is why does Paul think he’s been fetched up in the night because of his ‘remarkable statement’ in Lloyd’s and not because the police think he’s the murderer, how has he been left with that impression ? (this is especially awkward to explain if he’s a street wise minor criminal, or some kind of egotist who think the world revolves around them)

Or does anyone think that the night time raid was about his Lloyd’s article ?

On a side note, Mr Lucky - were you not in the process of publishing on Lechmere? Is that still in the pipeline? I´m curious about what it is you have looked into.

Oh I’ve looked into everything! and some of my work actually fits with your’s and Lechmere’s version of event, but a lot of it now travels a different path. The article is now 40+ pages and I’ve been reliably informed it contains ‘too much information’ so it still needs working on to thin it out and make it a bit more readable and that’s only part one. Hopefully it’ll be published soonish.

Cross is a suspect who is so suspect, he’s got two theories implicating him as the murderer of Nichols !!

But for example, I’ve got a ‘hot potato’ that you haven’t with your theory (ha-ha)

Best wishes.

[Rubyretro]

Ruby, I can't seem to send you a PM. Perhaps because I am new?

I think that it's because you are new. I will see if it is possible for us ' ole timers' to abuse 'newbies' by PM, without them having a right to reply...

Otherwise, we will have to put our 'Rick' conversation off until a later date.

I have to tell you that whenever I find myself 'challanged' during my day, I am increasingly asking myself 'what would RICK do ?'

[icicle]

Icicle
The Cross-Paul evidence makes it fairly clear (in my opinion) that they did not exchange names.

I've found it hard to believe a word either of them say

However I think it is quite likely that when Charles Lechmere went to the police station and gave Cross as his name he did not appreciate that he would be roped into the inquest nor that he would have to give his address and workplace.

Ah. I didn't think of this. Good point. He goes there saying "my name is Cross I want to give my statement, I'm ever so 'onest, an' 'elpful". Different starting point, same end result. I just thought, as Paul seems the social sort, he'd want to observe the social niceties, as it were.

But when he did turn and face – rather than flee – he could hardly have anticipated it, not least because he would not have known whether Paul was a policeman or not and what sort of person Paul was.
As it turned out Paul was the ideal type for his purposes.

Interesting choice, wasn't it? Turn and face trouble and have a hand in how it turns out, or flee and leave your wellbeing to chance. It says a lot that he instinctively chose a modicum of control. A confident character. Fisherman says serial killers are not like us, but this one is like me in some respects.

You ever think the reason he showed up for the inquest in workclothes might be nothing to do with work, or his wife, primarily? It occurred to me it was a social signal. Everyone else is in their Sunday Best and he is the guy who can't afford a suit or is too thick to know he should wear one. Like the judge once said to the lady barrister who addressed the court without her wig and gown "where are you? I can't see you?" Yeah, playing 'umble, but more than that, in a place where people you need to know about are all wearing suits, and trying to enhance their social status, he is there practically invisible in dazzle camoflage. Disguised as the 'elp. Overhearing many an interesting conversation, I should think. In those days, the 'suits' really were your 'betters' so he goes all out to look as stupid as he can. He understands people.

I share some of your views of the type of person we are dealing with.

They jump out of the page, all of them.

Charles Lechmere even though he had just discovered a body was not perturbed about Paul approaching him – I wonder why?

Oooh! Hadn't thought of that.

[on Paul] Some one who was naturally guilty (hence his emphasis that Polly had been dead a long tom - useful for Charles Lechmere) but also suggestable (he took his timings for the early death from the first lurid press reports).

Didn't know that either, thanks!

A weak willed character. The sort who would abandon a woman in the street who may have fainted after being raped. Yet would want to be seen to be decent by pulling her skirt down a bit.

You have met my friend Rick, haven't you??

Anyway once Charles Lechmere was with the easily manipulated Paul, everything went OK.

Yeah, it would. A psychopath can be spotted at the age of five. By me anyway. They say whatever it takes to get what they want, and then they spend decades practicing, day in, day out, on the nice people. Spidey senses tingling, reaching into your mind, looking for whatever makes you tick then simply playing the percentages if they draw a blank, which they often will with an Autistic, heh, they really hate us Autistics - anyway imagine you spent all day juggling. Imagine how good you would be by Lechmere's age. Easy as breathing, an unconscious process that is just there when you need it. You would soon feel superior to everyone else.

I mean, I've seen good people who can do this. Its like watching Derren Brown crossed with Obi Wan Kenobi. The thought of a nutter doing it... man... most people have no idea..

He got him to walk off together and then breeze past the first policeman they met

Yup. And Paul would have thought Lechmere was doing him a favour.

Then the braggart Paul goes running to the press.

I'm surprised he didn't end up disembowelled himself.

It was a question of Hobson’s Choice for Charles Lechmere. But I suspect that the main person he wanted to keep in the dark was his wife who will have known him better than most. It looks like he succeeded in this.

I'm still wondering about her. The Narcissists I have known, have, oddly, preferred fearsome women, though the Narcissists I have known have been a bit nicer than the textbook examples. The Pure Psychopaths have preferred dishrags, or getting a strong woman and turning her into one.

On a different note, it would seem that the reason I successfully avoided the attentions of the Filth, I mean the Rozzers, when I strayed south under or over the water, was because you seem to have been monopolising their manpower.
I can only be thankful that I must have been in the Albany (for some reason pronounced Al-bany instead of Awl-bany) while you were in Dun Cow or I might have joined poor Dixie, spark out on the cobbles.

Hahahah! Glad to be of service! But I never drank at the time. I was going out to get a takeaway baked potato when this rapist tried it on in full public view of everyone leaving the local pubs. He had followed me to the shop and he followed me almost home. I couldn't fight him off and no-one came to help.

Which gave me an idea. I stopped fighting and decided if he wanted to come home that much, he was coming. I grabbed him by the hair and dragged him home and bashed his face down on to every bollard on the way because the noise he was making was possibly disturbing the neighbours, and I am nice to my neighbours. Course I had no plan for what to do when I got him home, but I thought my boyfriend might want a stern word with him at least.

All he did was pick the guy up, dust him off, light him a cigarette and agree I was a madwoman then send him on his way. About 15 years later I see his stupid smirking supercilious face in the papers with a bit less curly hair and find out he killed some girl, had sex with her dead body and his defence - defence mind you - was that she was already dead when he found her so he thought he might as well.

[Fisherman]

Double posting - sorry.

[Fisherman]

Mr Lucky:

"My explanation includes Cross telling Mizen that there was a policeman at the scene and Paul hearing every word of this !"

I have myself thrown forward the possibility that this was so - that Lechmere talked Paul into going along with this bluff. Lechmere could have said that they really needed to alert the first policeman they came across, and that they would easiest get him to quicken his pace by the "other PC" bluff.
It is a possibility - but as it stands, I think it´s wiser to lean against the Echo that speaks of "the other man, who went down Hanbury Street". Plus Mizen never says a word about Paul speaking to him, it´s always "a" man, just as he blames just the one man for not telling him the graveness of the case. It adds up best that way, to my mind.

"He is after all, only talking to the press, why not claim he was there first and grab all the limelight ?"

Possibly because he knew that Mizen would blow that story out of the water - and once that was done, he would seem rather pathetic. It´s but a short warmth to pee in you pants, as we say in these parts. Also, he may have given the risks involved in putting yourself in place as the sole finder of Nichols some long and hard afterthought.

"Rather than Paul being a small time criminal or an egotist or having any sort of negative label attached to him, to explain his behaviour, I think he’s basically a good man and someone who is just taking a passing part in the events, and he’s actually trying to be helpful !!"

I don´t think of him as a small time criminal. I see him as a very meek braggard. He much reminds me of my wifes dog, when I first met her - that dog would call any fierce Dobermann out to fight, as long as he felt somebody was holding his leash. Once you gave slack, his tail went between his legs and he scooted in behind you. As for the helpfulness, it was more or less ordered by Lechmere, remember. I am in no way certain that it would have been there otherwise. And Paul is anything but helpful visavi the police - he stayed away from them as best as he could, apparently.

" We know Paul was fetched up in the middle of the night. It’s quite difficult to explain why this has happened without Cross incriminating Paul somehow..."

How about by murdering Chapman a hundred yards from where Paul worked? Surely that would do the trick?

"... the elephant in the room is why does Paul think he’s been fetched up in the night because of his ‘remarkable statement’ in Lloyd’s and not because the police think he’s the murderer, how has he been left with that impression ?"

When you are not a killer, then I think it is very hard to accept that somebody thinks you may be. To Paul, the suggestion will have been preposterous, probably.
I also think that we need to weigh the two things together. Paul did not give the police much credit in that interview, and that may have reflected on what the men that dragged him from his bed said and did. That could be part in the explanation too.

"some of my work actually fits with your’s and Lechmere’s version of event, but a lot of it now travels a different path."

I´ve gathered that much!

"Hopefully it’ll be published soonish."

I agree!

"Cross is a suspect who is so suspect, he’s got two theories implicating him as the murderer of Nichols !!"

Spells disaster for him.

"I’ve got a ‘hot potato’ that you haven’t with your theory"

I hate cliffhangers - get that show on the road, Mr Lucky. And good luck with it!

The best,
Fisherman

[FrankO]

...or flee and leave your wellbeing to chance.

Hi Icicle,

First of all, welcome to the boards! Secondly, I have a small comment that might give you a little more perspective regarding your remark above. Back in those days, the best chance the police had of catching a killer was to catch him in the act or to get a confession. If a killer could get away from the crime scene without being noticed, there was a very good chance he was never going to be buckled at all. Unless, of course, he himself talked or otherwise attracted suspicion.

All the best,
Frank

[Lechmere]

To provide yet more perspective, if the killer had been walking down Bucks Row – say on his way to work – for the previous ten or so weeks, then he might be aware that a beat policeman often appeared from a westerly direction at around that time.
If this hypothetical killer had got into a ‘killing zone’ that absorbed his mind for maybe 30 or more seconds while he was tearing at Polly’s body and what remaining senses he had were focussed on that westerly direction, then it can be seen that someone could approach from the opposite direction and remain undetected for a short while.
Once he became aware of this someone, this new presence, the hypothetical killer will have been aware that if he fled as quietly and swiftly as possible, just as the new presence reached the body he, the killer, might be alongside the beat copper. If the new presence cried out ‘Murder’ then the beat copper would probably stop him, the killer, in his tracks.

I find it slightly remarkable that some posters on here persist in resisting the possibility that a psychopathic killer - bearing in mind the sort of mental traits we would be dealing with – would turn and ‘fight’ rather than ‘fly’.
This lack of understanding actually underpins why psychopaths are so difficult to pin down as ‘normal’ people are unable to comprehend what they are dealing with.