Cross Theory II

[Lechmere]

I would suggtest that at this remove you will have nothing better than circumstantial evidence against anyone.
Unless Patricia Cornwell is right.
In the Lechmere instance the case is based on the accumulation of circumstances - each of which could have an innocent explanation but when put together these repeated innocent explanations start to wear thin.

[Steve S]

I think Patrick has summed up my problems with the theory better than I can.....To my mind, Cross falls in a category with Mann,Hutchinson and Barnett..Yes,much more likely than Top-hatted Toffs, but nothing that isn't circumstantial..........

[Patrick S]

Patrick

This account of his inquest testimony was published in the Times, but the other reports do not tell this aspect significantly differently:

They both crossed over to the body, and witness took hold of the woman's hands, which were cold and limp. Witness said, "I believe she is dead." He touched her face, which felt warm. The other man, placing his hand on her heart, said "I think she is breathing, but very little if she is." Witness suggested that they should give her a prop, but his companion refused to touch her.

I think you are correct that he touched a hand - while being observed by Paul - however, when asked to move the body, he refused.

So Lechmere said he took hold of the victims hand and also touched her face. In the instance of this murder, any blood he had on him accordingly had a ready excuse.
Lechmere’s refusal to touch the body was only in respect of Paul’s suggestion that they prop her up. I would suggest he did not want to prop her up as the neck wound, and the victim’s mortality, would have become obvious.

In my view, there are more logical reasons for not doing so. But, they don't fit your narrative, so we'll leave then out going forward.

If you want to talk about the real world, in the real world there have been serial killers who have been married and had children. In the real world there have been serial killers with steady jobs.
We have no idea whether or not Charles Lechmere was well adjusted.

Correct. We have no idea. Although, what we know of his life indicates he was well adjusted enough to live what was - to outward appearances - a completely normal life. So, again. The only reason you have to suspect that he was not well adjusted (in spite raising a family, working 20+ years for Pickfords, later becoming a green grocer, and dying of old age, at home, his bed) and thus a murderer is that he FOUND THE BODY OF POLLY NICHOLS. Again, WHAT ELSE DO YOU HAVE?

However in the real world most serial killers psychopathy is undiagnosed prior to their capture.
The ‘suspects’ who can tolerably be estimated to have been subject to psychopathic tendencies invariably have no history of this type of attack or cannot be reliably placed in the East End.

Undiagnosed and not acted upon are two different things. Since YOU are now the one dealing with statistical probabilities and what MOST serial killers do. MOST do not have stable work histories, raise families, blah blah blah. I've said it all before. Are you the only one who does not see the mental gymnastics one has to do in order to view Cross as JtR?

From the dry records we know that Charles Lechmere was from a broken home.
His grandfather, Chares Fox Lechmere, was the younger son of a wealthy member of the Herefordshire gentry. However his line of the family rapidly spiralled down the social scale and migrated to the East End, while their cousins lived in comfort in Fownhope Court (which was quite unlike Miller’s Court).
His father, John Allen Lechmere deserted his young family when Charles was a baby and started a new life in Northamptonshire.
Charles Lechmere had no male authority figure in his life until he was 9 years old, when his mother remarried, bigamously, a policeman who was only fourteen years older than himself. This was Thomas Cross, who was 9 years younger than his wife, Charles Lechmere’s mother.
Charles Lechmere’s only sibling, his older sister Emily, died of TB in July 1869. In December of the same year, Thomas Cross the twice over imposed authority figure (step father and policeman) also died.
In his later life Charles Lechmere exhibited an anal attention to detail and evidence of a controlling personality. That is why we have over 100 plus records of his life.

Charles Lechmere’s first child, also Charles Allen Lechmere, was born in March 1872. He seems to have been sickly and died in 1875. The unsolved murder of Harriet Buswell took place in Great Coram Street nine months after this birth.

Another of Charles Lechmere’s daughters was born in March 1888 a couple of weeks before the attack on Ada Wilson. This daughter also seems to have been sickly and died in October 1890.

Charles Lechmere’s second step father, Joseph Forsdike died in December 1889, exactly three months after the discovery of the Pinchin Street Torso, in a railway arch a few minutes lugging distance away from where he lived at 147 Cable Street.

So while Charles Lechmere may have been a well-adjusted citizen, there is enough material there to suggest potential psychological undercurrents.
And no, I don’t think he took a couple of months out of his law abiding life to kill and dissect prostitutes. There were unsolved deaths before and after the so-called C5.

That's great information I didn't know before reading it here. However, the unfortunate fact is that the life you describe here probably mirrors a high percentage of 19th century lives, in and around the East End, in New York, Paris, etc. Parenthetically, you just described the life of most of the United States founding fathers. I'm not aware of a serial killer among them.

Let's look for ANY reason to include Cross! You have this. He discovered the body (someone had to). He walked to work through the area. He and hundreds of others. WHAT ELSE HAVE YOU GOT!? Bullet your reasons to suspect him for dummies like me. Help me understand.

Although you have regularly claim (ha! A bit unconvincingly) that you ‘once suspected Cross’, you seem unaware of the points against him…

Suspected is a strong word. If I used it I was mistaken. I've been interested in him. Before learning about him, I could envisage him at the Ripper. It's known that some killers like to become involved involved, to help. As well, some become involved simply due to their proximity to the case. As well, there is no reason for me to lie about such things.

• Given the usual caveats about Victorian timings he had the time to carry out the attack.
• The culprit seems to have been disturbed (the abdominal wounds were covered - unlike other Whitechapel Murders).


• Paul spotted Lechmere very close to the body before Lechmere had raised the alarm.

Or he really did just find the body.

• There was a strange meeting between the two – with Paul thinking he was about to be mugged.

Based upon the street he was on! He said there were terrible gangs about. He made no comments whatsoever that Cross behaved in a manner that frightened him.

• There was the unusual touching of the body – unlike other Whitechapel Murders.
• They failed to alert any local householders and abandoned the body which they claimed they thought was unconscious.

They. So Paul was in on it too? As well, it's a dangerous business to assume guilt over otherwise explainable actions. I know if I were sleeping at three thirty AM and a guy knocked on my door by to tell me he found a drunk woman in the street, especially when he knows a cop is somewhere close by I'd be less than thrilled. But, fine. This is a minor point among minor points.

• There was disagreement between PC Mizen and Lechmere over what was said in their conversation. Mizen claimed Lechmere said he was wanted by a policeman.

This suggests what, exactly?

• Lechmere claimed he was late for work yet didn’t take the quickest route to work. When he left Mizen he went with Paul and avoided a route past the Tabram murder scene.

I once told a white lie to get out of sitting on jury. I once said I was late for work to avoid having to talk to a guy I didn't want to talk to. I once said I had eaten dinner to avoid eating something made by the wife of a friend I know to be a lousy cook. I once drove to work a different route because I wanted to see if an ex-girlfriend's car in her driveway or not. I didn't kill anyone any of those times. But let's revisit those actions in 100 years and see what they may suggest.

• Lechmere did not present himself to give a formal interview almost certainly until the Sunday, after the appearance of Paul’s newspaper story which put him next to the body.

Did he work on Saturday? Did he have a second job? Did his kid have a football game? Did he get drunk and forget. Was he ill? Did he have to attend his brother's wedding? Was he out doing early Christmas shopping? WE DON'T KNOW. And the police didn't seem to think this was an issue.

• Lechmere gave his name as Charles Cross – rather than the name he gave in every other instance that we know of in his well recorded life when he had any dealings with authority.


• Lechmere turned up to the inquest in his work clothes – giving a humble appearance and possibly indicating that he did not tell his wife where he was going (the Lechmere family were ignorant of their great great grandfather’s involvement in the Ripper case until recently).

Maybe those were his best clothes? Maybe his other suit was at the cleaners. Again. I mean, really?


• He seems to have avoided giving his address in open court at the inquest.
• He can be geographically linked to every one of the Whitechapel murder crime scenes and several other unsolved deaths, and also to the site of the Goulston Street Graffiti or apron drop.

I think that’s enough to be going on with.

It was said that a 5.30 time of death for Chapman definitely counted Charles Lechmere out.
I pointed out that there is no reason to suggest that he could not have carried out this murder if it did happened at around 5.30 am. That’s all. No one knows where he drove his cart – so to claim that he couldn’t have done it at that time is clearly ridiculous.

Again. The more hoops we just through the more we are fitting a suspect to the crimes. The crimes do not fit this suspect.
Equally he could have done it with an earlier timing – based on the doctor’s estimate.

As a matter of course I don’t put much faith in any of the eye witnesses – or ear witnesses in the case of Cadosch. That also goes for Schwartz and Lawende.

You would if they supported your theory.

PS I said there was no evidence that there was any blood spray in the Nichols case, but was in the Chapman case. However in the Chapman case it seems that an effort was made to ensure the spray went against the fence and away from the culprit.

If there was no evidence of spray Nichols but there was in Chapman that might suggest that the killer - committing his first such murder, if we abide canon - was himself hit by the spray. Learning his lesson, he took a different approach with Chapman.

Clearly no one can be written off from more than a century later. Just as we likely cannot prove anything. However, we can use common sense to say what's probably and improbably. To me, from what I've heard, it's improbably that Cross was the killer.

[Lechmere]

Pretty much - although there is some information to go on to help build a picture

[Jenni Shelden]

Hi Ed,
Just wondering...isn't it a fact that we don't know the work patterns at Pickfords? We don't know how many poeple started work at 4am and who was around before and or after this? We don't know the security arrangements? We don't know if the workers had to sign in? We don't know how well lit the depot was? We do not know Charles Cross' work pattern and if 4am was an ordinary start time, a iregularity or if he worked shifts?

Best wishes
Jenni

[Lechmere]

Jon
It isn’t a fact that a whole shift started at 4.00 am. All we know is that Charles Lechmere said he had to be in work at 4.00 am on that particular day. We testified that he saw no one else from when he left home to when he arrived at work – apart from Paul and Mizen.
Yes, the Old Bailey Transcripts make interesting reading. They illustrate that there were quiet places someone could go in Broad Street and that shifts started at different times.
Obviously the goods at the station were kept secure although there seems to have been a major theft issue.
Some of the Pickford's vans had boys but crimes were committed virtually in front of these boys.
The North West Railway Company employed policemen who were looking for people taking stuff out of the station (rather than in), although the police office there seems to have opened after 5.15 am.
The Pickford's depot within the station was distinct from the rest of the station anyway.
Which cases in particular were you referring to?

[Jon Guy]

However, I think it is far more likely that when Lechmere arrived at the Broad Street Depot in the early hours of the morning, it would have still been dark and relatively quiet, and that this provided all the cover he needed. It allowed him to check himself over and clean himself up prior to the light coming up and the full workforce arriving.

Ed

Having recently perused the the Old Bailey cases which contains details on the Pickfords company, it does appear that there was a degree of security, such as clerks and watchmen who would watch employees carefully to ensure they weren`t lifting goods off the premises etc etc.
I certainly get the impression that Pickfords wasn`t the ghost ship you suggest it was at that time of the morning. In fact, there would have been a whole shift starting at the same time as Cross, all using the same facilities at the same time.

[Lechmere]

Patrick

If I thought that Lechmere ‘reported to work’ in a manner where he would have been in clear view of his workmates, then I would agree that a sensible serial killer would think twice about killing on his way to work, in case he was unsuccessful in avoiding getting conspicuous amounts of blood on his person.

The first difficulty in taking this as an absolute is that although I would tend to guess that this killer was relatively clever, or cunning, and within certain bounds careful, serial killers tend to act with an overriding degree of compulsion. Not that I would imagine that he would kill without control. However serial killer, even very intelligent ones, often do things which leave you wondering – because they have inner compulsions which a normal person cannot readily comprehend.
Furthermore, as I think I tried to establish, if the killer was a local man, who had a family and who's work meant that he had to be on the streets in the early hours of the morning, the logistics of his life would mean that the only time he would be able to kill would be at the times these killings took place (most of them anyway).
Such a man would have to kill at that time and hope he would not get noticed when he ‘reported to work’. Or he could just remain frustrated.

However, I think it is far more likely that when Lechmere arrived at the Broad Street Depot in the early hours of the morning, it would have still been dark and relatively quiet, and that this provided all the cover he needed. It allowed him to check himself over and clean himself up prior to the light coming up and the full workforce arriving.

So I don’t accept your premise that if he had blood on his clothing when he turned up at Broad Street that this necessarily would have been noticed by anyone.
I suspect that the killer – whoever he was – was actually very careful not to get conspicuous amounts of blood on his person.

In the Nichols case, did Lechmere say that he did not touch the body?

This account of his inquest testimony was published in the Times, but the other reports do not tell this aspect significantly differently:

They both crossed over to the body, and witness took hold of the woman's hands, which were cold and limp. Witness said, "I believe she is dead." He touched her face, which felt warm. The other man, placing his hand on her heart, said "I think she is breathing, but very little if she is." Witness suggested that they should give her a prop, but his companion refused to touch her.

So Lechmere said he took hold of the victims hand and also touched her face. In the instance of this murder, any blood he had on him accordingly had a ready excuse.
Lechmere’s refusal to touch the body was only in respect of Paul’s suggestion that they prop her up. I would suggest he did not want to prop her up as the neck wound, and the victim’s mortality, would have become obvious.

If you want to talk about the real world, in the real world there have been serial killers who have been married and had children. In the real world there have been serial killers with steady jobs.
We have no idea whether or not Charles Lechmere was well adjusted.

However in the real world most serial killers psychopathy is undiagnosed prior to their capture.
The ‘suspects’ who can tolerably be estimated to have been subject to psychopathic tendencies invariably have no history of this type of attack or cannot be reliably placed in the East End.

From the dry records we know that Charles Lechmere was from a broken home.
His grandfather, Chares Fox Lechmere, was the younger son of a wealthy member of the Herefordshire gentry. However his line of the family rapidly spiralled down the social scale and migrated to the East End, while their cousins lived in comfort in Fownhope Court (which was quite unlike Miller’s Court).
His father, John Allen Lechmere deserted his young family when Charles was a baby and started a new life in Northamptonshire.
Charles Lechmere had no male authority figure in his life until he was 9 years old, when his mother remarried, bigamously, a policeman who was only fourteen years older than himself. This was Thomas Cross, who was 9 years younger than his wife, Charles Lechmere’s mother.
Charles Lechmere’s only sibling, his older sister Emily, died of TB in July 1869. In December of the same year, Thomas Cross the twice over imposed authority figure (step father and policeman) also died.
In his later life Charles Lechmere exhibited an anal attention to detail and evidence of a controlling personality. That is why we have over 100 plus records of his life.

Charles Lechmere’s first child, also Charles Allen Lechmere, was born in March 1872. He seems to have been sickly and died in 1875. The unsolved murder of Harriet Buswell took place in Great Coram Street nine months after this birth.

Another of Charles Lechmere’s daughters was born in March 1888 a couple of weeks before the attack on Ada Wilson. This daughter also seems to have been sickly and died in October 1890.

Charles Lechmere’s second step father, Joseph Forsdike died in December 1889, exactly three months after the discovery of the Pinchin Street Torso, in a railway arch a few minutes lugging distance away from where he lived at 147 Cable Street.

So while Charles Lechmere may have been a well-adjusted citizen, there is enough material there to suggest potential psychological undercurrents.
And no, I don’t think he took a couple of months out of his law abiding life to kill and dissect prostitutes. There were unsolved deaths before and after the so-called C5.

You say it is false that:
‘it is necessary, or particularly likely, for the killer to have been a well know (or even a secret) woman hater or to have had a down on prostitutes. Prostitutes are usually killed due to their availability rather than because the culprit has a specific ‘down’ on them.’
We shall have to disagree.

But then you say:

Let's look for ANY reason to include Cross! You have this. He discovered the body (someone had to). He walked to work through the area. He and hundreds of others. WHAT ELSE HAVE YOU GOT!? Bullet your reasons to suspect him for dummies like me. Help me understand.

Although you have regularly claim (ha! A bit unconvincingly) that you ‘once suspected Cross’, you seem unaware of the points against him…

• Given the usual caveats about Victorian timings he had the time to carry out the attack.
• The culprit seems to have been disturbed (the abdominal wounds were covered - unlike other Whitechapel Murders).
• Paul spotted Lechmere very close to the body before Lechmere had raised the alarm.
• There was a strange meeting between the two – with Paul thinking he was about to be mugged.
• There was the unusual touching of the body – unlike other Whitechapel Murders.
• They failed to alert any local householders and abandoned the body which they claimed they thought was unconscious.
• There was disagreement between PC Mizen and Lechmere over what was said in their conversation. Mizen claimed Lechmere said he was wanted by a policeman.
• Lechmere claimed he was late for work yet didn’t take the quickest route to work. When he left Mizen he went with Paul and avoided a route past the Tabram murder scene.
• Lechmere did not present himself to give a formal interview almost certainly until the Sunday, after the appearance of Paul’s newspaper story which put him next to the body.
• Lechmere gave his name as Charles Cross – rather than the name he gave in every other instance that we know of in his well recorded life when he had any dealings with authority.
• Lechmere turned up to the inquest in his work clothes – giving a humble appearance and possibly indicating that he did not tell his wife where he was going (the Lechmere family were ignorant of their great great grandfather’s involvement in the Ripper case until recently).
• He seems to have avoided giving his address in open court at the inquest.
• He can be geographically linked to every one of the Whitechapel murder crime scenes and several other unsolved deaths, and also to the site of the Goulston Street Graffiti or apron drop.

I think that’s enough to be going on with.

It was said that a 5.30 time of death for Chapman definitely counted Charles Lechmere out.
I pointed out that there is no reason to suggest that he could not have carried out this murder if it did happened at around 5.30 am. That’s all. No one knows where he drove his cart – so to claim that he couldn’t have done it at that time is clearly ridiculous.
Equally he could have done it with an earlier timing – based on the doctor’s estimate.
As a matter of course I don’t put much faith in any of the eye witnesses – or ear witnesses in the case of Cadosch. That also goes for Schwartz and Lawende.

PS I said there was no evidence that there was any blood spray in the Nichols case, but was in the Chapman case. However in the Chapman case it seems that an effort was made to ensure the spray went against the fence and away from the culprit.

[Patrick S]

Patrick
As I said, at that time of day, a bit of blood on his clothing would not be a major problem.

We'll agree to disagree here. In order to accept Cross as a suspect we must do one of two things. We either accept that reporting to work with a "a bit of blood on his clothing" would not raise any alarms among coworkers, in spite of the fact that a murder had been committed and Cross had discovered it. In his statement he said that he did not touch the body. Thus, he should not have had blood on him. No one observed blood on him. Its reasonable to assume, then, that he had no blood on him, OR we accept that Cross killed Nichols, mutilated her, and didn't get a drop of blood on his person. Both seem pretty implausible to me.

In Lechmere’s case he had the probable opportunity to clean up properly at his workplace before he went out in broad day light.

The aspect of Lechmere’s lifestyle that fits the pattern for these murders is that the only opportunity he would have had to kill (given the obvious proviso that he did them) was at precisely the times these killings took place.
That goes for pretty much all of the murders, not just the canonical ones.
I wasn’t suggesting that what we know of his lifestyle, specifically his lifestyle, would lead us to believe that he was Jack the Ripper. That is a different area of discussion.



You seem to provide some pointers to characteristics that you seem regard as plausible indicators of guilt:

Was he ultimately confined to an institution? Was he hanged for murder a few years later? Did he hate women? Was he dealt a bad hand from a prostitute?

I think it is extremely unlikely that whoever did it was conveniently confined in an institution, or was hung or locked up for some other crime – still less that he committed suicide in remorse - at precisely the right moment for the sequence to end.
These neat fits rarely happen in the real world.

Let's talk about the real world. In the real world serial killers are USUALLY not well adjusted working men with stable 20 years employment histories, wives, kids. In the real world, hopefully, we have some REASON for suspecting an individual for a string of brutal murders, clearly the work of a psychopath, other than the fact that he walked to work through the area and found a body. What else do you know about him? Being committed or arrested are facile examples. What do you know of him, his character, his life that cause you to think he he was JtR? You haven't answered that. Is it your contention that he lived a law abiding life, got a job, got married, had kids, took a few months to kill and dissect prostitutes, then went back to his quiet, simple, working man's life? And you think THIS is what happens in the real world?


Nor do it think that it is necessary, or particularly likely, for the killer to have been a well know (or even a secret) woman hater or to have had a down on prostitutes. Prostitutes are usually killed due to their availability rather than because the culprit has a specific ‘down’ on them.
The list you provided owes much to Victorian thinking.

False. See above. It's clear you are wedded to the idea that Cross was JtR. No amount of argument will put you off that idea.

If you wish to eliminate a potential suspect in a case such as this because he was married and didn’t live alone, and do it on the basis of the type of statistical analysis you gave as an example (average basket ball players) then you would have fitted in well with the Yorkshire Ripper Murder Squad.

Let's look for ANY reason to include Cross! You have this. He discovered the body (someone had to). He walked to work through the area. He and hundreds of others. WHAT ELSE HAVE YOU GOT!? Bullet your reasons to suspect him for dummies like me. Help me understand.

But you seem to be in agreement with me in describing the psychological type of the killer at least!

And as I have already said, Lechmere got to work at 4.00 am in the stables in a Goods Station. It was not a UPS depot illuminated with arc lights.
A little blood on dark clothing would not have shown up – and there where mess rooms and such like where he could have more closely inspected his clothes and cleaned up before emerging into the light of day.


Again, again, I have never suggested that Lechmere would have left his cart unattended.
The only victim who may possibly have been killed while he was at work was Chapman.
If this was the case then I believe he took an extra risk because he wanted to find a victim quite quickly and in a generally specific location. Quite unlike the other killings.
That would explain why Chapman was killed slightly later in the morning than the others.

Based on what? Why? Just because it fits the facts of what happened?

I believe there is evidence that some blood spray was found on the fence. Indicating perhaps that the killer deliberately turned the body and cut in a direction that made it less likely that blood would get on him.

You said there was no spray when dead (or nearly dead bodies) have their throats cut. You changed your mind?

We do not know whether Lechmere had a boy ‘driver’s mate’ or would have used cart minders. The nature of his job meant that he would very often be stuck waiting – for hours sometimes – for his cart to be unloaded. Often he may have stayed with his load himself.
However in extremis, if he felt it necessary, as I think he may have done in the case of Chapman, he could have either used a cart minder or left his boy and taken that extra risk.

Again, based on what?

Alternatively the doctor may have been right and Chapman may have been killed pretty much at the same hour as Nichols.
We know how much reliance can be placed on eye witness testimony. So I tend to go with the earlier hour for Chapman’s death.\

Because it fits your suspect.

However, I accept the possibility that Chapman could have been killed later in the morning and for that reason I introduce the possibility that Lechmere could have still been responsible for the crime even though he would have been ‘at work’ at the time, due to the nature of his work.

Based on what you know of his movements? His route? What WAS his route? Did he have a regular route?

Incidentally, the picture of the East End as a den of poverty and crime was in many ways born of the Ripper murders. I keep reporting that Booth’s 1889 survey divided London into 134 districts, each of roughly 30,000 inhabitants. The district that included Dorset Street, the Victoria Home and Middlesex Street was placed 54th in terms of poverty. Mid table in other words.

Yet it was normal for people who lived there to sashay around town with blood on them? It would not have stood out until he found opportunity to clean up. We are going down the rabbit hole again.

The worst areas for poverty and crime were on the South Bank, followed by a couple of north London districts. No murders happened in the worst districts in the East End (eg the western part of Bethnal Green – that included the ‘Old Nichol’, which may interest those who have a hankering for that quarter).

I do want to thank you. I once suspected Cross. This thread has helped me see reason. I know think he was totally innocent.

[Ben]

The best form of defence is attack – eh?

I wouldn't know, Lechmere. I rather assumed you were the expert there, considering the regularity with which you are called upon to defend your views.

I would not have posted at all had you not made more inaccurate comments about common lodging houses. Just leave that bit out next time, and we shouldn't have further problems.

Just for the record, I'm not interested in promoting or discussing any suspect other the one this thread relates to. I would only point out that the vast majority of men living in the neighbourhood of the murders would have lived in some form of shared accommodation with strangers. Complete privacy was a rare commodity indeed, and if people were in the business of concealment for whatever reason, their most prudent course of action was to become the needle in the haystack and hide in pain sight. Obviously, the larger establishments that catered for larger numbers facilitated this better than the Hanbury Street set-up, which consisted of several families using the same front door, and carried the greater risk of everyone monitoring everyone else's business.

I have no idea why you think the killer would have been required to hand over a package containing his innards to the night deputy. All he needed to do was keep the wrapped (or not?) organs in his pocket and proceed either to the kitchens, if open (for some good ol' east end cannibalism), or head upstairs to a private cabin, as Jack London did.

No problem at all.

In contrast, killing and eviserating on the way to work (as no other known serial killer has ever done) entailed the necessity of stashing the organs at work, and convince you don't here. It would have meant leaving the sticky, whiffy things there during his whole work day, and hoping nobody ventured into these supposedly private and untrodden areas. I'm not seeing too much evidence for these convenient "nooks and crannies" that you seem to be insisting were there either.

[Lechmere]

Ben
The best form of defence is attack – eh?
The trouble is you have quoted me very selectively in trying to accuse me of hypocrisy.

Patrick had reopened this thread (post 156) by contending that Lechmere (to paraphrase) would have had to go to work probably covered in blood. This made it seem to him to be unlikely that Lechmere could be the culprit.
You heartily concurred with him.

I answered these criticisms in my post 161, which you selectively quoted me from.
My main point was that I do not believe that it is necessarily the case that the culprit – whoever he was – was covered in blood.

I then made the point that if he was covered in blood, as had been proposed, then the culprit would have problems wherever he went.
I included the common lodging house bit for the benefit of those who think that the culprit may have stayed in such an establishment. I would suggest that a blood splattered murderer would have been spotted by the deputy when he checked in.
I then listed various other options which would be just as perilous for a blood splattered murderer – more perilous than turning up in a dusty, dark and quiet Good Depot that had facilities in which he could clean himself up.

The only inconsistency in reasoning is yours.
You think a blood splattered culprit could slip into a Common Lodging House and secret body parts. There was no privacy in a Common Lodging House. While some had facilities to keep possessions, it would not have been anything like a secure private safe deposit box.
Yet you think that a similar blood splattered culprit would be compromised in a dusty, dark and quiet Good Depot that had facilities in which he could clean himself up. A place where after having worked there for 20 years he would likely know all manner of secluded nooks and crannies among the stables and stores where things could be left safely.

I don’t know why you introduce the prospect of anyone being frisked for body parts.
Perhaps you think the culprit (let’s call him Mr H) after spending a night walking the streets after committing his crime, eventually gains entry to his lodging house and says to the deputy – can you look after this for me mate and the deputy duly gives him a receipt, wondering what the squiggy thing is wrapped in the parcel. Or you think that he took the body parts into his flimsily partitioned cabin which he had to vacate first thing in the morning?

[Ben]

Could he have taken refuge in a common lodging house?
The police certainty thought this was a likely possibility as they devoted a lot of their time ‘checking out’ these establishments after each crime, although it seems that as the series progressed, this opinion lessened as it would be next to impossible for a blood splattered killer – with body-part trophies – to enter such an establishment unnoticed.

Wrong, Lechmere.

And you contradict yourself.

You assert, on the one hand, that the killer would not have been stained with blood, but then do a complete U-turn with regard to Jack using a lodging house by saying he'd be a "blood-spattered" killer. This is a major inconsistency in your reasoning. If the killer entered a lodging house, he would not have been blood-spattered, and nor would he have been frisked for organs upon entry, so you can dispense with those two objections immediately. Some such establishments even provided private cubicles, enabling the killer to gaze at his "trophies" were he so inclined.

By contrast, killing on the way to work is not something that any serial killer can be shown to have done, chiefly because of the obstacle presented by the lack of an obvious "safe house" after arriving at work. I'm unconvinced by your claim that he could have just dumped them at a location at work which you insist wasn't regularly visited. This may have been true at 4.00, but what of afterwards? All those hours, and nobody ventures into the loo or the stables for a nasty surprise?

Lechmere's early work start renders him an irrefutably poor candidate for Chapman, who, in all probability, was murdered at 5:30am.

All the best,
Ben

[Lechmere]

Patrick
As I said, at that time of day, a bit of blood on his clothing would not be a major problem.
In Lechmere’s case he had the probable opportunity to clean up properly at his workplace before he went out in broad day light.

The aspect of Lechmere’s lifestyle that fits the pattern for these murders is that the only opportunity he would have had to kill (given the obvious proviso that he did them) was at precisely the times these killings took place.
That goes for pretty much all of the murders, not just the canonical ones.
I wasn’t suggesting that what we know of his lifestyle, specifically his lifestyle, would lead us to believe that he was Jack the Ripper. That is a different area of discussion.

You seem to provide some pointers to characteristics that you seem regard as plausible indicators of guilt:

Was he ultimately confined to an institution? Was he hanged for murder a few years later? Did he hate women? Was he dealt a bad hand from a prostitute?

I think it is extremely unlikely that whoever did it was conveniently confined in an institution, or was hung or locked up for some other crime – still less that he committed suicide in remorse - at precisely the right moment for the sequence to end.
These neat fits rarely happen in the real world.

Nor do it think that it is necessary, or particularly likely, for the killer to have been a well know (or even a secret) woman hater or to have had a down on prostitutes. Prostitutes are usually killed due to their availability rather than because the culprit has a specific ‘down’ on them.
The list you provided owes much to Victorian thinking.

If you wish to eliminate a potential suspect in a case such as this because he was married and didn’t live alone, and do it on the basis of the type of statistical analysis you gave as an example (average basket ball players) then you would have fitted in well with the Yorkshire Ripper Murder Squad.

But you seem to be in agreement with me in describing the psychological type of the killer at least!

And as I have already said, Lechmere got to work at 4.00 am in the stables in a Goods Station. It was not a UPS depot illuminated with arc lights.
A little blood on dark clothing would not have shown up – and there where mess rooms and such like where he could have more closely inspected his clothes and cleaned up before emerging into the light of day.

Again, again, I have never suggested that Lechmere would have left his cart unattended.
The only victim who may possibly have been killed while he was at work was Chapman.
If this was the case then I believe he took an extra risk because he wanted to find a victim quite quickly and in a generally specific location. Quite unlike the other killings.
That would explain why Chapman was killed slightly later in the morning than the others.
I believe there is evidence that some blood spray was found on the fence. Indicating perhaps that the killer deliberately turned the body and cut in a direction that made it less likely that blood would get on him.
We do not know whether Lechmere had a boy ‘driver’s mate’ or would have used cart minders. The nature of his job meant that he would very often be stuck waiting – for hours sometimes – for his cart to be unloaded. Often he may have stayed with his load himself.
However in extremis, if he felt it necessary, as I think he may have done in the case of Chapman, he could have either used a cart minder or left his boy and taken that extra risk.

Alternatively the doctor may have been right and Chapman may have been killed pretty much at the same hour as Nichols.
We know how much reliance can be placed on eye witness testimony. So I tend to go with the earlier hour for Chapman’s death.
However, I accept the possibility that Chapman could have been killed later in the morning and for that reason I introduce the possibility that Lechmere could have still been responsible for the crime even though he would have been ‘at work’ at the time, due to the nature of his work.

Incidentally, the picture of the East End as a den of poverty and crime was in many ways born of the Ripper murders. I keep reporting that Booth’s 1889 survey divided London into 134 districts, each of roughly 30,000 inhabitants. The district that included Dorset Street, the Victoria Home and Middlesex Street was placed 54th in terms of poverty. Mid table in other words.
The worst areas for poverty and crime were on the South Bank, followed by a couple of north London districts. No murders happened in the worst districts in the East End (eg the western part of Bethnal Green – that included the ‘Old Nichol’, which may interest those who have a hankering for that quarter).

[Lechmere]

Caz
Should the killer – Lechmere or whoever – have been worried about having blood on him?
Logically he should have.
Do serial killers – even cunning ones – always act rationally? No they don’t.
Did Lechmere, or whoever else may have been responsible, have had any opportunity to practice and so understand how to avoid getting blood on him while slashing away?
Possibly via Tabram, Millwood and Wilson?

If he did have some of that red sticky stuff on his clothing would it necessarily have been noticeable?
The streets were dark. Colours don’t show up well in the dark.
If his clothes were dark, then it is unlikely the blood would be noticeable unless he was drenched in the stuff.
I doubt that a carman would be wearing a bright white starched shirt.
Similarly his workplace was a stable and a warehouse – not an office.

The problem of walking away from any of the crime scenes with blood showing about his person was a common one for whoever was the culprit. It was a problem faced and surmounted – seemingly.
In Lechmere’s case he had a place to go, somewhere that plausibly he would have been able to clean himself up. He did not work in a well-lit office – he worked in a working depot and his time of arrival at work was early – almost certainly before many other people had turned up.

Theoretically and purely hypothetically, the best option would be for the killer to live in the centre of the crime zone in his own private accommodation, where he could come and go unobserved and be undisturbed. I know of no proposed culprit who fits this bill and in the real world serial killers do not tend to actually operate in that manner. All sorts of different people in a wide variety of personal circumstances have these barbarous urges that they fulfil – they are rare obviously – but do not tend to act with such premeditation as to be able to order their lives in such a perfect fashion for the commission of their crimes.

But, what's this? You have also returned to the ‘should I go or should I stay’ question. Otherwise known as ‘fight or flight’.
If you are unable to comprehend that a certain type of person feels more comfortable and confident in instinctively turning to face a situation rather than running off in panic (this is not a trait that is specifically tied to serial killers), then it is pointless discussing the matter.
But as I have endless patience (well almost) I will try once more.
If Lechmere decided that Paul was too close for him to flee – because he couldn’t be sure how much Paul had noticed, because he couldn’t be sure that when Paul happened upon the body that he wouldn’t cry out, and he couldn’t be sure that this cry would echo out just as he was passing an inconvenient beat copper - neutralising this threat by insinuating Paul into the ‘discovery’ of the body would be his best option.
I would suggest that if he bumped into a policeman in an uncontrolled manner, his main worry wouldn’t be blood on his clothing, which would probably have been almost invisible in the prevailing lighting. His worry would be the danger of being searched and having his knife discovered.

The blood stains thing is a bit of a red herring - for whoever did it.

Talking of red herrings, you accuse Fisherman of being a limpet?

[Lechmere]

Jon
I don’t think anyone has characterised Lechmere - if he was the culprit - as being a criminal genius. Whoever was the culprit must have had a degree of cunning.
If it was Lechmere then I would suggest he would have been a psychopath. Such people tend to be capable of acting calmly and ostensibly normally in stressful situations. They tend to be plausible and ready liars.
None of this would make him – or someone like him – a criminal genius.
Also, no one has suggested that Lechmere would have left his cart unattended.

Ginger
I will post some pictures of Pickfords wagons when I can find where I have put them.
They would have had a variety of types and we have no way of knowing what type Lechmere drove nor whether his type would have needed a ‘drivers mate’.
Juggernauts, lorries and vans regularly get robbed today. I suspect it was a problem since the dawn of wheeled transport. The employment of an extra person to guard against theft is again a perennial problem. The cost of employing such people set off against occasional theft.
Nowadays many stores don’t employ security as they accept a degree of theft as the lesser cost. This sort of calculation has always been made.

When I described the Goods Depot as dirty, I did it as a comparison to an office, for example.