Evidence of innocence

[Fisherman]

Hang on, Fishy.

Your theory is that when Robert Paul gave that interview to the newspaper, he didn't know what the other carman had or hadn't said to PC Mizen, in which case it would have been an assumption at best. If he related any part of a conversation he wasn't involved in and didn't hear, he was lying by definition.


Nope. If the two agreed to tell a PC about their exploits in Bucks Row, and if Lechmere told Paul to walk along as he did the telling, it would not be a lie on Pauls behalf to say that they informed the PC about things. It would be Lechmere who told the lies, and Paul would be unaware of them. That does not amount to Paul lying, it amounts to Lechmere doing so. Unless you disagree?

And if Lechmere had been the killer, and had lied through his teeth when talking to Mizen out of Paul's earshot, then both carmen should have had some serious explaining to do.

Yes, if asked about it. But the one question asked about it was when the juryman asked Lechmere if he had really told Mizen about a second PC, something he - of course - denied.
Not all people who lie and kill are going to tell about it. Not even if asked, actually.

For a start, Mizen would have known if one of the men had not uttered a single word to him and been at a distance while the other did all the talking. "We told Mizen a, b and c", coming from Paul's interview, would not have cut it if only one man had spoken and he had said "x, y and z".

Once again, any one person who is a member of a group of persons can use the term "we" about things he or she has not done himself. Once again, if a school class go into a church and light a candle, not all of them will hold the match, but all of them will be able to say after wards "We went to the church and lit a candle".
It is a common enough expression, so letīs not try and deny it, shall we?

When 'Cross' gave his own version of the same conversation at the inquest, and denied that Mizen was told he was wanted by another policeman in Buck's Row, that would have put the tin hat on it and proved to Mizen that both men were liars, who were trying to make him out to be the liar.

Did he even hear it? He had testified BEFORE Lechmere and may well have left the room as the carman spoke. Moreover, it may well be that Mizen asked himself if he had really heard what he thought he had heard.

Mizen doesn't come out of this smelling of roses, whichever way we view the evidence.

If we regard Lechmere as the liar, then yes, Mizen smells like awhole bundle of roses, not least since he went on to imnplicvate the carman as the killer by way of offering his view on the blood evidence.

It strikes me that he didn't want his own part in the night's events examined too closely, whether or not he suspected Paul or Cross of any wrongdoing.

Love,

Caz
X

I donīt share that view at all. To me, a person who swaps names, who disagrees with the police, who is found alone with a freshly killed murder victim and who has a geography that fits the murders in a series line a glove is the shady character, not a PC who does everything he is supposed to do by the book. But we cannot all think alike.

[MrBarnett]

If Swanson had extended his search to 300 yards from the arch, his men would have knocked on Ma Lechmere’s door. (Assuming my measurements are accurate.)

[Fisherman]

Christer, RJ, Abby and all.

A blanket reply to you. Sorry

I have said before and will say again, there is not sufficient, hard evidence that Frederick Wildbore and/or Richard Lawrence were responsible for depositing body parts all around London. Wildbore had no criminal record that I know about. If you read all the newspaper reports, and there are more than meet the eye in most discussions relating to these cases on the forums and even other places, the circumstances around the Whitehall case point to someone familiar with the construction of New Scotland Yard. Could that be Charles Lechmere? I guess it could if he had deliveries there and became familiar with the groundwork. Otherwise, I find it hard to believe someone would choose the very vault the workers originally, on purpose, picked to hide their tools due to it's "hard to get to" location in that basement, to dump the torso. There were so many other, less troublesome places to dump it and still keep it at New Scotland Yard, if the intention was to throw the finger at the police.

I have not held anything back regarding my research on this stuff. I post it as it comes to mind or as I find new information. With that, I can't direct you to everything I have posted (it's all over the place on two forums). My point here was to challenge Christer on this one particular case. Not in a combative way, I'm not like that, but to show that there are other, credible scenarios for this case (Whitehall) that maybe Charles Lechmere did not have a hand in. Now Christer, if Lechmere killed them and needed help disposing the bodies, we may need to talk about a book deal.

I much respect you and your research, Jerry, and that will not come as news to you. I only become combative when people say that I would have flippantly dismissed your suggestions, something that is patently untrue.

I trust you are more than able to see through that kind of weird claims. As I said, I find Wildbore interesting but not as viable as Lechmere for the combined role of the Ripper and the Torso killer.

I cannot remember if you have ever given your view on the suggestion that the Ripper and the Torso killer were one and the same, something that is implicated by a large number of very rare similarities and of course also by the general scarcity of eviscerating serial killers. Are you saying that Wildbore may have been the Torso killer or that he may have been the Torso killer AND the Ripper?

If you do not wish to comment on it, then feel free not to - I would understand and respect such a stance, and I have many times avoided to comment on matters although I have had views about them.

[Fisherman]

I thought that working out the logistics of the Torso/Ripper's geoprofile would be something worth exploring rather than glossing over with a flick of the wrist.

If the Torso killer was based in the East End, why were almost all of his murders dumped in a westerly direction, and only one on home turf? The Ripper obviously didn't mind crapping on his own doorstep (so to speak), so it's peculiar that he only chose to dump one torso in Whitechapel.

And if Pinchin Street held significance to Lechmere, why didn't he dump one there sooner?

I have given my view on these matters many times, Harry, but here they are again:

I think the killer was much into looking for recognition, not least by way of publicity. Therefore, I believe that he chose to dump his body parts in the western parts of London so that they would float ashore along the power centre of the late 19th century world.

I think the same mechanism is mirrored in the Pinchin Street business: I believe that Lechmere was irritated by how it was thought that there were two serial killers afoot, and I think that the Pinchin Street torso was designed to show his contemporaries that there was just the one killer. So he killed that woman and took of her legs and head, telling everybody that it was a Torso killing, but he ALSO provided a blueprint cut down from ribs to pubes and placed the torso in Ripper territory to announce that it was ALSO a Ripper murder.

All parts of these cases are worth exploring, of course, but not all explorations will be able to provide any useful facts to lean against. And sometimes, we can tell that beforehand.

[MrBarnett]

If Swanson had extended his search to 300 yards from the arch, his men would have knocked on Ma Lechmere’s door. (Assuming my measurements are accurate.)

They weren’t - make it 350.

[Trevor Marriott]

The Torso Killer went of his way to hide the identities of his victims.

The Ripper did nothing to hide the identities of his victims.

Which make it likely they were two different killers.

or no killers at all

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Trevor Marriott]

I have given my view on these matters many times, Harry, but here they are again:

I think the killer was much into looking for recognition, not least by way of publicity. Therefore, I believe that he chose to dump his body parts in the western parts of London so that they would float ashore along the power centre of the late 19th century world.

I think the same mechanism is mirrored in the Pinchin Street business: I believe that Lechmere was irritated by how it was thought that there were two serial killers afoot, and I think that the Pinchin Street torso was designed to show his contemporaries that there was just the one killer. So he killed that woman and took of her legs and head, telling everybody that it was a Torso killing, but he ALSO provided a blueprint cut down from ribs to pubes and placed the torso in Ripper territory to announce that it was ALSO a Ripper murder.

All parts of these cases are worth exploring, of course, but not all explorations will be able to provide any useful facts to lean against. And sometimes, we can tell that beforehand.

Case are not solved on “personal beliefs” and “I thinks” which you seem to frequently use in trying to assert your theories on others.

tve sharp reality is that you do not have one scrap of evidence to show Lechmere was involved in the disposing of torsos and furthermore there is no direct evidence to show the torsos were the subject of homicides

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[FrankO]

Personally, I think it would be odd if Wildbore first placed the torso in the vault himself, then waited a couple of weeks, after which he grew tired of how nobody else found the torso and so he resorted to "finding" it himself in the end.

Two things, Christer.

One: while it may seem odd if Wildbore first placed the torso in the vault, only to ‘discover’ it himself sometime later, it seems just as odd for Lechmere to kill a woman on precisely the ONLY street he just HAD to take every day on his way to work. I, for one, think it’s quite similar at least.

Two: as you say, there's a case to be made for the killer being much into looking for recognition, not least by way of publicity, so, when nobody else found the torso in the vault, it could be very well argued that he, therefore, did it himself for that very reason. After all, without the torso there would be no recognition.

[Fisherman]

Two things, Christer.

One: while it may seem odd if Wildbore first placed the torso in the vault, only to ‘discover’ it himself sometime later, it seems just as odd for Lechmere to kill a woman on precisely the ONLY street he just HAD to take every day on his way to work. I, for one, think it’s quite similar at least.

These are different matters to me, Frank. I am not pointing to the location in Wildbores case, but instead to how he would have placed the torso there for weeks only to then ”find it” himself.

Two: as you say, there's a case to be made for the killer being much into looking for recognition, not least by way of publicity, so, when nobody else found the torso in the vault, it could be very well argued that he, therefore, did it himself for that very reason. After all, without the torso there would be no recognition.

If publicity was on his mind, why not nail the torso to the door of the building? That should do the trick and it would be found quickly enough. Of course, the same argument could be used for Lechmere, but he could not have ”found” the body in the vault, not after Nichols. But, as I pointed out, it is an anomaly that can be overcome.

[FrankO]

I have given my view on these matters many times, Harry, but here they are again:

I think the killer was much into looking for recognition, not least by way of publicity. Therefore, I believe that he chose to dump his body parts in the western parts of London so that they would float ashore along the power centre of the late 19th century world.

I think the same mechanism is mirrored in the Pinchin Street business: I believe that Lechmere was irritated by how it was thought that there were two serial killers afoot, and I think that the Pinchin Street torso was designed to show his contemporaries that there was just the one killer. So he killed that woman and took of her legs and head, telling everybody that it was a Torso killing, but he ALSO provided a blueprint cut down from ribs to pubes and placed the torso in Ripper territory to announce that it was ALSO a Ripper murder.

All parts of these cases are worth exploring, of course, but not all explorations will be able to provide any useful facts to lean against. And sometimes, we can tell that beforehand.

As I said in my previous post, there is a case to be made that the Torso killer wanted recognition as a serial killer, but that's just the Torso killer. If he and the Ripper were one and the same and he wanted to let everybody know that, then what you suggest seems a rather lame attempt at it as far as I'm concerned.

There would have been much better things he could do to get it across and clearly, too. Why the non-penetrating cut from ribs to pubes? Why no entrails lifted out of the body and placed over the shoulder? Why no missing part of the belly wall, preferably including the navel? Why leave the uterus in place? Why no carving in the flesh of "I am the Ripper" or something alike? Or why didn't he do anything to Kelly that would have made the link between the 2 series clear? A letter, a face peeled off, the head/an arm/a leg/a hand/a foot cut off?

In fact, this is another reason why I believe they were seperate serial killers with the Torso killer wanting as much coverage/recognition as the Ripper, throwing a right thigh in the garden of Sir Percy Shelley's Chelsea house, dumping a torso in the vault of the New Scotland Yard building right after the double event and placing another torso close to, but still just outside "Ripper territory".

[FrankO]

If publicity was on his mind, why not nail the torso to the door of the building? That should do the trick and it would be found quickly enough.

True enough, in that sense dumping the torso in a place where it would be hard to find wasn't logical.

[Fisherman]

As I said in my previous post, there is a case to be made that the Torso killer wanted recognition as a serial killer, but that's just the Torso killer. If he and the Ripper were one and the same and he wanted to let everybody know that, then what you suggest seems a rather lame attempt at it as far as I'm concerned.

If even I am able to make it out, then it must surely be very clear, Frank. Nah, just joking, but I really would not call it lame - or rather lame. It was a typical torso murder with a blueprint abdominal cut from pubes to ribs and the torso was palced in Ripperland. Thatīs not lame in my world, although of course the kiiler could have written to the Morning Advertiser and proclaimed his sovereign ruling of the serial killing business. We can always do better than the killers in retrospect.

There would have been much better things he could do to get it across and clearly, too. Why the non-penetrating cut from ribs to pubes? Why no entrails lifted out of the body and placed over the shoulder? Why no missing part of the belly wall, preferably including the navel? Why leave the uterus in place? Why no carving in the flesh of "I am the Ripper" or something alike? Or why didn't he do anything to Kelly that would have made the link between the 2 series clear? A letter, a face peeled off, the head/an arm/a leg/a hand/a foot cut off?

Because the cut edged into the abdomen was telling enough. It signalled the kind of cut the press, public and police associated with the Ripper, as far as Iīm concerned.

In fact, this is another reason why I believe they were seperate serial killers with the Torso killer wanting as much coverage/recognition as the Ripper, throwing a right thigh in the garden of Sir Percy Shelley's Chelsea house, dumping a torso in the vault of the New Scotland Yard building right after the double event and placing another torso close to, but still just outside "Ripper territory".

Then you should ask yourself which of the two series got most attention and publicity, should you not?

[Fisherman]

True enough, in that sense dumping the torso in a place where it would be hard to find wasn't logical.

I would have thought that a torso dumped in the cellar vaults of the NSY was bound to be found sooner or later, and in that respect it was guaranteed to cause sensation. But if Wildbore was the killer and if he entertained this kind of reasoning, I find it hard to accept that he did not leave the torso where it was. Why loose his patience if he was such a patient man as to NOT nail the torso to the door, instead opting for hiding it in the deepest recesses of the building?

[jerryd]

Two things, Christer.

One: while it may seem odd if Wildbore first placed the torso in the vault, only to ‘discover’ it himself sometime later, it seems just as odd for Lechmere to kill a woman on precisely the ONLY street he just HAD to take every day on his way to work. I, for one, think it’s quite similar at least.

Two: as you say, there's a case to be made for the killer being much into looking for recognition, not least by way of publicity, so, when nobody else found the torso in the vault, it could be very well argued that he, therefore, did it himself for that very reason. After all, without the torso there would be no recognition.

Hi Frank.

I think Wildbore had no choice at this point but to reveal the body. Here is the testimony of six witnesses that were in the vault at various times from August 22nd to Saturday, September 29th, 1888. The body was discovered on Tuesday, October 2nd, 1888. All of them claim the body was NOT there prior to the discovery. Most of them used a candle or some kind of light while in the vault.

Morning Advertiser, 23 October 1888

William Brown was the first witness called. He stated, in reply to questions from the coroner, that on the 22nd ult., when engaged with two others in making out the quantities of completed work, he visited the vault where the remains were found subsequently, and in the particular corner, though he made measurements, he did not notice anything particular or observe that the earth had been disturbed. If there had been a parcel there at the time he must have trod upon it. Light was afforded by a paraffin lamp, and the trench in the vault to which frequent reference had been made was dry so far back as the middle of June. He had made a ground plan of the several vaults and of the road leading to them. He saw, on Tuesday, the vault after the discovery of the remains, when the earth was lower in the corner than in the other parts.

Mr. Robert Erant, clerk of the works, said that on the Saturday previous to the finding of the trunk of the body he was on the premises up to three o'clock, but did not go into the vault that day. He had done so, however, the previous day, and did not then notice any parcel there. There were about the place a few rags which the workmen used for rubbing brickwork with when it was pointed.

Richard Lawrence, labourer, 40, Sterndale-road, Battersea, stated that on the Saturday he placed for safety, at the end of the vault, on a mortar board, until the following Monday morning, a basket of workmen's tools, and on the latter day, at ten minutes past six o'clock in the morning, he fetched them out. On neither occasion did he notice anything extraordinary. The tools had not been disturbed in the meantime. A fellow workman (Young) had asked him to take the tools there. About half-past three o'clock that afternoon he saw, for the first and the last time, the parcel of remains as it was brought out into the light. The body might have been there at the time he groped in the dark into the vault, but he was strongly impressed with the idea that it was not.

Alfred Young, carpenters' labourer, stated that on the Saturday, about twelve o'clock, before the finding of the parcel of remains, he went to the vault, taking with him a basket of workmen's tools, and placed it on the mortar board to which the last witness had referred, but he noticed nothing particular in this place. There was no light or lamp.

Mr. A. Franklin, surveyor, stated that on the Friday he had been to the vault measuring work. He did not actually go into the corner where the remains were found, and he noticed nothing in that direction beyond rubbish and some old bricks and stones. If there were a parcel there he certainly thought he should have noticed it, especially if any smell pervaded the place. But he found no offensive smell. Still it was just possible that a parcel which did not give out an offensive odour might have escaped his observation.

Henry Edge, labourer, said he was the last person in the vault on the Saturday before the discovery of the body, and did not see any parcel, though he happened to look specially into the corner, believing that the tools he went to fetch were there; but when he struck a match light he discovered his mistake, and found them on a mortar-board at the corner of the vault, to the left of the trench as one entered.

Now, Wildbore said he was in the vault Monday morning (October 1st, 1888) at 6:00 a.m and said he saw what he thought was a workman's coat in that corner of the vault. He said nothing to anyone. He went back in the vault at 5:30 p.m that same evening and said he saw the parcel there and drew his mate's attention to it by lighting a wax vesta. Neither man mentioned anything to anyone at this point. The next morning, Tuesday, he was again in the vault in the morning and saw the parcel and again said nothing. Then he says at 1:00 (2:30 according to other witnesses) Mr. Brown, the assistant foreman, came to see him in the vault. It was then that he pointed the parcel out to Brown. Brown then told Mr. Cheney, foreman of the bricklayers, who went down and pulled the parcel into the light and discovered it was a body. Upon opening the parcel the men gagged from the smell.

So, two occasions on Monday, October 1st he sees the parcel but says nothing. One more time on the morning of Tuesday, October 2nd he examines the parcel and says nothing. The fourth time he decides to tell the foreman. Interesting to say also, Wildbore was off that weekend. Out of the 3 times he examined the parcel, did he not understand what it was? Or was he thinking his way out of the mess? If he was responsible for the torso being there, he had two choices. 1)Get rid of it or move it so nobody finds it, or 2) Act like he found it and alert his boss. also important to note, the men gagged from the smell but Wildbore smelled nothing in the 4 times he examined the parcel?

This is why I think there is something fishy with Wildbore. And Christer, to answer your question about there being a connection with the two series of murders. I do think it is a possibility. After all, in my opinion, and also the opinion of Dr. Neville who first examined the arm found at Pimlico, this victim seems to have been killed very near the date of September 8th, 1888. I differ in that I think there is more than one perpetrator involved.

[Abby Normal]

This is clearly incorrect.

Michael Ostrog, John Pizer, James Sadler, Francis Tumblety, Thomas Cream, Frederick Deeming, Carl Feigenbaum, Robert Stephenson, William Gull, James Maybrick, Michael Maybrick, John Williams, Jacob Isenschmidt, Oswald Puckridge, Thomas Barnardo, and L Forbes Winslow were all old enough to have been the Torso Killer.

Of course there is no evidence that any of them were the Torso Killer, just like there is no evidence that Charles lechmere was the Torso Killer.

do you even read or try to understand posts? I said old enough to be both torsoman AND the ripper so obviously most if not all of them dont apply as they couldnt also have been the ripper (example-Ostrog has been definitely ruled out as the ripper as he has an alibi-oh thats right-you dont know what one of those are either lol). no wonder people including me have stopped responding to your bs. As Mark JD so correctly put it-These are not good faith posts. far from it. Later