Suspect battle: Cross/Lechmere vs. Hutchinson

[Fisherman]

Hi Fish
I disagree. I think Lech, as well as hutch, could have stayed out of it, and if the police came and found them-could have just said "I did not want to get involved". end of story, no risk, no trouble-happens everyday.

Wrong. With Hutchinson, all the police would have had, would be a story telling them that there was a man outside Miller´s Court for a period of time.

They would feel the need to look at him, but they would not necessarily suspect him.

With Lechmere, they would know that somebody was seen standing by a freshly killed body, a man that could have been there for ten minutes, cutting away. Later, this man disappears.
They would seek him out thinking that he was the killer.

In my universe, the two are worlds apart in suspect magnitude.

The best
Fisherman

[Westbourne Wink]

Very, um, insightful...

You've failed to mention what a 'guilty' first impression would have been?

'At first I thought it was the body of a freshly murdered woman'?

The fact he tries to make out it was a tarpaulin is further proof he was trying to distance himself from the real situation. No one else mistook her for a tarpaulin, it was clear to everyone else it was a woman lying on her back.

And if he thought it was a tarpaulin why did he go over to start inspecting it?

At the inquest into Nichols’ death, Cross says that first impression he had upon seeing the body was that he thought it was a tarpaulin.

I remember reading several years ago, that one of the main indicators that police and psychologists look for when assessing the truthfulness of a witness, is what their first reaction was when the saw the scene, in this case a body.

Because the witness is looking at something which is totally unexpected, he or she will attempt to rationalise the sighting on the basis of past experience.
In this case, Cross stated that he initially thought that the body of Nichols was in fact a tarpaulin.

This is because a dead body, or even an unconscious person is the very last thing his brain would be expected to process, hence his initial impression that the body was a tarpaulin, or a pile of clothes etc.

I think that his initial statement misinterpreting what he saw is strongly indicative that he was in fact telling the truth.

[Westbourne Wink]

Thanks Abby, you're very reasonable.

Got a little heated there, maybe not needed! But I do find the arrogant dismissiveness of some posters irritating.

[Fisherman]

Very, um, insightful...

You've failed to mention what a 'guilty' first impression would have been?

'At first I thought it was the body of a freshly murdered woman'?

The fact he tries to make out it was a tarpaulin is further proof he was trying to distance himself from the real situation. No one else mistook her for a tarpaulin, it was clear to everyone else it was a woman lying on her back.

And if he thought it was a tarpaulin why did he go over to start inspecting it?

Once again, if he was the killer, then HE MADE UP THE STORY ABOUT THE TARPAULIN AND ABOUT BEING UNCERTAIN WHAT IT WAS!
If he was the killer, he actually never looked at the body from across the street - he walked into Buck´s Row with Nichols, killed her, was disturbed, got up, backed into the middle of the street and awaited Paul´s arrival.

There was never any sequence when he pondered what the shape was. He knew what it was, he didn´t have to ask himself - because he put it there himself if he was the killer!

The best,
Fisherman

[Westbourne Wink]

Fisherman I get that. I think you're missing my point (which is in agreement with yours... actually.)

It's farcical to claim Lechmere's line that he thought it was a tarpaulin was a sign of his innocence as there is no offering for what a guilty interpretation would be, especially because, as you say, if he killed her then there was no need for interpretation at all!

What that leaves us with is a blatant example of someone trying to come up with, possibly subconsciously, a 'innocent sounding' reason to be crouched over the murdered body of a woman.

But in trying to sound innocent he merely confirms his guilt.

[Rosella]

He may have thought "Oh, a bit of tarpaulin! I'll take that. It might be handy". Sometimes things are just as people say they are.

[Jon Guy]

He may have thought "Oh, a bit of tarpaulin! I'll take that. It might be handy". Sometimes things are just as people say they are.

Indeed, Rosella.
One thing a carman might find use for is a tarpaulin !!

[Fisherman]

Fisherman I get that. I think you're missing my point (which is in agreement with yours... actually.)

It's farcical to claim Lechmere's line that he thought it was a tarpaulin was a sign of his innocence as there is no offering for what a guilty interpretation would be, especially because, as you say, if he killed her then there was no need for interpretation at all!

What that leaves us with is a blatant example of someone trying to come up with, possibly subconsciously, a 'innocent sounding' reason to be crouched over the murdered body of a woman.

But in trying to sound innocent he merely confirms his guilt.

Well, the way I see it, what he does is to offer information that takes the edge off any thoughts the inquest jury could have had about guilt on his behalf.
He has had a day to think things over, and decide which parts need go into his story, and he delivers them on the inquest day:

He arrived at the site only thirty or forty yards before Paul - so he could not be the killer.

He had only just stepped out into the street as he heard Paul - so he could not be the killer.

He was not close enough to see what the bundle was until he heard Paul arriving. So he could not be the killer.

He urged Paul to look at the woman together with him. So he could not be the killer.

Add to this that the police knew that he had approached them on his own inititative, not once but twice, and it is easy to see why they never pondered him in the killer´s role.

It is not until we look at the oddities that another picture emerges.

-He should not even have been in Buck´s Row at 3.40-3.45.
-He said that he would no doubt have noticed if there was anybody by the body as he entered the street. That means that he was sure that the sound of his own footfalls would not obscure any movement 130 yards away.
-In spite of this, he did not hear Paul until he had covered the first hundred yards, having only 30 left! How on earth does that work?
-And Paul said nothing at all about hearing or seeing Lechmere in front of him.
-What business did he have to approximate the distance to Paul as he first heard him? How would it benefit the inquest? It is a totally superfluos piece of information, designed to reach one thing and one thing only if I am correct - to establish that the gap of time was not enough for Lechmere to have been the killer.

Please also note how Lechmere first says that he felt sure that the woman was dead, only to then say that when he first saw her, he thought that she had been outraged and gone off in a swoon, as per the Daily Telegraph: "In his opinion deceased looked as if she had been outraged and gone off in a swoon".

And how did Paul word it in the paper interview that we suggest was what made Lechmere approach the police? Well, here it is: "I thought that she had been outraged, and had died in the struggle".

And what does Paul say about his meeting with Lechmere? He says that: "He came a little towards me, but as I knew the dangerous character of the locality I tried to give him a wide berth. Few people like to come up and down here without being on their guard, for there are such terrible gangs about. There have been many knocked down and robbed at that spot."

... and Lechmere says that: "He stepped back and waited for the newcomer, who started on one side, as if he feared that the witness meant to knock him down".

So he echoes the Paul interview, more or less. It is as if he had read it before going to the inquest...

The best,
Fisherman

[Fisherman]

Indeed, Rosella.
One thing a carman might find use for is a tarpaulin !!

... and there´s the old tarpaulin scavenging myth again! A few more mentionings and it will become a truth!

My bet is that Pickfords actually supplied whatever tarpaulins that were needed - he was not his own man, you know.

The best,
Fisherman

[Jon Guy]

... and there´s the old tarpaulin scavenging myth again! A few more mentionings and it will become a truth!

I think it has become a fact now.
All Carmen got to have their tarpaulin, second only to the carman`s knife ... :-)

[Fisherman]

I think it has become a fact now.
All Carmen got to have their tarpaulin, second only to the carman`s knife ... :-)

If you can´t argue, jest.

Fine. So far, that´s as good as the criticism against the Lechmere theory has gotten. I can live with that.

The best,
Fisherman

[barnflatwyngarde]

I think it is the other way around. If we see a melon with two dots on it, we interpret it as a face. If we see this: , we see a smiling face.
We are very much inclined to read another person into whatever shape or form we are presented with, regardless if it IS a human being or not.
Nervous people with guns in their hands will fire away at moving tree branches, since they think they see an arm in motion.

We see a face on a smiley, or on a melon, or in the clouds because our brain can interpret shapes, shades and angles as something meaningful.
Probably the best example of this phenomenon is The Man in the Moon, and the Cydonia Face on Mars.

It doesn't alter the fact that it is a mishmash of shades and shapes.

I don’t see that Cross gained any advantage by telling the Police that he initially interpreted the body as a tarpaulin. Would he have been more of a suspect if he had told the Police that he could see immediately that it was a body?

You think that he felt it was a tarpaulin. But that predisposes that he was not the killer in the first place.

This is a huge leap of logic.
There is simply not enough evidence to carry this sweeping statement.

The implication is that the evidence against Cross is so overwhelming that I
have to produce evidence that he was not the killer.
Surely the onus is on those who advocate Cross as the killer to produce the required evidence.

Diemschutz testified at Stride’s inquest “I looked to see what the object was, and observed that it was something unusual, but could not tell what”.
So here we have another witness who had difficulty processing what he was looking at.

The earlier post by Fisherman in reply to my admittedly offhand dismissal of Cross, was an excellent one.
He clearly laid out those points that need to be considered when discussing Cross as a viable suspect, or at the very least as someone who demands further investigation.

I still feel that Cross’s testimony in regard to discovering Nichols' body has the clumsy ring of truth. Nothing I have read in the posts so far has led me to change my opinion.

But it is only an opinion, I could be wrong, I've been wrong before.

Poor old Cross, when he discovered the body of Nichols his brain employed the principles of Occam’s Razor, and he didn't even know it.

[Fisherman]

barnflatwyngarde: I don’t see that Cross gained any advantage by telling the Police that he initially interpreted the body as a tarpaulin. Would he have been more of a suspect if he had told the Police that he could see immediately that it was a body?

Maybe a little bit - "How was I to think that it was a BODY? Poor, unsuspecting me? No, I thought it was just a tarpaulin."

Sort of.

This is a huge leap of logic.
There is simply not enough evidence to carry this sweeping statement.

The implication is that the evidence against Cross is so overwhelming that I
have to produce evidence that he was not the killer.
Surely the onus is on those who advocate Cross as the killer to produce the required evidence.

Yes, of course. But there is no huge leap of logic to point to how the perspectives change when we look at him as the killer. If you don´t want to do it, then don´t. There are no implications in it at all, other than pointing to how it could be a superfluos discussion whether he thought he saw a tarpaulin or not.

Diemschutz testified at Stride’s inquest “I looked to see what the object was, and observed that it was something unusual, but could not tell what”.
So here we have another witness who had difficulty processing what he was looking at.

I´m sure you can find dozens of them if you look hard enough. And?

The earlier post by Fisherman in reply to my admittedly offhand dismissal of Cross, was an excellent one.
He clearly laid out those points that need to be considered when discussing Cross as a viable suspect, or at the very least as someone who demands further investigation.

I laid out a number of them - not all.

I still feel that Cross’s testimony in regard to discovering Nichols' body has the clumsy ring of truth. Nothing I have read in the posts so far has led me to change my opinion.

I think he was after that, exactly - the clumsy ring of truth. The slightly morose "Yes, Sir", "No, Sir" performance.

But it is only an opinion, I could be wrong, I've been wrong before.

Welcome to the club - I´m the chairman!

But really, out of interest, how do you regard the fact that he felt he needed to approximate how far away Paul was when he first heard him? It could be significant or not, but I find it interesting that he nails the exact things he needs to nail to get of the hook.

The best,
Fisherman

[Harry D]

He did?

So you are saying that I cannot prove that he killed in 1888, but you can prove that he didn´t in 1889-1920?

Great stuff.

I don't need to prove a negative. The burden of proof lies with you to link Crossmere with other cases after the Whitechapel murders. Unless you want us to believe that he suddenly stopped and lived a 'normal' life for the rest of his days.

[Fisherman]

I don't need to prove a negative. The burden of proof lies with you to link Crossmere with other cases after the Whitechapel murders. Unless you want us to believe that he suddenly stopped and lived a 'normal' life for the rest of his days.

Yes, when you firmly state that Lechmere was not active as a killer before and after 1888, you have made a stement that requires bolstering. It would of course be comfy for you if this did not apply, but it does.

As for wanting you to believe anything at all, I have no such desires - you can believe what you want. I am after the truth, and not after having you believe anything at all.

The best,
Fisherman