Rating The Suspects.

[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.

[The Rookie Detective]

It’s not important Trevor. We’re looking at the case unofficially so we are free to use our own terminology.

Good points all around, Herlock. And even from an official perspective the terms suspect and person of interest are not hard and fast and rigidly defined. And a person of interest can become a suspect at some point.

c.d.

Totally agree, well said.

[c.d.]

It’s not important Trevor. We’re looking at the case unofficially so we are free to use our own terminology.

Good points all around, Herlock. And even from an official perspective the terms suspect and person of interest are not hard and fast and rigidly defined. And a person of interest can become a suspect at some point.

c.d.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I wish posters would stop using the term "suspect" when 99% of the names mentioned from the long list of suspects are nothing more than "persons of interest"

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

It’s not important Trevor. We’re looking at the case unofficially so we are free to use our own terminology. As I’ve said before, it would be different for police in an ongoing investigation. They would have to narrow down and prioritise and any errors made by them could have far-reaching consequences. This isn’t the case for us. No one is going to escape justice, no further victims might suffer. Ripperology is separate from an actual police investigation. In Ripperology a suspect is anyone that has been suspected at any time by anyone. As long as we all know that’s the case it causes no issues. We could call them ‘sheep’ and it wouldn’t matter as long as we all know what we mean.

[Trevor Marriott]

Hi George,

That’s a tricky one. It’s a fair point of course but I would be uncomfortable just calling his actions as “violence with a knife,” a category which could include minor wounding. I’m tempted to change the criteria “murder including knife use?”When you think about it I could also add “post mortem” mutilation as a category which is a rarity and only Bury would score.

I wish posters would stop using the term "suspect" when 99% of the names mentioned from the long list of suspects are nothing more than "persons of interest"

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[GBinOz]

Hi George,

That’s a tricky one. It’s a fair point of course but I would be uncomfortable just calling his actions as “violence with a knife,” a category which could include minor wounding. I’m tempted to change the criteria “murder including knife use?”When you think about it I could also add “post mortem” mutilation as a category which is a rarity and only Bury would score.

Hi Herlock,

It is a dilemma and I fully appreciate your reservation. However, I beg your indulgence on some considerations.

The C5 + Mckenzie +Coles all had the signature of the throat cut. There was evidence of strangulation (as opposed to garrotting ) but possibly only to induce unconsciousness and to lower the blood pressure, and not as a method to produce their death. I believe that every doctor attributed the actual cause of death to be the throat cut. The mutilations varied from none, Stride and Coles, to Kelly, in various gradations of severity, with Ellen Bury rating at the lower end of severity. Bury initially told police that his wife had suicided by hanging herself, but suicide by cutting her own throat would have been as, if not more, believable.

I take your point that a category of post mortem mutilation would be populated by a single representative, but that same representative fails to accommodate the basic requirement of the throat cut as the means of actually killing the victim. The throat cut was the means of producing a body for the ultimate purpose of dissection. The degree of dissection was dependant on interruption and perceived time available. Bury had even more time available than the killer of Kelly, but the mutilations were minimal.
As you suggest...a tricky question, with the decision within your purview.

Cheers, George

[Herlock Sholmes]

Thanks. I recommend dropping Thompson from a 2 to a 1 on physical condition.

Good point Fiver. He was described in mid-May of 1888 as “…a waif of a man…more ragged and unkempt than the average beggar, with no shirt beneath his coat and bare feet in broken shoes.” This was a guy sleeping rough apart from his time in Chelsea in that period. Malnourished and addicted to drugs. In the early part of the year he bought a large dose of laudanum so that he could commit suicide.

Yes, we have to be fair. Thompson’s health doesn’t preclude him but it adds a layer of doubt.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Hi Herlock,

I notice that you are still rating Bury as a 3 in category "C". As I pointed out in a previous post, as far as is known, Bury never killed anyone with a knife. He garrotted his wife and any injuries inflicted on her with a knife were post mortem.

Cheers, George

Hi George,

That’s a tricky one. It’s a fair point of course but I would be uncomfortable just calling his actions as “violence with a knife,” a category which could include minor wounding. I’m tempted to change the criteria “murder including knife use?”When you think about it I could also add “post mortem” mutilation as a category which is a rarity and only Bury would score.