Did Hutchinson get the night wrong?

[Rubyretro]

[QUOTE]

I think the police heard Hutchinson's story, asked Lewis if this was the wideawake man to corroborate both stories, and she said it wasn't. So we have Hutchinson believed because he told his story, and Lewis, via her story, vouched for his being there, but later, when Lewis was asked if this was the man she saw, she said, "No." Then they dismissed Hutchinson. In fact, I'm very sure the police would have gotten Lewis to look at him despite her inability to give a great description.

I think that your answer throws up some very interesting points, Mike.

Firstly you agree that the Police would agree with Hutchinson because "he told his story".

Next , you think that the Police would surely have gotten Mrs Lewis to take a look at Hutchinson and She said 'No' it wasn't him. I agree that this is a plausible scenario :

I've already touched on my my idea of the 'body language' that Mrs Lewis probably used when she found herself in a deserted dark street, in the early hours of the morning, as a vulnerable lone woman faced with a loitering lone man, with his hat hiding his face -I bet that she averted her eyes and hurried past. When a woman looks a man straight in the face -at his eyes- in such circumstances, it can be construed as an invitation for further contact
(I get this on authority from male friends on what would give them the confidence to approach a strange woman or not -whether she looked straight at their faces, or anywhere but..).
I should say that Mrs Lewis was intent on getting to her friends house, took in the general dark shape of Hutchinson and looked away and quickened her step.

Hutch , however, would feel no possible physical threat from Mrs Lewis at the time -maybe he would step back into the shadows trying to shy away from being recognised, but he'd feel much more powerful than her.

I've already said in a previous post, why I think that there is a good chance that Hutch knew Mrs Lewis as an acquaintance -and he could easily have had more time and ease to observe her and recognise her as such, than she did him.

Of course, if they DID know each other in a casual way, that would be one reason why Hutch would be worried in the aftermath of Kelly's murder as to how much Lewis had seen -but also a reason why Mrs Lewis might relax and
say 'oh, No -it wasn't that nice Mr Hutchinson I saw -he's a friend-of-a friend -we would have greeted each other..'.

[The Good Michael]

Sorry, but possible is one thing, likely and plausible something else entirely.

Someone having some exciting information and then screwing up the day it happened IS plausible. Do I think that's what happened? It's not important. What is important is that Maxwell gets discredited as having given the wrong day, but when it is proposed that HUtch did so, it is seen as implausible, ridculous, and clutching at straws. We can see why this is so. The people who clutch to Hutchinson for dear life are reluctant to give an inch because their theory is so tenuous. In short, they are mad.

As for As* Man, well, it's possible the whole story is made up, or there was someone and HUtch didn't really see him and made up all the details. And, again, it doesn't matter as both ideas are as plausible as each other on Mike's scale of plausibility. Why did Hutch come to the inquest late? Why did the inquest finish so early? Why did it not continue 2 or 3 more days? Many questions whose answers are all possible and many even plausible.

Mike

[martin wilson]

Hi all
Without prejudice can I post something I read in a book about Hanratty?
I cant quote it verbatm but the gist was that the police were well aware that a criminal would present an alibi based on events that had actually ocurred on another day.
I have no evidence that criminals actually do this or that they did so in the past.
The most popular choice was the day before the crime ocurred,if true, I can accept this as plausible,but I imagine that it became more effective the longer time passed.
I'm not saying it applies in this instance,just been bugging me.
All the best.

[Ben]

Not Mike again….

The trouble with Mike is that he consistently resorts to insults and ridicule in lieu of credible arguments.

“I think the police heard Hutchinson's story, asked Lewis if this was the wideawake man to corroborate both stories, and she said it wasn't”

But you’re positing the existence of imaginary hoped-for events for which we have no evidence. People usually resort to this in order to build a case for a suspect, not to try and knock one down. For those who see the merit in the suggestion that Hutchinson could have been involved in the murder(s), it must be refreshing to contemplate the fact that the “opposition” is predicated upon a load of hoped-for events that “must have” happened, for which we have no evidence.

Given Lewis’ statement to the police that she could not describe the wideawake man, the chances are strong that she would not be able to recognise the man again, so if this strictly hypothetical Lewis-Hutchinson identification ever took place (and it almost certainly didn’t), it is very unlikely that she would be able to recognise Hutchinson even if he was the wideawake man (and he almost certainly was, short of silly coincidence).

“The point is, for loonies, Hutchinson lies about everything but that which they want to believe he was honest about, and then because they've made him into a liar, he must be a murderer.”

No, Mike. Wrong, Mike. The only aspect of Hutchinson’s account about which we can be reasonably sure was true was his presence outside the entrance to Miller’s Court, watching and waiting for someone to come out, because Sarah Lewis observed someone doing precisely that at the same location on the same time on the same night. It can be argued that Hutchinson only pretended to be the loiterer after learning of Lewis’ evidence, although I doubt very much that Hutchinson noticed that a witness account had described a potential suspect, pretended that he was the individual described but claimed also to have been just a witness himself. Certainly, I’ve never encountered any comparable example of such behaviour in other criminal investigations. In contrast, there have been cases in which the offenders have recognised themselves in witness accounts, and who subsequently came forward with false excuses for their presence there.

“Everyone should feel really stupid for arguing against the possibility that someone got the night wrong.”

Nobody has dismissed it as a possibility, but quite a number of posters consider the idea very improbable, and therein lies the crucial difference.

“What is important is that Maxwell gets discredited as having given the wrong day, but when it is proposed that HUtch did so, it is seen as implausible, ridculous, and clutching at straws”

But just pause for a second and contemplate why this might be so.

Maxwell’s evidence has been around for just as long as Hutchinson’s, but the different-day idea was only advanced in Maxwell’s case and not Hutchinson’s. Why do you think that is? Because we’re all “loony” and haven’t considered it for the decades that have elapsed since Dew’s memoirs were published, or because people have considered it, but didn’t consider it credible?

“Do I think that's what happened?”

Mo, Mike.

Best regards,
Ben

[The Good Michael]

Martin,

That could be a new angle: Hutchinson giving testimony about a previous night and then killing Kelly on the next night. No wonder he didn't see Lewis on the first night.

Mike

[Ben]

An intriguing suggestion, Martin, and certainly another angle to consider.

I'm afraid I'm not nearly as clued-up as I should be on the Hanratty case, but it's interesting to note that criminals have been known to choose "wrong days" when outlining their activities and movements.

All the best,
Ben

[Lechmere]

Blimey, what’s this? Hutchinson Sunday Funday?
Good Michael – I am clearly very naive!

Fact - Dew did not say Bowyer was young. Fact Dew did not mention Bowyer.
Supposition – Dew meant Bowyer.
Clearly there was something a bit odd about the Bowyer/McCarthy trip to the police station. A youngster running ahead does not preclude Bowyer puffing up behind anyway.
In any case the point about Bowyer for these purposes is that Ben felt that because Dew said the person who came to the police station to tell of Kelly’s murder was young, we should not take notice of the fact Dew said Hutchinson was young.
I am merely pointing out that is a ridiculous argument. It is one that Ben often employs. If a witness Ben disapproves of says something that may not be true then everything that witness says that is inconvenient to Ben’s theory can be discounted (e.g. Reg Hutchinson or that American newspaper that reported someone was being paid). This doesn’t apply to Hutchinson though – as the Good Michael has pointed out.

From Ben we have the sure assertion that Kennedy must be Lewis or someone who wanted to parrot her account. A very confident claim.
By the way Ben I didn’t say that you had claimed Hutchinson was at the police station the day before the inquest. I said he was there after the Inquest – for quite a while – he made two statements. He also must have gone there next day. That puts him in greater danger of bumping into a previous witness than him testifying at the inquest. Why would a witness at a previous murder be at the Kelly inquest anyway? Do you understand this?
Ben I also said you have not provided any credible avenues to describe how the Lewis testimony got to Hutchinson’s ears. I did not say there were no avenues available to Hutchinson should he wish to find out what was said. I would suggest reading the next day’s papers is the best avenue. But he didn’t wait for that did he?

Rubyretro – We don’t know that Hutchinson went to Romford for work.
Yes Lewis had a friend at Miller’s Court. Yes she probably had been there before. Probably a good friend.
Then you leap ahead and say probably Hutchinson had seen her before in a pub. There were masses of pubs around there. Kelly and Chapman were both supposed to drink in the Ten Bells but here is zero evidence they knew of each other. These pubs were not quiet locals where the clientele had a regular seat in the snug and a pewter tankard with their name in behind the bar.

There were thousands of people living cramped up together in that area. Hutchinson lived fairly close to Miller’s Court. He didn’t live next door. I wouldn’t describe it as a very short distance. Literally thousands of people lived on the roads off Commercial Street. It was an anonymous place. That is one reason why the police found it so hard to find the culprit.

We can be fairly sure Lewis didn’t recognise the wide-awake man (if it was Hutchinson). I know there is this convoluted argument that she couldn’t describe him but might recognize him. But a police interrogator would say – was he tall or short, fat or thin, dark hair etc and get a description that way.
As it is, her not tall but stout description doesn’t really fit the military bearing of Hutchinson (I know that is an old argument).
But Rubyretro’s depiction of the possible Hutchinson-Lewis encounter rings true – that is why I would say Hutchinson’s view of Lewis would have been fleeting.

Here is the cherry Ben picked “The only aspect of Hutchinson’s account about which we can be reasonably sure was true was his presence outside the entrance to Miller’s Court”
Why? How often will blokes have stood outside Crossinghams or that vicinity? Probably someone did every evening at some time or another. Probably several times each evening. Not a great coincidence is it?

Also for Hutchinson to hear the inquest testimony and get to Commercial Street Police Station, he had to be in the crowd. Otherwise he would be reliant on the information filtering the good ¾ mile from Shoreditch Town Hall to the Victoria Home, getting to him, and then he legs it up to Commercial Street. I would suggest there isn’t time for that. Also the wide-awake testimony was one of the boring passed over bits of evidence. Amongst the sensational stuff it wouldn’t have got to Victoria Home. It is exceptionally unlikely that it would reach the crowd outside.
One thing. Crowds outside court cases are very ill informed. They don’t know what the hell is going on inside. Little bits of info filter out when someone leave the building. The idea that Lewis’s testimony would be such a bit is exceptionally unlikely as it was so dull.
That brings it back to Hutchinson seeing her enter Shoreditch Town Hall. But what if she had seen him seeing her? What if she had gone running to the Rozzers – ‘It’s him outside’.
A bit of a risk taker is our Hutchinson.
If he saw her go in, why didn’t he go straight to the police rather than wait till the end of the inquest? Or was it just that he went to the police station after work and wasn’t hanging around the inquest at all?

We have murderer Hutchinson waiting until Monday to appear as he is worried whether or not Lewis will testify against his presence. But at the same time Hutchinson positively wanted to insert himself in the case as he was one of those rare inserters, rather than one of those commonplace crims who ups sticks and moves somewhere else.

Ben using over dramatic hyperbole to describe the level of coincidence that it took for Hutchinson to appear at Commercial Street Police Station after Lewis’s uncommented on testimony does not make it anything other than a very minor coincidence.

Yes the Victoria Home fits the bill geographically for a certain type of serial killer. I would suggest that a lodging house near-by that did not have strict rules would be better. I actually don’t think he would have lived in any lodging house as the police also had the bright idea that it was possible that the culprit lived in one and from an early stage regularly checked them for late night entrants. The deputies at these establishments all, over London were on their guard.
I know I said I wouldn’t mention it again, but can Ben or any other Hutchinsonians please explain away what these mean:

From the Daily Telegraph...
“Tickets for beds are issued from five p.m. until 12.30 midnight, and after that hour if a man wants to get in he must have a pass.”

From Later Leaves...
“No person will be admitted after one o'clock a.m. without a special pass.”

From In Whitecapel...
“near the entrance, is a small little office, where are hanging the metal bed-tickets, one of which is given out to each occupier on entering. Here also (unlike ordinary lodging-houses) registers are kept. Every man’s name and occupation is entered in the books, and these records against the names are filled up and make brief histories.”

I will tell you what I think it means. If you wanted a bed you got a metal ticket, but you had to apply fr one between 5 pm and 12.30- am. Once you had a ticket, or perhaps had pre-paid for a weekly one, then if you needed to get in late then you also needed a pass. Furthermore, they kept strict registers of who was there each night.

Getting muddled up over dates does not imply any level of diminished intellectual capability.

I personally think Hutchinson probably told some truths, embellished bits, added bits on incorrectly through reconstructed memory and quite possibly made certain bits up. A fairly average witness in fact, who came forward late as do many average witnesses.
I am pretty sure he didn’t know Kelly three years – a few months by sight is more likely. I think it is likely he didn’t have any consideration for the Lord Mayor’s Show. Kick away those two and it gets more likely that he could have got the days mixed up.

[babybird67]

Someone having some exciting information and then screwing up the day it happened IS plausible.

Really? Someone who's friend gets murdered on the same day as they trek miles back from Romford which also co-incides with the Lord Mayor's Show is plausible to you? Well, fine. To me it's no more than a very unlikely possibility for which there is no evidence, but if you think Hutch was that incompetent in his witness statement that he couldnt even recall such a significant day three days after it occurred, then how much credibility do you give the rest of his testimony?

Do I think that's what happened? It's not important.

Yet it's important to you to come and call people loonies for assessing the inconsistencies in Hutch's statement(s) as more likely to be attributable to lies than to mixing up the day? When there is evidence that he did lie, in the form of his the suspect he allegedly saw with Mary Kelly? There is no evidence for the wrong day scenario. That's the facts of the matter. And yes what you think does matter otherwise why bother posting your opinion here?

What is important is that Maxwell gets discredited as having given the wrong day, but when it is proposed that HUtch did so, it is seen as implausible, ridculous, and clutching at straws.

Um yes because there are crucial differences in evidence. The fact that the person Maxwell described as Mary Jane Kelly bore no resemblance to the woman known as Mary Jane Kelly by Barnett etc; the fact that the murdered woman on medical evidence was considered to be dead long before Maxwell states she last saw her. The fact that the person Maxwell claims she saw was throwing up, yet we know Mary Kelly had the remains of food in her stomach which wouldn't be there if she had just thrown it all up before death. Name one bit of evidence, evidence mind not conjecture, that supports the Hutch got the day wrong scenario.

We can see why this is so. The people who clutch to Hutchinson for dear life are reluctant to give an inch because their theory is so tenuous. In short, they are mad.

Well madness is in the mind of the beholder Mike! I think believing anything Hutch says after his comic suspect of Asrakhan is taken into account is mad but there we go!

As for As* Man, well, it's possible the whole story is made up, or there was someone and HUtch didn't really see him and made up all the details.

Sorry, so do you or don't you believe that the relation and description of Astrakhan was a truthful relation of what Hutch saw that night (whatever night you want to propose he saw it on ). Simple enough question. I am asking if YOU personally believe him.

And, again, it doesn't matter as both ideas are as plausible as each other on Mike's scale of plausibility. Why did Hutch come to the inquest late? Why did the inquest finish so early? Why did it not continue 2 or 3 more days? Many questions whose answers are all possible and many even plausible.

Mike

This just appears to be rambling. It matters because if you disbelieve Astrakhan you must take everything else Hutch said with a large dose of salt. And if you start to do that there really are very shaky foundations for claiming that those who see nefarious motives behind the inconsistencies are 'mad'.

[Rubyretro]

Quote:
What is important is that Maxwell gets discredited as having given the wrong day, but when it is proposed that HUtch did so, it is seen as implausible, ridculous, and clutching at straws.

Um yes because there are crucial differences in evidence. The fact that the person Maxwell described as Mary Jane Kelly bore no resemblance to the woman known as Mary Jane Kelly by Barnett etc; the fact that the murdered woman on medical evidence was considered to be dead long before Maxwell states she last saw her. The fact that the person Maxwell claims she saw was throwing up, yet we know Mary Kelly had the remains of food in her stomach which wouldn't be there if she had just thrown it all up before death. Name one bit of evidence, evidence mind not conjecture, that supports the Hutch got the day wrong scenario.

excellent reply, Babybird !

[The Good Michael]

Name one bit of evidence, evidence mind not conjecture, that supports the Hutch got the day wrong scenario. .

Easy. He didn't mention Lewis. That's evidence that they weren't in the same area at the same time.

Well madness is in the mind of the beholder Mike! I think believing anything Hutch says after his comic suspect of Asrakhan is taken into account is mad but there we go!

Yes. Then why do some folks only believe parts of his story that make him guilty of murder. I don't trust his story at all.

Sorry, so do you or don't you believe that the relation and description of Astrakhan was a truthful relation of what Hutch saw that night (whatever night you want to propose he saw it on ). Simple enough question. I am asking if YOU personally believe him.

I believe that anything is possible. I think Hutch was looking to make some money and it's possible others helped him make his story better and even pushed him out the door to tell his story as he was an unknown man to the police.

[Ben]

Again, so much for Lechmere’s “last observation”.

It’s my hypnosis again – the aftershave is clearly working.

“Fact - Dew did not say Bowyer was young. Fact Dew did not mention Bowyer. Supposition – Dew meant Bowyer.”

Overwhelmingly likely explanation - Bowyer was certainly the first person to alert the police about the discovery of the body. Dew states that that this person was a “young fellow”, in stark contrast to the evidence, and significantly, nobody confirmed the presence of Dew at the scene. It is very probable, therefore, that Dew was either confusing this encounter with another one or simply lying about it to make him appear more involved in the action than he really was. In which case, we should treat Dew’s other claims extreme caution, including the detail that Hutchinson was a “young man”, especially in light of his penchant for describing other people as "young" who clearly weren’t. What we certainly don’t do it treat this as gospel, add it to a dubious claim made in a discredited Royal Conspiracy book, add both of these to a demonstrably wrong newspaper article and claim it lends weight to our favourite Hutchinson identity theory – that’s just ludicrous.

Again, all three sources have been considered dubious well in advance of Lechmere embroiling himself in Hutchinson debates, and yet ironically, all three are being considered mutually supportive and capable of exonerating Hutchinson. What fun.

But off you pop to correct the Wikipedia entry if you think you know better.

“From Ben we have the sure assertion that Kennedy must be Lewis or someone who wanted to parrot her account. A very confident claim.”

There are no realistic alternatives, Lechmere, unless you can suggest any. Perhaps you want to argue that Mrs. Kennedy was somebody completely different? Somebody who had a near identical experience to Lewis, even to the point of meeting a scary man on Bethnal Green Road, having words with her husband, and walking to the same house as Lewis, where she also heard the murder cry? No, this is nonsense.

“He also must have gone there next day. That puts him in greater danger of bumping into a previous witness than him testifying at the inquest.”

No, it doesn’t.

If he was called to the inquest, he would have appeared on the stand and all eyes would have been on him. This would not have been the case at the Commercial Street Police station where, we might reasonably assume, witnesses considered of value would have been ushered into private offices for interviews. In any case, the previous witnesses who could realistically have identified him worked in closer proximity to the Leman Street police station. Yes, it was very realistic for Hutchinson to have entertained fears that previous witnesses might attend the inquest. They were, after all, involved at that stage whether they liked it or not, and it’s only reasonable to surmise that they thereafter kept themselves appraised of police progress. If Hutchinson had any involvement in the crimes, it would have been foolish to “expose” himself in public before he had got his story in.

“Ben I also said you have not provided any credible avenues to describe how the Lewis testimony got to Hutchinson’s ears. I did not say there were no avenues available to Hutchinson should he wish to find out what was said”

What’s the difference?

None.

There were plenty of avenues available to Hutchinson if he wanted to learn what was said at the recently terminated inquest.

Next.

“We can be fairly sure Lewis didn’t recognise the wide-awake man (if it was Hutchinson). I know there is this convoluted argument that she couldn’t describe him but might recognize him.”

It only seems “convoluted” to you because you failed to understand it or don’t know the difference between a description and a sighting. It should be very obvious that a witness might have acquired a very good sighting – to the point of being able to recognise their suspect again – without being able to describe them very well. This may be attributable to a number of reasons. The suspect might have been particularly non-descript, or the witness may simply be bad at describing features. If this distinction is lost on your for some difficult-to-sympathise-with reason, I doubt very much that it would have been lost on Hutchinson, or anyone else for that matter. It is extremely silly to argue that a short stout person cannot be of a “military appearance”, which obviously refers to carriage and possibly clothing. It should be obvious that a think-set and sturdy individual is better suited to most military tasks than someone tall and gangly. I would be hopeless, for instance!

“Why? How often will blokes have stood outside Crossinghams or that vicinity?”

Standing alone, with no interest in the lodging house directly behind them, but peering up the entrance of Miller’s Court as though watching and “waiting for someone to come out”? Not very often at all, would be the screamingly obvious answer there, and yet all this was observed of both Hutchinson and the loitering man seen by Lewis. Once again, you’ve made a futile effort to downplay the significance of what was an inescapable (non)-coincidence.

“Also for Hutchinson to hear the inquest testimony and get to Commercial Street Police Station, he had to be in the crowd.”

No, not necessarily, but I think it a reasonable possibility, certainly. It would not be remotely unusual for a serial killer to be part of the crowd all clamouring to hear the latest news of the murder, and it would certainly tally with a more modern understanding of a serial killer as someone who likes to keep appraised of police progress. It would simply have been a case of physically observing Lewis either entering or exiting the building in which she was due to provide her evidence, and given the reported extent of the crowding in the district, it is unlikely in the extreme that Hutchinson would have been singled out. If anything, it is more likely that he registered her departure from the area and was spurred into action accordingly, because if he had made himself known any earlier, there was always the danger that he would have been called to attend the inquest then in session.

As for describing Hutchinson as a “risk-taker” and then using this as a pointer against his possible culpability in the crimes, it might be high time you acquainted yourself a little better with the “risks” the ripper was proven to have taken, whatever his identity.

“But at the same time Hutchinson positively wanted to insert himself in the case as he was one of those rare inserters, rather than one of those commonplace crims who ups sticks and moves somewhere else.”

Again, this is where you need to educate yourself if you really want to learn something, as opposed to pronouncing weightily on subjects about which you are grossly ignorant. If the “inserters” were “rare”, the authorities would not set traps to snare the offender in full anticipation that he would insert himself into the investigation, with successful results, and yet this is exactly what has happened. As to serial killers moving somewhere else, the travelling serial killer is largely a myth, and for those without transport, “upping sticks” is very rare indeed.

“Ben using over dramatic hyperbole to describe the level of coincidence that it took for Hutchinson to appear at Commercial Street Police Station after Lewis’s uncommented on testimony does not make it anything other than a very minor coincidence.”

Lechmere using haughty gainsaying dogma to try to minimise what is so obviously an inescapable coincidence that Hutchinson came forward as soon as the inquest terminated, despite having the opportunity to come forward at any time before the inquest’s end and any time afterwards. But nope, his advice from a fellow lodger to come forward just happened to coincide with the end of the inquest, when the opportunity to be quizzed on oath had JUST slipped by. What a bummer, eh?

“I actually don’t think he would have lived in any lodging house as the police also had the bright idea that it was possible that the culprit lived in one and from an early stage regularly checked them for late night entrants. The deputies at these establishments all, over London were on their guard.”

There were 200 lodging houses in the area, with thousands of men coming and going at all hours of the night, often heading out to and returning back from work. If you consider this remotely police-able, then you have even less knowledge or imagination than I originally suspected when it comes to lodging houses. If the police thought it possible that the killer lived in a lodging house at one time, then it must be because they considered them viable locations for a serial killer. If they knew that all doormen adopted a vigorous checking policy, they would never have considered lodging houses as possible lairs for the culprit. The whole point about lodging houses is that they were considered popular with the criminal fraternity. Just reflect on the thugs who duffed up Thomas Sadler – they bolted straight into a lodging house after the beating.

“Tickets for beds are issued from five p.m. until 12.30 midnight, and after that hour if a man wants to get in he must have a pass.”

Meaning either that you flash the metal ticket that you had earlier purchased as a proof of your right to a bed, or less plausibly, that you also flash another metal ticket that says “daily pass” or “weekly pass” on it.

“Here also (unlike ordinary lodging-houses) registers are kept. Every man’s name and occupation is entered in the books, and these records against the names are filled up and make brief histories”

Yes, this happened once, for new lodgers to the building.

Do you honestly doubt this?

Do you honestly think that "brief histories" were made of every one of those 450 lodgers whenever they entered or exited the building? There is nothing in those sources to indicate that registers were kept of names of individuals who exited and entered the building on a nightly basis – this would have been ludicrously impractical. The registration process was obviously only in effect for lodgers new to the establishment, where they went through the “vetting” process outlined in other sources.

Didn't think you were content to give up mentioning the Victoria Home guidelines, despite last night's assurances that you would be.

“Getting muddled up over dates does not imply any level of diminished intellectual capability.”

No, but it is extraordinarily unlikely that he should have confused the date of Kelly’s death, his mammoth Romford jaunt and the Lord Mayor’s show that all occurred on the same day.

[Sally]

Inquest

Hutchinson coming forward when he did is striking; and I think should be considered suspicious. I have yet to see an explanation as to why he didn't come forward sooner - his having spent the previous couple of days in isolation is grossly unrealistic - so the premise that he hadn't heard about it until the Sunday falls flat on its posterior accordingly.

Why not come forward sooner and join in the inquest? The simplest explanation is that there was somebody there who could identifiy him. It could have been Sarah Lewis. Or maybe somebody there actually knew him.

He had reason to stay away from the inquest, apparently; but no reason not to come forward once that inquest was over.

When you think about it, nothing he said to the police amounted to anything solid. Ex-groom; no current trade; lived in a lodging house - virtually anonymous. He claimed to have known Kelly for 3 years - yet nobody seemed to know him. Barnett didn't mention him as a friend of Kelly's.

He appears in the case for a brief moment and disappears again. Frankly, he could have been anybody. And since he had never been firmly identified - he probably was. People don't just disappear - not if they are honest about who they are.

[The Good Michael]

Why not come forward sooner and join in the inquest? The simplest explanation is that there was somebody there who could identifiy him.

I must not be simple enough for that answer.

Mike

[Rubyretro]

[QUOTE]

I must not be simple enough for that answer.

You shouldn't run yourself down Mike..

[The Good Michael]

[QUOTE=Rubyretro;163349]

Mike

You shouldn't run yourself down Mike...I'm sure that you are 'simple'

And you just spotted that.