Evidence of innocence

[drstrange169]

>>And you know that for certain ?<<

He doesn't Darryl, it's just yet another story made up to imply guilt on Lechmere. Which begs the question, if the case is so strong, why keep making this stuff up?

[drstrange169]

>>Unfortunately, the East London Observer gives a different account, and quotes CAL as calling it a "tarpaulin sheet." <<

Correct RJ, given Cross was a carman who used tarpaulin sheets regularly, not a sailor I don't think there is any dispute as to what he saw.

[JeffHamm]

Hi Dusty,

I just tried that, Mitre Sq doesn't fall within the triangle by my reckoning, could you show us your triangle Abby?
I must say this reminds me of Ivor Edwards book. I think Dan Norder did an article in Ripper Notes years ago about all the crosses, symbols and signs people have drawn up about the murder sites.

What address is used to locate Cross/Lechmere's work? I know there's some debate about where exactly he might go, but I don't have any address that I can find.

- Jeff

[JeffHamm]

Hmmm, would the clocks chime the quarter hours at night?

It occurs to me, that 3:45 being reported by all the police could be synchronised to hearing a common "chime" sounding the quarter to mark. Given their jobs, that would be something they would take particular note of. But I'm not sure if they rung at night, particularly the quarter hours. If clocks were silenced, then of course, this doesn't work.

If they did, though, it would let Cross/Lechmere and Paul both know they had to get moving from PC Mizen if they were to get to work on time. And it would also mean Paul would know he left home "about 3:45" because he wasn't all that far from home when the chime rings?

Again, this only works if at least one clock in the area did sound off all night, and I can see lots of reasons why that might not be the case (and it only sounding on the hour, if at all)

- Jeff

[drstrange169]

Jeff, I've p.m.ed you some info.

[GBinOz]

>>Unfortunately, the East London Observer gives a different account, and quotes CAL as calling it a "tarpaulin sheet." <<

Correct RJ, given Cross was a carman who used tarpaulin sheets regularly, not a sailor I don't think there is any dispute as to what he saw.

Hi Dusty,

The tarpaulin sheets for the cart would have been supplied by his employer. Finding a "men's" weather protective coat would provide him with personal advantage. I would think that it would be more plausible to mistake a large coat for a woman than a sheet of tarpaulin. We have another case of conflicting press reports, either of which could be correct.

Can you point me towards the reference to the woolshed that you said was part of the testimony please?

Cheers, George

[Abby Normal]

Hi Abby Normal,



I know his home address, and his mother at 1 Mary Ann Street, but I've never been entirely sure of where he's headed for work? I think it's somewhere around the train station west of Commercial, but that's a pretty large landmark. I think there's been debate as well as to where (as in what address) he would be heading too. I probably should get this information recorded though, so could you let me know what address you're using in your above triangle idea?

I've got Paul's home and work location though.

Anyway, without knowing where Cross/Lechmere's work address is, here's what I have:

C/L's home is outside the estimated area of interest, but his mother's location falls in a region of interest (90% are inside the green, around 85% tend to be inside the red region; 75% inside the area that spans out to the purple area; 50% are found inside the orange/yellow area, and 25% are inside the yellow area, including the white spot). So, roughly 10% commuters (outside the whole area indicated). The "hot spot", or yellow area, contains 25% of the offenders but comprises only 2.5% of the total search area. As one increases the search area by an additional 2.5%, you gain more, but you don't double it, the rate of gain drops off as you move out.

Again, this isn't about "identifying person X", it's about "this area has a higher probabliity of being associated with the offender's daily life" (i.e. residence, place of work, club, etc). It's about suggesting good areas to look at, not good "people" per se. Lots of people will be associated with the highest priority zone indicated.

As we can see, Paul in fact works in that zone. And Paul's residence is also inside the search area. In contrast, Cross/Lechmere lives outside the search area, but his mother does live in a fairly decent area (provided of course Stride is a victim of JtR; that area becomes far less interesting if she's not). I'm not sure where exactly to place C/L's work address though, so I can't comment on that.

As such, if we were just comparing the two carmen with regards to how well their anchor points correspond to the spatial analysis, Paul's appear to be the better fit.

Oh, I've only included the C5 here. Adding Tabram and Millwood doesn't change things much, and because their linkage to the series is more debatable, I thought this would be more middle ground. Also, I'm not sure which end of Mary Ann Street #1 would be, so I've put her location in the middle, but both ends of the street are in an area of interest, so it doesn't matter for us.

- Jeff

thanks jeff
interesting . i dont have the exact address for pickfords. but i beleive next to the train station. is it broad in Broad street? im sure christer knows the exact address.

[JeffHamm]

Hi Abby,

thanks jeff
interesting . i dont have the exact address for pickfords. but i beleive next to the train station. is it broad in Broad street? im sure christer knows the exact address.

Ok. I see Old Broad Street and New Broad Street, but not just Broad Street. I went with the Broad in "new Broad Street" (old is outside the search area), as it's closer to the train station. So, that falls inside, near the far westerly edge, so our search pattern would find Cross/Lechmere "at work" after finding Paul "at home". So, as you can see, that means Paul's anchor points are more of interest than Cross/Lechmere's. However, there's a lot of information about both men we don't have, and again, both have an anchor point in fairly interesting areas (Paul's work is in the highest priority search zone, and Cross/Lechmere's mother is in an area of good consideration). The others, like Paul's residence and Cross/Lechmere's place of work, are in areas that are useful for overall statistical analysis, and have theoretical interest value, are too far from the main areas of interest to be considered of "practical interest". For investigative suggestions, I would recommend searching the yellow and orange areas (ask lots of questions around there; check out the pubs, etc), but if you have a person of interest you want to look at, include the purple region as well, and see if you're getting multiple locations associated with that person showing up, even if none are in the highest priority zone. If so, that person might be worth looking further into. If not, I wouldn't discard them, but if you're sifting through 100s or 1000s of people (as can happen in serial crime investigations, you need to organise that information somehow. This sort of thing does organise the information better than chance (i.e. alphabetical order), but it doesn't solve the case, and it doesn't prove innocence.

Anyway, going with your suggestion, this is what we would have (unless I'm just missing some other Broad Street; entirely possible )

- Jeff

[Abby Normal]

I just tried that, Mitre Sq doesn't fall within the triangle by my reckoning, could you show us your triangle Abby?
I must say this reminds me of Ivor Edwards book. I think Dan Norder did an article in Ripper Notes years ago about all the crosses, symbols and signs people have drawn up about the murder sites.

hi Dusty
i have a bit of a temper especially when ive been drinking and its gotten me in trouble on here in the past so im going to try and not respond in kind to mean spirited posts and personal attacks from here on out. id appreciate it if you understand that. but just a brief response- i clearly said inside the triangle or just on the border. and this has nothing to do with symbols, hidden meaning signs,anagrams and nonsense of that ilk.
i also self depreciatingly and in a light hearted tone admitted this was my simplistic version. jeff hamm geoprophile light if you will lol.
Thanks!

[FISHY1118]

Hi Jeff
As always you have done a fine job with your mapping and calculations.

But the reality is that a time of death cannot be firmly established and that is most crucial to the Lechmere saga. The evidence of Pc Neil as i have continually stated has to be taken on face value as to what his movments were leading up to the body being found, and was he where he said he was and passed by the murder spot at 3.15am I have my doubts his testimony makes it unclear "I had previously seen the men at work. That would be about a quarter-past three, or half an hour before I found the body" was he having a cuppa with those men? The officer clearly had been at the slaughterhouse because he left his cape behind but how long had he been there and if he had been there for a significant amount of time, that would have thrown his beat times out of sync so can his testimony be relied upon without question, no it cant!!!!!!!!! So Nichols could have been murdered much earlier and Pc Neils was forced to lie about his movements.

There is still this pointless argument going on about distances again, the reality is that Lechmere stated he saw/heard Paul coming 40 yards down the road that is a hell of a distance if he had been the killer that was more than enough time to take flight. Those who suggest he decided to front it out is beyond belief. As to how dark it was is unclear but at the crime scene it was that dark that Lechmere stated that he thought the body when he first saw it was a tarpaulin.

One final thing as a general observation, is that despite Lechmere being framed for these murders no one has come up with a motive for him to be the killer, and why after working for 20 years at Pickfords and travelling the same route to work every day on that morning he suddenly becomes a killer? The Whitechapel Murders were somewhat unique as there were very few serial killers in the LVP. So why does a married family man who has been holding down the same job for 20 years suddenly decide to go on a killing spree?

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

This is bordering on riduculous, we can of course establish a accurate time on death where Nichols murder is concerned ,P.C Neil passes through bucks row at 3.15 am, declares he saw no one . Body was discovered at 3.45am , theres no logical reason this should be questioned , no reason for P.C to lie ,no reason to suspect he was having bacon and eggs with those men at the time he said he was passing through bucks row , .The officer had clearly not been at the slaughter at 3.15 as suggested, no where at the inquest does it say he left his cap at the slaughterhouse, so thats not proof as its probably fom a newspaper article which we cant say is true . He was not forced to lie about anything to do with his inquest statement ,again thats just pure speculation, and in poor taste if you ask me . As ive already said, Nichols was last seen at 2.30 am its 15 minutes walk to were she lay dead, at worst shes killed at 2.50am , so shes either dead on the footpath for 55 mins without being discovered by any body passing through bucks row policeman or any one ,or shes killed just after neil passes through bucks row at 3.15am, the later is more than likely the case . but then clocks will be wrong , people will and maybe lied ,blah blah blah ,and on its goes .

[drstrange169]

No offence intended Abby, just a genuine question.

Using Christer's claimed entrance Mitre Sq is well out of the triangle. 29 Hanbury is too, but we know Cross and Paul passed it, so that's ok.

[JeffHamm]

Hi Fishy,

This is bordering on riduculous, we can of course establish a accurate time on death where Nichols murder is concerned ,P.C Neil passes through bucks row at 3.15 am, declares he saw no one . Body was discovered at 3.45am , theres no logical reason this should be questioned , no reason for P.C to lie ,no reason to suspect he was having bacon and eggs with those men at the time he said he was passing through bucks row , .The officer had clearly not been at the slaughter at 3.15 as suggested, no where at the inquest does it say he left his cap at the slaughterhouse, so thats not proof as its probably fom a newspaper article which we cant say is true . He was not forced to lie about anything to do with his inquest statement ,again thats just pure speculation, and in poor taste if you ask me . As ive already said, Nichols was last seen at 2.30 am its 15 minutes walk to were she lay dead, at worst shes killed at 2.50am , so shes either dead on the footpath for 55 mins without being discovered by any body passing through bucks row policeman or any one ,or shes killed just after neil passes through bucks row at 3.15am, the later is more than likely the case . but then clocks will be wrong , people will and maybe lied ,blah blah blah ,and on its goes .

No, it's not ridiculous. In a police investigation you have to prove it, prove it, prove it, never assume it. That means verify every detail of what is said, no matter who says it. PC Neil's statement also has to be examined very very carefully with respect to details.

I can think of an example from a documentary I watched ages ago, though I forget the specific case. There was a cold case. At the time, the police had a fellow they were interested in, and thought he looked like a promising "suspect". There were various bits of information that seemed to point to him as either responsible, or somehow involved. They had "promising leads" if you will. Then, they found out he had been in custody at the time of the murder. They called up to verify the guy was actually in custody, of course, and were told he was. After that, the case went cold. When a new set of detectives opened this cold case file, they too thought this guy seemed a good lead, so they looked at what was done investigating him. They found the report detailing that he was in custody, and that the detectives called to verify that. They thought, hmmm, did the person on the other end of the telephone actually verify he was in custody, or did he just confirm they had him? Might he have been out on a day or weekend pass? So they went to that jurisdiction and checked those records, and sure enough, he had been out on a weekend pass. He did not have an alibi. That then led to them being able to investigate further and eventually arrest and convict him.

Trevor's experience with actual police work makes him more than aware of just how common this sort of thing can arise. It's not at all ridiculous to point out that all we have are unverified statements, with only some corroborations on some points.

The thing is, we can't do what those cold case detectives did. We can't go and verify anything because all the important documents are lost, and all the people dead. So while I fully appreciate where Trevor's coming from, I have butted heads with him on such things with respect to what we can do. We cannot do a proper police type investigation, that's long since become impossible. As such, the best we can do is work with the information we have, and we have to go with the statements as being considered reliable unless we can show they are not. If we evaluate our information as if we are conducting a police investigation, we might as well just put the file away because we are left with such useless evidence from that view point that nothing can be done.

I've said a few times I'm not really suspect oriented, and I don't think we have enough information to actually solve "who did it", much for the same reasons that Trevor is pointing out here. I'm generally interested in seeing what we can extract, though, and see if we can build a reasonably reliable account of the events themselves. That's why I tend to be most interested in reconstructing the time lines. It won't be perfect, and I can't rule out Trevor's concern (maybe she was killed before 3:15 and PC Neil somehow wasn't there, etc), but I do think that is less likely than he did his patrol and she really wasn't there. Less likely doesn't mean impossible though. I accept that what I think we can do is construct what appears "the most likely story", but I don't think we can construct "the one and only true story".

When Trevor and I do disagree, it's entirely due to that difference in view point. I get why he sees things like this as necessary to consider, and I suspect he gets that if viewed from my perspective, he understands why I would say "but it is still more likely she was killed after 3:15". He just doesn't think approaching things from my perspective is a good idea. But then, I don't think approaching a historical case from a modern police investigation perspective is a good idea as that perspective is too strict and demanding and simply "breaks" all the evidence. If you adopt that perspective you really should just close the case and say "this can't be investigated further - it goes in the dead case files as unsolved, next". From a historical perspective, we recognize where the evidence is weak, but we do our best to make sense of it nonetheless.

- Jeff

[MrBarnett]

This is bordering on riduculous, we can of course establish a accurate time on death where Nichols murder is concerned ,P.C Neil passes through bucks row at 3.15 am, declares he saw no one . Body was discovered at 3.45am , theres no logical reason this should be questioned , no reason for P.C to lie ,no reason to suspect he was having bacon and eggs with those men at the time he said he was passing through bucks row , .The officer had clearly not been at the slaughter at 3.15 as suggested, no where at the inquest does it say he left his cap at the slaughterhouse, so thats not proof as its probably fom a newspaper article which we cant say is true . He was not forced to lie about anything to do with his inquest statement ,again thats just pure speculation, and in poor taste if you ask me . As ive already said, Nichols was last seen at 2.30 am its 15 minutes walk to were she lay dead, at worst shes killed at 2.50am , so shes either dead on the footpath for 55 mins without being discovered by any body passing through bucks row policeman or any one ,or shes killed just after neil passes through bucks row at 3.15am, the later is more than likely the case . but then clocks will be wrong , people will and maybe lied ,blah blah blah ,and on its goes .

Of course, it was Thain who called at the knacker’s yard at ‘about’ 4.15 to fetch his cape. That was stated by Henry Tomkins at the inquest. But Thain claimed that another constable had taken his cape there.

[drstrange169]

>>The tarpaulin sheets for the cart would have been supplied by his employer. Finding a "men's" weather protective coat would provide him with personal advantage. I would think that it would be more plausible to mistake a large coat for a woman than a sheet of tarpaulin. We have another case of conflicting press reports, either of which could be correct.<<

I can't see anyway an empty jacket has the volume and size to be mistaken for a body, however, a tarpaulin fits the bill perfectly. Cross makes no mention of wanting the object he saw, just that it aroused his attention. Considering cart tarps were part and parcel of his trade this is not surprising or odd.

8 newspapers called it a tarpaulin, 5 specifically called it a tarpaulin sheet.

East London Observer
Daily News
Telegraph
Illo Police News
Lloyds

Only one, Morning Advertiser, called it a "man's tarpaulin".

Given the numerous transcription errors in the Advertisers report that day, it's pretty unsound evidence to give credence over all the other reports and the logic of a carman's job.

Some of the Advertiser's errors:

George Maizen
at 20 minutes past four, I was at the end of Hanbury street
The man, whose name is George Cross
I went down Parson street
I saw something lying on the north side
in the gateway to a tool warehouse
a man's tarpaulin
we tried to pull them over her


>>Can you point me towards the reference to the woolshed that you said was part of the testimony please?<<

Echo
Morning Advertiser (which mis-spelt wool as tool)
Western Daily Press
Evening Standard
Birmingham Daily Post
Manchester Courier

I seem to remember at least two more newspapers, but I can't find them at the moment.

[GUT]

And as a carman Crossmere would have a fair idea of the value of a tarp. At the bare minimum Pickfords would sure have looked kindly on a driver who gave them one. Then if there were markings of ownership on it a reward might flow. A truck size tarp today costs at least a weeks wage.