Why is the possibility of Lechmere interrupting the ripper so often discarded?

[The Rookie Detective]

Hi RD,

One thing to keep in mind is that Nichols is the first of the mutilation murders. Serial Killers learn from their experiences, and build upon them, doing more of what they find satisfying and doing less of what they don't. While it is very likely that JtR had fantasized about murder, and destroying his victim via mutilations, if this is his first time then he also is engaging in these fantasies for real for the first time. How extensive those mutilations would need to be to satisfy him, combined with his fear of engaging in an activity that could get him hung if caught, is going to limit his activities. As he becomes more confident (because he gets away with it), and as he clearly found abdominal mutilations satisfying, we see him engaging in more and more of that activity in subsequent murders.

In short, the "pressure" for him to remain and mutilate more will be counter-balanced by the "pressure" for him to get away from the crime scene before he's spotted. So he may very well have reached the point where he "finished" with Nichols even though we see greater mutilations at later crime scenes. The order, and therefore experience level, of the offender needs to be considered.

The more his confidence grows, the weaker that 2nd pressure becomes, resulting in him spending more time at the crime scenes and therefore can do more extensive mutilations. And because he learns from previous experiences, if Chapman was murdered around the times Cadosche is going to and fro to the loo, then JtR is going to have learned two important things at least. First, people can emerge from nearby buildings unexpectedly even in the short time he's committing his murder (while that's obviously something he would always have "known" logically, to have it happened would increase his sense of it's probability - his ego and confidence in his invulnerability would have made him underestimate that probability in the Chapman case) and Second, h that he needs to have multiple exits and ensure that if anyone emerges he can't easily be seen).

If Stride is a JtR victim, and she might not be, but let's go with it for now. Then we know the area is quite dark, so that would fit the "I can't be easily seen here", but the location also only has one exit available to him (back onto Berner Street), and the singing and noise from the club also tells him there are lots of people in this building, and moreover, they are awake and doing things. This could be why she fits his criterion for murder, but at the same time, he finds it too risky to spend any additional time mutilating her. So he may have left for no other reason than that (doesn't require an external interruption, the interruption may be internally generated by his risk assessment, which would have been modified by his Chapman experience).

Eddowes, however, is in a quiet location, dark, and there are multiple exits for him to choose from should anyone emerge from the buildings facing the yard. Hence, he remains at the scene longer, engaging in even more extensive mutilations. However, now he's potentially interrupted by PC Harvey during his patrol of Church Passage. Due to the light at the end of Church Passage though, PC Harvey cannot see into Mitre Square, but JtR can see him clearly. PC Harvey turns around to leave, JtR flees, increasing again his sense of invulnerability but also increasing his awareness of just how probable it is for someone to come along, even during the few minutes he's engaging in his fantasies.

Which may explain why his next victim, Mary Kelly, is the only one indoors. He's adjusting his behaviors based upon the events of the previous murders, but still focused on his murder/mutilation obsessions.

I think it is easiest to understand how the mutilations increase over the sequence due to that "learning from experience" when we consider the cases in the order they occurred. But once we've done that, we can now understand the progression in the reverse order, making sense of the decreasing level of mutilations. And just like Mary Kelly ends up being the most extensively mutilated victim, it may not be surprising that Nichols is the least other than, of course Stride. So again, either she's not a JtR victim, so no further explanation required, or she is and perhaps something like what I suggest above accounts for her lack of an abdominal attack.

In short, I would be careful about us deciding what JtR considered to be "finished." I would suspect "finished" for him in the ideal sense would change over time, moving the goal post further into more and more extensive mutilations, but at the same time "finished" for him during an individual crime would be a complex decision between reaching that ideal goal while mitigating his concerns about getting caught. The latter of those will be influenced by what he's learned from the previous murders.

- Jeff

Jeff - that's one of the best and most accomplished posts I've ever read.
Well presented, considered and balanced.
I admire your views immensely and that post was testament to the reasons why.

I know it's a great post when it makes me rethink on my own previous assumptions on the case.

Hats off to you sir!


A fabulous read from start to finish

RD

[The Rookie Detective]

PC Neil saw the body, but didn't see the neck wound until he used his lantern to examine the body.

"police constable John Neil deposed that on Friday morning at a quarter to four o'clock he was going down Buck's row, Whitechapel, from Thomas Street to Brady Street. Not a soul was about. He was round there about half an hour previously, and met nobody then. the first thing he saw was a figure lying on the footpath. It was dark, but there was a Street lamp on the opposite side some distance away. The figure was lying alongside a gateway, of which the gate, nine or ten feet high, was locked. It led to some stables belonging to Mr. Brown. From the gateway eastward the houses began, and westward there was a Board School. All the houses were occupied. The deceased's left hand was touching the gate. Directly he turned his lantern on the body, he noticed blood was oozing from the woman's throat. She was lying on her back with her hands beside the body, the eyes wide open, the legs a little apart, and the hands open." - 3 September 1888 Daily News

That is a fair post Fiver, but also consider the line...

"...the eyes wide open..."

If both Paul and Lechmere both missed the blood and wounds, then they certainly wouldn't have missed seeing her eyes wide open.

Her eyes being open would have been visible at close proximity to her body, which the pair testify as having been.

So we have a police officer saying her eyes were wide open
And a mortuary photo where her eyes are partially open.

The proof that she died with her eyes open comes from the fact that her eyes in the mortuary photo are looking downward toward the camera...but when we relax, close our eyes naturally or go to sleep, our eyes roll upwards.

That means her optical muscles were working and not closed at the point she died, meaning her eyes would have been open and staring.

I can understand at a push how the blood was missed, the wounds were missed, but not the eyes as well.

Based on the physical evidence and that of the police officer, it is almost certain that Nichols would have been dead at the time the pair briefly examined her.

When they left her, they both knew she was dead and so they had no reason to shout or call for help, and it then explains their lacklustre efforts to relay the message to Mizen with any kind of urgency.

The evidence exonerates then to some extent because by her already being dead, it warrants their subsequent behaviour.

But if Nichols was still alive, and they had any belief she was alive, then they both failed in their moral duty to seek help urgently.
The manner in which they addressed Mizen proves that they either thought she was dead and it didn't matter, or she was alive and they were just being callous bast***s by walking away and just letting her die.

If they believed she was dead, it helps their case.
If they believed she was alive, then they both become suspicious in their subsequent choices in their failure to directly alert and alarm the officer to a woman dying in the street.

Her eyes being wide open is the crucial piece of evidence that proves she was dead when they left her, and how 2 men missed; or claimed to have missed that is beyond belief.


RD

[drstrange169]

" ... it is almost certain that Nichols would have been dead at the time the pair briefly examined her."

The coroner's summation states that not is NOT certain that she was dead when they saw her.

"She was only just dead, if life were really extinct. Paul says he felt a slight movement of her breast, and thought she was breathing. Cross says her hand was cold, but her face was warm."

The evidence is that Cross believed her dead or drunk at the time. Paul for some reason, despite feeling some sign of life, was insisting to all and sundry that she was dead. I don't think we can say one way or the other as to whether the eyes were open or shut at that point.

I don't think there is any doubt that, by any reasonable standards, they should have been more concerned about her welfare. Although, that said, it's highly likely Mrs. Stride was still alive when she was found and yet nobody attempted any kind of first aid.

[Abby Normal]

" ... it is almost certain that Nichols would have been dead at the time the pair briefly examined her."

The coroner's summation states that not is NOT certain that she was dead when they saw her.

"She was only just dead, if life were really extinct. Paul says he felt a slight movement of her breast, and thought she was breathing. Cross says her hand was cold, but her face was warm."

The evidence is that Cross believed her dead or drunk at the time. Paul for some reason, despite feeling some sign of life, was insisting to all and sundry that she was dead. I don't think we can say one way or the other as to whether the eyes were open or shut at that point.

I don't think there is any doubt that, by any reasonable standards, they should have been more concerned about her welfare. Although, that said, it's highly likely Mrs. Stride was still alive when she was found and yet nobody attempted any kind of first aid.

if she was still alive at that point then thats another piece that points to lechs possible guilt.

[JeffHamm]

Jeff - that's one of the best and most accomplished posts I've ever read.
Well presented, considered and balanced.
I admire your views immensely and that post was testament to the reasons why.

I know it's a great post when it makes me rethink on my own previous assumptions on the case.

Hats off to you sir!


A fabulous read from start to finish

RD

Hi RD,
Thank you. Much, and probably all, of what I included in my post has been suggested before. So really, I can't take credit for it. Standing on the shoulders of giants and all, you know.

- Jeff

[Fiver]

The evidence is that Cross believed her dead or drunk at the time. Paul for some reason, despite feeling some sign of life, was insisting to all and sundry that she was dead. I don't think we can say one way or the other as to whether the eyes were open or shut at that point.

I don't think there is any doubt that, by any reasonable standards, they should have been more concerned about her welfare. Although, that said, it's highly likely Mrs. Stride was still alive when she was found and yet nobody attempted any kind of first aid.

Lechmere and Paul were Victorian era delivery drivers with no first aid training or equipment. What sort of first aid could they have rendered?

[drstrange169]

"if she was still alive at that point then thats another piece that points to lechs possible guilt another piece that points to lechs possible guilt"

If she was still alive at that point then that places him in the same position as Diemshitz, likely to have disturbed the killer.

[drstrange169]

Hello Fiver,

I was referring to the fact that Mrs Stride was bleeding from the throat and nobody attempted to stanch the bleeding.

[Abby Normal]

"if she was still alive at that point then thats another piece that points to lechs possible guilt another piece that points to lechs possible guilt"

If she was still alive at that point then that places him in the same position as Diemshitz, likely to have disturbed the killer.

maybe, but not so sure of that. strides killer was probably bs man, and he left because it got to risky after schwartz saw him and or the noises from the club. and eddowes was clearly dead when diemshitz found her.

[drstrange169]

"... clearly dead when diemshitz found her."

The club members had no way of knowing whether she was dead or not. Spooner was the first person to check, and that's my point.

One also wonders what would have happened if the body wasn't on the club's property, would they have passed her by, not wanting to get involved?

[Holmes' Idiot Brother]

Lechmere and Paul were Victorian era delivery drivers with no first aid training or equipment. What sort of first aid could they have rendered?

Good point. I work in a Level One Trauma Center and can attest that even with the best people working on you, if you've severed the carotid or the femoral arteries, you are generally buggered! Unless they can do a running transfusion on you. But that is unlikely even today and was impossible at the time. I've seen gunshot victims who were hit in arteries leaking clear IV because they virtually bled completely out.

[Michael W Richards]

"... clearly dead when diemshitz found her."

The club members had no way of knowing whether she was dead or not. Spooner was the first person to check, and that's my point.

One also wonders what would have happened if the body wasn't on the club's property, would they have passed her by, not wanting to get involved?

I believe your right about Spooner Dr. Something any one would do, check to see if anything can be done. Did Diemshitz do that? Nope, checked to see what was wrong then immediately went to check on his wife...I guess he thought throats being slit was contagious.

What really happened was likely that Louis found the woman sometime between 12:40 and 1am, he gathered his "posse" in the alley to assess what they should do, some were then sent for help. How long did all that take, and why werent Liz Strides vitals checked? I think your suggestion about wanting to get involved caused hesitation...and that was concealed by a later claimed arrival.

As for Polly, based on the wounds on her abdomen and presuming that Annie was his next victim, it seems realistic to wonder whether he had more cutting planned and was prematurely halted. Some have asked...what if he didnt intend to cut more? My answer would be to them that they should familiarize themselves with Annie Chapmans murder, because the most anyone will ever know about what Jack the Ripper wanted to cut and do is all there in that single murder. Saying Martha Tabrams killer probably didnt want to cut more is safe, he was likely exhausted anyway.

[Newbie]

How would bumping into Mozen force their hand? If they didn't want to get involved, Lechmere and Paul could have just kept walking instead of interrupting PC Mizen from knocking people up.

How could Mizen's statement draw anyone out of the woodwork? Robert Paul was talking to the press the evening of the same day, a day before anyone testified and three days before Mizen testified. On the day of the Inquest, PC Neil was asked about being called to the scene by two men and denied it. It's unclear if Lechmere contacted the police before or after the statements of Paul and Neil, but he definitely came forward before Mizen's inquest testimony as Lechmere was there in the courtroom, where he was identified by Mizen and gave testimony immediately after Mizen.

I read somewhere that the police initially didn't believe Paul's story.
If true, that basically confirms the notion that Paul's story came out first,
and that Lech would have gone to the police on Sunday afternoon.

It also would seriously undercut the notion that a police sting captured Lech going to work Monday morning,
and held him until the inquest.

Paul, of course, didn't testify that Monday: maybe they couldn't track him down that Sunday.


As for their not skipping by Mizen confirmed that they wanted to get involved, the two weren't exactly working together:

Paul had to be dragged to the 2nd inquest, and Lech stopped Paul in the first place under the pretext of concern for the recumbent body.

It would appear very odd to Paul that this concerned citizen he did not know then skipped by the beat cop without informing him about their little discovery.

[Fiver]

I read somewhere that the police initially didn't believe Paul's story.
If true, that basically confirms the notion that Paul's story came out first,
and that Lech would have gone to the police on Sunday afternoon.

It also would seriously undercut the notion that a police sting captured Lech going to work Monday morning,
and held him until the inquest.

Paul, of course, didn't testify that Monday: maybe they couldn't track him down that Sunday.


As for their not skipping by Mizen confirmed that they wanted to get involved, the two weren't exactly working together:

Paul had to be dragged to the 2nd inquest, and Lech stopped Paul in the first place under the pretext of concern for the recumbent body.

It would appear very odd to Paul that this concerned citizen he did not know then skipped by the beat cop without informing him about their little discovery.

Paul appears to have gone to the press after he finished work on the day of the murder. The inquest started the next day, Saturday. Press accounts of what PC Neil said seem to indicate that PC Mizen hadn't told anyone about his encounter with Paul and Lechmere. Sometime between Friday and Sunday, Lechmere contacted the police. In contrast, the police had to track Paul down - he would complain about their treatment of him.