An hypothesis about Hutchinson that could discard him as a suspect

[c.d.]

Why do people insist on making the whole Hutchinson business way more complicated than it needs to be? If we follow these basic rules it becomes much simpler:

1. Assume that the police were not complete and total idiots;

2. Assume that the police were not completely dazzled by Hutchinson coming forward and therefore did not treat him as though he were a rock star;

3. Don't get hung up on the difference between "person of interest" and "suspect";

4. Don't get hung up on the difference between "questioned" and "interrogated";

5. Understand that the police were not infallible.

Now, following these basic rules we have this scenario -- The police, not being complete and total idiots, considered Hutchinson as a person of interest due to the fact that by his own admission he knew the victim and was the last person to be seen with her.

As a person of interest, he would have been questioned. It makes no difference whether they were polite questions over tea and that he was addressed as Mr. Hutchinson throughout or whether it was a brutal hours long interrogation with numerous night sticks to his kidneys. What matters is that his answers needed to satisfy the police which they apparently did. This also implies that the police (again not being complete and total idiots) verified his answers as best they could.

Any person in the entire investigation (including Hutchinson) could have fooled the police and could have been the Ripper. That is pretty much a given. What we can reasonably conclude is that for whatever reason the police determined that Hutchinson was not involved in Kelly's death and moved on from him. We each have to draw our own conclusions from that but there is no reason to make the whole process more complicated than it already is. Calling Mr. Occam. Calling Mr. Occam.

c.d.

[Fisherman]

Hutchinson came forward of his own volition - something the 1888 police were unlikely ever to have contemplated the real ripper doing - whereas Cross would have been forced to don a false witness guide if, as you claim, he had been "found" near the body by Paul.

All the best,
Ben

Lechmere ALSO came forward of his own volition - as far as the police knew. If the police had felt that he came forward to save his behind, he would have been turned into a suspect, right?
So there really would not be much of a difference between the two, as far as the police goes:
-Were at a murder site
-Could have come forward to be proactive
-Went to the police out of their own free will

You didnīt answer the question I put to you - would the police have cleared Lechmere, no questions asked, since he came forward of his own free will, just as you claim that they automatically did with Hutchinson?

Since the comparison is what matters here, this questions belong here and not on the Lechmere threads.

[Wickerman]

Hi Jon,

You've repeated that hoary old argument about Hutchinson becoming an "automatic suspect" many times before, and I doubt that trying it again will prove effective.

Hi Ben.
I'm not trying to convince you, I repeat that state of affairs because that is simply the way it is.

In any murder enquiry, in the absence of any other direct witness, the two people who garner the immediate attention of police are, first the 'companion/lover/spouse', and second, any person who claims to have been with the victim around the approximate time of the death.
The last person to see her alive, in other words.

That is just simply true, therefore Barnett & Hutchinson are very high on their list. The third person would be anyone known to have threatened the victim or had argued with her. And we don't appear to have anyone to fit that description.

I wasn't aware that obliqueness and evasion were considered virtues for detectives submitting reports. If Abberline interrogated Hutchinson as a suspect for the Kelly murder, he would certainly have made reference to it in the report.

No he wouldn't, he had no cause to make accusations.
The correct terminology today would be "person of interest". A person who 'may' know more than he is telling, a person who may have had more involvement than he is admitting to. Also, a person who may have had something to gain by her death.
All these circumstances are cause for Abberline to have suspicions, not solely as the killer, but the possibility cannot be excluded.

I see your reluctance to admit to this is largely due to your limited interpretation of what 'suspect' means.
A 'Person of Interest' is one who is set apart from the general population because there are possibilities of involvement - 'suspicions' about any potential role. This is the level of 'suspicion' the police will have.

Whereas a 'suspect' is the next level up, being someone whom the police already have sufficient knowledge about to regard him as more than a Person of Interest.

But this particular form of deception was completely unknown to the police of 1888, and was thus unlikely to have been entertained at any stage. Of course, if you have evidence to the contrary...?

That is a mind-boggling statement to make.
You seem to be saying that, no-one has ever suspected that a killer could come forward posing as a witness to deceive the investigators?

Well maybe you can educate us all then. Precisely when did it first dawn on human imagination that a killer might pose as a witness to avoid detection?
Did the police have to wait for it to happen before they believed it would be possible?
Was this a collective, "Gee, who would have thought of that!!" moment?

He didn't say a single thing about Mrs. Long, who was not, in any case, considered the barometer of truthfulness against whom all other Chapman witnesses were compared. If Violenia's account was true, he would, in all probability have been the last person to see the victim alive, bar her killer; and yet when the police decided his account was not true, he did not "convert" into a suspect, and nor did Hutchinson.

Violenia heard a man & woman quarreling as they walked along Hanbury St.
So, it couldn't have been 'after' Mrs Long's story which took place directly outside No. 29, so it had to be 'before'. Therefore Violenia was not the last person to see the victim alive.

And, as it stands he must have seen another couple because he couldn't identify the body as the woman he saw.
So even if he did truly see a couple quarreling passing along Hanbury St., the woman wasn't Chapman.
As has been stated every time you bring up Violenia, there is no parallel between him and Hutchinson. This example above being just another nail in the coffin of a dead argument.

Who says they were "able" or "unable"? That's right, the discredited witnesses themselves - a really great method of gauging truthfulness (and calpability!), that.

Oh right, silly me. Both witnesses obviously tried to discredit their own stories......never thought of that!

[c.d.]

The idea that the police never suspected Hutchinson because he came forward of his own volition is simply an opinion not an ascertained fact. It is certainly not an unreasonable assumption but it has its limits. What would happen if Hutchinson told the police that prior to that evening he had not seen Mary in over a year. They then question her neighbors and one of them tells them that they know Hutchinson and that Mary introduced him just last week. The tenant also goes on to describe overhearing a violent argument between the two of them. Does that blatant lie get overlooked because Hutchinson came forward or does he immediately become a serious suspect at that point?

The bottom line is that coming forward did not guarantee absolute immunity from suspicion. It had its limits.

c.d.

[Wickerman]

Why do people insist on making the whole Hutchinson business way more complicated than it needs to be? If we follow these basic rules it becomes much simpler:

1. Assume that the police were not complete and total idiots;

2. Assume that the police were not completely dazzled by Hutchinson coming forward and therefore did not treat him as though he were a rock star;

3. Don't get hung up on the difference between "person of interest" and "suspect";

4. Don't get hung up on the difference between "questioned" and "interrogated";

5. Understand that the police were not infallible.

Now, following these basic rules we have this scenario -- The police, not being complete and total idiots, considered Hutchinson as a person of interest due to the fact that by his own admission he knew the victim and was the last person to be seen with her.

As a person of interest, he would have been questioned. It makes no difference whether they were polite questions over tea and that he was addressed as Mr. Hutchinson throughout or whether it was a brutal hours long interrogation with numerous night sticks to his kidneys. What matters is that his answers needed to satisfy the police which they apparently did. This also implies that the police (again not being complete and total idiots) verified his answers as best they could.

Any person in the entire investigation (including Hutchinson) could have fooled the police and could have been the Ripper. That is pretty much a given. What we can reasonably conclude is that for whatever reason the police determined that Hutchinson was not involved in Kelly's death and moved on from him. We each have to draw our own conclusions from that but there is no reason to make the whole process more complicated than it already is. Calling Mr. Occam. Calling Mr. Occam.

c.d.

Well, c.d., there is an important distinction between a Person of Interest, and a Suspect, and at one time Interrogation and Interview were different means of obtaining information.

And yes, of course Hutchinson 'could' have tried to deceive the police, what is mind-boggling is that we are being asked to believe the police were not capable of imagining this could happen.

Overall though, you're quite right, that the simple approach is normally the most likely.

[c.d.]

Hello Jon,

As I mentioned in a previous post both a person of interest and a suspect are going to get questioned. It is also true that a person of interest can become a suspect. Sometimes the line between the two can get blurred so that it is probably best not to be too rigid in the definition of those terms.

c.d.

[Wickerman]

The idea that the police never suspected Hutchinson because he came forward of his own volition is simply an opinion not an ascertained fact. It is certainly not an unreasonable assumption but it has its limits. What would happen if Hutchinson told the police that prior to that evening he had not seen Mary in over a year. They then question her neighbors and one of them tells them that they know Hutchinson and that Mary introduced him just last week. The tenant also goes on to describe overhearing a violent argument between the two of them. Does that blatant lie get overlooked because Hutchinson came forward or does he immediately become a serious suspect at that point?

The bottom line is that coming forward did not guarantee absolute immunity from suspicion. It had its limits.

c.d.

By far, in an overwhelming number of cases, the action of a perpetrator seen near the crime by a witness will disappear from public eyes.
Not, walk into a police station bold as brass with some ****-and-bull story, that is the stuff of fiction.

[pinkmoon]

Its quite obvious given the time of the day and the area that hutchinson was up.to no.good prehaps he sweated for a few days then came foward rather than potentially be hunted by the police and accused of been jtr

[Fisherman]

The idea that the police never suspected Hutchinson because he came forward of his own volition is simply an opinion not an ascertained fact. It is certainly not an unreasonable assumption but it has its limits. What would happen if Hutchinson told the police that prior to that evening he had not seen Mary in over a year. They then question her neighbors and one of them tells them that they know Hutchinson and that Mary introduced him just last week. The tenant also goes on to describe overhearing a violent argument between the two of them. Does that blatant lie get overlooked because Hutchinson came forward or does he immediately become a serious suspect at that point?

The bottom line is that coming forward did not guarantee absolute immunity from suspicion. It had its limits.

c.d.

There you go, C.D.!

[Fisherman]

Its quite obvious given the time of the day and the area that hutchinson was up.to no.good

No. Nope. No way. That is not obvious at all. He may have waited outside to try and find a place to crash, for example. How is that being up to no good? Explain, please!

[SuspectZero]

What do you make of this story?

Apologies if this has already been fished up...

[Wickerman]

Its quite obvious given the time of the day and the area that hutchinson was up.to no.good prehaps he sweated for a few days then came foward rather than potentially be hunted by the police and accused of been jtr

Walking the streets was not uncommon in a part of London where not everyone could afford a bed for the night.
Have you read what this part of London was like?

[SirJohnFalstaff]

Hi Ben, speaking of Aberline, a thought occurred to me as a hypothetical:

George Hutchinson, the serial killer known as Jack the Ripper, knew the Mary Kelly inquest was over and final and there would be no further sessions. He must have hung around up at Shoreditch Town Hall right till the end, or quickly heard the definitive news somehow. It's finished.

So all he had to do was fool the police when he went directly to them. He would not have to appear at an inquest because he knew there would be no further inquest sessions. Just as he had not been required to appear at any of the inquests into his other murders, some of which had several sessions stretching over a period of days.

Roy

Except that he would have to spend the next 48hrs with two policemen, looking for Astrakan man.

[harry]

Sgt Badham w as the first to question Hutchinson.He could have taken a written statement and allowed Hutchinson to leave,then contacted Aberline.
Why didn't he? W as it because he(Badham) suspected that the truth was not being told. Most likely.

[SirJohnFalstaff]

Apologies if this has already been fished up...

this is interesting.

EDIT: he is already in The Suspect Guide.

http://www.casebook.org/ripper_media/book_reviews/non-fiction/cjmorley/87.html