Why Cross Was Almost Certainly Innocent

[drstrange169]

"re davis, he wasnt seen near chapmans bady before raising any alarm. he found the body and got help. lech was seen near nichols freshly killed body before he is doing anything else, trying to find help, raising the alarm etc."

There is a huge and I do mean HUGE difference between almost treading on a body in broad daylight that is to all intents and purposes naked and has been literally gutted with the entails thrown over the shoulder and a seeing, from a distance, a vague shape of a woman though the darkness.

There is no comparison what so ever that I can see between the two reactions.

[John Wheat]

Hi Abby & Gareth,

Sorry to butt in, but if I may...

Even though you would and perhaps I would too, it doesn't seem that Paul was, or Mizen, or anyone involved in the case, for that matter. I would think that the police would have had good reason to clear up the question of why Lechmere and Paul hadn't told Mizen that they'd examined the body, but if they did question the men about it, the carmen must have satisfactorily cleared it up and given no reason for the police to suspect at least Lechmere. Even though they knew well, at that point, that Paul had found Lechmere standing in the middle of the road, not far away from where Nichols was lying.

Cheers,
Frank

Hi Frank

An excellent post. The Police of 1888 were not familiar with serial killers but were not stupid.

Cheers John

[FrankO]

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.

Hi Abby & Gareth,

Sorry to butt in, but if I may...

Even though you would and perhaps I would too, it doesn't seem that Paul was, or Mizen, or anyone involved in the case, for that matter. I would think that the police would have had good reason to clear up the question of why Lechmere and Paul hadn't told Mizen that they'd examined the body, but if they did question the men about it, the carmen must have satisfactorily cleared it up and given no reason for the police to suspect at least Lechmere. Even though they knew well, at that point, that Paul had found Lechmere standing in the middle of the road, not far away from where Nichols was lying.

Cheers,
Frank

[Geddy2112]

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.

[Lewis C]

Chapman's ToD was being hotly disputed back when I was a child -- which is quite a few summers ago and ages before people even knew Lechmere's real name. The idea that a 'late' ToD is somehow 'established' is purely the product of anti-Lechmerian desperation, not any kind of objective reading.

'The weak underbelly'? I tell you: the anti-Lechmerian zealots have more weak underbellies than a ruminant has stomachs.

M.

Hi Mark,

Ichobod didn't say that the late TOD is established, he said that the evidence strongly supports a late TOD. What he said was also argued before Lechmere was promoted as a suspect, so it can't be the case that Ichobod's argument necessarily is the product of one's views about Lechmere.

[Abby Normal]

Here's the thing, though: Davis (and even Cadoche, albeit on 'tother side of the fence) was closer to Annie Chapman's body than Cross initially was to Polly's. Indeed, Louis Dymshitz, PC Watkins and Harry Bowyer were all probably closer than Cross to "their" corpses when they found them. The key difference in the latter's case was that somebody else was walking not far behind him and saw Cross mere moments after he'd made his discovery.

We've all heard of the Double Event, so here perhaps we have another... the unique "Double Event" of two witnesses finding a Ripper victim at almost the same time. Of course, there's no more sinister explanation for this than that both men traversed Buck's Row on their daily commute, and they were both en route to work that morning.

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.

[Sam Flynn]

lech was seen near nichols freshly killed body before he is doing anything else

Here's the thing, though: Davis (and even Cadoche, albeit on 'tother side of the fence) was closer to Annie Chapman's body than Cross initially was to Polly's. Indeed, Louis Dymshitz, PC Watkins and Harry Bowyer were all probably closer than Cross to "their" corpses when they found them. The key difference in the latter's case was that somebody else was walking not far behind him and saw Cross mere moments after he'd made his discovery.

We've all heard of the Double Event, so here perhaps we have another... the unique "Double Event" of two witnesses finding a Ripper victim at almost the same time. Of course, there's no more sinister explanation for this than that both men traversed Buck's Row on their daily commute, and they were both en route to work that morning.

[John Wheat]

hi ap
to me, people like davis, crow richardson would definitely need further looking into and if i were a detective i would question them long and hard and check alibis.

re davis, he wasnt seen near chapmans bady before raising any alarm. he found the body and got help. lech was seen near nichols freshly killed body before he is doing anything else, trying to find help, raising the alarm etc. to me thats odd and where any possible suspicion starts for me with lech. ive seen and read alot of true crime for many years and ive never heard of any innocent witness in this type of circ.

and yes, from what we know davis is a terrible suspect, but then again so are all of them. some are just less terrible. and imho lech is less terrible than many. and from my objective no dog in the fight view, the anti lechers can be just as zealous as the lechmerians on these boards.

Hi Abby

The anti lechers as you call them or as I refer to them serious Ripperologists are zealous because the chances of the witness Lechmere being the Ripper are somewhere in the region of 0.000000000000000000000000000000000001 per cent. Maybe they'd rather concentrate on serious suspects. I know I would.

Cheers John

[Lewis C]

When you get past the issue of the name, which was the big "We Cracked It!" moment for them and they've had to grasp straws ever since it was shown that there was nothing unusual in using a stepfathers surname, all the evidence they offer pretty much applies to Davis, but he WAS genuinely alone with a body and no one to corroborate that he wasn't the killer.
Surely their "Lechmere was caught with a freshly killed body" is less incriminating than a guy reporting finding a body without anyone to corroborate that he hadn't recently been elbow deep in that body's viscera.

And I'm not advancing Davis as a suspect... he's a terrible suspect.
But the time he spent alone with the body cannot be corroborated, so technically he could have found a woman sleeping on the stairs, lost his mind and murdered her, and made it look like the Ripper to cover his arse, cleaned up, burned his bloody clothes and reported "finding" a body and step backout of the limelight. (Insert whatever spurious motives ytou normally apply to Lechmere, and lets go!)

I have to be careful now when being sarcastic, because Ed is reading these, and I had to explain to him that when I said the Doveton Street was as likely a base for the Ripper as The Taj Mahal... he actually took me seriously.
So... for the record Ed. I do not think Jon Davis killed anyone. Simply by the standards you apply to Lechmere, he is a more likely suspect.

And Ed wanted me to tell that, "...embittered gaggle on the nutcase forum, that no one has suggested Lechmere abandoned a meat filled cart while he murdered Chapman a few streets away. Carts were however frequently left for hours awaiting unloading - not I suspect when they were loaded with perishables - and they were looked after by cart minders such as Elizabeth Long. I suggested his delivery could have been anywhere within 15 minutes walk of Hanbury Street which is a huge chunk of London. If those embittered souls want to critique the theory, itvwoukd do them a minor service if they at least got it right"

It would be odd if his excuse for being covered in blood was absent... if the cart DIDN'T have a load of dripping bloody meat on it though, wouldn't it?
I thought that was the whole point of that bit of "evidence"?
"Jesus Christ Almighty Charley! You were delivering curtains to the Pemberton House.... how the Hell did you get covered in blood?"

On a less frivolous note, it seems like just another of those crazy extreme gambles that just happened to pay off, that he was willing to go-a-hunting and leave his cart unattended half a mile away on the chance that it MIGHT not get robbed.

Hi AP,

I think that what Stow is saying is that the cart wouldn't have been unattended; he would have left the cart with a cart minder to guard it. But that seems rather unlikely as well, because the cart minder could then be a witness, noting how long Cross was away from the cart and how he appeared when he returned.

[Abby Normal]

When you get past the issue of the name, which was the big "We Cracked It!" moment for them and they've had to grasp straws ever since it was shown that there was nothing unusual in using a stepfathers surname, all the evidence they offer pretty much applies to Davis, but he WAS genuinely alone with a body and no one to corroborate that he wasn't the killer.
Surely their "Lechmere was caught with a freshly killed body" is less incriminating than a guy reporting finding a body without anyone to corroborate that he hadn't recently been elbow deep in that body's viscera.

And I'm not advancing Davis as a suspect... he's a terrible suspect.
But the time he spent alone with the body cannot be corroborated, so technically he could have found a woman sleeping on the stairs, lost his mind and murdered her, and made it look like the Ripper to cover his arse, cleaned up, burned his bloody clothes and reported "finding" a body and step backout of the limelight. (Insert whatever spurious motives ytou normally apply to Lechmere, and lets go!)

I have to be careful now when being sarcastic, because Ed is reading these, and I had to explain to him that when I said the Doveton Street was as likely a base for the Ripper as The Taj Mahal... he actually took me seriously.
So... for the record Ed. I do not think Jon Davis killed anyone. Simply by the standards you apply to Lechmere, he is a more likely suspect.

And Ed wanted me to tell that, "...embittered gaggle on the nutcase forum, that no one has suggested Lechmere abandoned a meat filled cart while he murdered Chapman a few streets away. Carts were however frequently left for hours awaiting unloading - not I suspect when they were loaded with perishables - and they were looked after by cart minders such as Elizabeth Long. I suggested his delivery could have been anywhere within 15 minutes walk of Hanbury Street which is a huge chunk of London. If those embittered souls want to critique the theory, itvwoukd do them a minor service if they at least got it right"

It would be odd if his excuse for being covered in blood was absent... if the cart DIDN'T have a load of dripping bloody meat on it though, wouldn't it?
I thought that was the whole point of that bit of "evidence"?
"Jesus Christ Almighty Charley! You were delivering curtains to the Pemberton House.... how the Hell did you get covered in blood?"

On a less frivolous note, it seems like just another of those crazy extreme gambles that just happened to pay off, that he was willing to go-a-hunting and leave his cart unattended half a mile away on the chance that it MIGHT not get robbed.

hi ap
to me, people like davis, crow richardson would definitely need further looking into and if i were a detective i would question them long and hard and check alibis.

re davis, he wasnt seen near chapmans bady before raising any alarm. he found the body and got help. lech was seen near nichols freshly killed body before he is doing anything else, trying to find help, raising the alarm etc. to me thats odd and where any possible suspicion starts for me with lech. ive seen and read alot of true crime for many years and ive never heard of any innocent witness in this type of circ.

and yes, from what we know davis is a terrible suspect, but then again so are all of them. some are just less terrible. and imho lech is less terrible than many. and from my objective no dog in the fight view, the anti lechers can be just as zealous as the lechmerians on these boards.

[A P Tomlinson]

Contrary to what the Lechmerians say, only two murder sites were on his known route to work. They were also on Robert Paul's way to work, so this proves nothing.

For Chapman's time of death we have the doctor's estimate versus three witnesses. In crime fiction doctors estimates are very accurate. Modern forensics has shown they are not, especially the techniques used in the Victorian era.

Witnesses can lie, seeking publicity. The witnesses in the Chapman case don't come across that way to me, Long didn't see the man's face and reports no sinister words or actions. Cadoche only heard, not saw things, and they sound mundane, not sensational. Richardson saw nothing and placed himself at the scene with a knife in his hand.

Unfortunately, a lot of people accept or reject witnesses based on whether they support their theory, not based on actual credibility.



Lechmere was not the only man to be alone when he found a body. They don't insist that we must rule out Alfred Crow before considering that anyone else could have killed Martha Tabram. They don't insist that we must rule out John Davis before considering that anyone else could have killed Annie Chapman. They don't insist that we must rule out Lewis Diemshutz before considering that anyone else could have killed Liz Stride. They don't insist that we must rule out Edward Watkins before considering that anyone else could have killed Annie Chapman. They don't insist that we must rule out Thomas Bowyer before considering that anyone else could have killed Mary Kelly.

Anyone who finds a body is a person of interest. Ignoring all other suspects to focus on them is bad policing.

Also, when we look at Lechmere as a suspect, we have to look at all the murders. Chapman was killed when Lechmere was at work. Killing Stride and Eddowes would have meant staying up 23+ hours or getting up 3+ hours early on his only day off.

When you get past the issue of the name, which was the big "We Cracked It!" moment for them and they've had to grasp straws ever since it was shown that there was nothing unusual in using a stepfathers surname, all the evidence they offer pretty much applies to Davis, but he WAS genuinely alone with a body and no one to corroborate that he wasn't the killer.
Surely their "Lechmere was caught with a freshly killed body" is less incriminating than a guy reporting finding a body without anyone to corroborate that he hadn't recently been elbow deep in that body's viscera.

And I'm not advancing Davis as a suspect... he's a terrible suspect.
But the time he spent alone with the body cannot be corroborated, so technically he could have found a woman sleeping on the stairs, lost his mind and murdered her, and made it look like the Ripper to cover his arse, cleaned up, burned his bloody clothes and reported "finding" a body and step backout of the limelight. (Insert whatever spurious motives ytou normally apply to Lechmere, and lets go!)

I have to be careful now when being sarcastic, because Ed is reading these, and I had to explain to him that when I said the Doveton Street was as likely a base for the Ripper as The Taj Mahal... he actually took me seriously.
So... for the record Ed. I do not think Jon Davis killed anyone. Simply by the standards you apply to Lechmere, he is a more likely suspect.

And Ed wanted me to tell that, "...embittered gaggle on the nutcase forum, that no one has suggested Lechmere abandoned a meat filled cart while he murdered Chapman a few streets away. Carts were however frequently left for hours awaiting unloading - not I suspect when they were loaded with perishables - and they were looked after by cart minders such as Elizabeth Long. I suggested his delivery could have been anywhere within 15 minutes walk of Hanbury Street which is a huge chunk of London. If those embittered souls want to critique the theory, itvwoukd do them a minor service if they at least got it right"

It would be odd if his excuse for being covered in blood was absent... if the cart DIDN'T have a load of dripping bloody meat on it though, wouldn't it?
I thought that was the whole point of that bit of "evidence"?
"Jesus Christ Almighty Charley! You were delivering curtains to the Pemberton House.... how the Hell did you get covered in blood?"

On a less frivolous note, it seems like just another of those crazy extreme gambles that just happened to pay off, that he was willing to go-a-hunting and leave his cart unattended half a mile away on the chance that it MIGHT not get robbed.

[Herlock Sholmes]

He was probably Jack the Stripper.

[Fiver]

'Lechmere is Jack The Ripper, the torso killer and killer of every woman in the east end of London in the 1880s.'

Some Lechmerians extend that well before and after the 1880s.

[Fiver]

I agree. In the absence of clear established facts, we should use probability to approximate the truth. If mathematical probability is employed to calculate e.g. the probability of 4 murder sites being located on someone's way to work, how high is the mathematical probability of 3 witnesses all being wrong about a time of death after 4.45 ?

Contrary to what the Lechmerians say, only two murder sites were on his known route to work. They were also on Robert Paul's way to work, so this proves nothing.

For Chapman's time of death we have the doctor's estimate versus three witnesses. In crime fiction doctors estimates are very accurate. Modern forensics has shown they are not, especially the techniques used in the Victorian era.

Witnesses can lie, seeking publicity. The witnesses in the Chapman case don't come across that way to me, Long didn't see the man's face and reports no sinister words or actions. Cadoche only heard, not saw things, and they sound mundane, not sensational. Richardson saw nothing and placed himself at the scene with a knife in his hand.

Unfortunately, a lot of people accept or reject witnesses based on whether they support their theory, not based on actual credibility.

That being said, I am somewhat 50/50 on Lechmere because I do agree with his supporters that in a modern day investigation he would first need to be cleared before looking elsewhere.

Lechmere was not the only man to be alone when he found a body. They don't insist that we must rule out Alfred Crow before considering that anyone else could have killed Martha Tabram. They don't insist that we must rule out John Davis before considering that anyone else could have killed Annie Chapman. They don't insist that we must rule out Lewis Diemshutz before considering that anyone else could have killed Liz Stride. They don't insist that we must rule out Edward Watkins before considering that anyone else could have killed Annie Chapman. They don't insist that we must rule out Thomas Bowyer before considering that anyone else could have killed Mary Kelly.

Anyone who finds a body is a person of interest. Ignoring all other suspects to focus on them is bad policing.

Also, when we look at Lechmere as a suspect, we have to look at all the murders. Chapman was killed when Lechmere was at work. Killing Stride and Eddowes would have meant staying up 23+ hours or getting up 3+ hours early on his only day off.

[Geddy2112]

Come on…you’ve heard worse.

'Lechmere is Jack The Ripper, the torso killer and killer of every woman in the east end of London in the 1880s.'