Charles Lechmere: Prototypical Life of a Serial Killer

[The Rookie Detective]

I think that Cross was transparently an innocent man and that simply because he found the body ears pricked up and people started to weave a case to fit. A mysterious gap was invented by editing the evidence. The language was twisted to mean what certain people wanted it to mean. A minor and understandable discrepancy on wording is magnified into something sinister. A ludicrous, unbelievable ‘scam’ is created to try and explain away the very obvious fact that the real killer would have fled. Then to top it off we get those silly geographical locations stuff. As if anything could be less relevant.

Cross has no case to answer. He’s only a marginally better suspect than Paul.

Thank you kindly for your reply Herlock.

Again, very well thought out and I can accept all your points regarding my post.

I think the only specific detail that I can't agree with, is the timing of only 2 minutes to arrive, attack/strangle, cut/kill and then leave to be clear of Bucks Row without any of the police seeing anyone, I feel that anything under 3 minutes is just not possible. It's not just the kill time, it's also the 30 seconds before and after the kill that need to be factored in.
2 minutes to strangle and cut her throat and abdominal injuries at the very least and then another 30 seconds either side of the kill, making the TOTAL MINIMUM TIME that the killer needed to have with his victim (including arrival route and escape route) would be no fewer than 3 minutes.

I have always said under 5 minutes and more likely nearer 4 minutes, but I can also accept a minimum of 3 minutes.

But just 2 minutes...that is beyond even my natural ability to listen, learn, compromise and re-hypothesize accordingly.


I really don't believe Lechmere was the killer, although I was on the fence at one point.

[The Rookie Detective]

Why is Nichols the only murder in which there are no witnesses at all who saw Nichols with a man walking towards Bucks Row?

Chapman
Stride
Eddowes
Kelly


They ALL had witnesses who saw a man/different men shortly before their respective murders...BUT Nichols is different.


No one saw her talking or walking with a man and more specifically, no one saw her walk into Bucks Row with anyone.


Why is that?

[Fiver]

I´m afraid I think it is relevant in the extreme that we can see that "oozing" can be described as a profusion of blood. That is the exact thing my example proved, just as Richard Jones agreed with me about it.

Your source definition is yourself. Our source is the dictionary. Faced with this fact, you ignore it, because it does not fit your theory.

if we were to disallow coupling the term with any adjective....

You coupling the word "oozing" with an adjective the witnesses did not use only proves that you are trying to manipulate the evidence and put words in the witnesses mouth.

But as I have said, we have two prominent forensic medicos saying that they favor 3-5 minutes as the likely bleeding time, but neither man excluded seven or nine minutes either.

In addition to misrepresenting the witnesses, you also misrepresent the forensic doctors. They are college professors, not crime scene investigators. The told you they had little or no data. And they did not agree on 3-5 minutes. You asked some vague questions of Jason Payne James and Ingemar Thiblin, and interpreted them the way you wanted to.

For Jason Payne James:
Q. Just how quickly CAN a person with the kind of damage that Nichols had bleed out, if we have nothing that hinders the bloodflow, and if the victim is flat on level ground? Can a total desanguination take place in very few minutes in such a case.
A. Yes
Q. Do you know of any examples?
A. No
Q. Is it possible for such a person to bleed out completely and stop bleeding in three minutes? In five? In seven?
A. I guess blood may continue to flow for up to this amount of time, but the shorter periods are more likely to be more realistic.

You appear to have made up the word "desanguination". You don't even appear to understand that to "bleed out completely' and to "stop bleeding" are not the same thing.

For Ingemar Thiblin you claim that Thiblin told you that there is "not much empirical data to go on"' as to how long "a seeping bleeding" could last, but that "ten to fifteen minutes'" possible.

So Thiblin stated that he had very little data and estimated 10 to 15 minutes.

James stated he had no data at all and estimated 3 to 7 minutes.

The two professors disagreed on time and admitted they had little or no information to base their estimates on.

I think we must accept that Neil was asked if he was aware of any other person being about as he turned into Bucks Row, and it also applies that on an unusually quiet night, he must have heard Lechmere and Paul. If you feel he could somehow have missed out on them or failed to remember them, then that is a stance you are of course allowed to.

That is a stance that neither he nor anyone else has taken. so now you're wrong about what the witnesses, the college professors, and the other posters have said.

On the Mizen scam, you basically repeat your belief that the police would not have gotten things wrong.

And now you give an incorrect summary of people's objections to the "Mizen scam". The objection is that you ignore Robert Paul's testimony, which supports Charles Lechmere over PC Mizen.

Plus of course, scores of people have read my suggestion and have no problems accepting it, people like Richard Jones and Tom Wescott amongst them. It is your own choice if you want to call them stupid for it, but keep in mind that people who disagree with us sometimes do so for eminent reasons.

Your use of the appeal to authority fallacy is noted.

You appear to be lying about Tom Wescott - the blurb for his Ripper Confidential says "Charles Lechmere, recently named as a suspect in the Jack the Ripper documentary, Conspiracy: The Missing Evidence, is restored to his proper place in history as an innocent witness."

You also appear to be lying about Richard Jones - his tour website says "As to whether Jack the Ripper has actually been “unmasked”, the honest answer to that question has to be a resounding no."

"The concrete facts about Charles Lechmere’s involvement in the Jack the Ripper murders, end with his being present at the site of the murder of Mary Nichols as the discoverer of her body, and anything linking him to the other Whitechapel murders is nothing more than supposition and speculation." - Robert Jones

"Already I’m sure you’re noticing that the might have, could have, what if school of criminology plays a pretty major part in the case against Charles Cross." - Robert Jones

[Fiver]

Delete. Others made the point sooner and better.

[JeffHamm]

Good work Jeff,
Nice examples of body weight v Blood volume.

I would tend to suggest she was larger than you think BMI wise, she is described as being well built, some even suggest stout.

Sadly as you have found we have no real data.
Therefore you assumptions are a valid range.

Your post takes mine a step further, adding to the arguments against either officer seeing Bleeding under pressure.

Very Good and informative post.

Steve

Thanks Steve. She may have been larger than I presumed. Words like stout, etc are contextual to the times, and with people more overweight in general now, stout to them might mean something quite smaller than we consider stout. Still, I think by covering the healthy and overweight ranges, we could probably be safe in saying she is in there somewhere. I doubt she was obese, which is the next heavier classification range.

Anyway, your initial post got the ball rolling, and I think by putting together the appropriate information we might be able to view some of the witness' statements in a new way. That is very interesting, and maybe some new ideas will emerge as a result.

- Jeff

[Fisherman]

With regards to the comments by Payne-James relating to your comments. Part of issue here is your use of the terms "bleed" and Bleed out".
Such terms are open to a great degree of interpretation not just by the person asking the questioned but also by the person answering.

Both experts appear to be very circumspect in their replies to the questions, neither are prepared to commit themselves.


This question of the interpretation as been raised several times, by others apart from.myself, on this and other sites.

Such a degree interpretation allows a for a manipulation of the answer.

Payne-james very clear does not want to get involved in what he calls a "turf war".

In reply to the email about the chapters in your book, the reply from Payne-James is fairl perfunctory, again suggesting he does not really want to get involved.

The attempt to portray this is my view, based on comments from anonymous source, verses that of an expert, is another example of a misleading comment.

Inside Bucks Row quotes not Anonymous discussions , but the views of Dr Michael Biggs. He while saying some degree of passive bleeding could go on, or restart after movement, for several hours, does also say that under 20 minutes is more likely.
Given there is, according to all 3 experts now mentioned, no actual concensus on an exact figure for passive bleeding to cease, both the 15 minute and 20 minute estimates must be given equal weight.

Using those figures it patently clear that there is ample time, some 6-11 minutes, for there to be a killer other than Lechmere.

In addition, in chapter 12 of Inside Bucks Row, while it does say that initially the argument appeared to be that Neil had observed bleeding under pressure, it also adds on page 174, that this appeared to change to ANY BLEEDING, be it under pressure or passive.
"bleeding” appeared to change to mean any blood loss whatever."

Therefore I do not accept that I incorrectly represent this part of the Theory.

That you do not think my closing comments belong in a serious debate is hardly surprising, since such opens up very serious issues.
I stand by those final comments. These points need to be made if a fully, accurate and unbias view is to be given

if you wish to respond does not really matter.

So yes go on with your private one to ones, held in public.

You speak of a "manipulation of the answer". What I wrote in my book, and asked Jason Payne James to verify was, as has already been shown:

I inquired about how long time a woman with the damage that Nichols had would bleed from the neck before the blood had been emptied out and stopped running. I asked whether it could be a matter of perhaps three, five or seven minutes. Professor Payne James´ response was that all three suggestions could per se be correct, but he personally favored three or five minutes as the likelier answer. It should be noted that professor Payne-James was well acquainted with the total damage done to the body of Polly Nichols.

Jason Payne James answered this with the two words: "That's fine". Why this would in any way encourage you to speak of a manipulation of the answer, I have a hard time to understand. The blood was likeliest to empty out and stop running in three or five minutes as per Payne James, although he did in no way say that it could not run for seven or nine minutes too. But he did find that any minute added to the three to five minutes he suggested, would represent a lesser and lesser likely outcome. That was what he was asked about and that was what he verified was his take on things: "That's fine".

Of course, these matters are never something that can be determined down to the last second. Instead, there is a wide scope of possible outcomes. And that was why I never asked about how long Nichols would bleed, but instead what the likeliest time of bleeding would be according to Payne James, before the blood seized to run. And you have the answer above.

As I said before, Jason Payne James and Ingemar Thiblin both worked from the assumption of Nichols having been strangled before the neck was cut, and that the blood emptied out passively. Neither man leaves that matter open to any discussion.

You add that any discussion about all of this must involve you pointing out that I may be intentionally misleading, and that my reasoning is shameful/disingenuous. As I said before, that will have to stand for you, and I will not engage in any such debate. Contrary to you, I do not think that Jason Payne James´ answers, as quoted above, leave any opportunity to hint at intentional misleading or shameful behavior on my behalf. As you can see, Payne James verifies the exact things I have been saying all along, and so the only way that answer could be misleading or shameful, would be if Jason Payne James himself mystically decided to mislead me (and ultimately anybody reading the boards). Although every- and anything is always theoretically possible, I have no intention of entertaining any such suspicions. The biggest reason why is of course that another forensic medico, Ingemar Thiblin concurs with Payne James, making any foul play an impossibility.

I have no problems debating this out here or in public. In fact, I have many times called upon you to take the debate in public with me, but you have never accepted that challenge - which is of course your right. I have also called upon you to disclose the expertise you lean against in the matter of the bleeding issue, as I have disclosed mine, but so far to no avail. Again, it is of course your right to not give your sources up, should you choose to favor that path.

Thank you.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Thank you kindly for your reply Herlock.

Again, very well thought out and I can accept all your points regarding my post.

I think the only specific detail that I can't agree with, is the timing of only 2 minutes to arrive, attack/strangle, cut/kill and then leave to be clear of Bucks Row without any of the police seeing anyone, I feel that anything under 3 minutes is just not possible. It's not just the kill time, it's also the 30 seconds before and after the kill that need to be factored in.
2 minutes to strangle and cut her throat and abdominal injuries at the very least and then another 30 seconds either side of the kill, making the TOTAL MINIMUM TIME that the killer needed to have with his victim (including arrival route and escape route) would be no fewer than 3 minutes.

I have always said under 5 minutes and more likely nearer 4 minutes, but I can also accept a minimum of 3 minutes.

But just 2 minutes...that is beyond even my natural ability to listen, learn, compromise and re-hypothesize accordingly.


I really don't believe Lechmere was the killer, although I was on the fence at one point.

No problem RD. Hats off too you for not getting caught up in Crossmania.

On that one point - if you are talking about entering Bucks Row, running into Nichols and then killing her, yes I’ll accept that 2 minutes is too tight I agree. I was just going on the actual murder. In his book Steve has the distance from the end of Bucks Row to the murder site as 130 yards which, using 3 walking speeds, would have Cross require between 53s and 1m 29s of walking time. So yes we need to factor in at least a minute plus briefest of conversations, kill/mutilate. So, as a whole, from entering Bucks Row to job done, approx 3-4 minutes?

[Herlock Sholmes]

Your source definition is yourself. Our source is the dictionary. Faced with this fact, you ignore it, because it does not fit your theory.



You coupling the word "oozing" with an adjective the witnesses did not use only proves that you are trying to manipulate the evidence and put words in the witnesses mouth.



In addition to misrepresenting the witnesses, you also misrepresent the forensic doctors. They are college professors, not crime scene investigators. The told you they had little or no data. And they did not agree on 3-5 minutes. You asked some vague questions of Jason Payne James and Ingemar Thiblin, and interpreted them the way you wanted to.

For Jason Payne James:
Q. Just how quickly CAN a person with the kind of damage that Nichols had bleed out, if we have nothing that hinders the bloodflow, and if the victim is flat on level ground? Can a total desanguination take place in very few minutes in such a case.
A. Yes
Q. Do you know of any examples?
A. No
Q. Is it possible for such a person to bleed out completely and stop bleeding in three minutes? In five? In seven?
A. I guess blood may continue to flow for up to this amount of time, but the shorter periods are more likely to be more realistic.

You appear to have made up the word "desanguination". You don't even appear to understand that to "bleed out completely' and to "stop bleeding" are not the same thing.

For Ingemar Thiblin you claim that Thiblin told you that there is "not much empirical data to go on"' as to how long "a seeping bleeding" could last, but that "ten to fifteen minutes'" possible.

So Thiblin stated that he had very little data and estimated 10 to 15 minutes.

James stated he had no data at all and estimated 3 to 7 minutes.

The two professors disagreed on time and admitted they had little or no information to base their estimates on.



That is a stance that neither he nor anyone else has taken. so now you're wrong about what the witnesses, the college professors, and the other posters have said.



And now you give an incorrect summary of people's objections to the "Mizen scam". The objection is that you ignore Robert Paul's testimony, which supports Charles Lechmere over PC Mizen.



Your use of the appeal to authority fallacy is noted.

You appear to be lying about Tom Wescott - the blurb for his Ripper Confidential says "Charles Lechmere, recently named as a suspect in the Jack the Ripper documentary, Conspiracy: The Missing Evidence, is restored to his proper place in history as an innocent witness."

You also appear to be lying about Richard Jones - his tour website says "As to whether Jack the Ripper has actually been “unmasked”, the honest answer to that question has to be a resounding no."

"The concrete facts about Charles Lechmere’s involvement in the Jack the Ripper murders, end with his being present at the site of the murder of Mary Nichols as the discoverer of her body, and anything linking him to the other Whitechapel murders is nothing more than supposition and speculation." - Robert Jones

"Already I’m sure you’re noticing that the might have, could have, what if school of criminology plays a pretty major part in the case against Charles Cross." - Robert Jones

Good post Fiver.

[Herlock Sholmes]

.
I have no problems debating this out here or in public. In fact, I have many times called upon you to take the debate in public with me, but you have never accepted that challenge - which is of course your right

Does anyone else see the irony here? Fish is basically telling everyone that Steve is afraid of debating the subject with him. This from a man who comes on here and tells everyone that he’s completely dictating the agenda as to what topics he’ll discus and who he’ll discus them with.

[Herlock Sholmes]

. The biggest reason why is of course that another forensic medico, Ingemar Thiblin concurs with Payne James, making any foul play an impossibility.

Are there two other experts called Payne-James and Ingemar Thiblin? Perhaps the other two agreed?

[Elamarna]

I have also called upon you to disclose the expertise you lean against in the matter of the bleeding issue, as I have disclosed mine, but so far to no avail. Again, it is of course your right to not give your sources up, should you choose to favor that path.

Thank you.

Let's be clear here, the "bleeding Issue"

Divides into many sections.

On bleeding under pressure, I quote the peer reviewed papers used to arrive at those figures in INSIDE BUCKS ROW.

On the issue of passive bleeding I quote Dr Michael Bigg, at length, with Trevors very kind permission, in INSIDE BUCKS ROW.

for the arrival of Neil, firstly part of that is about general belief expressed often.
Where it relates to the Theory specifically, well even that was addressed in one post, i assume you havent read it.

To say I have not given sources is inaccurate.

[Elamarna]

Why is Nichols the only murder in which there are no witnesses at all who saw Nichols with a man walking towards Bucks Row?

Chapman
Stride
Eddowes
Kelly


They ALL had witnesses who saw a man/different men shortly before their respective murders...BUT Nichols is different.


No one saw her talking or walking with a man and more specifically, no one saw her walk into Bucks Row with anyone.


Why is that?

Can I suggest there are several points here, she is not seen by anyone, after she leaves Holland, at Osbone St.
This suggests she does not stand out. Of course we don't know which route she took to Bucks Row, it's often assumed it's just walking along the Whitechapel Road, and while this is indeed very probable, it's not the only option, she may have gone by back roads, which were less populated at 2.30am.

The next point is that maybe the reason she is not seen walking with a man towards Bucks Row is that she didn't.
That is she went there alone, because it was apparently an area known to be used for prostitution, and the killer meet her either at Brown's Yard, or very close to it.

Steve

[FrankO]

Why is Nichols the only murder in which there are no witnesses at all who saw Nichols with a man walking towards Bucks Row?

Chapman
Stride
Eddowes
Kelly


They ALL had witnesses who saw a man/different men shortly before their respective murders...BUT Nichols is different.


No one saw her talking or walking with a man and more specifically, no one saw her walk into Bucks Row with anyone.


Why is that?

Hi TRD,

In addition to what Steve wrote, clearly the most witnesses who thought they'd seen one of the victims are to be found in the case of Stride. That's what sticks out to me, anyway, and I think is simply explained by the fact that she was attacked quite a bit earlier than the other victims, when people generally hadn't hone to bed, yet.

Cheers,
Frank

[Elamarna]

Hi TRD,

In addition to what Steve wrote, clearly the most witnesses who thought they'd seen one of the victims are to be found in the case of Stride. That's what sticks out to me, anyway, and I think is simply explained by the fact that she was attacked quite a bit earlier than the other victims, when people generally hadn't hone to bed, yet.

Cheers,
Frank

Good point Frank

Steve

[Fisherman]

Let's be clear here, the "bleeding Issue"

Divides into many sections.

On bleeding under pressure, I quote the peer reviewed papers used to arrive at those figures in INSIDE BUCKS ROW.

On the issue of passive bleeding I quote Dr Michael Bigg, at length, with Trevors very kind permission, in INSIDE BUCKS ROW.

for the arrival of Neil, firstly part of that is about general belief expressed often.
Where it relates to the Theory specifically, well even that was addressed in one post, i assume you havent read it.

To say I have not given sources is inaccurate.

Then I apologize - as I said, I have not read the entire book. But I would make the point that it seems to me that Jason Payne James and Ingemar Thiblin are the much better qualified professionals to have expressed their respective views.

I am now moving on to another poster, and so I consider my debate with you finished for the time being. I will, as I said, answer questions as I have concluded business with the last poster I choose to approach.