Any updates, or opinions on this witness.

[Ben]

Hi Jon,

If you took the time to read my posts a little more carefully, instead of being in such tremendous haste to post all the time yourself, you would have noticed that I already addressed the issue of police concerns over Hutchinson’s late arrival.

We know that Abberline initially endorsed Hutchinson despite the latter only making himself known after the closure of the inquest, but unfortunately the buck did not stop with Abberline. He wasn’t the sole voice of the “authorities”, nor was he anything like the most senior amongst them.

You’re the one always going on about “divisions” within the police, and here may be another case in point. Regardless of Abberline’s initial non-issue with Hutchinson’s three-day tardiness, it is clear from the Echo’s proven correspondence with the police that it was very much an “issue” in the ultimate judgement of Scotland Yard.

Alternatively, Abberline might have given Hutchinson the benefit of the doubt initially, only to do an about-turn “in light of later investigation” reported by the Echo. Who knows precisely what that betokened, but it’s possible that Hutchinson slipped up when on walkabout with detectives in search of the non-existent Astrakhan man. Whatever occurred, it would only have been compounded by the numerous embellishments he made in his unsanctioned press interview.

Speaking of “terrible arguments”, to borrow your phrase, are you now suggesting that Hutchinson supplied Abberline with a candid, clandestine “reason” for coming forward late, which the latter didn’t bother to mention in his report to his superiors?

It’s fun the way the mystery “Sunday policeman” now stands accused of being afflicted by the same bizarre condition that you insist Hutchinson suffered from; becoming so obsessed with reading and collating only those press reports mentioning a “later” time of death that he closed his eyes and blocked his ears to anything that might lend support to a different time.

In the case of your mystery copper, the fixation was apparently so irrational that when a witness approached him in the form of Hutchinson with a story of potentially major importance, his first priority was to check whether it corresponded with selective press gossip and rumour. And if it didn’t, ignore it entirely.

Even if this mystery policeman was the incompetent buffoon that you and RJ would have us believe (but can’t), whose commitment to his professional duties only went as far as aligning himself with the latest press speculation, there were plenty of reports indicating an “earlier” time of death circulating on Saturday. How could he have missed or ignored all of these, and for what possible reason? It wasn’t exactly his call to make. As a mere constable on beat, all professional wisdom regarding the likely time of Kelly’s death would have been passed down from his superiors, not from a handful of newspapers.

I'm sure he did see exactly what he claimed to see, and there are other statements referred to that Kelly was out after she met Blotchy.

In the form of actual police statements and inquest testimony, or confused press accounts?

[Ben]

The fact Abberline was reported as being excited at the Dec. 6th arrest of the Astrachan look-alike (Isaacs), shows he still held Hutchinson's story in high regard.

There is no evidence that Isaacs even vaguely resembled Astrakhan, nor is there the slightest hint that Abberline was interested in Isaacs for that reason (always assuming he was “interested” in him at all, and that the “keep this quiet!! We’ve found the ripper at last!!” quote attributed to him in the press wasn’t a vast mound of steaming fictitious cow dung, as it so obviously was).

As they are still investigating it 4 days later

The evidence for which is...?

We’re still waiting.

A story may be “discredited” without being proven false. I have never claimed that Hutchinson was “proved” a liar; only that he was suspected of having lied. If this distinction isn’t “so obvious it doesn't need explaining” I don’t know what is. What was “bogus” about the Star’s report that Hutchinson had been discredited? What possible motive are you ascribing to them for falsely devaluing the account, bearing in mind the same newspaper had enthusiastically published it the previous morning?

The report also groups three previous suspects as in keeping with the Astrachan suspect, namely, the report suggests - the Berner-street suspect, the Hanbury-street suspect, & a Bucks Row suspect.

In what respect are any of those suspects “in keeping” with Astrakhan man?

Yet that flies in contradiction with the story given by Galloway on the 16th, where a Met. constable indicates he is looking for, "a man of a very different appearance", meaning Astrachan.

No, NOT meaning Astrakhan.

We’ve been over this a million times. The man observed by Galloway was “working in concert with the police”, and the policeman he encountered simply fobbed him off. Not to be misconstrued as evidence supporting a continued hunt for Astrakhan man.

Maybe you should be aware that the story published by the Echo on the evening of the 13th, was a copy of an article first published in the morning press.

Where’s your evidence that any “copying” occurred, as opposed to two different newspapers independently obtaining their information from the same source? The Echo had no reason to “copy” any other paper when they were in direct and proven communication with the police.

Another reason the Echo were in possession of details unavailable to their “morning contemporaries” was simple chronology - the “later investigations” that had so drastically reduced Hutchinson’s credibility had not yet occurred, or at least were not known about, by the time the morning newspapers went to print early on the 13th; whereas the Echo, being an evening paper, were able to report on events and decisions that had occurred throughout that day.

The only “tampering” here is being done by you, erroneously and baselessly claiming that the Echo reworded an article from a morning paper, whereas in fact they were reporting on an entirely separate issue - one that was totally unknown to the “Morning Post” in the morning of 13th November. It all boils down to your annoyance that the Echo article doesn’t support your conclusion regarding the ultimate treatment of Hutchinson.

That annoyance evidently extends to the inquest evidence, and its conspicuous absence of your favourite “well-dressed” suspect, which is why you’re compelled to invent and conjure up a whole load of mythical Astrakhan-spotters, insisting (without a shred of evidence) that it was they who comprised the 53 statement-providers alluded to in the Echo, and that they were all “slated to appear” at a phantom “second sitting”.

The far more logical explanation, however, is that the vast majority of these 53 “witnesses” provided neither valuable information to the investigation nor any insight into Kelly’s final movements, and were filtered out prior to the opening of the inquest.

[Ben]

Obviously, if she can't describe anything in detail it is because she can't see the detail.
Common sense?

No.

Not common sense.

Total fallacy.

You’re still not getting to grips with the basic concept of nondescript people and objects being recognised again. What if there was nothing in particular to distinguish him from other nondescript looking people? It’s also nonsense to argue that Lewis couldn’t have seen his face from 20 feet away (whereas Hutchinson is perfectly capable of noticing the pattern on a handkerchief from 120 feet away apparently!).

But that is not your position, and we are talking about 'your' belief, like you talk about mine. You don't lump someone else's belief into it when you are talking about my theory (whatever that is).

Sorry, Jon, I can’t even begin to decipher what you’re talking about here. I was responding directly to the argument that he would not have engaged in X or Y activity if he was the killer, and I thought my point was a reasonable one; why would he “use” previous descriptions of himself to help create a fictional suspect?

When you were a kid didn't you ever follow someone down the street, and when they turn the corner you run to that corner and peek around it watching them until they get far enough away that you can walk down the street behind them again.

Not without getting caught, which I certainly would have been if I had been as absurdly conspicuous and unsubtle as you claim Hutchinson was, contrary to his very own words. It would have been impossible for Kelly and Astrakhan to have remained oblivious to Hutchinson’s stalking behaviour if he had followed them into Dorset Street and hovered a few feet away while the couple had their three-minute hanky exchange outside the court.

You agree Hutchinson had to be within earshot of them both to hear what he claimed, yet you don't apply common sense. The problem is not with Hutchinson, it's with you Ben.

So it’s my fault that Hutchinson’s own account of his own location during the “lost my handkerchief” conversation made it impossible for him to hear it? It couldn’t be the simplest and most obvious explanation, that he made up the encounter. I don’t envy the insolubility of your task - place him too far away from the couple and he’s out of earshot and hanky-spotting range, but place him any closer and it becomes hopelessly implausible that Kelly and Astrakhan weren’t both alerted to his presence.

Alternatively, you could always read his actual interview where he provided his actual location - at the corner of Commercial and Dorset Street. If that’s too far away to have heard conversation or discerned colour (and I agree entirely), I don’t see how that’s my problem. If you believe him, you have to accept his words as they stand, rather than manipulating and altering them to salvage some semblance of believability.

You call it a “stupid mistake”, but people are still falling for it even today.

Lewis was there AT 2:30, she does not say what time she arrived.
She said " I was at her house at half past 2 on Friday morning.."

Why would she mention the time of 2.30am if it didn’t relate to her arrival? She was “there” at 3.00, 3.30, 4.00, 4.30 etc too - why didn’t she randomly volunteer the information that she was in the same room at those times? What was so special about 2.30 that it warranted inclusion in her statement and testimony?

All this tells me is, you probably do not do a whole lot of walking.

Considerably more than you, Jon. If there’s one thing your omnipresence on Casebook Hutchinson discussions makes clear, it’s that opportunities for outdoor recreation must be at a premium.

[Ben]

But for all this vigorous defense of your belief GH was only a timewaster, who do you think actually caused these crimes?

I have never suggested, “vigorously” or otherwise, that Hutchinson was “only a timewaster”. I thought I’d made that abundantly clear throughout our discussions, but suffice to say I share your conclusion that Hutchinson was the man in the wideawake seen by Sarah Lewis.

Your couldn’t be more wrong in your assessment of common lodging houses as ill-suited for the killer’s purposes. On the contrary, they would have served him excellently, as they enabled their inmates to become needles in a haystack, which is presumably why senior detectives continued to investigate them as probable bolt-holes for the killer. Why do you suppose the men who duffed up Thomas Sadler made straight for a lodging house directly after their attack?

Then we have this respectably dressed "botherer" (Britannia-man), who did at least try to lure loose? women into dark alley's.
Who else in this drama, local low-life or not, was ever reported to have employed such obviously suspicious activity?

Who described the bothersome man from Bethnal Green Road as “respectably dressed”, and what do you consider so “obviously suspicious” about his behaviour? No, I don’t think he’s a “reasonable candidate”; I think he’s a lousy one. Or do we imagine the ripper was in the habit of approaching two women, murdering one of them in a nearby alley while the other waits patiently nearby and promises not to do anything inconvenient like running for the nearest policeman?

You don’t have a scrap of evidence that Bowyer ever signed a statement to the effect that he had seen a man in the court at 3.00, less still one who “fit the published description”.

In this case the witness (Hutch) did not know what happened, or when it happened

Unless he had his head stuck down a rabbit hole for several days, it is inconceivable that he remained oblivious to the fact that a murder had occurred in Miller’s Court for more than a few hours after leaving the front door of the nearby Victoria Home; ditto the revelation that the victim, Mary Jane Kelly, was the same woman he effectively stalked in the small hours of that morning.

You really think he needed to collate and assess other witness accounts to decide whether or not his own encounter with the victim just a few hours earlier might just have been significant?

Really, if you think a witness in court can just talk about whatever they think is important you clearly have never been in a court of law.

Whereas you’ve never been in the real world if you’re seriously suggesting that witnesses are actively suppressed from revealing critical information because the stupid, ignorant authorities - as per your theory - never think to ask them or permit them to volunteer information unprompted. No, that’s just normal courtroom procedure, according to your purportedly extensive experience. If it wasn’t for street gossip and a keen-eyed journalist asking the “right” question, police and inquest proceedings would have yielded nothing, according to you?

This is precisely the sort of desperate nonsense you must cling to in order to revive the discredited bits of tattle and rumour that appeared in the press shortly after the murder, and you don’t mind painting the police and coroner as painfully and breathtakingly incompetent in the process, all because you’re frantic for anything, however tenuous, to come to the rescue of your “well-dressed” toff ripper theory.

If Bowyer had truly seen a man in Miller’s Court at 3.00am on the morning of the Kelly murder, the police and coroner would have elicited the information. Definitely and irrefutably.

He described the man to Abberline. Which is consistent with one of those "others" in the Police Notice, who had seen a similar looking man to what Hutchinson later described

No, he didn’t.

Provide a direct quote from Bowyer attesting to the presence of anyone in the court at 3.00am, and show me where anyone else described a man resembling Astrakhan. I’m not confident that you will deliver in either case.

All the best, though.

Ben

[rjpalmer]

You don’t find it all problematic that he mentioned nothing of this encounter during his first “interrogation” with Abberline (who would certainly have quizzed Hutchinson on the time and location of this policeman encounter, had it truly occurred.

Hi Ben. And how do you know that he didn't mention it?

Here is the totality of Abberline's statement regarding Hutchinson:

"I have interrogated him this evening and I am of opinion his statement is true. He informed me that he had occasionally given the deceased a few shillings, and that he had known her about 3 years. Also that he was surprised to see a man so well dressed in her company which caused him to watch them."


This was recorded the same evening that Hutchinson came forward. No mention of the PC one way or the other, which is not to say it hadn't been discussed. Do you expect Abberline to have given this PC a right good bullocking in print before he even had a chance to speak with him? For all he knew at that point the man DID report the incident to his superior officer. The files are mute.

Other than that, more of the same. I think we have reached an understanding and there is little need to proceed further.

I do, however, suggest you carefully re-read Post #1226 by Caz. You seem not to grasp the internal contradiction in your own thinking regarding this 'lazy' PC. Hutchinson's story is obviously bogus, transparent, etc. etc., and yet this men ignored this "crucial" clue? Come again?

With all good wishes, RJP

P.S. What is a 'dink driver'? Is this some sort of golf club to be used when you just want to 'dink' the ball back onto the fairway?

[DJA]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinky_Toys

[Wickerman]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinky_Toys

The Dinky toy, those were the toys most common when I was a kid, just cars and trucks. The upscale toy was the Corgi - upper class, more expensive.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corgi_Toys

Dink Driver is likely shorthand for Drunk Driver, or by a drunk typist?

[Wickerman]

Possibly for the same reason various known serial killers have inserted themselves into the investigation as witnesses; because it affords then the opportunity to “explain away” potentially incriminating connections to the victim or crime location, to keep track of the investigation, and to perhaps send police on a false scent.

"Keep track of the investigation"?
Ah, yes, of course....the detectives will tell the witness everything they are doing.
Obvious, when you think about it.

"Various known serial killers"?
Common is it Ben?
There's a whole list of serial killers who pretend to be witnesses in order to divert investigations?

Given these Jack the Ripper murders are often touted as the first true example of a serial killer in the media. This killer-turned-witness appears to have rapidly evolved his craft given no known precedence for a role such as this.

You're not allowing for the evolution of the serial killer. We can't apply the modern methods of some serial killers to the first known case, any more than we should credit early stone-age man using the wheel.

Of course, if you had a genuine mid 19th century murder case where a killer came forward posing as a witness, then you might have the basis for an argument.
Do you have such a case?

[DJA]

The Dinky toy, those were the toys most common when I was a kid, just cars and trucks. The upscale toy was the Corgi - upper class, more expensive.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corgi_Toys

Dink Driver is likely shorthand for Drunk Driver, or by a drunk typist?

Are those Welsh connections,or just coincidence?

[Ben]

This was recorded the same evening that Hutchinson came forward. No mention of the PC one way or the other, which is not to say it hadn't been discussed

But you don’t find it at all unusual, RJ, that no mention of this PC appeared in either the body of the statement (as it did with the press interview) or Abberline’s accompanying report, which might have sought to address the question of Hutchinson’s late arrival, if only for the satisfaction of Scotland Yard?

“The files are mute” you say, and yet according to you there must be a file out there somewhere asserting that “PC Moron of Negligent Terrace, on duty in Petticoat Lane, 11th inst., is hereby dismissed for serious professional misconduct”.

It was probably in that special filing cabinet that got bombed in the Blitz; the one that also contained numerous update reports on the ongoing hunt for Astrakhan man.

All the best,
Ben

[Ben]

Hi Caz,

I've been trying to explore why Hutch the Ripper would have invented those extra details for the press, knowing that the police could - and almost certainly would - check for themselves and discover he had lied about alerting a copper on the Sunday, after allegedly seeing Flash Harry again in the Jews' Market [as Petticoat Lane/Middlesex St was also once called].

Your timely reminder about Petticoat Lane’s strong Jewish associations goes some way to answering that question, in my view. I suspect Hutchinson became so carried away with “tidying up” and improving on his previous police statement that he slipped up when referencing the made-up Sunday policeman episode. If his intent was to incriminate the Jewish community, following on from earlier efforts at the “double event” and in the form of his description of Astrakhan already provided to police, a logical progression was to place his Jewish villain in one of the biggest Jewish hotspots of all - Petticoat Lane on market day.

The press interviewer might have asked why a possible second sighting didn’t send him searching for the nearest constable, promoting a cornered Hutchinson to claim that he did so, not immediately considering (at that potentially compromising moment) the implications of such a lie; that it would leave unexplained the policeman’s failure to take action.

I take your point regarding Mizen, but we might assume that if PC Neil had not independently encountered the body, the former constable would have sounded the alarm eventually, as opposed to taking no action at all like Hutchinson’s man.

If the policeman truly existed, he might well have balked at such an implausible tale, but as I mentioned to Jon yesterday, it wasn’t the responsibility of the bobby on beat to exercise those sorts of judgements. Unless the “report” was so outlandish that it warranted instant dismissal - such as a flying pig - the policeman was duty bound to investigate or at least make a basic note of it. That he didn’t is tantamount to a dereliction of that duty. At the very least he should have recorded Hutchinson’s name and address, along with a brief note explaining that the informant had shared a ridiculous-sounding story involving the victim and an Astrakhan-adorned man.

[Ben]

I’m not sure I agree that other victims were “ten a penny” on the 9th November if the prospect of waiting outside Kelly’s room seemed less than enticing. It was just as likely, if not more so, that a combination of unwilling prostitutes and an increased police presence acted as a deterrent to continued killings on the street.

It makes no sense to me to argue that loitering outside the victim’s home an hour before the murder entailed a high degree of “risk” and “idiocy”, whereas allowing himself to be seen with the victim ten minutes prior to the discovery of her body (Eddowes, Lawende etc) was somehow more sensible and cautious. How does that work?

Bear in mind that Hutchinson would not have anticipated Lewis entering the court itself as she made her way east along Dorset Street. At the time of her sighting, he would probably have bargained on her “passing along” like the drunk woman and her young male companion, probably destined for one of the grotty lodging houses further down the street.

As I’ve said before, being seen at some point during the crime’s planning, commission and escape was utterly inevitable in the crowded, bustling east end. It was an occupational hazard that the killer just had to work around, and evidently did. Some even think Astrakhan was the murderer, but what “idiocy” propelled him to go through with his grisly plans despite a stranger having “stooped down” to look him in the face?

If Hutchinson was the killer and kept Kelly’s home under surveillance prior to entering it some time later, he would have behaved in a very similar fashion to his serial successors in terms of his pre-crime approach, and as for being being seen by witnesses, he fared a good better than he did at the double event, where he was probably witnessed in the act of attacking his first victim.

I don’t know if Hutchinson had an “urgent” need to target Kelly specifically, but if he was at least an acquaintance of hers, he may have been aware that Joseph Barnett’s recent self-extrication from the premises presented a new opportunity, away from the coppers and vigilantes patrolling every court and alley.

I appreciate that Kelly was officially in arrears, but her behaviour on the night of her murder was anything but consistent with an image of a woman desperate for rent money, electing instead to spend several boozy hours in her room, singing about plucking violets, apparently without a care in the world.

Once out in the open, of his own volition, he was no longer truly at large to continue his favourite game as if nothing had happened. He was a known entity who could not afford to be seen ever again at or near the scene of a murder.

I’m not sure what you mean by a “known entity”. His face would have been a familiar one to the few police officers with whom he had direct contact, granted, but surely that would only have been a problem if they saw him loitering outside a victim’s home or in the company of a soon-to-be-dispatched prostitute? Since Hutchinson’s photo wasn’t splashed all over the news (like it would be today), I don’t see how he was in any real danger of being recognised as George Hutchinson the discredited witness by anyone other than Abberline, Badham, and a handful of policemen and journalists.

[Ben]

The problem with assigning Hutchinson the same status as Robert Paul - that of “just a reluctant witness” - is that this “reluctance” immediately and mysteriously dissipated the moment the inquest closed in the former’s case. It defies credibility, in my humble opinion, to dismiss this as mere coincidence, especially in light of Sarah Lewis’s evidence - provided at that very same inquest - of a man standing in the same location as Hutchinson would later place himself, and behaving in precisely the same manner, “waiting for someone to come out” of Miller’s Court at 2.30 on the morning of the murder.

Unless the forgoing was mere coincidence - and it clearly could not have been - his tall tale involving a mysteriously negligent Sunday policeman may be viewed in context. It was an obvious attempt to explain his failure to come forward earlier, which he would not have done at all had it not been for Lewis’ evidence. It also provided him with an opportunity to throw in a second sighting of his Jewish suspect in the most Jewish location around.

The bogus PC encounter clearly backfired, however, because of all the lies he told, this one at least could be investigated and exposed as false, which it clearly was. Since coppers patrolled delineated and recorded beats, Hutchinson had only to cite the time and location of the encounter, and the policeman in question would have tracked down and stripped of his duties. Fortunately for Hutchinson, however, he only mentioned this detail to the press, who had no such beat-checking abilities.

I don’t think PC Mizen quite compares to the Sunday policeman in terms of sheer, baffling negligence. Firstly, Mizen would certainly have got round to visiting Bucks Row shortly after encountering the carmen, as opposed to taking no action of any description at any point, like Hutchinson’s copper. Secondly, the Buck’s Row murder happened before it was even remotely established that a serial killer nicknamed “Jack the Ripper” was habitually slaughtering prostitutes, as opposed to the 11th November, when the matter was quite beyond question and the ongoing manhunt at its zenith.

I won’t yet again enumerate and expound the numerous possible and likely motives for Hutchinson coming forward if he was the killer, but I don’t see how those arguing in favour of his truthfulness and innocence can then insist that he can’t have been the killer or else he’d have told a less ridiculously implausible story. I thought the whole point of Hutchinson’s defence was that the story wasn’t ridiculous or implausible, or else the police would not have believed him?

Unless we go down the road of “he can’t have been a liar, otherwise he would have lied better!”, which for obvious reasons, I’m very reluctant to do .

Surely the obvious compromise here is that the story was sufficiently plausible to pass muster initially, but suffered a “very reduced importance” upon closer inspection and following a little more investigation; a reality born out by the evidence, and not remotely incompatible with him either lying or being responsible for the murders.

Anyway, sorry for the long posts. There was such a mountain to catch up on since last I peaked, most of it addressed to me personally, that I wanted to cover as much as possible.

All the best,
Ben

[Ben]

Hi Jon,

Ah, yes, of course....the detectives will tell the witness everything they are doing.

Not everything by any means, but a killer may garner important clues as a result of communicating with the police under a false guise, such as Kenneth Bianchi did during the Hillside Strangler murders, when he would often accompany officers in their cars.

There's a whole list of serial killers who pretend to be witnesses in order to divert investigations?

Approaching the police under false pretences is a strategy so widely recognised that law enforcement has often successfully predicted its occurrence.

You're not allowing for the evolution of the serial killer. We can't apply the modern methods of some serial killers to the first known case, any more than we should credit early stone-age man using the wheel.

A weirder, less applicable analogy you never will encounter. People living in 4000BC didn’t have the wheel, whereas people living in late Victorian London did have a basic human capacity for subterfuge, deception and self preservation.

I’m not sure what it is you’re trying to convince me of here; that without an earlier precedent for serial killers coming forward as witnesses, it would never have occurred to Hutchinson to do likewise? So how did the first person ever to resort to this strategy, if not Hutchinson, manage to alight upon it without an earlier precedent?

Surely somebody has to be the originator of a practice or idea in order to set the ensuing precedent for it, or else how would anything ever get achieved? You’re basically suggesting that nobody ever comes up with their own original ideas.

Interesting theory.

Best wishes,
Ben

[Sam Flynn]

people living in late Victorian London did have a basic human capacity for subterfuge, deception and self preservation.

But they didn't have CCTV, good lighting, distinctive clothing/hairstyles, low population density, personal (identifiable) transport, fixed addresses or a close sense of community - the sorts of things that would be conducive to identifying and tracking down a modern-day criminal.