Eye Witness Evidence

[GUT]

Time and again read references here, and elsewhere, to a suspect being great because he fits the eyewitness description, or in the clear because he doesn't.

Please read Jon Rees' great article in Ripperologist 143, eye witness identification is all but worthless. For years judges have had to give juries specific and detailed instructions about how they are to deal with such evidence.

[Mayerling]

Time and again read references here, and elsewhere, to a suspect being great because he fits the eyewitness description, or in the clear because he doesn't.

Please read Jon Rees' great article in Ripperologist 143, eye witness identification is all but worthless. For years judges have had to give juries specific and detailed instructions about how they are to deal with such evidence.

G'day GUT,

I guess the ayes don't have it!

Jeff

[GUT]

G'day GUT,

I guess the ayes don't have it!

Jeff

Maybe not the ears [or was that hair] either.

[Wickerman]

Agreed, the article is a pertinent reminder for both the researcher and the theorist alike.

With respect to the Pearly Poll example, many years ago I did read that soldiers out on the town would often exchange service tunics - like the jacket, to deceive any potential witnesses should any trouble arise.

If an incident did occur that night, when inquiries are made the rank of the offender will not match the physical description of the soldier.
For example, a sergeant, who sports a beard, will switch his jacket with a Private, who is clean shaven.

Any witness will swear the one implicated was a Private with a beard - deception is insurance. The subsequent line-up of soldiers out on leave that night will show that no such soldier exists.

The Pearly Poll incident strikes me as another example of this deception.

[martin wilson]

Hi all

And alibi's. Criminals say 'No guv' last Tuesday I was in the pub with Fred'.

Fred. 'Yeah, he was in the pub with me last week, I suppose it was Tuesday'.

In fairness the police are wise to this but it's interesting when a rock solid alibi is claimed for a suspect.

Btw, I keep coming across 'ginger poll' in newspapers of the period, which simply means someone with ginger hair. Could Pearly Poll mean she had grey or white hair?
all the best.

[GUT]

Hi all

And alibi's. Criminals say 'No guv' last Tuesday I was in the pub with Fred'.

Fred. 'Yeah, he was in the pub with me last week, I suppose it was Tuesday'.

In fairness the police are wise to this but it's interesting when a rock solid alibi is claimed for a suspect.

Btw, I keep coming across 'ginger poll' in newspapers of the period, which simply means someone with ginger hair. Could Pearly Poll mean she had grey or white hair?
all the best.

G'day Martin

I've never come across the Ginger Poll references, however if it was a common usage for a red head then your suggestion is eminently reasonable.

[Harry D]

Hi all

And alibi's. Criminals say 'No guv' last Tuesday I was in the pub with Fred'.

Fred. 'Yeah, he was in the pub with me last week, I suppose it was Tuesday'.

In fairness the police are wise to this but it's interesting when a rock solid alibi is claimed for a suspect.

Btw, I keep coming across 'ginger poll' in newspapers of the period, which simply means someone with ginger hair. Could Pearly Poll mean she had grey or white hair?
all the best.

That's why I was interested in the alibis of minor suspects who were arrested. This hypothetical scenario is perfectly plausible, but you could swap out the pub for 'doss house' or any other popular establishment and there you go. Whitechapel was overcrowded with people, it's not like the police would've expected everyone to remember that 'Joe Bloggs' was in the pub that night, but so long as one or two people could vouch for him, what else could the police do? It's not as if they had CCTV to rely on back then.

[Batman]

I would be very surprised with the volume of witness testimony given that they haven't captured the essence of what JtR looks like.

There are pre-capture photofits of many SKs that look identical to the person they are after.

Check this out -> It's from Biltons book on the yorkshire ripper. http://www.yorkshireripper.co.uk/hyp...0photofits.jpg (he is in the bottom right).

There is even a pretty poor drawing of BTK which looks just like Denis Rader.

While human memory is frail and doesn't transport us into the past, when we starting getting multiple hits for the same thing, it sets a trend we shouldn't ignore.

[Abby Normal]

I would be very surprised with the volume of witness testimony given that they haven't captured the essence of what JtR looks like.

There are pre-capture photofits of many SKs that look identical to the person they are after.

Check this out -> It's from Biltons book on the yorkshire ripper. http://www.yorkshireripper.co.uk/hyp...0photofits.jpg (he is in the bottom right).

There is even a pretty poor drawing of BTK which looks just like Denis Rader.

While human memory is frail and doesn't transport us into the past, when we starting getting multiple hits for the same thing, it sets a trend we shouldn't ignore.

Hi Batman
Bingo.
double event-Peaked cap man.

[MayBea]

According to studies, witnesses are right about the suspect's age only 40 percent of the time and completely wrong 40 percent of the time.

So there's a 40 percent chance of the Ripper being nowhere near 35.

http://www.researchgate.net/profile/...006f736e6d.pdf

Witnesses tend to estimate toward the median age of 30 to 35. Older suspects are commonly given ages 10 years younger even in daylight so Jack could be nearer 45.

I go with the old fogey. People look younger in the dark if anything, in my opinion.

[martin wilson]

Hi Harry D

One alibi trick is to go out after the crime and deliberately make yourself known to people. I read this in a book about James Hanratty.
It's an impossible task, all we have is the evidence from the time. The unreliability of eyewitnesses is known, the unreliability of alibis less so and cannot be disputed now, other than to be aware of it when someone claims this suspect could not have done it because he was elsewhere.
I believe alibis from family members are considered weak, and of course as time passes so are witness statements from friends or strangers.
Anybody can experience this, can you say what day you saw someone from say a month ago? With 100% certainty? As I get older and feebler I struggle to remember what I was doing yesterday!
Obviously someone could have slipped through the net, but as you rightly say, what else could the police do? And how at this juncture do we sift the evidence?
On the other hand it is worthwhile looking at the photofits in Bilton's book if you haven't seen them, my initial reaction was astonishment at the fact that Sutcliffe had been interviewed 9 times iirc and nobody put it together.
All the best.

[MayBea]

There are pre-capture photofits of many SKs that look identical to the person they are after.

Were any of the Ripper photofits or sketches done in the presence of the witness?

I think only the Packer sketch might have been and we can't be sure he saw the Ripper. The "Freddy Mercury" sketches would be equally if not more unreliable.

[Bigbellabongo]

I think in general the people who saw the victims with a man were generally accurate - they didn't (apart from Hutchison) give detailed descriptions, but could tell his height compared to the woman, the kind of appearance he had (shabby genteel, etc,etc) that would let you know that he was of the same class of people that lived in Whitechapel/Spitalfields.