Evidence of innocence

[drstrange169]

>>I’ve never really researched the Watneys brewery. When I was younger and a dedicated real ale drinker the word ‘Watneys’ was considered rather offensive.<<

One of you most accurate posts!

[drstrange169]

>>... I'd like to offer the thought that career professionals in criminology and medicine sometimes commit howlers in regard to this case that a mere buff never would. I've genuinely read one paper that actually got the victims mixed up. (A reminder there that 'peer review' isn't all it's cracked up to be.)<<

Scobie? Griffiths?

[MrBarnett]

>>One thing to point out - it may have been already - is that time was of the essence in the railway business. It was the arrival of the railways that lead to the standardisation of time in Britain.<<

It has indeed and which witness went to a railway station that morning?

Charles Lechmere - aka Mr ‘About’.

[Trevor Marriott]

"It seems astonishing at first thought that the culprit should escape detection for there must surely have been marks of blood about his person. The blood, however, might be principally on his hands, and the presence of so many slaughter houses in the neighbourhood would make the frequenters of this spot familiar with bloodstained clothes and hands, and his appearance might in that way have failed to attract attention while he passed from Buck's row in the twilight into Whitechapel road, and was last sight of in the morning's market traffic.”

On this point slaughtermen would wear long full length rubber coated butchers aprons to protect their clothing i would suggest would wash their hands to remove any blood before they left work.

wwww.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Fisherman]

There we’re no facts available that would have allowed anyone to state that Lechmere found the body at 3.45. They had Paul saying that he arrived at 3.45 and Mizen saying that the two were with him at 3.45 and Paul said that it took 4 minutes for them to get there.

Lechmere discovered the body sometime before 3.45.

Times cannot be used to point to Lechmere’s guilt. This is a fact.

Of course it is no fact. He said he left home at around 3.30 or possibly 3.20, and neither of those times are in line with him being in Bucks Row at 3.40 or 3.45. I think what you are trying to say is that the timings cannot conclusively prove how Lechmere must have had a lot of time on his hands in Bucks Row before Paul arrived, but thatīs another matter. The timings certainly are suggestive of possible guilt, unless we radically redefine what "facts" are.

[Fisherman]

And if I’d said “not far off 6.00” it would easily include both 5.55 and 6.05 and all points in between. And I can say that Fish because I’m not trying to make an estimate into a known.

Indeed it would comprise 5.55 and 6.05 as alternative possibilities! It would, at least to my mind, also include 5.50 and 6.10. But the point I made was that it would NOT exclude 6.00! Instead, the wording "I donīt know when I woke up, but it cannot have been far off the 6.00 mark" means that 6.00 is the best guess I can make.

Of course, me accepting in this case that 5.50 and 6.10 are viable alternatives, does not mean that I am ready to carve away five or ten minutes from Baxters estimation. That one was leaning against fair few times and since the coroner knew that there would be an approximate gap of five minutes between Neil and Lechmere, allowing for two minute discrepancies becomes unviable.

[Fisherman]

and I have an expert who has gone to great lenghts to negate that view by saying there is no definitive answer as to how long a body would take to bleed out which I am motre inclined to belive that an expert who gives a definitive specific time.

Without you reliant on your experts times your theory is blown out of the water, so it is not wrong to suggest she was killed between 3.15am-3.45am or even earlier than that.

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

Two things: Biggs gave his view BEFORE Payne James and Thiblin, and so it could not have been given to negate them.

Payne James and Thiblin are renowmed forensic pathologists, and as far as I know, Biggs is nothing of the sort. So in the choice between these doctors, I would recommend that the experience and seniority is weighed in.

I think I have read you writing about things being "blown ourt of the water" dozens of times now. It is of course absolute nonsense only.

[MrBarnett]

On this point slaughtermen would wear long full length rubber coated butchers aprons to protect their clothing i would suggest would wash their hands to remove any blood before they left work.

wwww.trevormarriott.co.uk

And where were the ‘many slaughterhouses’ in the immediate vicinity of Buck’s Row? Baxter’s opinions (he was full of them) need to be treated with a degree of caution.

[Fisherman]

From what I can see Whittington-Egan is just another enthusiast - he doesn't appear to have worked on any actual cases involving tracking down a serial killer. I put more faith in people who might actually know what they are talking about. I can see you have written a book and all that, but has any of that actually been subject to any sort of peer review by people who know what they are talking about?

I set you a challenge for this year if you are so confident in your case - write and submit an article to a leading journal about your Lech torso theory. As you don't rate the Keppel paper why don't you try for the same journal (Journal of Investigative Psychology and Offender Profiling). I have done this a dozen times (nothing related to crime) and they are all published and I can tell you it is difficult. Your work will be blind peer reviewed and critiqued in some detail. You will then have to come up with satisfactory edits and replies to get it published. It will take the best part of a year. I look forward to reading your work.

On a side note, this whole 'flaps' similarity business is a non starter for me. If someone plonked a torso down in front of you and said remove the internal organs I can imagine cutting away flaps is an entire logical way to go about it. It is not diagnostic enough - anyone could have done the same. Even if they were related, show me one shred of evidence that indicates Lech committed any of these crimes. Oh hang on, he walked past the sites in his magic triangle...

If you want to prove a point of yours, then you must do the writing and submitting yourself. I would consider it a waste of time myself, since I have no doubt that any psychologist worth his or her salt would be able to realize that similarities between murders point TO a link, not FROM it. If we are speaking of forensic psychiatrists, I am equally certain that they will all be aware of the rarity of eviscerating serial killers. So write and submit away, to your hearts delight, and waste your time to whatever degree you find clever.

As for your idea that eviscerators will all cut away the abdominal walls to get at the organs, my advice is that you collect the evidence to prove that point BEFORE you make it. If you are going to be academic about matters, submitting texts to psychiatric journals, then you need to do things in the correct order.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Of course it is no fact. He said he left home at around 3.30 or possibly 3.20, and neither of those times are in line with him being in Bucks Row at 3.40 or 3.45. I think what you are trying to say is that the timings cannot conclusively prove how Lechmere must have had a lot of time on his hands in Bucks Row before Paul arrived, but thatīs another matter. The timings certainly are suggestive of possible guilt, unless we radically redefine what "facts" are.

2 out out of 19 reporters said 3.20 apparently. So the odds are against this being the case. Also if Lechmere was guilty then we would have to accuse him of gross stupidity if, considering the time gap between the event and the Inquest, he told the police he’d left the house at 3.20 given that he knew how long it took for him to walk to Bucks Row and therefore the police would have known too. He would have been knowingly dropping himself right in it. So I’d say that we would be on solid ground in sidelining the 3.20 at best.

So we have the 11 out of the remaining 17 saying “about 3.30.” And what’s more likely, that 6 reporters missed the word ‘about’ or omitted it for whatever reason when they were writing up their notes, or that 11 reporters imagined that they heard the word ‘about.’

So at the minimum we have to accept the possibility that Lechmere said “about 3.30” or the more likely is that the evidence tells us that he almost certainly said “about 3.30.”

And as we know that the English language tells us the by using the phrase “about 3.30” Lechmere was estimating the time that he left the house. So I’ll be fair and admit 2 things (as I always have) 1) that a guilty Lechmere could have lied and left the house much earlier, and 2) his estimation of ‘about 3.30’ could certainly have incorporated 3.25.

Unfortunately though Fish this even handedness isn’t always reciprocated by some. The time that Lechmere left the house could very easily have been 3.35 but some get very annoyed when this very obvious point is mentioned. I’m afraid that it’s a fact though. Lechmere could very easily have left the house at 3.35 and we don’t have a single thing that casts doubt on this.

We don’t know how Lechmere came by his estimation of course. Did he have a clock or a watch? He might have done but we can’t state this as a fact. And if he did have one how can we know how accurate it was? We can’t know of course. And if he did have a watch or a clock then it seems unlikely that he looked at it on the way out or he wouldn’t have needed an estimated time. For all that we know he might have been ‘knocked up’ every day at around 3.15 and simply estimated the time between getting ‘knocked up’ and leaving the house and we know that estimates can be out. Also, we don’t know that the Constable ‘knocking up’ wasn’t 5 minutes late that day. Or 3 minutes or 4 minutes?

…..

And so given all of the above, and none of it is manipulated or far fetched and I have certainly allowed for the possibility of an earlier time, we simply cannot assume a time that Lechmere left the house. So if we can’t assume a time reason and logic tells us that we cannot assume a gap.

So if we cannot assume a gap how can this be used as a pointer to Lechmere’s guilt anymore than saying “well, if Lechmere left the house at 3.00 he’d have had time to find a victim and kill her.”

The “gap” point should be dropped.

[MrBarnett]

In July, 1885, a correspondent calling himself TEMPUS FUGIT wrote to the Chelmsford Chronicle to complain about the accuracy of the public clocks in his home town of Halstead

We can analyse this until the cows come home: at what time would a train due to depart at 3.20 be steaming into the station?; where was the inconveniently placed clock actually located?; did TF have to disembark from his conveyance, pay a cab driver and purchase a ticket before he saw the station clock? etc etc… But it’s clear that what he was getting hot under the collar about was a discrepancy of 5 minutes or so.

Meanwhile, down in Southsea, the local magistrates accepted the word of a barmaid that the brewery clock was half an hour fast. And that is evidence of the inaccuracy of public clocks in Whitechapel - even, presumably, the chiming ones that provided half of the East End with their temporal reference point.

[Fisherman]

Fish, don’t you think that it’s a little disingenuous to say the least to keep using the phrase ‘phantom killer’ in regard to any non-Lechmere suggestion? You are implying that those of us that don’t feel that Lechmere was guilty (which, let’s face it, is the majority of those interested in the subject after all) are suggesting some far fetched almost mythical figure. When in actual fact all that we are suggesting is a killer that we cannot put a name to. A suspect doesn’t become stronger merely because we can name him (and yes I understand that we can place Lechmere at the scene but we cannot show that this is more or less likely than someone else being at the scene)

I am saying that if it was NOT Lechmere - who was observed all alone in close proximity to a freshly killed Polly Nichols, and who had a working trek that took him right through the Spitalfields murder area - then it was someone ELSE. That someone elseīs existence is not proven in any shape of form, so we have the choice of regarding himmor her as a genuine person whose existence is not in doubt, or as somebody whose existence is a mere suggestion. And people whose existence are mere suggestions, since nothing at all can be produced to prove it, are phantom people. So I will stick with that term, becasue I thinbk it is of the utmost importance to point put just how much there is to suggest another killer, let alone to point to such a fictitious character as being as likely a suspect or a better one than Lechmere.

What I don’t accept, and never will until such time that some positive proof emerges, is that an alternative scenario is any less likely.

And there we are - you did it again. You promoted a person whose existence is in no way proven as a better suspect than a man we KNOW was in place right by the victim at a time that is consistent with when she was killed. By all means, tell me that you personally donīt feel that Lechmere was the killer, and by all means, tell me that there is a possibility that it was somebody else, but donīt give up contact with the real world, Herlock, becasue that does not strenghten your take. It makes it look ridiculous.

There isn’t a single fact that we know or a single reasonable assumption that we can make based on what is known, that precludes the simple suggestion that an unknown man (JTR) killed Polly Nichols shortly before Lechmere arrived at the scene.

True, there is not a single fact that rules out the possibility of another killer totally. There is the blood evidence that speaks against the suggestion, but I agree that it cannot rule it out.

This suggestion eliminates any suggestion of an issue with blood.

Eh? What Payne James and Thiblin says about the blood - why would that information be rendered useless by the suggestion that somebody killed Nichols before Lechmere arrived? That is simply wrong, Iīm afraid.

Indeed it’s entirely possible, as has been suggested numerous times, that the killer might have fled on hearing Lechmere’s approach (this also encompasses your point about the body not being displayed like the other victims)

Yes, it is possible, and if you had read me correctly, you would know that I have never ruled the possibility out. Of course, if there WAS such a killer, he would have left Nichols with the wounds hidden, and thatb would be in conflict with how he left the other evisceration victims on display. That could of course hapen, but it is not the likely thing. But we must be discerning and allow for discrepancies, so yes, we still have the possibility of another killer.

Therefore there’s no proper evidence against Lechmere that couldn’t apply to an unknown killer.

Of course not! What Lechmere could have done, somebdy else could have done, albeit the blood evidence provides an alternative killer with a small window of time.

So why do we hold such suspicion against Lechmere?

Because he was THERE, of course! He was there, and there are lots of anomalies linked to him. He gave an alternative name at the inquest, he disagreed with Mizen on a number of matters, each and every one of them with a shape that would be perfect for circumventing the police, he had a morning trek that took him right past Spitalfields, he had his mother staying very close by the Stride murder scene, the Goulston Street rag was left in between the murder site and 22 Doveton Street and so on. The fact of the matter is that when we look closer at Lechmere, there are many matters that are all in keeping with guilt on his behalf. If he had given his registered name, if he and Mizen had told the same story, if Paul had confirmed that he saw Lechmere halting in front of him, if he had worked somewheere else, ANYWHERE else, that did not take him through the killing fields, if he had "found" the body when it was too cold gīfor him to have been the killer - THEN it would make sense to beleive his story. But it is the other way around on point after point.
My question to you: Why do youn even ask why we suspect Lechmere? Has the many pointers presented against him completely illuded you? Is it even remotely possible?

The main point of ‘suspicion’ is the so called gap but we know that this is an obvious fallacy created by moving times, narrowing gaps and suggesting that estimations have to be certain times.

No, the gap in not the main point against him at all. It is one point of many, and if I was allowed to present only three points against Lechmere at a trial, I would not pick the gap.

Any reasonable person has to conclude (and this is 100% unavoidable) that we cannot assume a gap of time. Saying if he left at x time and if he arrived at y time is an exercise in utter futility. We cannot state a positive from unknowns. How can this be debated. It’s just a fact. Yes Lechmere could have left home earlier but we can’t claim this as a known. Yes he could have lied about when he left home but we can’t claim this as a known. So if we remove the suggestion of a sinister gap which logic and reason tells us that we absolutely have to then what’s left to make us suspicious of him?

Read the above. Please, PLEASE read the above!!

He gave the name Charles Allen Cross instead of Charles Allen Lechmere. It wasn’t an invented name but the name of his step father who for all that we know might have been more of a father to him than his real father. And if he was going to give a name as a piece of subterfuge why not Fred Smith or Barrington J Wilberforce? Why did he give his real address? Yes you might suggest an alternative explanation on the address but it’s only speculation. What we know for a fact was that his first names and address were known and we have nothing to show that he himself didn’t provide them.

His step father had been dead for nineteen years. And we know that he - unless he was involved in legal cases of brutal deaths - always used the name Lechmere when dealing with any authorities. How this point can not sink in, is a total riddle for me. The matter that he would not have been doing something unusual if he had an alias, and the matter that it was legal to use othe names than your registered ones is neither here nor there un til you can prove that he actually DID, but for when he was called to inquests into violent cases of death where he either caused that death or is suspected of having done so.
I have explained this thousands and thousands of times, and still people are having problems to understand how this is a proven anomaly. And these are peoiple I discuss the case with! People who aspire to have insights about the case and a genuine wish to understand it! It is small wonder that I must take the occasional break from it!

So that leaves us with next to zero.

Who are "us", Herlock? What I see is a poster who denies the obvious and who cannot understand why a person of flesh and blood is a better suspect than a fictional character telling us that there is no case against Lechmere. And when a barrister, who WOULD be able to gauge a case like thie, says that ther is reason enough not to suspect Lechmere, but to take him to trial, the knee-jerk answer is that since you are a better judge of matters legal than James Scobie, it must be concluded that he was badly misled or lied to by the film team. And he would not have asked to see how he was represented in the docu. And he would not have sued the film team for having made him say something he did not mean.
Donīt talk about us, Herlock. You and me are having this conversation and there is no "us" whatsoever around to verify your claims.

We have a man in a spot where he had every reason to be at the time that he’d have been expected to have been there.

The "he had a reason to be there" was always a better argument for guilt than against. The killer was likely somebody who melted in - and had a reason to be there. Do you believe that only those who have NO reason to be in place are killers? If somebody is killed at a school, should we exonerate theteachers and pupils? If it happens asīt a working site, do we rule out the workers there as possible culprits?
The fact that he had reason to be there does in no way clear him or even implicate any lesser viability as the killer.

He finds a body.

Or kills a woman. The thing is, NEITHER can be claimed as a fact. But one of them is suggested by the evidence.

Waits around for a second man to get there. They go and find a Constable. Then he shows up at the Inquest. And no one has yet provided an example of a serial killer butchering a woman 15 or 20 minutes before he was due to be at work and on a direct route to that workplace.

But MANY serial killers are proven to be opportunistic. Meaning that you have no point at all. There was never any need to produce a twin replica for every serial killer to prove his or her existence. No other serial killer was ever know to drive a tan VW bug before Bundy did. That does. not mean that he could not have done so. And there are at present a couple of hundred so called "Highway murders" in the US, where it is generally accepted that they were to a large degree committed by commercial lorry drivers - men at work, that is, or en route to it.
If you can provide good, solid proof that it is impossible to kill somebody while on your way to work, then do so. If you can prove that Lechmere did not leave home half an hour before he ordinarily did on many an occasion with the intent to look for prey,m then do so or, as they say, forever hold your tongue.

Where’s the suspicious behaviour Fish. I see absolutely none. In fact everything points to the fact that he simply found the body.

How much is a blind mans cane? If it is not too dear, Iīll send you one for next Christmas.

[Fisherman]

Also Trevor, if the killer fled the scene say a minute before Lechmere got there the point about the blood vanishes into thin air.

Actually, regardless of who killed her and when, blood will behave in must the same way anyway.

[Mark J D]

... down in Southsea, the local magistrates accepted the word of a barmaid that the brewery clock was half an hour fast. And that is evidence of the inaccuracy of public clocks in Whitechapel - even, presumably, the chiming ones that provided half of the East End with their temporal reference point.

What landlord or brewery doesn't love a fast clock? That way, not only can a pub open and staffed before most people even think a drink is available, but the landlord can also get the towels up nice and early, and let the night's last customers wander off to other pubs for their final round...

M.

[Fisherman]

Depends upon the circumstances. If you said "cannot have been far off six o'clock" because you did know that at 6:00 o'clock you were eating your breakfast, and knew you got up, went from your bed room, prepared a simple breakfast, and sat down with it just as the 6 am news came on the radio, then we know it wasn't 6:00 when you got up - 0% chance - because you had to use some time to do the other things. You're just saying those other things didn't take all that long as you recall.

In Buck's Row, Baxter has PC Neil stating that he was at the body at 3:45, and we have PC Mizen, not a great distance away, with the carmen at that time. Baxter also had Paul saying it was no more than 4 minutes for them to see the body and get to PC Mizen - an estimate that suggests it did not take them all that long to get to PC Mizen.

And as those two situations show, your suggestion that 3:45 is the most likely time is based upon flawed logic. It is, in fact, a less likely time than an unknown, but earlier, time.

Glad to clear that up for you.

- Jeff

The circumstances I am referring to is a man who woke up at a time he believed was at or very close to 6.00, although he had no conclusive proof for it. If he said "It could not have been far off 6.00", he would mean that his best guess was 6.00, but he was willing to accept that it could have been befoe or after that time too.

I am glad to see that you now admit that it takes special circumstances for Baxter not to have meant what I suggest he meant, instead of claiming that I do not copmprehend the English language. You also inadvertenly admit that for Baxter to have known that it could not have been 3.45, but must instead have been before or after that time, he would need to be able to exclude the 3.45 timing by proving it impossible.

The truth will out! And so we now know that what I suggest; that when Baxter said "The body could not have been found far off the 3.45 mark", he may have meant that Charles Lechmere will likely have been there spot on 3.45 or in close proximity to it.

Me, I think that it is more or less the only working suggestion, since Baxter knew that Lechmere was the only true finder, since Swanson joined ranks with him and since the Daily News supported the take.

But that is secondary in this post. This post only celebrated that you now admit that Baxter must not have meant that the time was close to but not exactly 3.45 as the body was found. 3.45 is instead the benchmark he uses, but were he allows for some little discrepancy.