Lechmere's Behavior in Buck's Row

[Barnaby]

Hi Frank,

I am very limited in being able to conceptualize things spatially, so I do tend to think in terms of time. By "within seconds close" I was thinking of about 30 seconds. He has time to run. He has time to hide the mutilations and step out on the street. But he has to choose a course of action quickly.

[Fisherman]

Define "close"... on second thoughts, Fish, perhaps not
Compare and contrast:

"He was found 10 inches away from a smoking gun"

"He was found 10 feet away from a smoking gun"

(and, as a reminder, contrast both with "He found a smoking gun")

Hi Gareth!

You are forgetting - perhaps? - one thing. If there is nobody else in the street where the smoking gun lies, the question of ten inches or ten feet becomes somewhat immaterial.

What we have here, is a man that is alone in the street with a dead body in his near proximity.
We KNOW full well that the man was not standing in contact with the body. He was said to have been standing "where the body was", something that inevitably places him close.
The same source that said that he was standing where the body was, also said that he was standing in the middle of the street. The body was not lying in the middle of the street, so we may conclude that there was probably some distance between the man and the body.
"In the middle of the street" is an expression that does not - in this context - have to mean in the EXACT middle of the street. We must leave some learoom, but it is nevertheless apparent that the distance inbetween man and body would have been a matter of a number of feet.

Our theory works from a suggestion that Lechmere killed the woman. It also predisposes that he heard Paul arriving and decided to bluff it out. In order to do so, he would have a/hidden the knife, b/pulled the dress down over her wounds to the abdomen, and c/moved away from the body into the street.

It can easily be argued that Lechmere would have wanted to move away from the body, in order to distance himself from any accusation of being the killer. Judging by what Paul said, he managed a number of feet. If he was up at the place where the body lay, and moved in a ninety degree angle to the stable yard doors, and if he reached the exact middle of the street, then the 24 feet wide street would not allow for more.

It would have been a matter of two or three steps or something like that. Given that he would have had time to hide the weapon and the wounds if he was the one who killed her, it would be extremely odd if he was standing in close contact with the body as Paul arrived.

The gist of the matter is that one, two or ten feet will not matter to this scenario. We can easily see that if he had chosen to walk in the direction of Paul from the scene of the crime, he would have been able to cover a substantial distance - Paul supposedly walked thirty, forty yards after Lechmere had noticed him. He could then have said "come look over here, there´s a woman".
In that case, he would have had perhaps twentyfive yards to the body, but he would nevertheless have come from the place where the woman was and therefore he would STILL be just as good a bid for the killers role.

Qubbling about the odd feet or two is totally disingenious once we take in the context, Gareth.

All the best,
Fisherman

[lynn cates]

close

Hello Christer. Thanks.

"Close to" is fine--provided it does not get embellished later.

Cheers.
LC

[lynn cates]

prof

Hello Gareth. That's yet another "compare and contrast" from you.

Next you'll be after MY job. (heh-heh)

Cheers.
LC

[Fisherman]

Hello Christer. Thanks.

"Close to" is fine--provided it does not get embellished later.

Cheers.
LC

"Found the body" is conjecture. "Close to the body" is true. "By the body" and "where the body was" are equally useful.

So much for embellishments!

The best,
Fisherman

[Abby Normal]

Hi Gareth!

You are forgetting - perhaps? - one thing. If there is nobody else in the street where the smoking gun lies, the question of ten inches or ten feet becomes somewhat immaterial.

What we have here, is a man that is alone in the street with a dead body in his near proximity.
We KNOW full well that the man was not standing in contact with the body. He was said to have been standing "where the body was", something that inevitably places him close.
The same source that said that he was standing where the body was, also said that he was standing in the middle of the street. The body was not lying in the middle of the street, so we may conclude that there was probably some distance between the man and the body.
"In the middle of the street" is an expression that does not - in this context - have to mean in the EXACT middle of the street. We must leave some learoom, but it is nevertheless apparent that the distance inbetween man and body would have been a matter of a number of feet.

Our theory works from a suggestion that Lechmere killed the woman. It also predisposes that he heard Paul arriving and decided to bluff it out. In order to do so, he would have a/hidden the knife, b/pulled the dress down over her wounds to the abdomen, and c/moved away from the body into the street.

It can easily be argued that Lechmere would have wanted to move away from the body, in order to distance himself from any accusation of being the killer. Judging by what Paul said, he managed a number of feet. If he was up at the place where the body lay, and moved in a ninety degree angle to the stable yard doors, and if he reached the exact middle of the street, then the 24 feet wide street would not allow for more.

It would have been a matter of two or three steps or something like that. Given that he would have had time to hide the weapon and the wounds if he was the one who killed her, it would be extremely odd if he was standing in close contact with the body as Paul arrived.

The gist of the matter is that one, two or ten feet will not matter to this scenario. We can easily see that if he had chosen to walk in the direction of Paul from the scene of the crime, he would have been able to cover a substantial distance - Paul supposedly walked thirty, forty yards after Lechmere had noticed him. He could then have said "come look over here, there´s a woman".
In that case, he would have had perhaps twentyfive yards to the body, but he would nevertheless have come from the place where the woman was and therefore he would STILL be just as good a bid for the killers role.

Qubbling about the odd feet or two is totally disingenious once we take in the context, Gareth.

All the best,
Fisherman

It's leeway. Or leg room. Not learoom. : )

[Fisherman]

This is an ongoing crash course in English for me. Thanks Abby - leeway it is, then!

The best,
Fisherman

[lynn cates]

close

Hello Christer. Thanks.

""Found the body" is conjecture."

Already agreed to this one.

""Close to the body" is true."

Agreed previously also.

""By the body" and "where the body was" are equally useful."'

Right. 0 = 0. (heh-heh) The former would indicate "next to."

Shall we stay with "close to"?

Cheers.
LC

[Fisherman]

Hello Christer. Thanks.

""Found the body" is conjecture."

Already agreed to this one.

""Close to the body" is true."

Agreed previously also.

""By the body" and "where the body was" are equally useful."'

Right. 0 = 0. (heh-heh) The former would indicate "next to."

Shall we stay with "close to"?

Cheers.
LC

You can stay with whatever version you like, as long as you are prepared to do battle over faulty conceptions, should they come along.
And I will use what I (and Robert Paul) find the best alternative.

The best,
Fisherman

[lynn cates]

battle

Hello Christer. Thanks.

Well, SHOULD any false conceptions arise, I shall indeed do battle.

Cheers.
LC

[Ben]

We know he was interrogated.
He is unsatisfactory as he has no ‘back story’ – so how can he be linked to any crime except the Kelly murder?

This was a rather naughty post from you, Lechmere.

I appreciate that you were responding to another poster's Hutchinson-related observation and that you were not necessarily "inviting a debate on these issues", but naughty it remains, considering how cross you got with me for using a Cross thread as an arena for expounding my Hutchinson-related opinions. Here I find you doing the same thing.

I'd better just respond to your observations before returning - at the speed of light - back on topic:

We know he was interrogated

No, we don't.

Nor do we have any evidence that was scrutinised more thoroughly than Cross.

He is unsatisfactory as he has no ‘back story’ – so how can he be linked to any crime except the Kelly murder?

Crime scene evidence links the victims for us, and unless you wish to argue that Kelly was not a ripper victim, it follows that a strong suspect for her murder is a strong suspect for the others. Cross can't be linked to any other murder than Nichols, and even then, not in an incriminating way.

The Hutchinson theorists are forced to deny he was Toppy as Toppy’s back story is not that of a murderer.

Pretty much everyone denies that "he was Toppy", because he almost certainly wasn't. In fact, since the rejection (by its own author) of the royal conspiracy theory in which Toppy appeared in 1993, it is only a tiny minority of those with a studied hostility towards "Hutchinson theorists" who still consider him worth discussing. For everyone else, he belongs on the same skip onto which Lord Randolph Churchill the ripper was consigned more than 20 years ago. What we know about Toppy is biographically incompatible with what we know of the real Hutchinson, insurmountably so.

Having said that, his "back story" is no less compatible with that of a murderer than Cross's is.

No, the Victoria Home did not have a "curfew", at least not for those who had purchased their daily or weekly bed tickets in advance. Your assertion that they needed additional "passes" is certainly wrong.

Fleming's height was obviously recorded in error, as there is only a very remote possibility of him being 6'7" and in good bodily health and only 11 stone in weight. These are mutually incompatible records, unless he was a ringwraith whose extreme and unhealthy physique could not have escaped comment from Kelly. The explanation we're forced to accept is that the height was recorded in error.

I'm not inviting debate on Hutchinson here either, you understand. I'm just making the usual corrections.

Regards,
Ben

[Lechmere]

How tired - same old, same old, denial of historical facts and records -no wonder Hutchinson never got any traction.

[caz]

It's not a non starter - it's already started and us half way round the track and you haven't even got your trousers on yet.
As we say in ze Inglis - he is very fishy.

That's a rather unfortunate analogy, Ed, if I may be so bold.

I believe the original goes something like: A lie can travel halfway round the world while the truth is getting its trousers on.

Love,

Caz
X

[Lechmere]

Godamit, I am undone

[MrBarnett]

Godamit, I am undone

Ed,

That'll save some time should you have to get your strides off.

MrB