Can George Chapmam reform himself to being a calculating poisoner seven years later?.

[Abby Normal]

If the story about the knife is true, of course. There's a contradictory version on the police files which said that it was a revolver, not a knife. Helena Wojtczak makes some interesting comments on the whole matter in her book.

Assuming for the sake of argument that he had stabbed her to death, then we'd have a domestic knife murder on our hands. Hardly ripperesque, and we'd still be left with a man who can't be definitively placed anywhere near the epicentre of the Ripper murders in 1888.

Hi Sam
Thanks! isn't there documented evidence he was living in Cable street during the ripper murders?

[Fisherman]

Ripping his partners would have been obvious. So that ends why he didn't rip them.

Poisoning isn't supposed to give away murder let alone he was JtR. He didn't expect to be caught. Obviously, he was hoping no association to murder would be made at all, let alone JtR.

So no it wasn't a giveaway and even though he was caught, you still don't think he is a candidate for JtR, so it would have worked with you and many others apparently.

You sidestep the real issue here - once he had learnt that the streets offered rich prey with no ties to him at all, why would he set about poisoning partners? The second a suspicion arises, the first person suspected will always be the spouse.

You need a wheelchair for that legless theory of yours by now.

[Fisherman]

if that customer hadn't walked in when he was assaulting his wife in America and he had stabbed her to death, what would be saying about his validity as a ripper suspect then?

Personally, I would say he was still a no-go, and that the dead giveaway were still the poison murders. Stabbing is an extremely common murder method. It´s when the stabber starts poking around the inside of his victim with the knife, slicing selected parts out, that it turns rare (excuse the pun).

[Abby Normal]

look at it another way.

its like saying you would clear a serial strong armed robbery suspect just because he was convicted of bank fraud several years later. of course you wouldnt.

[Fisherman]

look at it another way.

its like saying you would clear a serial strong armed robbery suspect just because he was convicted of bank fraud several years later. of course you wouldnt.

Nope. Serial strong armed robbers and bank fraudsters have the same drive - money. There is arguably no inner drive and/or urge to what they do. But there WAS a drive to what the Ripper did! And reasonably, he liked to do what he did, so much so that he was ready to take immense risks to get that kick.

There is really no comparison, Abby.

[Batman]

They didn't catch him, though, did they? It wasn't by any means axiomatic that the police would get their man, so why would a confident open-air Ripper suddenly retreat into his shell just because his postcode had changed? Not that they even had postcodes back then - never mind databases, surveillance or modern policing techniques.
I was referring to Ripper murders. If anything remotely Ripper-like had happened in Hastings, Tottenham, The Borough or Poplar, we'd have got to know about them.

Quite. So why would Chapman-as-Ripper stop ripping?

Because they could easily narrow it down to who it was obviously.

If JtR moved out of Whitechapel and killed locally where he has moved to, then it is only a matter of time before journalists and ripper investigators make the deduction that there is a person in this new area who has moved there recently from Whitechapel. To escape that kind of news coverage would be unlikely. All it would take is one person to note that the new so-and-so was from Whitechapel. In fact, they realized this pretty evidently with Chapman himself after he was found to poisoned three partners.

[Sam Flynn]

What happened to him being a party on the same night Tabram's was murdered one hour walk away?

I'm not disputing he'd have been in London in August 1888, that much is clear, but where he was based is another matter entirely. On that specific point, it's interesting that the party in question was apparently given by Ethel Radin, presumably at their place in West India Dock Road (almost exactly one hour's walk away from where Tabram died). If Kłosowski was still at the Radins' place on 7th August 1888, my suggestion that he might not have moved to Cable Street until the Ripper murders were already underway - or even finished - remains viable. Stronger, even.

[Batman]

You sidestep the real issue here - once he had learnt that the streets offered rich prey with no ties to him at all, why would he set about poisoning partners? The second a suspicion arises, the first person suspected will always be the spouse.

You need a wheelchair for that legless theory of yours by now.

First of all the environment changed after MJK was murdered. Ripper awareness was at its height and lighting was being introduced to reduce dark areas prostitutes could go with their clients. They were also aware of the problem of bringing men back to their room if they had one. So JtR had to change if he didn't want to get caught because Whitechapel had changed. The government set out to change it and the crown was adamant that they do so.

Anyway, Chapman, if JtR, has problems with his partners. He didn't foresee it as JtR and he wants to get rid of them by murdering them. The last thing he does would be to murder them like JtR. In order to avoid that connection, he needs something the opposite. Undetectable, not suspicious and whatever it is, not like JtR.

What method would most people have gone for in 1888? The same for JtR.

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Sam
Thanks! isn't there documented evidence he was living in Cable street during the ripper murders?

None that I'm aware of, Abby. His Cable Street barber shop is listed in the Post Office directory of 1889 which would, of course, have been compiled the previous year. However, we do know that the directory was still receiving submissions up until 13th December 1888, as it didn't hit the presses until the next day.

Now, I'm not suggesting that Kłosowski's shop was among the last entries, although it might have been. However, at least we have a latest date by which he could have taken up residence in Cable Street. My guess is that he arrived there sometime between August and the second week of December, but I can't prove it.

[Fisherman]

First of all the environment changed after MJK was murdered. Ripper awareness was at its height and lighting was being introduced to reduce dark areas prostitutes could go with their clients. They were also aware of the problem of bringing men back to their room if they had one. So JtR had to change if he didn't want to get caught because Whitechapel had changed. The government set out to change it and the crown was adamant that they do so.

Anyway, Chapman, if JtR, has problems with his partners. He didn't foresee it as JtR and he wants to get rid of them by murdering them. The last thing he does would be to murder them like JtR. In order to avoid that connection, he needs something the opposite. Undetectable, not suspicious and whatever it is, not like JtR.

What method would most people have gone for in 1888? The same for JtR.

Batman, a serial killer does not "change" on account of external danger. The threat of being caught will not transform a person whose whole life revolves around cutting other people up and eviscerating them, into a poisoner. If anything, a serial killer may take his business elsewhere - but the business remains the same. Or he may go out of business - but he will be the same type of businessman when he reenters the market. What he won´t do is think "I can go on killing if I start poisoning instead", for the simple reason that poisoning will not do the trick for him. And that trick is what he is in the business for in the first place.

Chapman is not our guy. It is that simple.

[Batman]

Batman, a serial killer does not "change" on account of external danger. The threat of being caught will not transform a person whose whole life revolves around cutting other people up and eviscerating them, into a poisoner. If anything, a serial killer may take his business elsewhere - but the business remains the same. Or he may go out of business - but he will be the same type of businessman when he reenters the market. What he won´t do is think "I can go on killing if I start poisoning instead", for the simple reason that poisoning will not do the trick for him. And that trick is what he is in the business for in the first place.

Chapman is not our guy. It is that simple.

Serial Killers can stop because of dangers.

If Chapman was JtR, and given we know he wanted to kill his partner, what method would he use in order to prevent any implication that he is JtR?

He could still very well have plans for JtR episode II. It doesn't replace it.

There is nothing much in the way of Chapman being a JtR candidate.

Look,

1. Chapman mutilates loads of prostitutes.
2. Chapman wants to kill his partner.
3. The last thing he will do is rip her up obviously.
4. What method would be least likely to indicate JtR if he is caught?

Not difficult. Nothing involving JtR stopping being a mutilator. Just JtR having to deal with someone he wants to murder who is close to him.

Easy peasy.

[Fisherman]

Not difficult. Nothing involving JtR stopping being a mutilator. Just JtR having to deal with someone he wants to murder who is close to him.

Easy peasy.

But he DOES stop being a mutilator in your scenario! The Chapman poison career stretched over some five or six years. If he was certain that he would not be caught for these murders, as you suggest, then why did he not kill and mutilate away to his hearts delight if he was still the mutilator you say he may have been?
If he was found out to have poisoned his partners, it´s not as if he would get hanged twice if he was also revealed as the Ripper.

It-does-not-wash, Batman. And it is anything but easy peasy - if that is what you think, you are on the wrong forum.

[Batman]

But he DOES stop being a mutilator in your scenario! The Chapman poison career stretched over some five or six years. If he was certain that he would not be caught for these murders, as you suggest, then why did he not kill and mutilate away to his hearts delight if he was still the mutilator you say he may have been?
If he was found out to have poisoned his partners, it´s not as if he would get hanged twice if he was also revealed as the Ripper.

It-does-not-wash, Batman. And it is anything but easy peasy - if that is what you think, you are on the wrong forum.

He doesn't stop permanently. He IS stopped. By the gallows.

Pauses are not a problem.

BTK (Dennis Rader)
Vicki Wegerle September 16, 1986
Dolores E. Davis January 19, 1991

5 years right there.

I don't understand why you are asking why he didn't keep mutilating. I already stated how much Whitechapel was changing and he had to change also to adapt to it. So what was he going to do in those conditions? His old haunts had been lit up and women were hardly going to invite Chapman into their rooms looking the head off the ripper himself according to Hutchinson's description in the papers.

[Sam Flynn]

women were hardly going to invite Chapman into their rooms looking the head off the ripper himself according to Hutchinson's description in the papers.

Not that he'd have looked like the well-off Mr Astrakhan in 1888/89. Nor would he have been 35 years old.

[John G]

Well, you don't think H.H.Holmes poisoned anyone, despite the gassing chambers built in his murder hotel, and his access to poisons from the pharmacy he ran. However, if you want to claim that there is a lack of evidence to convict Holmes, then your criteria for evidence is very high indeed. If I held such a high level of criteria then I wouldn't be able to say much about the Whitechapel murders at all except repeat what's in the case files and newspapers. No deductions. No Inferences. Do you keep that up? Or is it a special case for just this one time?

Using your rationale, I could say no serial killer has ever evolved into a compliance officer who targets family pets to be put down in order to harass women. Let's say BTK left no evidence and all we have is Dennis Rader harassing women. He gets a restraining order (as he did) and his name pops up. Using your rationale this is what you would be saying...



The rationale can't be right. Rader IS BTK.

The rationale is that there was a barrier of 'I can't believe it' put in there somewhere which isn't based on any modern professional literature which indicates MOs and Signatures can change. The moment the idea appears that not all MOs and no all Signatures are immutable is why it collapses.

In fact, Rader wouldn't have come to our attention for this because there were no murders in his later life, meaning he doesn't enter into the statistics of the population density for homicides... but Chapman does. Chapman is a candidate because he is a serial killer living in Whitechapel at the time of the murders. You have two killers operating in a 9km^2 area with a population of a few tens thousands of people. Which points to Chapman being JtR statistically. Chapman is the statistical argument for JtR.

I didn't say that Holmes didn't poison anyone, just that there's no proof. In fact, was it even proved that any of the victims were poisoned? What do you mean, "Chapman is the statistical argument for JtR?"