Evidence of innocence

[JeffHamm]

Hi all,

The recent discussion on behavioural profiling has just led me to recheck to see what I can find on it's efficacy. Came across a simple article in Psychology Today (not the highest prestige journal out there, but contains articles that don't expect one to be an expert in the field).

In it, they mention how profiling approaches break down (broadly) into
1) statistical/analytical approaches
2) clinical interpretive approaches (i.e. of the Douglas type - experience, intuition, educated guesswork)

It's the latter that most people hear about, and yes, it's the latter that performs more poorly. While they don't go into details, the article does mention an experimental study. They trained one police force to use analytic approaches and another they left to use their usual approaches. After a year, the one trained with analytic profiling tools had solved over 260% more crimes. They didn't have a group trained in the clinical/interpretive approaches, which is unfortunate as I would have liked to see that outcome.

They also mention a study which reports that profile predictions were accurate 66% of the time, but don't provide enough details in this article to know how accuracy was judged, or what the chance rate would be. If it is scored such that the chance rate by random guessing would be 50%, then 66% is better than chance, but hardly something to bank upon. But if the chance rate of guessing was 10%, then that's a very big improvement.

The police themselves don't view profiles as if they're manna from heaven, but egos run high in police forces and profiles come from outsiders, so opinion polls might not be a great measure of their efficacy. Other similar values they mention are fairly low rates (like in only 2.7% of cases did the profile lead to an arrest) could suffer from the same problem - a reluctance to credit the outsider with contributing to the arrest, particularly as profiles are intended to make suggestions about what to look for, and an arrest only occurs after you've looked and found. But maybe the study is able to account for this problem, I'm just thinking of questions after having found this one.

anyway, it looks like there are some studies out now that are starting to look at behavioural profiling. Personally, I'm more interested in reading up on the statistical/analytical approaches (hardly a surprise there). I still haven't found a good study on the more "famous" version of profiling, but then, it's always the problem child everyone knows and not the quiet good one.

Here's a link to the article if anyone's interested: Behavioural Profiling

- Jeff

[Abby Normal]

Hi all,

The recent discussion on behavioural profiling has just led me to recheck to see what I can find on it's efficacy. Came across a simple article in Psychology Today (not the highest prestige journal out there, but contains articles that don't expect one to be an expert in the field).

In it, they mention how profiling approaches break down (broadly) into
1) statistical/analytical approaches
2) clinical interpretive approaches (i.e. of the Douglas type - experience, intuition, educated guesswork)

It's the latter that most people hear about, and yes, it's the latter that performs more poorly. While they don't go into details, the article does mention an experimental study. They trained one police force to use analytic approaches and another they left to use their usual approaches. After a year, the one trained with analytic profiling tools had solved over 260% more crimes. They didn't have a group trained in the clinical/interpretive approaches, which is unfortunate as I would have liked to see that outcome.

They also mention a study which reports that profile predictions were accurate 66% of the time, but don't provide enough details in this article to know how accuracy was judged, or what the chance rate would be. If it is scored such that the chance rate by random guessing would be 50%, then 66% is better than chance, but hardly something to bank upon. But if the chance rate of guessing was 10%, then that's a very big improvement.

The police themselves don't view profiles as if they're manna from heaven, but egos run high in police forces and profiles come from outsiders, so opinion polls might not be a great measure of their efficacy. Other similar values they mention are fairly low rates (like in only 2.7% of cases did the profile lead to an arrest) could suffer from the same problem - a reluctance to credit the outsider with contributing to the arrest, particularly as profiles are intended to make suggestions about what to look for, and an arrest only occurs after you've looked and found. But maybe the study is able to account for this problem, I'm just thinking of questions after having found this one.

anyway, it looks like there are some studies out now that are starting to look at behavioural profiling. Personally, I'm more interested in reading up on the statistical/analytical approaches (hardly a surprise there). I still haven't found a good study on the more "famous" version of profiling, but then, it's always the problem child everyone knows and not the quiet good one.

Here's a link to the article if anyone's interested: Behavioural Profiling

- Jeff

thanks jeff. interesting and thanks for posting. i think profiling can be helpful, but as i said i take it with a grain of salt.just for jolly i did my own arm chair profile of the ripper and posted it a few years back and it was quite lengthy and backed up each characteristic i listed from the circs of the crimes scenes and what we now know about serial killers.i think the thread title was. . My profile of the ripper. it would be interesting to dig that up and see if it would fit with lech, because i didnt consider him a suspect at all back then.

[drstrange169]

>>Actually Dusty Lloyds Weekly and the Evening News both had Paul hurrying along.<<

Lloyds and Evening News are the same article cut and pasted so hardly surprising they both say, "hurrying along".


>> It was an error and I’m happy to hold my hands up and admit it. <<

Good to read, thank you. Now how about that Baxter's quote?


>>I think your recent posts about Christer are generally weird and unpleasant and say a great deal more about you than they do about him.<<

Flattery will get you nowhere.


>>All you ever do is copy and paste others theories and suggestions - and point out errors in a date or if somebody’s got a quote wrong or mixed something up.<<

You think correcting errors is a bad thing? I think you may actually be revealing more about you than my posts.


>>People like you who only criticise, but offer no suggestions, hypothesis, explanations or theories of their own are usually insecure, low self worth and over compensating. Pointing out a flaw in some else’s work gives your self esteem a boost. <<

On the good side, at least I've moved on from autism to histrionic personality disorder. I'm certainly running the gamut of brain abnormalities!


>>The way you copy chunks of Christer’s and others posts is actually pitiful. <<

I copy because it's important to show what I'm saying is correct, but I understand sticking to facts isn't a trait some Lechmerians are fond of.


>>It’s like the more he ignores you the more desperate you are to get his attention.<<

Christer never ignores my posts, so I guess I'm sated with his attention. Should cut and paste some examples, I don't want to creep you out anymore than necessary?

What he ignores is answering my questions and with good reason.


>>I suggest you try and write a few posts that aren’t just fault finding someone’s else’s, you might just find you get the recognition you so clearly want. <<

Like this maybe?

https://forum.casebook.org/forum/ripper-discussions/victims/non-canonical-victims/alice-mackenzie/1480-alice-mckenzie-some-details-not-seen-before/page4#post777830

The upshot is, a lot of damage is done by people like you and Christer spreading false stories. I have no problem with Lechmere being a person interest. I do have a problem with him being fitted up for the crimes with factually wrong information.

For some people, seems you are one, the attaction in ripperology is the excitement of the criminal and his crimes, being the person to solve one of the great mysteries and showing off your theories. Playing some kind of a real life Cluedo game. This is a story about violence and sickness.

For some us, I'm not alone, the main interest is the people, their lives and where they lead.

[drstrange169]

Interesting article Jeff,

"Contrary to popular belief, most of the work on criminal profiling was not conducted by members of the famed FBI Behavioral Science Unit. In fact, just 7% of all profiling publications were authored by FBI Special Agents and profilers. Most “profilers” are actually psychologists (43%) or criminologists (17%), and the majority of offender profiling publications came out in the last decade, between 2006 and 2016. None of those were authored by profilers or Special Agents in the FBI."

Maybe this has more better info.

Copson, G. (1995). Coals to Newcastle? Part 1: A study of offender profiling. London, England: Home Office, Police Research Group.

[JeffHamm]

Interesting article Jeff,

"Contrary to popular belief, most of the work on criminal profiling was not conducted by members of the famed FBI Behavioral Science Unit. In fact, just 7% of all profiling publications were authored by FBI Special Agents and profilers. Most “profilers” are actually psychologists (43%) or criminologists (17%), and the majority of offender profiling publications came out in the last decade, between 2006 and 2016. None of those were authored by profilers or Special Agents in the FBI."

Maybe this has more better info.

Copson, G. (1995). Coals to Newcastle? Part 1: A study of offender profiling. London, England: Home Office, Police Research Group.

It's a nice summary and easy to read. I plan on reading the Copson article soon. Grabbed the one looking at the benefit in training in the analytical approach to profiling and want to have a look at what they do first, and may end up down a statistical rabbit hole as I do.

- Jeff

[Mark J D]

As you say, no date, but obviously later than 1888.

I'd say later than the 1892(?) OS map also: looks like Paul's house has already been redeveloped into the works that took up two blocks, his side of Foster Street included.

If I'm reading the photo right, Paul's house had been in the vicinity of that red 'x'.

(Surely the fact that this is a detailed aerial image dates it to after the normalisation and spread of powered flight?!?)



M.

[rjpalmer]

From Twitter? Kudos, RJ!

Yes, Gary, amazing isn't it? Even the Survey of London posts images on Twitter these days, which, of course, renders those images highly suspect.

I recently came across this and had a bit of a laugh:

Googling away, I found that in the book ”Bushmen in a Victorian World: The Remarkable Story of the Bleek-Lloyd Collection of Bushman Folklore” ...

Googling away? Who would have thunk? And here I thought the Lechmere theorists only conducted research in dusty basements underneath the British Museum.The next thing you know, they'll tweet.

there’s no harm in re-emphasising how massive the complex was and how insignificant the 14ft surrounding walls were in relation to the buildings inside them.

Now you're just pulling my leg, Gary.

Even if the front of the Brewery stretched all the way to Brighton, and the east side all the way to the White Cliffs of Dover, how would this change the fact that Robert Paul, leaving his house on Forster Street, only walked along one tiny back corner of the complex in the dead of night? And, based on the Goad map of 1890, was fronted by a 14' wall?

Are you suggesting he had a sweeping view of the entire facility from this small vantage point, and thus must have seen an illuminated clock? Based on what, exactly?

There is not the slightest indication of how Paul determined the time, but we know that his estimate of 3:45 clashes with the estimates of everyone else and has him not even leaving home until 5 minutes after Neil rediscovered the body as estimated by the highly sensible Fred Abberline.

I'll stick with Abberline.

[Mark J D]

... Are you suggesting he had a sweeping view of the entire facility from this small vantage point, and thus must have seen an illuminated clock? Based on what, exactly?

Seems like only yesterday that Paul was said to have got his time-checks from a timepiece bonging half a mile away. Now he has to have line-of-sight with an illuminated clock face?

M.

[rjpalmer]

Seems like only yesterday that Paul was said to have got his time-checks from a timepiece bonging half a mile away. Now he has to have line-of-sight with an illuminated clock face?

M.

How else do you see something unless it’s in your line of sight?

And since it’s 3.35ish in the morning in an age not known for having glaring electric lights everywhere, how is he going to see it without illumination?

Even if this theoretical clock existed, as you and Gary apparently believe, how do you know it wouldn’t have been as untrustworthy as the clocks in Halstead?

This line of reasoning strikes me as increasingly pointless. Unless more data is found, we might as well speculate about angels dancing on the head of a pin.

Currently, all the objective viewer can say is that Paul’s account clashes with everyone else’s, thus leaving it highly suspect.

If you’re comfortable hanging your theory on that wobbly peg, why should I complain? It’s your theory.

[Mark J D]

How else do you see something unless it’s in your line of sight?

And since it’s 3.35ish in the morning in an age not known for having glaring electric lights everywhere, how is he going to see it without illumination?

Even if this theoretical clock existed, as you and Gary apparently believe, how do you know it wouldn’t have been as untrustworthy as the clocks in Halstead?

This line of reasoning strikes me as increasingly pointless. Unless more data is found, we might as well speculate about angels dancing on the head of a pin.

Currently, all the objective viewer can say is that Paul’s account clashes with everyone else’s, thus leaving it highly suspect.

If you’re comfortable hanging your theory on that wobbly peg, why should I complain? It’s your theory.

Mischievous twaddle. It ought to be obvious that lay people talking in terms of round quarter-hours are more likely to be hearing a clock than seeing it. And without daytime traffic noise, sound will carry further, making it more likely that multiple clocks will be audible and any outlier recognised.

As for a public clock conveniently being fast or slow by half an hour, I can just imagine Paul's conversation with his wife...

"Time is a weird thing, isn't it, love? When I arrive at work, it seems to have taken me 50 minutes to walk three quarters of a mile. But when I walk home from work, I somehow arrive here ten minutes before I've even left..."

M.

[FrankO]

Mischievous twaddle. It ought to be obvious that lay people talking in terms of round quarter-hours are more likely to be hearing a clock than seeing it. And without daytime traffic noise, sound will carry further, making it more likely that multiple clocks will be audible and an outlier recognised.

Neither of you wrote mischievous twaddle (or you both did). The fact of the matter is that we don't know how Paul came to his timing. He may have heard a clock chime and he may have seen one or he may even have got it in another way (for instance, from a knocker-up). We don't and can't know. As far as I can see, the only thing we might be relatively sure of is that Thain and Paul didn't base their timing on the same clock, as there's just too little room for that to have happened.

[MrBarnett]

How else do you see something unless it’s in your line of sight?

And since it’s 3.35ish in the morning in an age not known for having glaring electric lights everywhere, how is he going to see it without illumination?

Even if this theoretical clock existed, as you and Gary apparently believe, how do you know it wouldn’t have been as untrustworthy as the clocks in Halstead?

This line of reasoning strikes me as increasingly pointless. Unless more data is found, we might as well speculate about angels dancing on the head of a pin.

Currently, all the objective viewer can say is that Paul’s account clashes with everyone else’s, thus leaving it highly suspect.

If you’re comfortable hanging your theory on that wobbly peg, why should I complain? It’s your theory.

RJ,

On this particular topic I’m not putting forward my own theory on whether Paul could have seen a brewery clock, I’m simply pointing out the flaws in your increasingly desperate attempts to argue that he couldn’t.

This is a photo of Pereira Street, the next street along (approx W) from Foster Street. It was on the same alignment as Foster Street and met Bath Street at its southern end. The photo shows the view towards Bath Street and the 14ft wall your theory relies so heavily on. There appears to have been a gateway in the wall at that point, and the towering buildings of the brewery complex are clearly visible beyond the wall.

Can we now at least drop the wall nonsense?

[SuperShodan]

How Paul came to know the time is of great interest as it’s so important to the case. I would be particularly interested in how working class Victorian men got themselves up at the right time in the first place. The danger of sleeping in and losing a days pay must have been very real.

Knocking up seems an option, but could a Constable realistically knock up every worker on their beat ?

And once Paul is up and heading off to work he does seem very sure of the time. It does appear to me he could either hear the quarter hour chime (something he would likely be listening out for) or he could see a clock. Perhaps he was lucky enough to have had one on the mantelpiece.

However, I do think this is an avenue well worth pursuing. How our protagonists know the time is something I’d love to know.

[MrBarnett]

Neither of you wrote mischievous twaddle (or you both did). The fact of the matter is that we don't know how Paul came to his timing. He may have heard a clock chime and he may have seen one or he may even have got it in another way (for instance, from a knocker-up). We don't and can't know. As far as I can see, the only thing we might be relatively sure of is that Thain and Paul didn't base their timing on the same clock, as there's just too little room for that to have happened.

We don’t, but RJ has suggested that Elizabeth Long may have heard the Albion Brewery clock chiming while she was half a mile away in Hanbury Street, so he must acknowledge that Paul may have heard it when he was a few feet away.

And if the Halstead Brewery clock is anything to go by, it would have been pretty accurate.

[MrBarnett]

A slight diversion. My grandad had a mate - a partner in crime - named Mark Tarbuck who lived in Pereira Street. Tarby must have been a greedy little blighter because almost every one of his criminal convictions involved the theft of foodstuffs - chocolate, fish, eggs, whisky…

One or more of Tarby’s relatives were killed alongside the Lechmeres who perished in the Bethnal Green Tube Disaster in WWII.

That incident put an end to the Lechmeres’ 50(+?)-year involvement in the horse flesh trade.