Evidence of innocence

[Fiver]

Despite what you say, I am trying to be fair. Are you -- or are you not -- now abandoning this "very real" possibility for Ed Stowe's suggestion--a suggestion you argued against when I made it?

Or is it that you want to juggle two possibilities at the same time, so you can't be pinned down?

Everything in Fisherman's version of the case is like Schroderinger's Cat - he'll entertain contradictory positions so long as they point towards Charles Lechmere as a suspect. Fishy's Lechmere is simultaneously both impulsive and calculating, bold and cautious, feigning innocence and deliberately contradicting the police.

[Fiver]

We know for a fact that Charles Lechmere disagreed with the police over what he had said and done on the murder morning.

Charles Lechmere disagreed with PC Mizen about what he said to Mizen and how Mizen reacted. That's it. Charles Lechmere did not disagree with the police about when he found the body. Charles Lechmere did not disagree with the police about anything he did before he found the body, after he found the body, his search for a police officer, or his actions after finding PC Mizen.

Robert Paul also disagreed with PC Mizen about what he said to Mizen and how Mizen reacted. Robert Paul disagreed with Lechmere and the police about when the body was found. Robert Paul corroborates Lechmere on all points from his first seeing Lechmere to his partying company long after they spoke to PC Mizen.

Finally, R J lists a number of addresses where Crow lived over the years, pointing to how they all were addresses close or relatively close to Ripper murder sites. What R J seems to forget here is the typical pattern of the Victorian Eastenders. They had a propensity to move many times but never very far. Charles Lechmere is of course another example of this. And living in an area is not the same thing as being a suspect, because that would provide us with thousands and thousands of suspects. Nor does having lived in Bakers Row in 1871 point somebody out as a probable killer in 1888.

RJ uses the same sort geographical evidence against Crow that you use against Lechmere. Glad so see you belatedly admitting that living in the area gives us "thousands and thousands of suspects". Your refutation of RJ is a systematic dismantling of your own case.

[Varqm]

Thanks Varqm! Acts are not something I know much about, other than they exist somewhere and I'm suppose to abide by them.

- Jeff

You're welcome. Follow your heart. . I have read 1-2 Old Bailey cases where they go to a public house at 3-4 am in the West end near Covent Garden and Smithfield. But wont serve if visibly drunk. I think the exception was it was market or theater related but the litigants clearly were not. Reading between the lines one was an unfortunate.

[Fiver]

The geography as such is never what makes for an initial suspicion visavi a person. The geography is used not to establish but to confirm suspicion. The reason that we look at the geography in Lechmeres case is because he DID alter his name, which Crow did not. It is because he DID disagree with the police, which Crow did not. It is because he HAS been proven to have been present at a murder site at the approximate time the victim died, which Crow is not proven to have been. It is because he IS proven to have traversed the murder area on workday mornings, which Crow is NOT proven to have done. As a cabman, he is instead likely to have been all over London, with no fixed reoccurring pathway through the murder area.

You based your suspicion of Lechmere on the killings taking place on Lechmere's route to work. Yet now you totally contradict yourself by saying "As a cabman, he is instead likely to have been all over London, with no fixed reoccurring pathway through the murder area."

If Charles Lechmere had "no fixed reoccurring pathway through the murder area" then it is impossible to tell if any of the killings took place on his route to work. By saying this you completely undermines any reason you had to tie Lechmere to the locations of the killings.

Charles Lechmere did go by the name of Cross, his stepfather's surname, at the Inquest. He had done it before in 1876, so clearly using the name Cross has nothing to do with the Ripper killings. Charles Lechmere also gave his home and work addresses at the Inquest, so clearly his use of the name Cross was not an attempt to hide his identity from his family, his neighbors, his employers, his coworkers, or the police.

Lechmere was present at a murder site at the approximate time the victim died. So were Robert Paul and PC Neil. And for other victims - John Richardson, Elizabeth Long, Albert Cadosch, John Davis, Israel Schwartz, Louis Diemschutz, Leon Goldstein, and PC Watkins.

Lechmere disagreed with PC Mizen. So did Robert Paul.

Nichols was killed on Lechmere's route to work. You've claimed 5 million-to-1 odds about where the victims were killed.

But the 5 million-to-1 odds about where the victims were killed are clearly nonsense. They apply to Robert Paul's route to work exactly as much as they apply to Charles Lechmere's route to work. They might apply to some of Paul's co-workers. They probably apply to some of Lechmere's co-workers at Broadstreet Station. They almost certainly apply to several of the hundreds of people who worked in or near near Spitalfield's Market. Not counting the Market, an 1891 map shows a Cocoa Manufactory, the National telephone Works, a Chenniles Manufactory, a Boot & Shoe Factory, a Tobacco Manufactory, and the Black Eagle Brewery.

[Fiver]

Much of my time out here has been spent pointing out why idiotic suggestions like ”Diemschitz is just as good a suspect as Lechmere”, ”Somebody HAS to find a dead body, it is not something that implicates guilt in any way” and ”Lechmere has no record of violence at all whereas Bury HAS!”.

Most of your time here has been spent dodging the real questions that posters have actually asked. And repeating claims that have been disporven.

Charles Lechmere is unique as a suspect. The most common reason that some people dislike him is that they compare him to the other suspects along a template resorted to by the police back in 1888, resorted to because they were not able to identify what I would call a category 1 suspect - somebody who is proven to have been in place at a murder site at the approximate time the murder took place, who has no alibi and who has a lot of anomalies and inconsistencies pointing in his way.

Nothing about Charles Lechmere is unique as a suspect.

He has no "anomalies and inconsistencies pointing in his way".

He's not the only man to have been near a victim shortly before them being found dead.
He's not the only man to take that route to work.
He's not the only man to disagree with PC Mizen.
He's not the only man to sometimes use his stepfather's surname.
He's not the only carman to be the first person to find a victim.
He's not the only man to have no alibi for the killing of the victim he found.

He's not even the only man to have an alibi for some of the Ripper killings where he did not find the victim.

[Abby Normal]

You based your suspicion of Lechmere on the killings taking place on Lechmere's route to work. Yet now you totally contradict yourself by saying "As a cabman, he is instead likely to have been all over London, with no fixed reoccurring pathway through the murder area."

If Charles Lechmere had "no fixed reoccurring pathway through the murder area" then it is impossible to tell if any of the killings took place on his route to work. By saying this you completely undermines any reason you had to tie Lechmere to the locations of the killings.

Charles Lechmere did go by the name of Cross, his stepfather's surname, at the Inquest. He had done it before in 1876, so clearly using the name Cross has nothing to do with the Ripper killings. Charles Lechmere also gave his home and work addresses at the Inquest, so clearly his use of the name Cross was not an attempt to hide his identity from his family, his neighbors, his employers, his coworkers, or the police.

Lechmere was present at a murder site at the approximate time the victim died. So were Robert Paul and PC Neil. And for other victims - John Richardson, Elizabeth Long, Albert Cadosch, John Davis, Israel Schwartz, Louis Diemschutz, Leon Goldstein, and PC Watkins.

Lechmere disagreed with PC Mizen. So did Robert Paul.

Nichols was killed on Lechmere's route to work. You've claimed 5 million-to-1 odds about where the victims were killed.

But the 5 million-to-1 odds about where the victims were killed are clearly nonsense. They apply to Robert Paul's route to work exactly as much as they apply to Charles Lechmere's route to work. They might apply to some of Paul's co-workers. They probably apply to some of Lechmere's co-workers at Broadstreet Station. They almost certainly apply to several of the hundreds of people who worked in or near near Spitalfield's Market. Not counting the Market, an 1891 map shows a Cocoa Manufactory, the National telephone Works, a Chenniles Manufactory, a Boot & Shoe Factory, a Tobacco Manufactory, and the Black Eagle Brewery.

hi fiver
re you first paragraph, i think fish is differentiating between lechs route to work, and his travels with his cart afterwards delivering goods.
his route to work would take him very near the murder sites near murder times, yet his cart travels would take him everywhere, so he would not only have an intimate knowledge of the quickest routes to work, shortcuts etc, but also an intimate knowledge of the general area as well.

[Abby Normal]

Most of your time here has been spent dodging the real questions that posters have actually asked. And repeating claims that have been disporven.



Nothing about Charles Lechmere is unique as a suspect.

He has no "anomalies and inconsistencies pointing in his way".

He's not the only man to have been near a victim shortly before them being found dead.
He's not the only man to take that route to work.
He's not the only man to disagree with PC Mizen.
He's not the only man to sometimes use his stepfather's surname.
He's not the only carman to be the first person to find a victim.
He's not the only man to have no alibi for the killing of the victim he found.

He's not even the only man to have an alibi for some of the Ripper killings where he did not find the victim.

your last sentence makes no sense, he has no alibi for any of the murders.
and if you find a man that has all those things you listed, then id say he might be a good suspect? who is this other man? lol

[Fiver]

And we need to weigh in many things, like for example how Lechmere could have known from experience that Bucks Row was always silent and dark, with very few people passing through it, whereas any other street that he did perhaps NOT walk on his morning treks may have been an unwritten story to him.

Buck's row was certainly dark, but it was not silent.

"I knew the dangerous character of the locality I tried to give him a wide berth. Few people like to come up and down here without being on their guard, for there are such terrible gangs about. There have been many knocked down and robbed at that spot." - Robert Paul.

Plus Buck's row was part of PC Neil's patrol.

[Fiver]

Look at it from the other side: If dumped evidence was never going to tell us anything at all about a killers pathways, why is it that it has always been agreed that the Goulston Street rag has been looked at as an indicator of how the killer doubled back towards his home after Mitre Square? I would say because the logic and statistics favor the idea that somebody who has killed and gutted a woman in a public space and thereafter left that space, is in fact heading towards some sort of bolthole after the strike.
A question: What will a dumped, bloody rag, emanating from a murder scene have the police do? Will it have them:

A/ doing a door to door in the area where the rag was dropped, or

B/ take out a ruler and draw an exact line from the murder site and over the rag, and then talk to all people living in some sort of proximity to where that line passes? Regardless of how such a line would run all around the globe?

I have seen one of these methods employed, but I am still waiting to see the other one put into action. My guess is that it will never happen, though.

You will never see the second employed by police because it's useless.

If you "take out a ruler and draw an exact line from the murder site and over the rag" you will have a route that no human being could walk - it would require going through or over buildings. Likewise, no human being would continue that ruler straight route to their lodging, ignoring the actual presense of buildings in the way and the actual directions of the streets.

Police would know the killer was at the place the rag was found. They would have no idea what direction the killer continued after that. They would have no idea what distance the killer traveled after dropping the rag. They would have no idea if the rag was accidentally dropped on killer's way home or deliberately dropped to make the police waste time looking in the wrong direction.

All the police would know was that the killer was at the place the rag was found. And so they would ask the people nearby, in hopes some of them saw something.

They wouldn't draw imaginary lines to nowhere.

[FrankO]

In a sense, I donīt think it would do much harm to the theory if we took Eldon Street off the table (although no such thing can be done so far as I can see). What we would get is a scenario where Lechmere supposedly used Hanbury Street every day, and what that would do would be to cast the Tabram murder into doubt, as to whether or not it was a Ripper strike. And the Tabram murder has always been the odd one out in many a way. So if we lift it out of the picture, we instead get a more or less perfect three canonical murders picture, with Lechmere passing by Nichols and Chapman and perhaps picking Kelly up in Hanbury Street, and then going to her room, a very short walk that would not take Lechmere out of direction in any significant way. Plus it would have the advantage that my ears would be spared another "You cannot PROVE he used Old Montague Street!"

Then again, if we allow for Eldon Street as an alternative entrance, Tabram suddenly fits the bill again. If the Eldon Street entrance was used by carmen en route to their Pickfords work, then it would have been a passing point that fit Lechmereīs old lodgings in James Street very well, and it may be that he always used it as he lived there - and that he used it after Tabram. The one thing we can tell with certainty is that Lechmere would have traversed Whitechapel/Spitalfields in an east-westerly direction in the early mornings, and so I donīt think that the question whether or not he used the Eldon Street entrance is something that materially changes the carmansī candidacy.

It would have been another matter if it could be proven or suggested that Lechmere did NOT traverse the area in question but instead some other area, but that is not so.
The case against Lechmere in not built on the geographical correlation. The correlations is instead used to test whether or not the case as such is a viable one, in terms of geography. And it is, regardless of which door Lechmere used after traversing Whitechapel/Spitalfields.

When I was doing the exercise with the timings & distances and assumed for that sake that Lechmere arrived at work at 4 (in time), I wasn’t really thinking about what it might or might not mean for your theory, other than that it would suggest that Lechmere would have no reason to use the Old Montague route. I was just excited to see that it fitted to a tee with Lechmere entering the Broad Street Station premises in Worship Street. I really discovered that while writing my post. That was all.

But you’re right. If he'd only use Hanbury Street, the canon as to Nichols & Chapman would remain intact and Kelly’s murder would, probably, not be too far off in Miller’s Court. And the Tabram murder would indeed be cast into doubt, as would MacKenzie’s.

[GBinOz]

Hi Frank.

In your pre-murder timing exercises, did you allow time for Lechmere walking to Whitechapel Road, finding and propositioning Nichols and then accompanying her back to the murder site?

Cheers, George

[Fisherman]

Hi Christer,

I've just watched Ed Stow's latest Youtube video where he proposes that Lechmere may have brought Nichols from Whitechapel Road through Court St to where he killed her. If Polly was still plying her trade then Whitechapel Road would seem to be a more customer friendly location compared to Buck's Row, but if that was the case then the time for Lechmere to locate her in Whitechapel Road and for them to proceed to the murder site would need to be added to the calculations. Furthermore, the murder would have had to have been planned rather than an opportunistic encounter on a regular route to work.

A possibility that I have considered is that, as time passed, Polly may have abandoned her search for a customer and decided to sleep rough in the gateway and Lechmere, if he was the killer, found her and strangled her in her sleep. But that is pure conjecture.

Cheers, George

Hi George, sorry not to have answered before, but here goes:

I think the pre-murder timings are by and large very open to speculation. Yes, if he left Doveton Street at 3.30, it would mean stretching the timings if he needed to seek out prey in Whitechapel Road. Then again, and as has been pointed out before, why would I presume that a man I think was a liar and a killer would be patently honest about his timings? And what stands in the way of him having left before 3.30? Nothing.

As for the choice between planning and being opportunistic, I think we are dealing with something inbetween, n ot least if he DID leave earlier than he said. Such a thing would be part of planning to kill, but where and who he killed would be opportunistic; once he got the chance to be alone with a prostitute in a secluded place, the trap was sprung.

Of course Nichols may have been sleeping in the road, but although we must allow for it, I donīt favor the suggestion for the simple reason that the area outside Browns Stable Yard does not look very comfortable. Of course, unfortunated were not spoilt for choice, but I am certain that there were spots that offered better protection from the elements and perhaps a little more comfort. But thatīs just me, of course.

[FrankO]

Hi Frank.

In your pre-murder timing exercises, did you allow time for Lechmere walking to Whitechapel Road, finding and propositioning Nichols and then accompanying her back to the murder site?

Cheers, George

Hi George,

The point of departure for my timings was that Lechmere arrived at 4 am at work, meaning that he was in time for work. From there I calculated back to when he left home, using different walking paces and an entrance to Broad Street Station in Worship Street. My conclusion was that Lechmere left home, roughly, between 3.30 and 3.35, which would fit with "about 3.30". So, if the assumptions upon which I based my calculations are (about) correct and Lechmere, in reality, left home at exactly 3.30 (or somewhat earlier), then there would have been a couple of minutes for him to make a detour via Whitechapel Road, pick up Nichols, etc.

Cheers,
Frank

[Mark J D]

The point of departure for my timings was that Lechmere arrived at 4 am at work, meaning that he was in time for work. From there I calculated back to when he left home, using different walking paces and an entrance to Broad Street Station in Worship Street. My conclusion was that Lechmere left home, roughly, between 3.30 and 3.35, which would fit with "about 3.30". So, if the assumptions upon which I based my calculations are (about) correct and Lechmere, in reality, left home at exactly 3.30 (or somewhat earlier), then there would have been a couple of minutes for him to make a detour via Whitechapel Road, pick up Nichols, etc.

Cheers,
Frank

Is that entrance the one that seems to be indicated on the top north-west corner of the huge Broad Street site?

M.

[GBinOz]

Hi George,

The point of departure for my timings was that Lechmere arrived at 4 am at work, meaning that he was in time for work. From there I calculated back to when he left home, using different walking paces and an entrance to Broad Street Station in Worship Street. My conclusion was that Lechmere left home, roughly, between 3.30 and 3.35, which would fit with "about 3.30". So, if the assumptions upon which I based my calculations are (about) correct and Lechmere, in reality, left home at exactly 3.30 (or somewhat earlier), then there would have been a couple of minutes for him to make a detour via Whitechapel Road, pick up Nichols, etc.

Cheers,
Frank

Hi Frank,

You are aware of the esteem in which I hold your posts, but I am having difficultly in believing that the journey to WR, negotiations and return to the murder site could be accomplished in a couple of minutes.

Cheers, George