Why Didn't the Police Have Schwartz and/or Lawende Take a Look at Hutchinson?

[Simon Wood]

Millers Court tenant, 41 year-old charwoman, Julia Venturney, testified—

“She broke the windows a few weeks ago whilst drunk . . .”

Happily, the windows got broken before the key went missing. Had the key been lost first, Barnett would have had to deliberately break the window in order to gain access to the room.

[Batman]

Yet Barnett suggests they were locking it.

An impression has gone abroad that the murderer took away the key of the room. Barnett informs me that it has been missing some time, and since it has been lost they have put their hand through the broken window, and moved back the catch. It is quite easy. - Abberline.

[c.d.]

I think you are correct, Wick. I sometimes see that a homeless person has left their possessions unguarded and I think wow anybody could just steal them and then I think but what do they have that anybody would want?

c.d.

[Wickerman]

If we look at Mary Cox's testimony [Coroner] The chin was shaven ? - Yes. A lamp faced the door.
[Coroner] Did you see them go into her room ? - Yes; I said "Good night, Mary," and she turned round and banged the door.
So with the lamp facing the door. I am assuming that Mary Cox would have seen Mary go round the side to open the door through the broken pane. Of course, she may not have mentioned it, but I am just wondering if the key was found a day or two earlier? The killer then locked the door from the outside and maybe threw the key in the room through the smashed window.

I recall reading that the need to lock a door is different in our day than it was in the East End of the time.
People locked their door (or barricaded it - Prater?), when they were home. The need was for personal safety, not to protect their possessions, they had no possessions worth stealing. So they didn't lock the door when they went out. This would explain why loosing a key was no problem, the tenant never used one anyway.
This being the case Cox would not see Kelly unlock her door, or reach through the window, when she saw her at midnight with Blotchy. Kelly would just walk right in, which is what Cox said.

[Batman]

But if her killer was someone who came to her door and she willingly let them in then the key plays no part in it.

c.d.

That's true too I suppose. We can't discount that someone paid a late night visit and was let inside.

[c.d.]

There are only really a few permutations to what could have happened but what we can say is this - whoever MJK brought back to her room must have been someone she trusted to have shown him the trick of getting into her room because of a lost key. Is that something she would just show to anyone she brought back? At the height of the Ripper murders? In Ripper central? How precarious she would be to do this.

Couple this with the sing-song and fish and potatoes suppers and one could swear it was just a normal evening home she was having.

But if her killer was someone who came to her door and she willingly let them in then the key plays no part in it.

c.d.

[Simon Wood]

Hi Sam,

It is in Ripperland.

Have a warm, safe Christmas and a prosperous New Year.

Regards,

Simon

[Sam Flynn]

Strange that the key should be found after the door had been broken open.

Yes. Life's never like that, is it?

[DJA]

Why do you assume that McCarthy knew the lock could be reached through one of the broken panes?
It's jumping to conclusions that is the basis of too many theories in this case.

Anyone who had looked through the broken window would realise over the course of a couple of hours that the door lock was well within reach.

Crikey a lecture on too many theories from you is a laugh.

[Batman]

That's what I was thinking, Batman. It does seem a reasonable enough question to be asked at the inquest considering the trouble they had getting in the room.

There are only really a few permutations to what could have happened but what we can say is this - whoever MJK brought back to her room must have been someone she trusted to have shown him the trick of getting into her room because of a lost key. Is that something she would just show to anyone she brought back? At the height of the Ripper murders? In Ripper central? How precarious she would be to do this.

Couple this with the sing-song and fish and potatoes suppers and one could swear it was just a normal evening home she was having.

[Simon Wood]

Strange that the key should be found after the door had been broken open.

Personally, I do not believe the key was ever lost, nor that the door was ever locked.

Put this together with the bloodhounds who were out of town at the time, and a whole new Millers Court scenario opens itself up for examination.

[Sam Flynn]

I take your point Sam, but if the Evening standard report is correct they must have found the key somewhere, and the most likely answer is in Mary's room.

I wasn't questioning that, only the idea that the killer had thrown the key back into the room when he left.

[Darryl Kenyon]

Why would he bother doing that, when he could have dropped it anywhere or kept it as a trophy? Besides, if he had thrown it into the room, the key would have been fairly easy to spot on that sparsely-furnished floor.

I take your point Sam, but if the Evening standard report is correct they must have found the key somewhere, and the most likely answer is in Mary's room.

[Darryl Kenyon]

If MJK didn't have a key to get back in, then any clients she brought back would have witnessed the trick, especially on the night of her murder.

So why didn't Cox say she saw the trick?

That's what I was thinking, Batman. It does seem a reasonable enough question to be asked at the inquest considering the trouble they had getting in the room.

[Batman]

If MJK didn't have a key to get back in, then any clients she brought back would have witnessed the trick, especially on the night of her murder.

So why didn't Cox say she saw the trick?