Why Cross Was Almost Certainly Innocent

[Abby Normal]

But Abby, from the information we have he's not next to the body, he's in the middle of the street looking across the road to where the body is, and that's not an inconsiderable distance. And then he waits there for Paul to reach him, and rather than let Paul pass, calls upon him for assistance. That's a very different situation than him standing next to the body with Paul suddenly appearing out of nowhere, which makes it sound like he was right there beside the body and come upon unawares. I'm not trying to make it sound like he was miles away obviously, but at the same time he was not close enough to describe his location as being "next to" the body either. And clearly, there's no indication that Paul, who is the person who actually had the encounter with Cross/Lechmere, was ever even a "tad suspicious", so that sort of suggests that describing the situation in a way that arouses suspicion might, well, not be how it was? (meaning, he wasn't actually "next to the body", but rather, was in the middle of the street at a sufficiently large distance from the body that it wasn't suspicious to anyone actually there.")

As you know, I tend to consider the case against Cross/Lechmere as being based primarily on charged language rather than hard evidence, and I'm not having a go at you or anything, rather, just putting it out there that perhaps the phrase "next to the body" is not reflective of how the situation should be described.

- Jeff

hi jeff
he was close enough to recognize that it was a body of a woman in the dark. id say next to is an accurate enough description. but no big deal, in the past ive used the word near, i can use that instead if it makes you feel better. : )

[Abby Normal]

Yet so many seem happy to dismiss Robert Paul's lack of suspicion on seeing Cross and his lack of "raising the alarm".
As I keep being told, those boots apparently sounded like a hammer on a dustbin lid, so if Cross IS the killer, he will hear Paul as soon as he's walking up the Row, he has a short walk to the end of the wall where he can just disappear and at least make an effort to make sure he isn't visibly blood stained by the murder and aftermath. Instead, he stands up in the middle of the street, stops Paul. and puts his hand on the guys shoulder. (No blood transfer...lucky? Maybe so...) He must have had blood on or around his hands and sleeves, and cant have known whether or not he had blood on his face. And even if "It was dark" that won't help when they approach Mizen with his lantern.
WHERE was the blood? If he'd used her clothes to wipe it off, that would have been felt when they tidied her up. Or is that just another "He got lucky" situation?
Or was it down to his miraculous "Bloody apron of immunity?" He wore it to court, and no one in the press mentioned it being bloody, and Mizen must have recognised him but didn't point out, "Yes, but the apron he had on, the morning of the event, had a lot more blood on it..."

I'm not sure what Cross should have done when faced with that situation, that Paul also didn't do. Started shouting "murder"? What's that going to do? Wake everyone up so that they could... get dressed, come downstairs and someone eventually go find a copper.
Why didn't Paul immediately start doing those things that (according to the Lechmere advocates) Cross should have, if that would be the most obvious and optimum means of getting help? Paul did claim to have been sure she was dead when they examined her. Cross only said he wasn't sure if she was dead or drunk.
So why didn't (or wouldn't) Paul do all the things that people think Cross SHOULD have done?

If Paul is inncoent of the murder and didn't "Raise the alarm" why does Cross not doing so become a marker for guilt?

paul wasnt seen standing near the dead body alone. my point being lech is clearly in the frame for being her killer, and being seen hesitating near her is suspicious imho.

[Fiver]

yes of course sam. i see your point.but im not talking about how close someone was to a body.of course legit witnesses will be close. but let me ask you this. if you were walking along to work and saw a man standing in the middle of the street in the dead of night next to what you later found out was a freshly killed dead woman wouldnt you be a tad suspicious? i know i would.

Paul was suspicious and tried to avoid Lechmere because Paul was afraid of being mugged. Those suspicions disappeared when Lechmere did a series of things that only make sense if Lechmere was innocent.

[A P Tomlinson]

Of course, as I'm sure you'll agree, in the domestic cases, the murderer knows he's going to be questioned about the crime anyway--he (or she) can't hope to slink into anonymity. The victim is his wife or sibling or housekeeper, etc., so an interview with Johnny Upright is an inevitability...

By contrast, a man who murders a stranger in a public street has no such concern. His concern is the exact opposite--to be unwittingly seen or connected to the case. To draw a passing pedestrian's attention to his deed strikes me as extraordinary.

Absolutely. What we have is the proposition that a man brutally murdered a woman in the street and deliberately hung around long enough for a stranger to approach him, (as Herlock as pointed out, if he heard Paul approaching DURING the act there is no way he would have the ability to gauge how much or how little Paul had seen...) then stopped that stranger, pointed out the body and asked "What should WE do?" then agreed to travel with that stranger to find a policeman.
Somehow, he shows up on the Monday of the inquest. The only logical way THAT happens is if he reads/hears about the murder on the Sunday via Pauls interview, and goes and tells the police that HE is the other man in the article.

Things he couldn't have known when hanging around instead of vacating the scene...

• Whether he had been seen in the act. (Pretty important)
• Whether he had obvious signs of blood on him. (Also...)
• Whether Paul would run a shrieking "Murder! Murder!" calling everyone to the place and forcing him to remain at the location till the Bobbies showed up where a further examination of his clothes and pockets would have revealed a not inconsiderable amount of blood on his hands and sleeves along with a bloody knife. Or if he started to run at that point would lead to a foot race that Paul had just as much chance of winning as he did, along with making a few cries of "Murder!" Stop that Man!" to slow him down as he tried to escape. (HUGE risk!)
• That any police officer they found, such as Constable Mizen, would essentially drag them BACK to Bucks Row to be questioned properly to establish some sort of chain of evidence from the eye witnesses. A genuinely diligent copper may well have done that upon hearing that there might be a dead person in the street! Or AT LEAST taken their ****ing NAMES DOWN and reported the meeting to the inspectors investigating the crime!" Luckily they landed on Good old "Knocker Mizen" who left PC Neil dangling in the witness box telling Wyne Baxter that it was HE who first discovered the body, only for everyone to read Robert Pauls contary point of view the next day in the Sunday Rag! (Again with the risk...)
• Whether or not he was now a wanted suspect when he reports his status as witness to the police. He could have left it days, weeks even for them to identify him and tell him they need to talk to him, and drag him to the inquest allowing time to pass and the excuse of faded memories to apply... (You know... like Robert Paul did...)

ALL of that risk is overcome quite simply by walking west a few hundred feet at the first sound of footsteps, and vanishing into the night.

[Fiver]

Does anyone give any serious credibility to this thead https://victorianripper.forumotion.c...echmere-busted

That basically states Charles Cross and Charles Lechmere were two different people? It's a difficult read on an horrendous forum layout that gives me a headache haha, I presume it's been seen and destroyed though.

It's from 2013 and that forum appears to have died in 2021.

[Abby Normal]

hi AP and rj

many people who discovered the body turned out to be the killer, but yes, those are mainly domestics, so point taken. similarily though even in tje ripper case we have a suspect that, although didnt walk up to another witness and point out the body, walked up to the police and did. and turned out to be the killer.

i asked this question a while back but there was no takers so ill ask again...has there ever been a serial killer who "discovered" one of his own victims? of course the bury supporters will point out that he did and was a serial killer (per my point above). but has a PROVEN serial killer ever done so?

of course the rarity or non existance of such a thing is a check mark against lechs candidacy for being a serial killer then.

[Fiver]

As I keep being told, those boots apparently sounded like a hammer on a dustbin lid...

Thats one of the more absurd Lechmerian claims. If boots on pavement were really that loud, why didn't any of the neighbors or night watchmen hear Robert Paul, PC Neil, PC Thain, and PC Mizen thundering about?

[Abby Normal]

Paul was suspicious and tried to avoid Lechmere because Paul was afraid of being mugged. Those suspicions disappeared when Lechmere did a series of things that only make sense if Lechmere was innocent.

or guilty, felt he was trapped, and trying to bluff his way out of it. but point taken, yes i agree, the obvious and most normal thing for a guilty person would be to skidaddle.

[Fiver]

If Paul is inncoent of the murder and didn't "Raise the alarm" why does Cross not doing so become a marker for guilt?

It's one of many things that Lechmerians say point to guilt, but only for Charles Lechmere.

Crow didn't shout for help when he found Tabram's body. He went in search of a policeman.
Davis didn't shout for help when he found Chapman's body. He contacted some other men nearby, showed them the body, and then went in search of a policeman.
Diemschutz didn't shout for help when he found Stride's body. He contacted some other men nearby, showed them the body, and then went in search of a policeman.
PC Watkin didn't shout for help when he found Eddowes' body. He contacted another man nearby, showed them the body, and that man ran to fetch more police.
Bowyer didn't shout for help when he found Kelly's body. He contacted another man nearby, showed them the body, and both men went in search of a policeman.
Lechmere didn't shout for help when he found Nichols' body. He contacted another men nearby, showed them the body, and both men went in search of a policeman.

So how is Lechmere different?

[A P Tomlinson]

Thats one of the more absurd Lechmerian claims. If boots on pavement were really that loud, why didn't any of the neighbors or night watchmen hear Robert Paul, PC Neil, PC Thain, and PC Mizen thundering about?

I think there is a general assumption that everyone wore "Hobnail Boots" (they didn't) and walked on the cobbles of the streets, (they didn't... and even if they did wear hobnail boots on dawn cobblestones, it would have looked like "Bambi on Ice" and sprained ankles would have claimed more victims than the Boer War.)

[FrankO]

good point. but the police didnt really have experience they do now. unlike today, witnesses and or people who found a body werent de facto people of interest that need to be cleared like they are now. i can only say that they werent stupid just inexperienced. and as far as we know, lech was not investigated.

Fair enough, Abby. As far as your last remark, though, an honest question: would we necessarily have known it if he had been investigated or even just questioned and cleared?

I'm curious what you and others think about that.

[John Wheat]

Fair enough, Abby. As far as your last remark, though, an honest question: would we necessarily have known it if he had been investigated or even just questioned and cleared?

I'm curious what you and others think about that.

No we wouldn't necessarily have known if Lechmere had been questioned and cleared.

[FrankO]

Just a few remarks, Andrew.

[*]Whether he had been seen in the act. (Pretty important)

Or heard. According to the yea-sayers Paul must have heard Lechmere ahead of him, so why shouldn't he have heard him move around the body to finish up and move away from it to take his position in the middle of the street?

[*]Whether Paul would run a shrieking "Murder! Murder!" calling everyone to the place and forcing him to remain at the location till the Bobbies showed up where a further examination of his clothes and pockets would have revealed a not inconsiderable amount of blood on his hands and sleeves along with a bloody knife. Or if he started to run at that point would lead to a foot race that Paul had just as much chance of winning as he did, along with making a few cries of "Murder!" Stop that Man!" to slow him down as he tried to escape. (HUGE risk!)

Good one. Just as he couldn't know whether Paul would have slapped Nichols in the face, discovered her open eyes or anything else that would have led him to conclude that the woman was dead and knifed down. And what Paul would have done then.

[*]That any police officer they found, such as Constable Mizen, would essentially drag them BACK to Bucks Row to be questioned properly to establish some sort of chain of evidence from the eye witnesses. A genuinely diligent copper may well have done that upon hearing that there might be a dead person in the street! Or AT LEAST taken their ****ing NAMES DOWN and reported the meeting to the inspectors investigating the crime!" Luckily they landed on Good old "Knocker Mizen" who left PC Neil dangling in the witness box telling Wyne Baxter that it was HE who first discovered the body, only for everyone to read Robert Pauls contary point of view the next day in the Sunday Rag! (Again with the risk...)

He couldn't know that they wouldn't walk right into the arms of the beat copper, or whether Paul would or wouldn't have noticed him in some side street & would have called him over. The beat copper could certainly not be 'scammed' like Mizen.

Cheers,
Frank

[FrankO]

No we wouldn't necessarily have known if Lechmere had been questioned and cleared.

Thanks, John.

[John Wheat]

Thanks, John.

No problem Frank