Evidence of innocence

[rjpalmer]

As an annoying aside....

disinterested = objective; non-partisan.

uninterested = not interested.

I certainly don't think Fisherman is disinterested in Trevor's opinions. I think he has a stake in the game. Whether he is uninterested in them, I cannot say. He says that he is, so I'll take his word for it.

[MrBarnett]

This is a good example of reductio ad absurdum. The idea is to dismiss someone's position by deliberately oversimplifying it in a ridiculous way.

No one has argued that Dew was "personally involved in every single detail of the investigation," nor does Dew anywhere makes this claim or even imply it. It's a straw argument.

Dew was stationed in H-Division in Autumn 1888, and would have known about aspects of the investigation that are now lost. He will have correctly remembered some details, and misremembered others. When an elderly man is writing largely from memory after 50 years, it will be a very easy matter to poke fun at his memory and to treat his reminiscences in a childish way. More generously-minded people might try and see some good in them.

Dew's only relevance to this discussion is that he recalled there having being suspicions against Robert Paul, and Dew wrongly believed that Paul was never traced. But while we admit his errors, can we also admit that something meaningful might gleaned from them? Or is our only task to ridicule?

As with Dew misremembering Thomas Bowyer as a youth, could the mistake be traceable to something that had actually occurred at the time? (We know there were reports of a youth--John McCarthy, Jr. aka "Steve"--in Miller's Court that morning).

Elsewhere Gary claims Dew was 'probably' writing his account using contemporary press reports, but this is a dubious suggestion; even a cursory look at contemporary press reports of the Nichols murder would have reminded Dew that Paul WAS traced. One can hardly have it both ways, so I think we can safely ignore this guesswork.

In fact, according to an account that appeared in Lloyd's on Sept 2nd, Robert Paul was traced on the day of the murder, when he was returning home. Which is pretty darned interesting, as it doesn't appear that either he, nor Crossmere, gave their names to Mizen. It would appear that the two men from Buck's Row were very easily traced--probably because both men openly discussed their strange encounter to their coworkers, and news of it quickly spread when it was realized that Nichols had been murdered.





This sure makes it sound as if the reporter was able to quickly trace Robert Paul to his home address.

So is Dew's memory entirely poppycock?

Not necessarily. If Paul was so easily traced, it still begs the question why he never appeared at the inquest on Day #2, when Crossmere and others were giving their depositions. This would have been the appropriate time. Instead, his appearance before the coroner is curiously belated. It also leaves unanswered why Paul complained about being dragged out of bed and losing work when he was forced to attend the inquest. It certainly adds weight to the idea that--after initially being traced--the police had a difficult time in bringing Paul before the coroner.

Whether Dew was involved in dragging Paul out of bed is, of course, unknown and unknowable. He doesn't claim that he was--and, in fact, Dew doesn't remember the incident.

Dew wasn't in J-Division, but vaguely remembering the search for a 'Whitechapel' witness known to have been at the murder site and subsequently went missing is precisely something that a 'lowly' DC might recall, even 50 years later. Depending on the addresses of Paul's associates and friends and relatives, the police might have gone looking for him on H-Division turf, and this is just the sort of task that would be relegated to a 'lowly' DC.

Just because a source is problematic, doesn't mean we have to approach it in a low-level, superficial way. It's okay to have a more measured approach.

Dew's mistaken memory---even his bad memory on this point--could still help explain one of uncertainties of the case: the oddities surrounding Paul and the Nichols inquest.

Perhaps a more relevant question to ask is that if Paul was so easily traced on returning from work, why wouldn't this also be true of 'Charles Cross'? And if CAL was traced at work, or while returning from work, it would readily explain why his 'work name' was the one that stuck--if Cross was indeed his work name, which seems highly probable considering he began working at Pickford's during his step-father's lifetime--you know, Thomas Cross, the man who, by all appearances, raised him?

You are the one reducing things to absurdity.

The argument was being built that because Dew had described Lechmere as honest, he must have been thoroughly checked out. So I provided examples of Dew making mistakes - I can provide more if you would like - to demonstrate that that was an unsafe conclusion to draw.

It’s clear to me that for dramatic effect Dew was contrasting the ‘honest’ Lechmere who notified Mizen of the woman lying in Bucks Row with the shady, suspicious Paul who disappeared like a phantom into the East End labyrinth.

I see you’re now twisting things to give the impression that I am saying that Dew memory was ‘entirely poppycock’. Shame on you again, RJ.

Perhaps it was ‘easy’ for the press to track Paul down as he’d returned to work. Perhaps pressmen hung around in Bucks Row and engaged passers-by in conversation. Perhaps Paul was one of those passers by. Perhaps Lechmere wasn’t.

[MrBarnett]

Exactly!

Lechmere was a thoroughly honest man.




The Baron

And Robert Paul was never identified.

[Fisherman]

As an annoying aside....

disinterested = objective; non-partisan.

uninterested = not interested.

I certainly don't think Fisherman is disinterested in Trevor's opinions. I think he has a stake in the game. Whether he is uninterested in them, I cannot say. He says that he is, so I'll take his word for it.

I was not commenting on Trevor.

[rjpalmer]

It’s clear to me that for dramatic effect Dew was contrasting the ‘honest’ Lechmere who notified Mizen of the woman lying in Bucks Row with the shady, suspicious Paul who disappeared like a phantom into the East End labyrinth.

It might be clear to you, Gary, but it certainly isn't clear to me. There's a contrast, but there's no evidence it wasn't entirely justified. Indeed, contemporary reports suggest that Cross was more cooperative than Paul.

And in all your dozens of posts, you've yet to produce a single fact that shows that CAL wasn't a completely honest human being. If you want to suggest Dew is wrong about this, isn't the onus on you?

And who is using dramatic effect? You, or Walter Dew? 'Disappeared like a phantom'? Are those Dew's words, or your own?

Dew states, quite prosaically, that a second man could not be found. He writes that this seemed suspicious, but immediately qualifies those suspicions as quite possibly unwarranted:

"In any other district and in any other circumstances this would have been a natural inference, but in the East End of London at this time the man might have had a dozen reasons for avoiding the publicity which would have followed. He might have been a criminal; or he might have been afraid, as so many were, to risk the linking of his name with a Ripper-crime."

Does one normally try to cast someone in a good light by comparing them to someone who was unidentified and whose motives were uncertain? Your interpretation seems far too subtle to be convincing. To me, Dew's account sounds more like the genuine memories of an old copper.

What would Dew's motive be for falsely claiming Lechmere was an honest man? To cast this 'unknown phantom' as the killer? If so, why does he immediately undermine any such suggestion by stating that there could have been a 'dozen reasons' for the man not to have come forward?

I remain unconvinced by your suggestion.

I see you’re now twisting things to give the impression that I am saying that Dew memory was ‘entirely poppycock’. Shame on you again, RJ.

The 'impression' you have left is entirely your own doing. So why should I feel shame? Point me to a single post where you have had anything good to say about Walter Dew. He's always been a 'lowly' DC, and those who would take him seriously are 'bumbling buffoons.' Your discussions of him always revolve around a self-aggrandizing old duffer with a deeply flawed memory. All I'm saying is there is a more intelligent way to approach his writing.

[rjpalmer]

Maybe this will clarify things, but probably not.

I see in an old post that Ed Stowe accuses those who doubt the Lechmere theory of 'wanting it both ways.' He believes our stance is paradoxical.

On one hand, we see nothing suspicious in Lechmere's behavior in Buck's Row; on the other hand, we argue that the police would have found him suspicious, and thus would have investigated him. He sees this an internal contradiction.

But the same thing can be said about the Lechmere theorists: they find CAL's behavior at the inquest and in Buck's Row to be undeniably suspicious, yet imply that the police didn't investigate him, or even attempt to verify his bona fides, etc. This is also an internal contradiction.

Both extremes are somewhat logically flawed, but I find the first stance far more rational, for the following reason.

No, we don't think that Lechmere's behavior in Buck's Row or at the inquest is inconsistent with the behavior of an entirely innocent person.

That much is true.

But at the same time, we realize that the circumstances he found himself under--being found alone in a dark street with a dead woman--would have inherently raised concerns, and would have required an explanation.

It's truly that simple, and there isn't any contradiction. Lechmere found himself a very awkward circumstance, and one that would need some sort of investigation, but that does not equate to his behavior being suspicious in itself.

Thus we can have it both ways, which is what I think Jeff Hamm and others are arguing. The circumstances are concerning enough that the police would quietly investigate, but ultimately there is nothing in Lechmere's own behavior that justifies suspicion. We deny the bits about him refusing to move a dead or drunk woman, walking on the north side of the street, waving over Paul as a sign of psychopathy, etc. No one denies that the situation in which he found himself wasn't awkward.

To me, it's much harder for the Lechmere theorists to reconcile their twin belief that CAL was both deeply suspicious, and yet stayed off the police 'radar.' Further, I can't see how anyone could seriously suggest that those at Pickford's wouldn't have realized CAL's true identity, and, if he had tried to deceive the inquest, wouldn't have informed the police.

[MrBarnett]

Dew and the grapes:

“Then came dramatic corroboration of his story. In the little Berners Street court, quite close to the spot where the body was found, detectives searching every inch of the ground came upon a number of grape skins and stones.”

[Trevor Marriott]

In this case because Dew’s errors are glaringly obvious. To what extent do you imagine he, a lowly H Div PC, was personally involved in the investigation into the Nichols murder which occurred in J Div?

Extra officers were drafted into Whitechapel.

Walter Dew who was a police detective at the time of the Kelly murder, working under Inspector Reid. He also attended the Millers Court crime scene

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Fisherman]

To me, it's much harder for the Lechmere theorists to reconcile their twin belief that CAL was both deeply suspicious, and yet stayed off the police 'radar.'

If we begin from the back, we can see that there is a Charles Cross mentioned in the police reports from September and October. Not a Charles Lechmere. Like it or not, this is compelling evidence that the police did not investigate him.

Following your "logic", we therefore get a situation where you think that the insight that the police did not investigate him tells us that they never found him suspicious.

Once we understand that the police is actually able to misjudge these things, we have our solution. They didnīt find Christie suspicious when he witnessed against Evans, did they?

The mistake you make is that you work from an assumption that people who are not investigated by the police cannot be or seem to be villains, because if they were or did, the police WOULD have investigated them.

It is as circular a reasoning as can be found.

To accept that Lechmere was the culprit, it must also be accepted that the police missed out on him. And to those familar with criminal and legal history, examples of the police missing out are par for the course. The policemen who interviewed Christie failed to see that a fencepost in his garden was a femur.

Charles Lechmere approached the police not once, but twice, seemingly out of free will (as you know, I believe it was something he instead saw as a risk-minimizing necessity). He provided a scenario that was not in any way new to the police - they had heard the rumours and read the articles suggesting that two men were the first finders of the body, not PC Neil. But they DENIED that the scenario with two men who found the body was correct, and so they embarrased themselves pretty badly. This would probably have played a role when it came to how likely they were to mistrust a man who had contacted the police twice and given the inquest what they accepoted was the true picture of what transpired on the murder night. Furthermore, Charles Lechmere was - at least on the surface - the kind of man; a hard working family man with a steady job and kids, that even today make a poster like Greenway go "He couldnīt have done it, he seems such a productive and good guy!".
Guess how it will have looked in a period where criminal anthropology ruled the decisions of who was a likely criminal and who was not…

The lack of the name Lechmere in the police reports is good enough to tell us that the carman was not investigated.

A large host of circumstantil evidence is enough to tell that he OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN!

The simple solution to this perceived conundrum of yours is that the police goofed up very badly. They were not as informed and unbiased as the police goofing up even today. Far, far from it. It is the only reasonable solution if you are not willing to accept a dozen very odd coincidences or two.

[MrBarnett]

Extra officers were drafted into Whitechapel.

Walter Dew who was a police detective at the time of the Kelly murder, working under Inspector Reid. He also attended the Millers Court crime scene

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

He says he was there. He says he slipped on the gore on Kelly’s floor and that Inspector Beck warned him’ "For God's sake, Dew, don’t look."

Dramatic stuff indeed.

He also says that on discovering Stride’s body, before entering the club, Diemschitz cried out, ‘The Ripper!’

And in a rather confused description of Packer’s second sighting of the man he claimed to have seen with Stride, Dew seems to say that Packer watched the man board a tramcar from inside his shop. Perhaps he was the proud owner of a very large periscope.

How many examples of Dew’s errors do we need to see before we come to the conclusion that a throwaway line about Lechmere being honest is of little value?

When he talks about the Coles murder, Dew tells us that Swallow gardens was used by a number of respectable railwaymen. How did he determine their ‘respectability’? Were they thoroughly investigated according to the ‘standard procedure’ we’ve been told about?

[Mark J D]

Once we understand that the police is actually able to misjudge these things, we have our solution. They didnīt find Christie suspicious when he witnessed against Evans, did they?

It's probably signficant that Christie had -- like Lechmere! -- an historical connection with the police: in the war he'd been a 'War Reserve Constable'. Of course, a man with his criminal record should never have been accepted; but -- guess what! -- the authorities, uh, failed to check his background...

M.

[Trevor Marriott]

If we begin from the back, we can see that there is a Charles Cross mentioned in the police reports from September and October. Not a Charles Lechmere. Like it or not, this is compelling evidence that the police did not investigate him.

Following your "logic", we therefore get a situation where you think that the insight that the police did not investigate him tells us that they never found him suspicious.

Once we understand that the police is actually able to misjudge these things, we have our solution. They didnīt find Christie suspicious when he witnessed against Evans, did they?

The mistake you make is that you work from an assumption that people who are not investigated by the police cannot be or seem to be villains, because if they were or did, the police WOULD have investigated them.

It is as circular a reasoning as can be found.

To accept that Lechmere was the culprit, it must also be accepted that the police missed out on him. And to those familar with criminal and legal history, examples of the police missing out are par for the course. The policemen who interviewed Christie failed to see that a fencepost in his garden was a femur.

Charles Lechmere approached the police not once, but twice, seemingly out of free will (as you know, I believe it was something he instead saw as a risk-minimizing necessity). He provided a scenario that was not in any way new to the police - they had heard the rumours and read the articles suggesting that two men were the first finders of the body, not PC Neil. But they DENIED that the scenario with two men who found the body was correct, and so they embarrased themselves pretty badly. This would probably have played a role when it came to how likely they were to mistrust a man who had contacted the police twice and given the inquest what they accepoted was the true picture of what transpired on the murder night. Furthermore, Charles Lechmere was - at least on the surface - the kind of man; a hard working family man with a steady job and kids, that even today make a poster like Greenway go "He couldnīt have done it, he seems such a productive and good guy!".
Guess how it will have looked in a period where criminal anthropology ruled the decisions of who was a likely criminal and who was not…

The lack of the name Lechmere in the police reports is good enough to tell us that the carman was not investigated.

A large host of circumstantil evidence is enough to tell that he OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN!

The simple solution to this perceived conundrum of yours is that the police goofed up very badly. They were not as informed and unbiased as the police goofing up even today. Far, far from it. It is the only reasonable solution if you are not willing to accept a dozen very odd coincidences or two.

You cannot produce one scrap of evidence to show that he wasnt, or that his evidence and account were regarded by the police as unsafe.

Furthermore you do not know why he used the name Cross, according to you it was with intent to impede the investigation at the inquest and deflect away from the sugestion that he was the killer.

If he had given the name Lechmere to the court would you have still suspected him?

Furthermore you dont know that whatever explantion he gave to the police for using the name Cross was not looked upon by the police as a plausible explantion.

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Trevor Marriott]

He says he was there. He says he slipped on the gore on Kelly’s floor and that Inspector Beck warned him’ "For God's sake, Dew, don’t look."

Dramatic stuff indeed.

He also says that on discovering Stride’s body, before entering the club, Diemschitz cried out, ‘The Ripper!’

And in a rather confused description of Packer’s second sighting of the man he claimed to have seen with Stride, Dew seems to say that Packer watched the man board a tramcar from inside his shop. Perhaps he was the proud owner of a very large periscope.

How many examples of Dew’s errors do we need to see before we come to the conclusion that a throwaway line about Lechmere being honest is of little value?

When he talks about the Coles murder, Dew tells us that Swallow gardens was used by a number of respectable railwaymen. How did he determine their ‘respectability’? Were they thoroughly investigated according to the ‘standard procedure’ we’ve been told about?

Its far to easy to dismiss the points that negate what you want to believe.

As to respectabilty of railwaymen I would say that a person who is in full time work and support his family coiud be described as respectable, as against those who did not work and stole and robbed and lived of immoral earnings.

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Fisherman]

You cannot produce one scrap of evidence to show that he wasnt, or that his evidence and account were regarded by the police as unsafe.

Yes, I can. The name.

Furthermore you do not know why he used the name Cross, according to you it was with intent to impede the investigation at the inquest and deflect away from the sugestion that he was the killer.

No, according to me, it was to keep somebody out of the matter. The inquest and not least the police should have suspected him. But the did not,apparently.

If he had given the name Lechmere to the court would you have still suspected him?

Yes.

Furthermore you dont know that whatever explantion he gave to the police for using the name Cross was not looked upon by the police as a plausible explantion.

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

I don’ t need to know it, and I dont think he gave any explanation.

[Fisherman]

Perhaps signficantly, Christie had -- like Lechmere! -- an historical connection with the police: in the war he'd been a 'War Reserve Constable'. Of course, a man with his criminal record should never have been accepted; but -- guess what! -- the authorities, uh, failed to check his background...

M.

Yup. It is that easy, in all probability. So now the naysayers are tasked with proving that the victorian police would NEVER get it wrong.

Good luck with that one.