The Darkness of Bakers Row

[Fisherman]

Ive done it over many posts. I even posted a list.

That is the normal approach: "I have already done that".

Surely, it would give you great pleasure to do so again, and reveal me as a liar? So lets see that list, Herlock.

i suspect is consists of cases as "great" as the one I mentioned above, where you call it "manipulation" to say that then closest time there is to "around 3.30" is 3.30.

Come on now, show us that list! Or point me to it! Fair is fair.

[Fisherman]

As was every single person in the history of crime who find a body. Hardly unique is it. What else is there?

ZILCH

There is a lot more, and the post was in reply to A P Tomlinsons rather exotic claim that anybody who was at home in Bucks Row during the murder are equally viable as suspects as the man who was found alone close by the body of Polly Nichols when she was still bleeding.

But this has become the same ping-pong that you always have on offer, so I will say no more in the errand.

[Fisherman]

You need to work on your reading comprehension.

Since you claim that I "treat approximations as being precise.", it is obviously the other way around. I have stated time and time again now that I ackonowledge that we cannot do that, so it seems your reading comprehension went out the window, Fiver.

Sadly, this is what I find run regularly do: claim things on my behalf that are not true. Things that would paint me out as a complete moron, unacquainted with the case details.

if such a thing happens once, it can be corrected. If it becomes a pattern, it is another thing. And in your case, it has become a pattern.

Now, go back and read up and you will see what I say: The timings cannot be regarded as precise, but since we have no other timings, it applies that they seem to suggest an eight minute gap.

Fair is fair, and you don't find me misrepresenting your views. We are not supposed to, because that risks to give a skewed picture of our opponents. And you don't want to do that, Fiver, do you?

Posters who regularly post on Lechemre threads have refuted your theory. But posters that only occasionally post on Lechmere threads have also refuted your theory. Even posters with less than a years time on the site or less than one hundred posts have refuted your theories on this thread.

Yes, and people who post on other forums refute YOUR ideas and claims, Fiver. As I said before, that kind of popularity contest was never in any way a reliable thing. Luckily, in this case I can ot be refuted, since it is a proven fact that the timings DO suggest a time gap of 8 minutes. So any effort to try and refute that is logical and factual harakiri.

In the future, I would prefer if you made your points and stood by them, without claiming to have lots and lots of followers. I will do the same, and that is the only way to do debate fairly. If you feel you cannot stand up for your points without calling in the fire brigade, that tells a story too. It's your choice.

[Herlock Sholmes]

You struggle to see what separates him from anyone living in Bucks Row, and who can be proven to have been at home at the time of the murder?

I will help out - he was observed, all alone, close by the freshly slain Polly Nichols. That is what tells him apart from Walter Purkiss, for example.

As was every single person in the history of crime who find a body. Hardly unique is it. What else is there?

ZILCH

[Herlock Sholmes]

Here we go again, you want to cling things as facts that cannot be claimed as facts. And you keep on banging on about me being a liar, dishonest, misleading and manipulating. For example, when I argue that the time most representative of "not far off 3.45" is in fact 3.45, you call it manipulation. How on earth can that be manipulation? What time would be equally representative of "not far off 3.45" while not being 3.45?
Yes, it may be that another time applies than 3.45, I have pointed this out, but it remains a fact that no other time is as representative of "not far off 3.45" as 3.45.

Absolute nonsense. Its no more or less likely than 3.40 or 3.41 or 3.42 or 3.43 or 3.44 because Baxter wasn’t claiming to know. He wasn’t saying “well it must have been very close to 3.45.” All that he was saying was that the body had to have been discovered before Neil, Thain and Mizen got involved. Therefore it happened before 3.45. And it couldn’t have been a great deal before 3.45 because he had a rough estimate of when Cross found the body. So even if he’d left the house at exactly 3.30 and arrived at 3.37 then that’s approximately when the body was found. Or he could have worked from Mizen’s 3.45 and deducted Paul’s 4 minutes giving 3.41. So it occurred not long before 3.45 which is what Baxter was saying. We can say no more than this. If we are viewing the case honestly of course.

If this is the kind of proof you are going to use to take yourself the right to call people you cannot prove wrong, then it does you no favors in terms of veracity. Your accusations, that can be proven wrong - because no other time IS as representative of "not far off 3.45" as 3.45 is, and that has been a fact since time was invented - fall back on yourself.

How can anyone post such drivel? Staggering!!! You really don’t know what you’re talking about.

You then, rather amazingly, try ti prove yourself right by recap ting your trip to IKEA. And by telling us that people can get times wrong. But that is not the point, Herlock. The point is that if you and your brother and your mother and all of your relatives and friends all THOUGHT that you were picked up at 2.30, while you were in fact picked up at 2.39, that does not mean that when we interview all of your family and they all say that they think you were picked up at 2.30, people investigating the matter (and no, I don't think that anybody investigated it, I am speaking theoretically) would be likely to go "No, they are probably all wrong, he was probably picked up at 2.39 instead". Instead, what the investigators will do - if they are not provided with the revealing mess the way your sister in law was - that will and should go "2.30 is the likely time, and we need to work from it being our best guess, not least since multiple people agree about it".

Therefore, if your IKEA trip had been tied to a gruesome murder, where you or any of your kin could have been responsible if you were picked up at 2.30 but NOT if you were picked up at 2.39, there would be an incorrect belief that any of you could be the culprit. In retrospect, we all would know that the timing was nine minutes off, and that you were innocent, but that would not change the fact that the investigators did the right thing, working from the assumption that you could be guilty. Becasue they based their investigation on the only timings they had been given, and they all pointed to you getting picked up at 2.30.

But it couldn’t be used. For f***s sake Christer! Just for once stop wriggling on the hook. I was pointing out how people can not only be wrong in their estimations but they can be surprisingly wrong by a large timespan. Which gives the utter lie to your constant claim of the estimated time being the likeliest to be correct. You are sooooo wrong. And totally deliberately so. It’s a tactic and nothing more bdcause it’s impossible that an educated man can’t grasp this point.

In the Lechmere case, we do not HAVE that mess from a sister in law, and therefore we cannot establish that the timing "around 3.30" must have been many minutes off. It COULD have been many minutes off, but until evidence surfaced that proved that, any investigator would be wise to work from the assumption that 3.30 is the best bid there is. Equally, any investigator would be aware that this timing COUOD be off, but it nevertheless has to represent the best bid there is.
Ergo, until it can be proven that the timings in the Lechmere case are wrong, it applies that they suggest that there was a time gap of eight minutes - just as it, until your sister in law got involved, it applied that any working premise would favor the assumption that you were picked up at 2.30.

Utterly without merit. More manipulation.

Me, I avoid IKEA - too crowded and you have to walk the full length of each floor every time you put your foot inside that labyrinth.

Again the same request - PROVE that I lie, that I manipulate, that I misrepresent, that I am devious and ill willing before you make the claims that I am. Surely, Herlock, you are able to refute my claims about the timings effectively and conclusively, if you have such a great case. You should note have to resort to allegations of lies, you should be home and dry in ten seconds, should you not?

Ive done it over many posts. I even posted a list.

[Fisherman]

I think when it comes to anything other than the Nichols matter, that we are stretching it pretty thin to refer to it as even "circumstancial evidence" since it is largely down to the phrase that is one of my particular bugbears, "He is geographically linked to multiple murders" which is Youtube-Devotee long hand for "He lived in the Whitechapel area".

He did not live in the Whitechapel area, though - he lived in Bethnal Green. And his route to work took him right through Spitalfields, where four of the murders under discussion took place. And if he used the two - equally time consuming -thoroughfares of Hanbury Street and Old Montague Street, he could well have passed right by three of the sites and quite close to the fourth, regardless of which route of the two he took, he would pass the sites only a few minutes away.
That is another thing than "living in Whitechapel".
It also applies that we are dealing with an eviscerating serial killer, who inflicted damage on his victims that more or less proved that we are only dealing with the one killer (with the obvious exception of the Stride case), and so any case that can be made for anybody in ONE of the murders, more or less clinched that he must be looked upon with great suspicion in the others too.
The links he had to the Stride murder site and the Eddowes ditto does. not weaken the case against Lechmere in any way. He is absolutely unique in this context. So your misgivings seem less guided by any real insights than a general disliking of the carman as a suspect. You are entitled to that, but less so to claim that his living in, herm, Whitechapel, is all there is to go on.

I struggle to see what separates him as a suspect from any man who lived on Bucks row and was at home at the time the body was found. I'll pre-empt the obvious by saying I simply don't buy that he lied to Mizen or the coroner, either about a police officer or his name. Because when you scratch the sufrace neither makes sense. And I see absolutely neither need nor reason to question Abberline's time scale, beyond making it fit a predetermined conclusion.
And at that point I realise that my argument is becoming circular, back to my previous reasoning.

You struggle to see what separates him from anyone living in Bucks Row, and who can be proven to have been at home at the time of the murder?

I will help out - he was observed, all alone, close by the freshly slain Polly Nichols. That is what tells him apart from Walter Purkiss, for example.

[Fisherman]

I’ll finish with an example (with a bit of Sweden thrown in just for you)

On Tuesday I agreed to go to IKEA with my brother. I was visiting my mom so he said that he’d pick me up there at around 2.30 (it usually took him around 30 minutes to get from his work to there and he finished work at exactly 2.00)

We both estimated that he’d arrived at fairly close to 2.30 and when I asked my mother she agreed at close to 2.30. So by your thinking 2.30 was the likeliest time (and we had 3 people all estimating the same) We were able to check though because as soon as he arrived he texted his wife to tell her he’d be late picking her up. The text was timed at 2.39. So 9 minutes out. In 2023.

And yet you insist on narrowing down times in 1888!

These times cannot be narrowed down if we use evidence honestly. Cross has no case to answer. The ‘case’ against him is a combination of exaggeration, manipulation and the deliberate misuse of the English language. The efforts to shoehorn this clearly innocent man is a stain on the subject. An embarrassment.

Here we go again, you want to claim things as facts that cannot be claimed as facts. And you keep on banging on about me being a liar, dishonest, misleading and manipulating.
For example, when I argue that the time most representative of "not far off 3.45" is in fact 3.45, you call it manipulation.
How on earth can that be manipulation?
What time would be equally representative of "not far off 3.45" while not being 3.45???
Yes, it may be that another time applies than 3.45, I have pointed this out, but it remains a fact that no other time is as representative of "not far off 3.45" as 3.45. There is no manipulation whatsoever involved, there are the laws of physics only.

If this is the kind of proof you are going to use to take yourself the right to call people you cannot prove wrong, then it does you no favors in terms of veracity. Your accusations, that can be proven wrong - because no other time IS as representative of "not far off 3.45" as 3.45 is, and that has been a fact since time was invented - fall back on yourself.

You then, rather amazingly, try to prove yourself right by sharing a story about a a trip to IKEA. And by telling us that people can get times wrong.
But that is not the point, Herlock. It never was. Nobody contests that this is so - how could we?

The point is that if you and your brother and your mother and all of your relatives and friends all THOUGHT that you were picked up at 2.30, while you were in fact picked up at 2.39, that does not mean that when we interview all of your family and they all say that they think you were picked up at 2.30, people investigating the matter (and no, I don't think that anybody investigated it, I am speaking theoretically) would be likely to go "No, they are probably all wrong, he was probably picked up at 2.39 instead". Instead, what the investigators will do - if they are not provided with the revealing mess the way your sister in law was - is to go "2.30 is the likely time, and we need to work from it being our best guess, not least since multiple people agree about it".

Therefore, if your IKEA trip had been tied to a gruesome murder, where you or any of your kin could have been responsible if you were picked up at 2.30 but NOT if you were picked up at 2.39, there would be an incorrect belief that any of you could be the culprit. In retrospect, we all would know that the timing was nine minutes off, and that you were innocent. But that, and this is the salient matter, would not change the fact that the investigators did the exact right thing, working from the assumption that you could be guilty. Because they based their investigation on the only timings they had been given, and they all pointed to you getting picked up at 2.30.

In the Lechmere case, we do not HAVE that mess from a sister in law, and therefore we cannot establish that the timing "around 3.30" must have been many minutes off. Or that it was correct. It COULD have been many minutes off, but until evidence surfaced that proved that, any investigator would be wise to work from the assumption that 3.30 is the best bid there was. Equally, any investigator would be aware that this timing COULD be off, but it nevertheless has to represent the best bid there is.
Ergo, until it can be proven that the timings in the Lechmere case are wrong, it applies that they suggest that there was a time gap of eight minutes - just as it, until your sister in law got involved, it applied that any working premise would favor the assumption that you were picked up at 2.30 and that you could be guilty of the IKEA murder.

Me, I avoid IKEA - too crowded and you have to walk the full length of each floor every time you put your foot inside that labyrinth.

Again the same request - PROVE that I lie, that I manipulate, that I misrepresent, that I am devious and ill willing before you make the claims that I am. Surely, Herlock, you are able to refute my claims about the timings effectively and conclusively, if you have such a great case. You should note have to resort to allegations of lies, you should be home and dry in ten seconds, should you not?

[A P Tomlinson]

I am not working from "he did it, so lets work out how". I am working from how there is a large array of circumstantial evidence that seems to point straight to him. I have never once argued that he is the killer because nobody can disprove it - I consider that a pathetic way to go about it, and I find tat whenever that argument arises, it always do so in combination with very poor suspects. But NOT with Lechmere, so we may need to get real on that score.

My view is that there is a lot of things that make him an extremely good suspect in the Nichols case, that there is not anywhere near enough to make his the killer in any of the other cases, if we isolate them, but that when we instead weigh them together, there is quite enough to convince me that he is either the killer or the person that has racked up more circumstantial evidence without being the killer, than anybody else in criminal history. And you are perfectly welcome to disprove THAT, if you can. Which is an entirely different matter than trying so disprove that Lechmere was the killer. Any examples of people who had heaps of circumstantial evidence pointing in their way, without being guilty and without having been framed, would help us a great deal in clarifying the case.

I think when it comes to anything other than the Nichols matter, that we are stretching it pretty thin to refer to it as even "circumstancial evidence" since it is largely down to the phrase that is one of my particular bugbears, "He is geographically linked to multiple murders" which is Youtube-Devotee long hand for "He lived in the Whitechapel area".

I struggle to see what separates him as a suspect from any man who lived on Bucks row and was at home at the time the body was found. I'll pre-empt the obvious by saying I simply don't buy that he lied to Mizen or the coroner, either about a police officer or his name. Because when you scratch the sufrace neither makes sense. And I see absolutely neither need nor reason to question Abberline's time scale, beyond making it fit a predetermined conclusion.
And at that point I realise that my argument is becoming circular, back to my previous reasoning.

[Fisherman]

R J Palmer! Lets get to the core immediately and waste no time:

I then wrote:

"The distinction is a little tedious, but what they are saying is that his own account of leaving around that time would place him in Buck's Row 6 or 7 minutes ahead of Robert Paul, whereas Lechmere also states Paul was only about 40 yards behind him. Thus, Lechmere must be lying."

What do you find unfair about this statement?

That nobody representing the Lechmere theory - and that will be me and Edward Stow - has ever said that Lechmere must be lying.If you have heard or read other people who believe the carman is guilty, you are welcome to criticize them, but you don't get to say that any of the ones behind the theory have ever said that the timings mean that Lechmere must be guilty. Inferring such a thing is equal to making us responsible for a statement that none of us would utter, on account of how you, me, Edward Stow and the rest of the ripperological world with few exceptions, know that making that statement would be a falsehood.

That is what I find unfair about your statement.

[Fisherman]

This sort of suggests Cross is thinking something along the lines of "He thinks I'm a threat, I'd better show him this body and try and talk my way round it."
It still doesn't address why, if he has literally just finished killing this woman that he goes out of his way to stop a man who is clearly trying to avoid him and draw his attention to it. He has no idea if he has blood on his face, or on his clothes...

If Paul is close enough to touch her, at that point we have to assume that HE is in something like the Documentary pose ascribed to Lechmere and leaning by the body. At that point he is a quicker and easier kill than Polly.

I for one don't discount the suggestion he may be the killer. He is absolutely a person of interest. But I don't think, with the evidence we have, there is anything near a case to put forward, beyond "you can't disprove it".
We see this with the back and forth over the times. Abberline provides (as far as I'm aware) the only timeframe on the Nichols murder that isn't based purely on times "around" the quarters with his "3:40" etc, and of all the coppers and witnesses he's the one I'd most trust over the measuring and keeping of time. So I can't see what suggests he was wrong.

My principal issue is that we seem to need to start from a "He did it, so lets work out how..." and there's just not enough from even the Nichols murder to establish that, even with the selective use of witnesses and times, let alone all the other murders.

I am not working from "he did it, so lets work out how". I am working from how there is a large array of circumstantial evidence that seems to point straight to him. I have never once argued that he is the killer because nobody can disprove it - I consider that a pathetic way to go about it, and I find tat whenever that argument arises, it always do so in combination with very poor suspects. But NOT with Lechmere, so we may need to get real on that score.

My view is that there is a lot of things that make him an extremely good suspect in the Nichols case, that there is not anywhere near enough to make his the killer in any of the other cases, if we isolate them, but that when we instead weigh them together, there is quite enough to convince me that he is either the killer or the person that has racked up more circumstantial evidence without being the killer, than anybody else in criminal history. And you are perfectly welcome to disprove THAT, if you can. Which is an entirely different matter than trying so disprove that Lechmere was the killer. Any examples of people who had heaps of circumstantial evidence pointing in their way, without being guilty and without having been framed, would help us a great deal in clarifying the case.

[Fiver]

[COLOR=#1abc9c]As usual, when Lechmeres name is mentioned, an avalanche of posts arrive, all of them written by the same people as always.

You need to work on your reading comprehension.

Posters who regularly post on Lechemre threads have refuted your theory. But posters that only occasionally post on Lechmere threads have also refuted your theory. Even posters with less than a years time on the site or less than one hundred posts have refuted your theories on this thread.

[A P Tomlinson]

That's an official report by the man in charge of the case. Unlike you, Inspector Abberline looked at all the evidence. He weighed the time estimates of Paul, Lechmere, and the three PCs and concluded that Polly Nichols was killed around 3:40am. Inspector Abberline concluded there was no 8 minute time gap. That's an unshakeable fact.

I don't mean to be a you-know-what, but I think you need to re-phrase & clarify that Abberline concluded she was "Found"around 3.40 or a whole new can of worms might open up...

[Fiver]

[COLOR=#1abc9c]My reasoning has been given many times, but here it is again: Charles Lechmere said he left home at around 3.30. Coroner Baxter said that the time at which the body was found could not have been far off 3.45. If the approximated timings were both spot on, then we have an established time gap of eight minutes. But we cannot know if the approximations WERE spot on, and so all we can say is that the timings given seem to involve a time gap of eight minutes. These are unshakable facts.

Again, you refuse to present the full picture. You treat approximations as being precise. You ignore most of the witnesses. You selectively quote Baxter. You claim your speculations are not just facts, but unshakeable facts.

"Mr. Baxter proceeded to point out that the unfortunate woman was last seen alive at half-past two o'clock on Saturday morning, Sept 1, by Mrs. Holland, who knew her well. Deceased was at that time much the worse for drink, and was endeavouring to walk eastward down Whitechapel. What her exact movements were after this it was impossible to say; but in less than an hour and a quarter her dead body was discovered at a spot rather under three-quarters of a mile distant." - 23 September 1888 Daily Telegraph

That's Baxter saying that Nichols was murdered before 3:45am. How much before? We don't know. But clearly Baxter did not think there was a time gap in Lechmere's testimony. Neither did the jury. Neither did the press. Those are unshakeable facts.

"Police-constable John Thail [Thain] stated that the nearest point on his beat to Buck's- row was Brady-street. He passed the end every thirty minutes on the Thursday night, and nothing attracted his attention until 3.45 a.m., when he was signalled by the flash of the lantern of another constable (Neale)." - 18 September 1888 Daily Telegraph

"Police constable John Neil deposed that on Friday morning at a quarter to four o'clock he was going down Buck's row, Whitechapel, from Thomas street to Brady street. Not a soul was about. He was round there about half an hour previously, and met nobody then. the first thing he saw was a figure lying on the footpath." - 3 September 1888 Daily News

"Police constable Mizen said that about a quarter to four o'clock on Friday morning he was at the corner of Hanbury street and Baker's row, when a carman passing by in company with another..." - 4 September 1888 Daily News

All three police officers' times rule out 3:45 as the time that Lechmre found the body, placing that event far enough before 3:45am that Lechmere and Paul had left Bucks Row before PC Neil entered the street. PC Mizen, who was knocking people up, put Lechmere and Cross at Hanbury Street and Bakers Row at 3:45am. Since Mizen was knocking people up, he was likely to have pocket watch. He certainly had a motive for undermining Lechemre and Paul, since both had accused Mizen of dereliction of duty.

But neither Mizen, Neil, nor Thain thought there was an eight minute time gap in Lechemre's testimony. After all, their testimonies showed it could not exist. Those are unshakeable facts.

"I beg to report that about 3.40am 31st Ult. as Charles Cross, "carman" of 22 Doveton Street, Cambridge Road, Bethnal Green was passing through Bucks Row, Whitechapel (on his way to work) he noticed a woman lying on her back in the footway...he stopped to look at the woman when another carman (also on his way to work) named Robert Paul of 30 Foster St., Bethnal Green came up..." - Inspector Abberline's report of 19 Sept 1888

That's an official report by the man in charge of the case. Unlike you, Inspector Abberline looked at all the evidence. He weighed the time estimates of Paul, Lechmere, and the three PCs and concluded that Polly Nichols was killed around 3:40am. Inspector Abberline concluded there was no 8 minute time gap. That's an unshakeable fact.

Inspectors Helson and Spratling were present at the inquest. So was Detective Segeant Enwright of Scotland Yard. Nome of them disagreed with Abberline's time estimate of 3:40am. None of them thought there was an 8 minute time gap. Those are facts.

But you aren't interested in facts unless they can be twisted to fit your theory.

[Herlock Sholmes]

As usual, when Lechmeres name is mentioned, an avalanche of posts arrive, all of them written by the same people as always. That is why I have said that I am going to pick you one by one, and only debate with the person picked - which is what I am going to do with Fiver next.

But I will answer Herlocks first post, with the addition of two small inclusions from other posts of his, one on this thread, one from another. The post chosen illustrates, the way I see it, many of the problems at hand. Here it is:



Originally posted by Fisherman View Post
You know that Baxter said that the body was found at a time that could not have been far off 3.45. And then you reason that the body could have been found at 3.40, since "3.40 is not far off 3.45".

And then you claim that I am the one trying to shape the evidence to fit?

Personally, I could have sworn that I am the one who does not shape the evidence at all, while you are doing your utmost to rearrange it to fit your suggestions.

At the end of the day, we remain at the exact same situation: If we want to find the time that is most representative for "around 3.30", it is 3.30.


Manipulation. Simply untrue. A lie. A 3.30 estimation is no more or less likely than 3.27 or 3.28 or 3.29 or 3.31 or 3.32 or 3.33. And the fact that you desperately want it to be likelier is evidence of your bias and nothing more.

No, it is not manipulation. It is demonstrably true that the time most likely to be the correct one when somebody says "around 3.30" IS 3.30. When you say that all the times adjacent to 3.30 are no more or less likely, that means, in essence, that according to you, it does not matter how far away from the estimation given we move, all the times will be equally likely to be the correct one. This is false of course. If we claim that "around 3.30" estimation means that 3.30 and 8.25 are equally likely, we will soon enough find ourselves at the funny farm, wearing a jacket with very long arms. But hey, you say, everybody knows that 8.25 is impossible, but I am not suggesting a time hours removed, I am suggesting one only the fewest of minutes removed!
Yes, Herlock, that is true. But it is also true that just as 8.25 is moving away from the estimation, so is 3.31. It applies that every minute you move away from that estimation will be less likely than 3.30, and that is not something anyone of us can do anything about. It is a physical law.

If it were true and 3.30 would be the likeliest to be correct then we would have to assume that any time that we thought back and estimated a time we would get it exactly correct more times than not. Clearly this is tosh. Your addition of 8.25 is a typical tactic for you. Deception and nothing more. Obviously no one would suggest such a way out time. You’re scraping the barrel again.

By allowing a simply 5 minutes either way or even a 3 minutes either way none of the non-3.30 times can be considered less likely.

Harsh though that may sound, there is consolation to be had; I of course agree that adding a minute or two keeps us on a ground that is consistent with the suggestion "around 3.30". I have no problems accepting that it could have been 3.31. Or 3.32. Or 3.34. None of these times would be in denial with the "around 3.30" proposition.

Replace ‘harsh’ with ‘wrong.’

But - and this is an important but - that matter has never been where our conflict lies. I have time after time said that there must be learoom, so the conflict lies somewhere else. And to help illustrating how I look upon things, I am going to post a snippet from one of your posts on the thread "The Problem with Times". In the first post of that thread, you make a poll, and you offer up two answer alternatives to the question about how we should look upon the timings give in the case:

• With all times we should allow a reasonable margin for error.
• We should accept all times as correct and synchronised.

What we have here is a classical example of a misworded poll question. Because why would we think that all the ones answering the poll had the same idea about what a "reasonable margin for error" is? There may be those who think that a minute or two is the most they would consider reasonable, there are those who think that 10-12 minutes is reasonable, and there are lots and lots of other takes.
Making the poll worthless.
What would be more interesting would be to hear what people would allow for, because I don't think that anybody would disallow small time errors. And if that assumption is correct, there is only one answer one could give to your poll. I certainly would go for the first option - but that was only if I had to vote. From the outset, I would not answer a poll with this kind of wording!

You really are getting worse Christer. I’m a little disappointed really. The poll is entirely valid because there are posters (a small minority) who don’t think that any margin for error should be given. So it was aimed at their opinion. Perhaps you should have read it properly?

But even if we accept that various people allow for various time discrepancies, that does not alter the outcome of the matter we are REALLY discussing here, and that is the matter of whether or not a tie gap is suggested by the material - and it is. It is an eight minute time gap that is suggested.

A lie.

From what I have said above, it should be patently obvious that I do not say that "my" gap is in any way proven. Nor do I object to the idea that the gap could have been smaller or bigger. Nor can I say with absolute certainty that there must have been some sort of time gap.

Then stop talking trying to convince the gullible that there was one then.

My reasoning has been given many times, but here it is again: Charles Lechmere said he left home at around 3.30. Coroner Baxter said that the time at which the body was found could not have been far off 3.45. If the approximated timings were both spot on, then we have an established time gap of eight minutes. But we cannot know if the approximations WERE spot on, and so all we can say is that the timings given seem to involve a time gap of eight minutes. These are unshakable facts.

But it’s irrelevant reasoning. I’ve never denied what could have been the case within reason. You are trying to manipulate the level of likeliness and looking desperate in the process.

My way of looking at the timings given is that I personally believe the 3.30 approximation to allow for more learoom than the 3.45 one. And before you react to that, I am not saying that either suggestion must be spot on. But I find that whilst the 3.30 thing was not looked into with the intention of getting as close to the truth as possible, the 3.45 timing actually was. It was the result of how the coroner and inquest strived to get as close to the truth as they could. And since Baxter spoke of it being established that the timing could not be far off 3.45, I reason that one or more clocks, that could be checked for accuracy in retrospect, will have been involved. And those timepieces seem to me to have belonged to Dr Llewellyn and possibly Robert Paul.
The events surrounding Thain being informed by Neil and hurrying to fetch Dr Lewellyn could be timed in a reconstruction of the event, and a very useful timing could be made for that detail. If Llewellyn was then able to say with good accuracy when Thain arrived, and if he got that accuracy from a clock that was checked for accuracy and found to be perfectly accurate, then Baxter would be able to say that many independent data fixed the time to a place not far off 3.45 with only a small allowance for time deviations.

Too many words to say nothing. Baxter arrived at his time by considering the three times available to him. The 3.45 times quoted by the three Constable’s. So the body must have been discovered before that time. It’s obvious. There is no other explanation.

Bearing this in mind, I myself - no need to agree - consider any suggestion nearer 3.40 than 3.45 as being highly unlikely. So in this end of the matter, I am reasoning that "not far off 3.45" will very likely involve the possible timings of 3.43, 3.44, 3.45, 3.46 or 3.47. Any other times would mean that they should reasonably have been worded "not far off 3.40" or "not far off 3.45". And since we know quite well that the initial belief was that the body was found at around 3.40, owing to how Neil/Thain/Mizen spoke of having been drawn into the errand at circa 3.45, we can also say that Baxter in his summation opted for a timing that offered another scenario; that Lechmere found the body at circa 3.45 and Neil accordingly got to the spot around 3.50.

The Fisherman version of the English language. Complete and utter nonsense. And absolutely deliberate.

So that is why I am less generous with that particular timing. Because you are biased. And it applies that since I only allow for two or two and a half minutes in that direction, we need five and a half or six minutes in the other end, and since that should have taken the time not to "around 3.30" but instead "around 3.40", my summation is that I find that a time gap around eight minutes is much likelier than no time gap.

And your wrong. Not mistaken….deliberately wrong.

Again what I think looks bad and what you think does not look bad, does not have any influence about how the estimations given have approximated center points (points around which the giver of the time allows for deviations, but also points that remain the centers for these possible deviations), are estimations that suggest that there was an eight minute gap.

And here is where we add in a snippet for a later post by your hand:

If there was an 8 minute gap what was he doing? The murder and mutilations can only have taken 2 minutes tops. Why was he still there?

Herlock, there is no need to think that Lechmere must have found Nichols in Bucks Row at 3.37, and then had tea with her until 3.43, when he struck. He could well have prowled Whitechapel Road in search of prey for some minutes, finding Nichols there and walking into Bucks Row and then attacked her. There are more possibilities that there is space out here. As I have said that I have no problems allowing for a smaller time gap, one of those possibilities would of course be if there was only a gap of, say, four minutes, Lechmere may have found Nichols in Bucks Row and gone to work on her immediately. There is absolutely no kind of problem connected to the suggestion of a time gap!

This is a joke right?

Surprise, surprise! And if we want to t´find the time that is most representative for "not far off 3.45", it is 3.45. Well, I never ...!

Manipulation.

And when we apply these things - and there are no other timings suggested, although they may have to be allowed for to a smaller or larger extent - we gat a suggested time gap of eight minutes.

Manipulation.

Baxter does not contradict that - he reinforces it. To reason otherwise, we must try to fit the evidence to fit. Which I didn't - but you just did

Manipulation.

Totally untrue. You continue to manipulate evidence. All Baxter said was not far off 3.45. That’s all. That includes 3,44 or 3.43 or 3.42 or 3.41 or 3.40. We have no way of narrowing it down. Any attempt to do so is blatant dishonesty.

This is the exact problem that I have discussed above, and so I will not add anything to it here, with the exception of a few remarks that links onto the final words of your post, Herlock.

You simply cannot be misunderstanding this. It clearly a deliberate attempt to obfuscate. 3.40 is not far off 3.45. I don’t know what the case is in Swedish Christer but please don’t try telling native English speakers like myself, like Roger, like Fiver, like AP and everyone else apart from zealous Cross supporters that this isn’t the case. Five minutes is not far off.

When you say that I simply cannot misunderstand this, it seems what you want to say is that I must agree with you, that there are no other alternatives. The above should tell you how and why I disagree - and it should point you to how the REAL issue at hand, the suggested time gap, is something that remains as a likelihood. So nothing new there.
What IS new (well ...) is that you call me a liar, a deliberate obfuscator , a manipulator of the evidence, and blatantly dishonest.
Things like these may be true or they may be untrue. Regardless of what applies in this case, they are always allegations that must be supported by proof. It is not enough to disagree with somebody, to allow for throwing these kinds of allegations around oneself.
What I would suggest is that we both abstain from making allegations we cannot prove, and let the points we make in debate be the only things that give away where we stand. I am all for engagement and passion - I make my own case with lots of it - but I am less impressed with hysteria. If you can prove your reasoning about the timings to be correct, you do not need to claim what you claim about me, Herlock. Once you do resort to such behavior, it actually looks a lot more like frustration of having failed to prove your points.

I could also add that if I was a habitual liar, that would have been disclosed and proven a long time ago. And people like Tom Wescott would not be saluting my book and pointing out that it is all based on years of research and accessing reliable sources. Nor would Richard Jones call my book "fantastic", I think.
Then again, it is not a popularity contest. It is not about how you can name a handful of fellow posters who agree with you, whereas noone so far has agreed with me. That, I would suggest, is not because nobody does. Hundreds and thousands of people agree with me, but they are not writing out here, where there has for a long time been a very clear overweight for the so called naysayers. Therefore, finding support out here for your take is not something that seals any deal - it is not about popularity contests and polls, it is about the case facts.
Incidentally, speaking about polls, if you had made a poll back in 2012, asking who was the likely Ripper, Charles Lechmere would not have been among the top fifty mentioned contenders. Today, he is habitually up among the top three.
That owes to how the story about the carman has been expanded with added facts, and how it has come to peoples knowledge over the last stiff decade. And it tells us how much faith we should put in polls.

I hope this tells you exactly where I stand, and I work from the assumption that you are able to make whichever case you choose to make forthwith, without calling your opponent a liar for disagreeing with you.

---

I’ll finish with an example (with a bit of Sweden thrown in just for you)

On Tuesday I agreed to go to IKEA with my brother. I was visiting my mom so he said that he’d pick me up there at around 2.30 (it usually took him around 30 minutes to get from his work to there and he finished work at exactly 2.00)

We both estimated that he’d arrived at fairly close to 2.30 and when I asked my mother she agreed at close to 2.30. So by your thinking 2.30 was the likeliest time (and we had 3 people all estimating the same) We were able to check though because as soon as he arrived he texted his wife to tell her he’d be late picking her up. The text was timed at 2.39. So 9 minutes out. In 2023.

And yet you insist on narrowing down times in 1888!

These times cannot be narrowed down if we use evidence honestly. Cross has no case to answer. The ‘case’ against him is a combination of exaggeration, manipulation and the deliberate misuse of the English language. The efforts to shoehorn this clearly innocent man is a stain on the subject. An embarrassment.

[A P Tomlinson]

Fiver! Since I am not going to have the time to answer your many points, I decided to do just the one - this one. You will be given ample time to give your view in the future, and I will answer whatever questions you may have then.

On the point you make above - that since Lechmere did not kill Paul, he is either dumber than a cobblestone or innocent - I would direct your attention to how Paul did not actually see Nichols in the darkness until he was shown the body by Lechmere:

As he got nearer the man stepped on to the pavement, and as witness was passing he touched him on the shoulder and said, "Come and look at this woman." He then saw the body of a woman lying across the gateway, dead. (Illustrated Police News)

As witness approached him he walked towards the pavement, and witness stepped on to the roadway in order to pass him. He then touched witness on the shoulder, and said, "Come and look at this woman here." Witness went with him, and saw a woman lying right across the gateway. (The Times)

Therefore, if Lechmere had his eye on Paul as he approached, he would know in which direction he had his attention, and apparently he had that attention on Lechmere himself, missing out on the body on the pavement across the street. And when Paul stepped aside, Lechmere interpreted that as an effort to try and avoid getting into trouble with Lechmere.

So when Lechmere put his hand on Pauls shoulder, and informed him about the woman, any reaction of surprise on Pauls face could well have assured Lechmere that his fellow carman knew nothing. And it also applies that Lechmere had ample time to question Paul as they walked to Bakers Row/Hanbury Street.

Of course, one can argue that a careful killer would have killed Paul anyway. Then again, counter to that it could be argued that it would be anything but careful to kill a fellow carman in the open street. He would have been another proposal altogether than a frail and drunken woman, in terms of possible resistance power.

Things like these can never nullify the suggestion that Lechmere was the killer. They are personal reflections, where an effort to add extra weight to them is made by making it out as if the proponent would know how Lechmere would have gauged the situation. Once somebody who disagrees, says that it would be stupid and reckless to kill Paul if he did not know that it was necessary, a counterweight has been produced, with equal value when it comes to the ability to read Lechmeres thoughts in retrospect - none.

This sort of suggests Cross is thinking something along the lines of "He thinks I'm a threat, I'd better show him this body and try and talk my way round it."
It still doesn't address why, if he has literally just finished killing this woman that he goes out of his way to stop a man who is clearly trying to avoid him and draw his attention to it. He has no idea if he has blood on his face, or on his clothes...

If Paul is close enough to touch her, at that point we have to assume that HE is in something like the Documentary pose ascribed to Lechmere and leaning by the body. At that point he is a quicker and easier kill than Polly.

I for one don't discount the suggestion he may be the killer. He is absolutely a person of interest. But I don't think, with the evidence we have, there is anything near a case to put forward, beyond "you can't disprove it".
We see this with the back and forth over the times. Abberline provides (as far as I'm aware) the only timeframe on the Nichols murder that isn't based purely on times "around" the quarters with his "3:40" etc, and of all the coppers and witnesses he's the one I'd most trust over the measuring and keeping of time. So I can't see what suggests he was wrong.

My principal issue is that we seem to need to start from a "He did it, so lets work out how..." and there's just not enough from even the Nichols murder to establish that, even with the selective use of witnesses and times, let alone all the other murders.