change in modus operandi

[lynn cates]

sociopath

Hello Natalie and Anna. Do either of you see the classical sociopath in Klosowski? The sociopath presumably has no genuine remorse, no conscience, and yet can be charming and gracious as occasion demands.

The best.
LC

[Sam Flynn]

The flags hung upside down apparently deliberately also appear to me to show a very contemptuous and angry side to Chapman"s nature

I never knew that there was a flag equivalent of "graphology" - but if it didn't exist, you've certainly invented it, Nats.

[Natalie Severn]

Hello Natalie and Anna. Do either of you see the classical sociopath in Klosowski? The sociopath presumably has no genuine remorse, no conscience, and yet can be charming and gracious as occasion demands.

The best.
LC

Hello Lynn,
Yes,I definitely think he was sociopathic.I am not sure he even knew how wicked he was since in 1903 it all seems to have been a matter of course-getting rid of his women as soon as he tired of them.He seems to have had a lot of enjoyment going cycling each weekend with both Bessie Taylor and Maud Marsh,kissing and cuddling publicly with Mary Spink and having a bit of fun sailing his boat with her and providing" musical shaves" in the Hasting barber shop with Mary at the piano while Chapman shaved---and then he seems to have decided he needed "to move on".So he discarded them--not in a usual or conventional way as people tend to do -moving out,shouting and rowing until one or other moves out of their life ,but by killing them---because he was in a position to do so with his knowledge of poisons and he did manage to avoid getting caught for several years.

[Natalie Severn]

Thanks Adam,
By the way I dont think he made any money at all from Maud Marsh.She was 19 years old and the daughter of a poor labourer.

[Natalie Severn]

I never knew that there was a flag equivalent of "graphology" - but if it didn't exist, you've certainly invented it, Nats.

Well Sam,I tend to think,like Anna,that all these symbols meant something to him.Its an odd thing to do to take a picture of the stars and stripes hung upside down alongside a load of lethal weapons.Had they been hung the right way up,I would have thought him rather conformist and possibly rather military minded- perhaps- but in this picture he looks as though he is enjoying his display of iconoclasm.

[lynn cates]

3 times

Hello Natalie. Agreed. Of course, the poor devil was none too smart trying the same MO for all his wives. The third time proved NOT to be a charm in his case.

The best.
LC

[miss_anna]

Hello Natalie and Anna. Do either of you see the classical sociopath in Klosowski? The sociopath presumably has no genuine remorse, no conscience, and yet can be charming and gracious as occasion demands.

The best.
LC

Hi Lynn!
I think Klosowski was an outright psychopath. Sociopaths are usually lawbiding and Klosowski's reptilian cruelty, beating and slowly poisoning his wives was psychopathic!

[miss_anna]

Well Sam,I tend to think,like Anna,that all these symbols meant something to him.Its an odd thing to do to take a picture of the stars and stripes hung upside down alongside a load of lethal weapons.Had they been hung the right way up,I would have thought him rather conformist and possibly rather military minded- perhaps- but in this picture he looks as though he is enjoying his display of iconoclasm.

Iconoclasm or Nihilism! Poland was under the rule of Czarist Russia when Klosowski lived there and these 2 rebellious, anarchistic and destructive ideologies were present.

[lynn cates]

P/S

Hello Anna. I'm wondering what you consider the distinction between the 2? In some texts, sociopath is considered merely the modern analogue of psychopath.

On the other hand, I have seen some distinctions made between the 2 but have forgotten them.

Cheers.
LC

[miss_anna]

Hello Anna. I'm wondering what you consider the distinction between the 2? In some texts, sociopath is considered merely the modern analogue of psychopath.

On the other hand, I have seen some distinctions made between the 2 but have forgotten them.

Cheers.
LC

Statically 1% of the population is considered to be "psychopathic".
2% are believed to be "sociopathic", which is a less severe form.

[Natalie Severn]

I am not sure he was just psychopathic or sociopathic.What he seems to have been is a mixture of a silly billy type "lad" engaging in rather unconventional and unusual affairs especially for those Victorian times. Mary Spink"s landlady had decided she and her husband would challenge Mary and him about "carrying on" in their boarding house -Mary was separated from her husband and both she and Chapman were apparently unable to be prised apart kissing and cuddling on stairways and a lot more besides.So Chapman decided to placate them by telling them they had become an item and that a[ bogus] marriage had taken place with very different laws than the landlady"s since "their" marriage didnt involve any "marriage certificate".This is the scene Philip Sugden describes in his book," The Complete JtR"":....... he told the Wards they were going to Whitechapel to get married.They returned that night and Chapman,posing as a Jew, and ushering Mrs Spink into the presenceof the Wards,said, "Allow me to present you to my wife".Nobody appears to have been fooled but it was difficult to contest by the sound of it.Next thing-? they had skipped off to Hastings,apparently a place then reknowned for its illegal abortions.THey bought a barber shop there,conducted eccentric "musical shaves" for customers and bought a boat that Chapman sailed up and down with her on wearing a nautical P& O cap.
Prior to his affair with Mary Spink who he seems to have tired of fairly soon after they arrived since he tried to "court" at least one other young woman,he had had a "menage a trois" with his Polish wife Lucy-who he had actually married and a new paramour named Annie Chapman---no relation---and who quickly became pregnant which caused a big rumpus with Lucy.
So we have a man who makes up his own rules as he goes along,who likes to display the flags of different countries upside down alongside his collection of killing weapons and who is totally indifferent to the suffering caused by the agonising deaths his "wives" have to endure when he needs to kill them so he can "move on" to the next gal!
Seems to me he lived in a fantasy world all of his own making.He told people he was an American,boasted of his adventures at sea and that he was a big game hunter!The women who inhabited his world appear to have been like so many pawns in a game of Russian Roulette that he had turned on its head.

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Anna and Lynn and Sam and all,
Hope I havent brought thread to a complete stop with the above post!
Another thought I have had since discussing the case here is whether with Chapman it wasnt really a case of changes in MO but rather that he was got his fix from death itself-like Harold Shipman appears to have done.Shipman as a GP found vulnerable elderly ladies in his practice .So rather than choosing injection as an "MO" it chose him -they were the easiest victims for him to murder as he could charm them with his "interested" visits so that before they knew it he was "administering " lethal doses of morphine to "help".But the fix seems to have been in experiencing seeing them die in the moment as they passed from life to death,not in using the instrument of death .
With Chapman"s previous 5 year experience in Poland between the ages of 15 and 20 ,working as an apprentice to a surgeon in his village,he would have seen numbers of the sick,wounded and dying in the surgery and it may have been then that began the stirrings of some sort of addiction to watching people die.His stay in Warsaw first working as an assistant surgeon at a "clinic" then at the big Praga Hospital ,seems to have been uneventful though there is a curious report amongst his documents from Poland about him "never having been convicted of any misdemeanour".
What may though have sent him over the edge was the short course in practical surgery at the Praga Hospital that he had to take in addition to his previous experience.This undoubtedly had him in attendance at operations which were still very dangerous and bloody affairs, even though anaesthetics had started to be used.There were still frequent botches with people ending up as corpses on the operating tabl;es and it took a strong stomach to persist with the qualification.You never know,it could be why he emigrated apparently very soon after qualifying in February 1887.Maybe at that point he didnt have the stomach for it either.......so he came to England to gain experience on the streets of London!

Best

Norma

[miss_anna]

Hi Natalie!
We can only speculate what kind of mindset Klosowski/Chapman had.
This video takes a tour of Klosowski's barber shop, which was in the basement of the White Hart pub. I don't think any ripper tour would take you there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ano7hg800gU&NR=1

The Martha Tabram murder occured just a stone throw away from the White Hart pub. I believe the Tabram murder was the first ripper murder.

I don't give any credence to the video's "psychic detective" and his belief that Tumblety was the ripper. I posted recently a couple of times in the suspects/Tumblety section to dispell that nonsense!

[Natalie Severn]

I am having trouble downloading your link Anna- frustrating as it looks very interesting.At the weekend I am going to download a backlog of software which might well enable the link.Meanwhile many thanks for taking the trouble to post it up.
I am interested ijn Tumblety actually for several reasons.He isnt my first choice but he is in there alright.A bit of a psychopath in my view Tumblety!

[miss_anna]

I am having trouble downloading your link Anna- frustrating as it looks very interesting.At the weekend I am going to download a backlog of software which might well enable the link.Meanwhile many thanks for taking the trouble to post it up.
I am interested ijn Tumblety actually for several reasons. He isnt my first choice but he is in there alright.A bit of a psychopath in my view Tumblety!

Morning Natalie!
I posted 3 times on this Tumblety thread and i don't believe he's a serious suspect.

http://forum.casebook.org/showthread.php?p=103559#post103559

You need to have an Adobe installation or something like that for YouTube videos.