Why did Abberline believe Hutch ?

[caz]

They sent Hutchison on a search around Whitechapel. Schwartz and Lawende are the witnesses used after Hutchinson vanishes from the investigation.

Hutchinson said he thought the man lived in the area.

Yeah, I know. What's your point?

The police had to know where to find Schwartz and Lawende if they wanted to use them again. Hutch would have vanished from the investigation and into thin air if he didn't stay put at the Victoria Home every night from then on.

Love,

Caz
X

[Amanda]

Really..?

Easy: I've always thought Hutchinson was a police spy in the area, though potentially one hired just for the express purpose of Ripper-watching. He probably saw nobody on 9 November and invented the story to retain Abberline's confidence.

Or it's possible Abberline didn't actually believe him, but allowed his testimony to go public anyway, for fear that to do otherwise would be to jeporadize Hutchinson's role as a spy.

Either way, he needn't be the murderer to have a good reason to be loitering around like a creep in the neighborhood.

Hi Defective Detective,
Do you seriously consider the possibility that Hutchinson was a spy?
If that were true he certainly wasn't a very good one as he didn't make an attempt to conceal his identity, didn't find a discreet place in which to observe and then came up with a bizarre detailed description of the assailant which was obviously 'exaggerated' given the lighting conditions and circumstances.

Amanda

[John G]

What I find most remarkable about Hutchinson's evidence is that even though it seems pretty implausible from a modern perspective- too much detail/ suspect too well dressed- a highly experienced detective, Inspector Abberline, believed him.

I would also tend to agree with the excellent arguments put forward by Caz. Moreover, to my mind it is certainly possible that the reason for Hutchinson not being subsequently utilised as a witness was that the police decided to put all of their eggs in one basket and relied upon their prime witness, Joseph Lawende, possibly because of proximity of sighting to the time frame in which Eddowes must have been killed.

Of course, this might explain why the likes of Long, Cox, Schwartz and Hutchinson were not utilised. In the case of Kelly, for example, we have no real idea what time she was killed - Dr Bond calculated sometime between 2:00am and 8:00am- therefore Hutchinson's suspect, if identified, and assuming he existed, could simply have argued that Kelly was fine when he left her.

Of course, he subsequently seemed to have rejected Hutchinson's evidence when he stated "One discrepancy I have noted, and this is that the people who alleged they saw Jack the Ripper at one time or another, state that he was a man of about 35 or 40 years of age. They, however, state that they only saw his back..." This is clearly absurd as no witness claimed to have seen Jack the Ripper, they only alleged that they saw suspects, and plenty of witnesses, including Hutchinson, "alleged" that they had a front view of a suspect.

Abberline's comments need to be viewed in context: he is arguing that George Chapman was JTR and trying to explain why no witness described anyone as young as he would have been, 23, in 1888. His misguided comments are therefore driven by his obsession that Chapman was the killer, causing him to have selective amnesia regarding witness testimony!

[Batman]

They sent Hutchison on a search around Whitechapel. Schwartz and Lawende are the witnesses used after Hutchinson vanishes from the investigation.

Hutchinson said he thought the man lived in the area.

[caz]

Why wasn't he used anymore after a very short while? He claims to have seen him face to face.

Well they had to find a suspect first, Batman, before they could ask Hutch to look him over.

If you looked anything like Hutch's suspect, would you have hung around the district without changing your appearance?

No, nor me.

Love,

Caz
X

[Batman]

Who corroborated anything Hutchinson had to say? Lewis said she saw a man standing there. Hutchinson turns up post-inquest talks about wandering around all morning and no one, not even a PC can say he saw that witness. Heck even Hutchinson omits seeing Lewis.

Why wasn't he used anymore after a very short while? He claims to have seen him face to face.

The Jewish villain was music to their ears. Still is for many others too even today. Hutchinson was just yet another publicity seeker.

[caz]

If Hutchinson had no money - as he claimed he told Kelly - he had no possibility of securing lodgings for the remainder of the night, unless he was in possession of a daily/weekly pass for the Victoria Home or any establishment that operated a similar policy (I don’t know of any). This, of course, renders the closure of any home completely irrelevant, and yet he offered this explanation – the closure of the place where he “usually” slept – for his alleged homelessness that night, and not his lack of money. If anyone can suggest a plausible explanation for this beyond the obvious (i.e. that he lied about it), I’d be interested to hear it.

Here you are, Ben, in your own words:

Boris mentioned the case of Cooney’s, which would certainly have been open to paying customers when Hutchinson allegedly arrived back in the area, and for a long time afterwards.

So it would have been 'closed' to anyone who couldn't pay the going rate. Yes, I see.

Similarly the Victoria Home would have been 'closed' to Hutch without a valid pass.

Similarly, his "usual" place, if not the VH, would likely have been 'closed' to him if he didn't have enough money or a valid pass.

So how exactly have you proved Hutch was lying about his inability to secure lodgings that night? What evidence do you have that he had either sufficient funds or a valid pass? If he had tried but failed to earn enough doss money before arriving back in Whitechapel, or had no pass on him, he may have tried his "usual" place anyway, hoping to get a sympathetic reception.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

Hutchinson's statement didn't get reduced in terms of importance and then subsequently discredited simply because another witness saw the victim earlier on the evening, which was old news anyway. If we're going to use the Echo as a source, at least acknowledge what they actually recorded as reasons for Hutchinson's evidence being "considerably discounted".

"such a statement should have been made at the inquest, where the evidence, taken on oath, could have been compared with the supposed description of the murderer given by the witnesses. Why, ask the authorities, did not the informant come forward before?"

...(it was) considerably discounted because the statement of the informant had not been made at the inquest and in a more official manner"

Reasons that related directly to the issue of credibility in other words. It is entirely consistent with the report in the Star on the 15th November, which stated that the account was "now discredited" along with Matthew Packer's - both witness having supplied "worthless stories (that) lead the police on false scents".

I've rarely seen such poor reasoning, Ben. Certainly on the part of the Echo hacks if they seriously believed the authorities had only just thought to ask why Hutch had not come forward sooner. The 'authorities' had known this from the moment he walked into the police station, so Abberline would have asked the question while interrogating him and taken his explanation into account when stating his belief that the statement was true (despite its bad timing). The delay itself would only have affected his credibility if he could come up with no satisfactory excuse for it. Yet one of your constant refrains is that he would have had evasive answers up his sleeve for every occasion, which could not be disproven. So what went wrong on this one, for the 'authorities' to suddenly decide his explanation had been so poor that his entire story must now be in doubt?

If Hutch's account really was discredited and put in the bin with all the other 'false scents', Mrs Cox's account must have gone the same way in the long run, assuming Blotchy similarly failed to feature among the senior policemen's major suspects as fingered in their various memos and memoirs.

The police tried, but evidently failed, to track down either Hutch's or Cox's man and the trail simply went cold like all the others did eventually. It is circular reasoning to argue that Hutch's account must have been totally discredited or the police would have recalled him as a witness for future identifications. Chance would have been a fine thing. How would they ever have found him again if he was no longer 'in residence' at the Victoria Home and had long since gone off without telling anyone where? Mrs Cox may or may not still have been living in Miller's Court, but they apparently didn't try to recall her either.

Knowing where to find Lawende again greatly increased his own chances of being recalled. Granted, he was also the most likely witness to have seen the ripper, but his credibility at the identification stage would have been compromised by his early doubts of recognising the man again. At least Hutch had claimed he could identify his man, and it's not hard to see why if Abberline's belief in him was not misplaced after all. But again, if there was no way of tracking him down at a much later date, their failure to use him again would have been assured, regardless of the credibility issue.

Please remember, I am not arguing that Hutch retained his credibility as a witness; I merely find the 'evidence' presented for his total fall from grace leaves much to be desired.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

If Hutchinson was “proved” a liar, he would not have been “considerably discounted”; he would have been conclusively eliminated.

Or suspected of murder. He could only have been eliminated if he had provably lied about being there at all that night.

…Hutchinson's account received a “very reduced importance” in the absence of proof of his dishonesty, otherwise it would have received a "totally eradicated importance". The police merely had strong suspicions in that regard…

But a very reduced importance is very far from no importance at all, so unless this was merely the press making it up as they went along (surely they never resort to that? ), the police must have continued to consider the possibility, however slight, that Hutch really had seen the killer with his victim.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

He wasn't asked to attend the mortuary to identify clothes. He went there to identify a person. The only reason to ask a witness about the victim's clothes was to establish that victim's identity, but in Hutchinson's case, he claimed to have known her for three years AND was due to identify the body the next day. The police would not – unless they were dumbarses – have asked about clothes in order to determine if Hutchinson was telling the truth, as all the latter needed to say (if he wasn't) was that he didn't notice.

Wrong again, Ben, because of your total inability to grasp that Abberline would be trying to confirm Hutch was being truthful at the same time as looking out for signs that he was full of it. Your thinking is stuck on him being a liar and having ready excuses, like he was too busy gawping at Kelly's flashy companion and taking in every last detail to notice a damned thing about what she was wearing. "Come on George, your powers of observation are better than that. You claimed you knew the woman and had a conversation with her before she met her companion." Of course, he had no real need to invent a private conversation with her if he was playing the evasive card. She was dead. He could have said anything or nothing at all. Yet he made it tougher on himself in the event he was asked to describe her appearance and couldn't.

But what if he could perfectly describe the victim's appearance and clothing, in accordance with Abberline's own information? He'd have been satisfied they were talking about the same woman and the next day's formal identification would nail it on instead of being a potential waste of precious time and resources.

If Hutchinson was there that night, as I believe he was, he'd have known precisely what she was wearing, and would have related the details upon request, but as I've explained above, there is no evidence that he was asked.

What? I thought your belief was that he hung around the court until the coast was clear, then entered her room and launched his ferocious attack when she was already undressed, if not yet fast asleep. Are you suggesting he did see her out and about earlier, but perhaps with Blotchy? Or that he stopped in full murderous flow to make a mental note of all the clothes in the room and guessed 'precisely' which ones she had been wearing earlier, in case he was later asked to describe them to the police?

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

Catching up after a looooong absence...

Still no evidence that Hutchinson was ever asked about Kelly's clothing, which would have been pointless considering that he was due to attend the mortuary the next day to conduct an identification. As with the above two mythical "questions", a lying Hutchinson could have evaded it with ease: I didn't notice sir, I was preoccupied with Mr. Hastrakhan".

What we have then is:

a) No evidence that these questions were ever asked.

b) No good reason to think they were.

c) Easy ways for a guilty Hutchinson to get round them even if they were.

d) Idiot detectives if they were stooopid enough to ask such questions, knowing how easy there were to bluff around without fear of inviting censure or suspicion.

Regards,
Ben

Circular reasoning, Ben. You start from the presumption of a guilty Hutch giving deliberately evasive answers (or not even being asked the questions) so his statement could not be shown to be the catalogue of lies you believe it was. Your position is that Abberline was somehow obliged to believe his story because there was no way to prove it false.

But this totally ignores the alternative possibility, that Abberline believed him because he was able to confirm certain elements of the story under interrogation, either from information already in his possession or a minimum of enquiry.

Love,

Caz
X

[Defective Detective]

Easy: I've always thought Hutchinson was a police spy in the area, though potentially one hired just for the express purpose of Ripper-watching. He probably saw nobody on 9 November and invented the story to retain Abberline's confidence.

Or it's possible Abberline didn't actually believe him, but allowed his testimony to go public anyway, for fear that to do otherwise would be to jeporadize Hutchinson's role as a spy.

Either way, he needn't be the murderer to have a good reason to be loitering around like a creep in the neighborhood.

[SirJohnFalstaff]

I have a question.

I'm guessing this must have been discussed several time among you good people, so if anyone can point me in the right direction, I would appreciate.

How thorough was the vetting on Hutchinson at the time? Not only about his testimony but also about who the man was?

I'm not saying that Abberline was sloppy, the man must have been under a lot of pressure and overworked, but I can't help thinking this is the same police officer who said Issenschmid was probably the man Mrs Fiddymont saw at the pub after the Chapman murder, without any proof that a proper identification was made after Issenschmid arrest.

[DVV]

Semoule !

[Lechmere]

Cry - Foul!