Kosminski and Victim DNA Match on Shawl

[Simon Wood]

Hi Jeff,

A straight question.

Did Aaron Kosminski, a 23/24 year-old Polish Jew, committed to Colney Hatch Lunatic Asylum on 7th February 1891, commit the murders known collectively as the C5?

A straight answer of yes or no is acceptable.

Regards,

Simon

[robhouse]

However, schizophrenics and psychotics are not very likely to turn killers, whereas psychopaths - like Rolling, Shawcross and Sutcliffe, for example - are more frequent beasts and much more common among the serial killer lists.

From what I have read, it is more the psychopathic traits that are predictors of violence for people with schizophrenia. In other words, schizophrenia itself does not normally cause someone to become a killer. But schizophrenia with co-morbid psychopathy can do so, and leads to this kind of killer.

RH

[Chris]

Would it be a good idea to start a new thread for this general discussion about psychotic/schizophrenic serial killers in relation to Aaron Kozminski?

It's some distance away from the question of the "shawl" and the DNA matches.

[Simon Wood]

Hi Chris,

Why would you bother inaugurating a general discussion about psychotic/schizophrenic serial killers when Aaron Kosminski was innocent as a lamb?

Regards,

Simon

[Errata]

Richard Chase - 6 victims
Tsutomu Miyazaki - 4 victims
Nikolai Dzumagaliev - 9+ victims
Bobby Joe McCauley - 7+ victims
Hadden Clark - 2-15 victims
Marc Sappington - 3-4 victims
Jorge Beltrao Negromonte - 2+ victims
Herbert Mullin - 13 victims
Ed Gein - 2 victims
Robert Napper - 3+ victims (also serial rapist, over 70 attacks)
Otis Toole - 6+ victims
Ramen Raghav - 35+ victims
Juan Corona - 25 victims
Peter Bryan - 3 victims
Kenneth Erksine - 7-11 victims

Possibly Schizophrenic

Peter Sutcliffe - probably faked it.
Gary Heidnik - diagnosed schizo-affective
Andrei Chikatilo - possible schizophrenic
Joseph Kallinger - may have faked insanity

I will add that many of the above psychotic serial killers also were post-mortem mutilators (like Jack the Ripper), and many engaged in cannibalism, evisceration, removing organs, etc.

First of all, there are serial killers on this list who were not psychotic. Which isn't to say they didn't have issues, but they were not diagnosed nor were they medicated for any disorder known to cause psychosis. And remember psychosis is tough. It's a handy term, but it is more a symptom than a disease (and not even that, really it's an umbrella term), and frankly because it is identified through exclusion it's terribly difficult to pin on someone. We call people psychotic who lose touch with reality, but that doesn't actually mean they are psychotic, despite the fact that it is the very definition of psychosis. Sort of how I might say that anyone who thinks Kosminski is the Ripper is delusional, because I know the definition of the word "delusional", but I would bet few people here are actually delusional in a medical sense... let's just say the terminology is a bitch.

Tsutomu Miyazaki was not psychotic. He was not schizophrenic. He was never diagnosed though his lawyers claimed some split personality defense. He may have been Borderline, but mostly he was acting on fantasies.

Bobby Joe McCauley is absolutely schizophrenic, and is not a serial killer. He killed one woman. I had the occasion to interview him twice by phone. He is not okay. When he was arrested he talked about killing other women, so there was very real reason to think he was a serial killer. However those women turned out to be the victims of another serial killer who also had ties to Tennessee. I don't think he is still under investigation. Can't swear to it, but I never heard anything.

Negromonte is likely not schizophrenic. There is absolutely an Axis I and Axis II party going on his head, but schizophrenia includes structural and physical issues that there is no mention of. Frankly he is old enough for unmedicated schizophrenia to be killing him at this point, and it isn't. He may well be psychotic. But the diagnosis of schizophrenia is probably wrong. Narcissism, Borderline Personality Disorder, Paranoia, paraphilias... yeah. Also a sincere disagreement on taboos is not evidence of mental illness, just like murder isn't. People can disagree on cannibalism, incest, even pedophilia (god help us) without being crazy or out of touch with reality. I don't want to ever be in a room with this guy, but he might not be delusional.

Schizoaffective disorder is really quite different, and probably does not apply to any serial killer. It is highly over diagnosed because mood disorders can cause psychotic breaks. But that doesn't mean it will happen again, so a person can no longer be diagnose schizoaffective on the first psychotic episode. And the psychotic episodes last for days maybe. Not weeks and months.

But I think ironically, the list you have provided of schizoid serial killers proves a rather interesting point. If you look at the behaviors of these people, you see a couple of interesting commonalities. Firstly, they are mostly spree killers. They may be multiple spree killers, which is pretty rare, but they kill a bunch of people in a short amount of time. Like, five people in four days. Behavior one would expect of someone who "snapped". There are precious few examples of hunting victims, measured pacing, etc. that are not completely due to victims being unavailable. Also most of these killers needed something. Flesh, blood, to protect the world, whatever. Their murders were dictated by these needs. Sure there are cannibals who killed every three weeks or so, but that's because they killed when ran out of meat. Their schedule was externally defined. The most important thing about these killers is that they didn't have a type. They killed men and women, old and young, black and white. And even the few occassions where there was a little bit of a victim preference, it was not a terribly specific one. One guy has gerontophilia, he kills and sexually assault old people. Men and women. Psychotic killers don't tend to get too specific.

If you apply these behaviors to the Ripper, you get an interesting result. The Ripper was not a spree killer. Not even a multiple spree killer. Kosminski had all the time in the world. And was psychotic. If Kosminski were the Ripper, why wouldn't he kill many women in a short period of time? Why not two or three a night? Why not one every night for a week? That's what psychotic killers do. The Ripper may have needed something from his victims, but his pacing was not defined by that need. If he needed a uterus, how long could that last? And since he clearly had no need for the majority of the corpse, why not kill more women, get more uteri? If he was eating the whole body, yeah that takes time. But a uterus? That's a single meal. Kosminski thinks he's dying and his odd dietary habits are whats going to save him. Do you think a "dying" man is going to linger over a single kill? And the Ripper had a type. It had to be women. It had to be unfortunates. It had to be women who at least might be tempted into prostitution. They were a certain age, they had a certain amount of wear on them. They were obviously very poor. The Ripper never killed a man. He never killed a child or a teenager. He never killed a maid or a waitress. Psychotics don't have specific types. As a psychotic, if Kosminski was the Ripper, it would look like someone snapped. Lashing out every where. Like Chase. Like Mullin.

And lastly, psychotics don't take care to not get caught. Some certainly achieved it by isolation or remoteness. Nobody schlepped to the Gein house. He wasn't trying to hide anything, but no one was going to see it. Dzhumagaliev started dismembering some guy he killed at his own party. The Ripper was not isolated. There was a very real risk for being seen. But he took steps so that he would not get caught. He didn't walk up to them and start slashing away. He took some basic precautions. Psychotics don't do that. Kosminski talked to god. If god is giving instructions, why would he worry about getting caught? Why take the time to stay out of sight? Remember delusions are sincere beliefs. They cannot be argued with. So with someone like Kosminski, who has scrupulosity, you have to ask what would his god tell him to do, and "worry about the cops" is probably not on that list.

The Ripper does not act like a psychotic. So why are we looking at a psychotic suspect?

[John G]

Hi John

If you check out some of the posts on this subject on "The other site' you will note that I provide some statistic analysis from Finland re" Schizophrenia

it concludes that schizophrenics 'statistically' are more dangerous than general population

However I caveat this as follows

1) Schizophrenics are more prone to alcohol and Drug abuse. Thus statistically they are going to create a high violence print because the condition takes them into a higher violence category

2) Finland use a very specific 'Catigorization' for schizophrenic symptoms…its vary different from the same assessment used in the USA and thus very difficult to draw statistical analysis. Indeed its extremely difficult to compare international statistics per ce…That because they use different critia

3) Until an internation form of schizophrenic observation and symptom analysis is actually used… we are simply comparing potatoes with tomatoes, it don't really hold much water

So any analysis really comes down to One to One observation

We can generalise…but should be cautious of specific observation based on any counties specific schizophrenic crime statistics

Thats because you have to compare like with like..

And thats not available

Yours Jeff

Hi Jeff,

Thanks for your very comprehensive reply. Firstly, i would agree that there is no clear definition of schizophrenia but, as with most mental illness, this raises the question of whether the condition actually exists at all. Thus, there is no proven biomedical evidence for the condition- I know there's the dopamine hypothesis, but against that there is the alternative social defeat hypothesis. Of course labeling theorists, such as Scheff, would argue that conditions such as schizophrenia are simply labels that we attached to people who are deemed to have deviated from social norms. You are also possibly aware of the famous Rosenhan experiment, whereby an American mental hospital wrongly diagnosed a number of pseudo patients as schizophrenic.

Turning to the statistics. Firstly, only 15% of murderers have any kind of major mental disorder, such as schizophrenia. Secondly, although the prevalence of schizophrenia in homicide offenders has been calculated as being around 6%, the prevalence of personality disorder and alcohol abuse is substantially higher: 10% to 38% respectively. In fact, the greatest risk factor seems to be the minor schizophrenic subgroup, where schizophrenia is combined with substance abuse: see Richard- Devantoy et al. (2009), which can be found at the following site:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20004282

Regards,

John

[Chris]

Why would you bother inaugurating a general discussion about psychotic/schizophrenic serial killers when Aaron Kosminski was innocent as a lamb?

I wouldn't. I was just hoping those who want to discuss it would do it elsewhere, as it doesn't really have anything directly to do with the subject of this thread.

[mickreed]

SRA displays all the hallmarks of an arsehole.

Well, I do't know whether this academic critique has legs, but it does put me in mind of an opinion of (and I can never remember which one) Jeremy Bentham or James Mill that whether it's a bath tub or a society, you always find the scum on top.

Good old class prejudice can work both ways. RA, no doubt, looked down his nose at the poor huddled masses in the East End thinking them capable of anything, while people like Simon Wood and me are quite willing, it seems, to think the worst of people like RA.

There are good historical precedents for our views, although I would concede that they need to be backed by evidence in this case. And, I submit, the opinions of other scholars, are not evidence, merely an interpretation of same. Possibly, maybe even probably, right, but not definitely so.

[mickreed]

Well, I do't know whether this academic critique has legs, but it does put me in mind of an opinion of (and I can never remember which one) Jeremy Bentham or James Mill that whether it's a bath tub or a society, you always find the scum on top.

It was Bentham:

for be it pot or be it kingdom, that which occupies the top of it, is it not the scum?

[pinkmoon]

update

It's getting rather boring now.

[Monty]

Dr Jari has a PR agent.

Now that is interesting...surely

Monty

[mickreed]

Dr Jari has a PR agent.

Now that is interesting...surely

Monty

Que?

When did this happen?

[Fisherman]

From what I have read, it is more the psychopathic traits that are predictors of violence for people with schizophrenia. In other words, schizophrenia itself does not normally cause someone to become a killer. But schizophrenia with co-morbid psychopathy can do so, and leads to this kind of killer.

RH

And is this kind of killer a man who kills silently, who tilts the bodies of his victims to avoid getting blood on him, who approaches and leaves the murder spots undetected, who leaves no trail, no trace, no clue...?

All the best,
Fisherman

[AdamNeilWood]

Que?

When did this happen?

I believe all PR contact for Dr Jari, Russell Edwards and Karen Miller has been handled Four Colman Getty from the day the book was released.

Adam

[pinkmoon]

Jack the ripper gift shop opens then book is published then doctor who produces d.n.a evidence gets himself p.r agent !!!! and we are asked to believe this is not just a money making exercise .