Rating The Suspects.

[GBinOz]

Did someone mention cricket?

Not long until the holy grail commences in Australia. The Ashes! In case anyone was wondering. The best from blighty against the colonials. Bring it on!!

[Trevor Marriott]

Good points c.d.

We’ve had this suspect/person of interest discussion on here before but I’ve never understood why it should be thought of as important. If we did distinguish between suspects and persons of interest it would just introduce something else for us to disagree on. If you thought someone deserved to be a suspect but I thought that they should only be a person of interest how would we decide? Would we nominate someone to be the oracle who makes the final decision? Vote? Would we still accept the decision?

I notice from your list you have not mentioned who I believe is a prime suspect Carl Feigenbaum, aka Anton Zahn a German Merchant seaman who at the time of the murders was employed as a German Merchant seaman for the Nordeutscher German Shipping line, which had merchant ships in London on the dates of all the murders. He can formally be identified through crew lists as being In London as late as 1891 the date of the Coles murder.

Following him leaving the sea he emigrated to New York when in 1896 he murdered a woman by cutting her throat. He was arrested fleeing the scene and executed in 1896. He told his lawyer prior to execution that he was in London at the time of the murders and his lawyer believed him to have been JTR.

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[andy1867]

There’s nothing uninformed about that opinion Andy. I’d say that perhaps the likeliest ‘solution’ is that it’s an as yet unnamed man, whether a local or not.

(It sounds like you are a fellow cricket fan, I’m from the West Mids but you are of the White Rose variety I assume)

I am very much so....funnily enough though Ian Bell was my favourite cricketer, saw him get a century against Pakistan at Headingly can't remember the year.. at his peak he would have been great in the current side
I found Druitt extremely interesting, but its when the facts are skewed by some authors favourite, i tend to dismiss it and I think it was on here or a podcast where it was posited that Druitts form had dropped off..Then saw in his last games he took 5 for not many in one game and 3 in the other, so wondered "God knows what he was like when he was "ON" form lol

[GBinOz]

It seems like wounding should be counted as worse than threatening,

Yes, I agree. I am put in mind of the Henry Fonda argument in 12 Angry Men regarding hollow threats, and it being disagreed with until his opponent himself uttered a threat in a fit of anger. I tend to regard the alleged threat by Aaron Kosminsky towards his sister in this manner.

[Fiver]

Amendment #17

(E) Police interest > 2 = at the time (without exoneration)/1 = later (within 10 yrs and without exoneration)/0 = none known or not serious.

--- (A) (B) (C) (D) (E) (F) (G) (H) ---

09 = 2 - 2 - 1 - 2 - 2 - 0 - 0 - 0 : Puckridge, Oswald

Puckridge should be E = 0 since he was suspected, but exonerated at the time.

[Fiver]

(C) > 4 = committed murder with a knife/ 3 = used a knife during a murder/ 2 = wounding or threatening with a knife/ 2 = violence without a knife/ 0 = no known violence

I still have the question about fitting in Kelly.

Any thoughts?

It seems like wounding should be counted as worse than threatening, especially if the wounding was a failed attempt at killing. Likewise, someone who cut, or tried to cut a victim's neck should count higher than someone who stabbed the victim in the chest.

Perhaps
4 Murder
3 Attempted murder
2 Assault
1 Threats

Targeted the throat +1 to the above.
Alternate method of attack (Poison, etc) -1 to above.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I don’t want to over-complicate the criteria but I haven’t been happy with the (C) violence section since I changed it a while ago. I want it to be fair but it’s tricky. I’m not happy with raising the importance of the victim being a relative or not. It’s about the capacity for murder. I’ve pretty much made my mind up to remove it. It’s currently this:

(C) Violence > 4 = killed woman (non-relative) with knife/3 = killed female relative with knife/

2 = violence with a knife/1 = violence without a knife/0 = no known violence.


I certainly wouldn’t be comfortable with leaving Kelly out of this section because he killed with a chisel. To me stabbing someone in the neck with a chisel is the same as doing it with a knife. So this is a possible (though it seems a bit clumsy to me):


(C) > 4 = killed a woman using a knife/ 3 = used a knife during the murder of a woman or used a tool to cut or stab/ 2 = the wounding or threatening of a woman with a knife/ 2 = violence without a knife/ 0 = no known violence


Or, I could simplify it further:


(C) > 4 = committed murder with a knife/ 3 = used a knife during a murder/ 2 = wounding or threatening with a knife/ 2 = violence without a knife/ 0 = no known violence

I still have the question about fitting in Kelly.



Any thoughts?

[c.d.]

I see no real point or benefit to having to use an asterisk every time we use the word suspect with an explanatory note of well he was actually more of a person of interest.

I think we are probably done with this discussion unless someone wants to take it in another direction.

c.d.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I've been on here years, and still am of the maybe , "Uninformed" opinion thats its an unknown local man.....So I don;t have a particular problem with dragging everybody into the "Suspect" category.
Obviously you need some meat on the bones, and its one step further when you eliminate or another, but you need reasons, mine are usually really spurious, due to lack of research..I.E Druitt...no cricketer would EVER do that...(Unless from Lancashire maybe..so Maybricks up there)

There’s nothing uninformed about that opinion Andy. I’d say that perhaps the likeliest ‘solution’ is that it’s an as yet unnamed man, whether a local or not.

(It sounds like you are a fellow cricket fan, I’m from the West Mids but you are of the White Rose variety I assume)

[andy1867]

I've been on here years, and still am of the maybe , "Uninformed" opinion thats its an unknown local man.....So I don;t have a particular problem with dragging everybody into the "Suspect" category.
Obviously you need some meat on the bones, and its one step further when you eliminate or another, but you need reasons, mine are usually really spurious, due to lack of research..I.E Druitt...no cricketer would EVER do that...(Unless from Lancashire maybe..so Maybricks up there)

[c.d.]

This does seem like a pointless exercise. Yes, from a police perspective Trevor is correct. But as Herlock points out we are looking at the case unofficially from the perspective of being Ripperologists. I mean from a practical standpoint should the thread header be changed from favorite suspect to favorite person of interest? It is what it is.

c.d.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Yes but many of the names of modern day suspects never even came to the notice of the police at the time of the murders. they are names researchers have put forward over the years with no tangible evidence to back up their suspect status

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

Why does that matter Trevor? As long as we know that, in Ripperological terms, ‘suspect’ and ‘person of interest’ are interchangeable then all’s well.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Good points c.d.

We’ve had this suspect/person of interest discussion on here before but I’ve never understood why it should be thought of as important. If we did distinguish between suspects and persons of interest it would just introduce something else for us to disagree on. If you thought someone deserved to be a suspect but I thought that they should only be a person of interest how would we decide? Would we nominate someone to be the oracle who makes the final decision? Vote? Would we still accept the decision?

[Trevor Marriott]

I would also add that someone could be a person of interest because the police believe that they might be able to provide information that could be helpful to the investigation but they themselves are not a suspect. But someone could also be a person of interest because something about them is suspicious and the police want an explanation. So if a person of interest is suspicious does that make him a suspect? You are getting into semantics but it would seem they are a suspect or quasi-suspect or "suspect" until they can provide adequate explanations for their behavior.

c.d.

Yes but many of the names of modern day suspects never even came to the notice of the police at the time of the murders. they are names researchers have put forward over the years with no tangible evidence to back up their suspect status

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[c.d.]

I would also add that someone could be a person of interest because the police believe that they might be able to provide information that could be helpful to the investigation but they themselves are not a suspect. But someone could also be a person of interest because something about them is suspicious and the police want an explanation. So if a person of interest is suspicious does that make him a suspect? You are getting into semantics but it would seem they are a suspect or quasi-suspect or "suspect" until they can provide adequate explanations for their behavior.

c.d.