Did the Seaside Home ID happen?

[Chris]

Then that would rule out Aaron Kosminski would it not ?

Why should it?

[Chris]

Fitness to plead and insanity [MacNaughten] are again different things.

Yes, I know. My initial post mentioned both.

[Chris]

There is no evidence, because we know that no witness ever saw the crimes being committed.

Yes, I've already made this point above. My post about insanity and fitness to plead was in response to some remarks by JohnG.

[John G]

But in order for anyone to stand trial sane, or insane, there has to be the evidence to first charge them. The arguing about certifiably insane or not surely starts thereafter.

There is no evidence, because we know that no witness ever saw the crimes being committed. At level best if either Lawende or Schwartz identified the person they saw with the victims prior to their death. I would suggest that as that stands on its own would not be enough to ever get anyone charged.

The Met were supposed to have instigated this ID and so their witness if it did take place could only have been Schwartz. But if they were so sure in the first instance, sure enough to go to all this trouble then why did they not involve the city police and take Lawende with them after all two positive id`s would perhaps given them the corroboration they needed.

No records from City police corroborating such an ID and after all I am sure in any event they would have wanted to be involved even if they had subsequently carried out their own ID

Answers as to why because it never took place in the way it has been suggested. Aaron Kosminski has been wrongly looked upon as a prime suspect based mainly on the questionable marginalia entry, which if written by Swanson was recorded after Macnaghten had eliminated the man name Kosminski previously put forward by him.

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

Hello Trevor,

But might not this suggest that the police had additional evidence that didn't rely on the ID? As I've noted before, Grainger represents a clear precedent in respect of this issue; he was also clearly identified, probably by Lawende but, despite the additional factor of the Alice Graham murder, the police clearly considered such an identification as being insufficient, by itself, to warrant bringing charges.

As the Pall Mall Gazette pointed out at the time, in respect of the Grainger ID: "there is one person whom the police believe to have actually seen the Whitechapel murderer with a woman a few minutes before that women's dissected body was found in the street. That person is stated to have identified Grainger as the man she saw. But obviously identification after so cursory a glance, and after the lapse of so long an interval, could not be reliable; and the enquiries were at length pulled up in a cul-de-sac."

[Hunter]

The Met were supposed to have instigated this ID and so their witness if it did take place could only have been Schwartz...

.
Then you have forgotten the Coles murder (Met investigation) and the case against James Thomas Sadler where a city witness in the Eddowes case was reportedly used in an ID attempt of Sadler. And no City police records apparently remain of that either.

Grainger was Met also and apparently confronted by the same witness.

[Phil Carter]

Perhaps again I am being naive here..but surely it is normal in most circumstances for the witness to be brought/asked/escorted/accompanied to the suspect in order to carry out an identification?

You see..The "with difficulty" problem is removed from the equation then.

I also note that it has been suggested that the suspect may have been staying/visiting/resident at said Seaside Home.
In which case..WHICH Seaside Home? Because I was under the impression..perhaps falsely, that the Seaside Home in question was first suggested as the Police Seaside Home, by Don Rumblelow. In which case..what is a non police officer..even non ex-police officer..doing there?

There existed other Seaside Homes..Some of them Jewish.
Which would be rather more logical for a poor Jewish person to be visiting/resident/sent to/accompanied?

That is before we consider the even more logical scenario of the Seaman's Home in Whitechapel itself.

Everything is poor on the proof front..IMHO.

Phil

[Monty]

"The fact is that an arrest doesn't appear to have been made, so the question is; why? You, Trevor, and one or two others think the absence of an arrest indicates that the iD never took place"

Whoop, there is is.

I'm glad someone can work through Marriotts muddying of the waters, and is able to see the parade for what it most likely was.

Monty

[Monty]

Many Seaside Homes were available for hire, not just by the police, but also by companies for use by their employees.

It was a common thing.

Monty

[Jonathan H]

Is 1895 the key to all this?

Anderson and Swanson both imply that the Ripper--who had for all practical purposes confessed at that alleged confrontation, and it was only the Judas witness that prevented justice--had been positively identified by early 1889, and deceased soon after that.

Even if we allow for a fading memory compressing events regarding Aaron Kosminski, e.g. between the years 1888 and 1891, that still leaves the oddity of a Ripper witness confronting Grant in 1895--if the newspaper account is correct and it may not be.

Since the same article quotes Swanson as saying the best bet is that the real murderer is deceased, you would think that it would have been put to him by the "Pall Mall Gazette" reporter that there had reportedly been a positive identification--of Grant, likely by Lawende--that led nowhere. In other words, if that had not happened the sneior policeman would have corrected the record.

But ... why would Scotland Yard bother to humiliate themselves all over again--in 1895!--with a Ripper connection to a malicious wounding of a prostitute in the East End, if Anderson and Swanson had already identified Jack as a suspect who had practically confessed at a witness confrontation held sometime between 1888 and 1891 (supposedly at a police convalescent hospital of all places)?

I do not think they would have been that silly. Ergo the witness confrontation between Kosminski and anybody never happened, at least not between 1888 and 1891.

I think that Anderson in the immediate aftermah of the Grant fizzer telling Major Griffiths (as Alfred Aylmer) that he had a perfectly plausible theory that the Ripper is locked up in a madhouse coincides with the chief learning about " Kosminski". Before that moment, in 1895, the local Polish immigrant had just been a name on a list. Now he was catapulted to the top and accepted by Anderson and presumably Swanson as Jack.

What is more it is possible, as had been pointed out before, that Anderson was unaware that Macnaghten strenuously disagreed with him about the viability of Kosminski if--and I stress if--Swanson's annotation, about all the chiefs accepting this, does not refer to the identity of the hoax reporter but to the identity of the chief suspect.

Why did this man suddenly become the chief suspect in 1895?

Because "Kosminski" was sectioned as insane, demonstrably violent to a female, lived near all the murder sites, was an abomination (e.g. a self-abuser), had been protected by his own people and had been safely deceased for several years (the notion of a witness and a confession, of sorts, does not appear in the extant record until 1910).

Therefore it was only in 1895 that Anderson and Swanson zeroed in on the Polish suspect and this would also make sense that, as the former's memory fell apart in the Edwardian era, his mind replaced the Tory Matthews with the Liberal Harcourt as the Home Sec during the murders. Not only because both had been Home Secretaries but also due to the latter being the nation's Treasurer in 1895.

The year a Jewish witness allegedly affirmed to a prime Ripper suspect, and yet nothing came of it. Within a very short time of that disappointment both Anderson and Swanson are telling writers, who have readers, that they are confident of a solution.
.

[Phil Carter]

Many Seaside Homes were available for hire, not just by the police, but also by companies for use by their employees.

It was a common thing.

Monty

Hello Monty,

Thank you..and indeed.

However I am yet to see any evidence of this in this Kosminski Seaside Home story.

I see more evidence of police and a identification situation in The Seaman's Home plausibility.

None of this means though that any Kosminski ID actually took place. There is no solid evidence for it, as far as I am aware.

What we have is ridden with holes that are at odds with known facts. It simply cannot be relied upon as trustworthy.

Phil

[harry]

PaulB,
Why do I restate things.Same reason you and others do.Had you not addressed a response to a post using my name,I would not have needed to restate anything.You talk about nit-picking.

[Trevor Marriott]

"The fact is that an arrest doesn't appear to have been made, so the question is; why? You, Trevor, and one or two others think the absence of an arrest indicates that the iD never took place"

Whoop, there is is.

I'm glad someone can work through Marriotts muddying of the waters, and is able to see the parade for what it most likely was.

Monty

I am not muddying the waters I am trying to cleanse them of all the different scenarios being banded about of here which go against known procedures.

Perhaps you would care to enlighten the masses as to what you suggest the ID parade was then?

Any ID parade is an important evidential part of a case especially when the only evidence is identification, so everything about it has to be done correctly otherwise the police risk losing their case.

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Trevor Marriott]

Hello Trevor,

But might not this suggest that the police had additional evidence that didn't rely on the ID? As I've noted before, Grainger represents a clear precedent in respect of this issue; he was also clearly identified, probably by Lawende but, despite the additional factor of the Alice Graham murder, the police clearly considered such an identification as being insufficient, by itself, to warrant bringing charges.

As the Pall Mall Gazette pointed out at the time, in respect of the Grainger ID: "there is one person whom the police believe to have actually seen the Whitechapel murderer with a woman a few minutes before that women's dissected body was found in the street. That person is stated to have identified Grainger as the man she saw. But obviously identification after so cursory a glance, and after the lapse of so long an interval, could not be reliable; and the enquiries were at length pulled up in a cul-de-sac."

Hi John

I am going to play devils advocate again

If the police had any substantial additional evidence then they could have used it to bring a charge in any event.

Of course there is one thing which has been overlooked here with all the different scenarios being banded about about. That relates to the witness himself, and to what he was actually being asked to give an identification on. We know no one saw any murders being committed or anyone leaving the scenes of the crimes, that would be prime evidence.

Anderson and others infer it was direct evidence relating to the murders, but that is not corroborated, so that leaves us to infer that perhaps it was not that, but perhaps simply the identification of someone seen with one of the victims prior to their death, in which case it puts a completely different light on all of this, a light which I can see many will want to extinguish.

With regards to the Grainger case I would say three things. The first is that no two investigations are the same, as to a precedent being set that is questionable simply because we don't know when the seaside ID is supposed to have taken place, and thirdly the only reference to the Grainger ID came from a secondary newspaper report

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[PaulB]

PaulB,
Why do I restate things.Same reason you and others do.Had you not addressed a response to a post using my name,I would not have needed to restate anything.You talk about nit-picking.

Never mind Harry. rest assured that in the future I won't bother to respond to your arguments, opinions, or whatever it is you are sharing.

[Monty]

I am not muddying the waters I am trying to cleanse them of all the different scenarios being banded about of here which go against known procedures.

Perhaps you would care to enlighten the masses as to what you suggest the ID parade was then?

Any ID parade is an important evidential part of a case especially when the only evidence is identification, so everything about it has to be done correctly otherwise the police risk losing their case.

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

What are the purposes (plural) of an identification parade Trevor?

And what were those known procedures?

Monty