Charles Lechmere: Prototypical Life of a Serial Killer

[Herlock Sholmes]

Do we know who the police did or didn’t speak to?

[Paddy Goose]

Hurley, we know Christer never proved the police did not inquire if Pickford's had a Charles Cross in their employ. His theory never got off the ground. He has no starting point.



Pads

[Fiver]

-- The same police who couldn't even be bothered to knock on all the doors in Buck's Row itself. Yeah, they'd certainly be sending someone over to Broad Street to check up on a white, working Englishman. Once they'd finished their checks at Doveton Street, of course.

M.

You're probably basing your statement on the following.

"Inspector Spratling said he had been making inquiries into the matter. He had not been to every house in Buck's-row, but if anything had come to light down there he would have heard of it. He had seen all the watchmen in the neighborhood, and they neither saw nor heard anything. The board school ground had been searched, but nothing likely to throw any light on the matter was discovered." - 18 September 1888 Pall Mall Gazette.

So as of 18 September, Spratling had not personally visited every house in Buck's Row. But he was not the only person assigned to investigating Nichols death. It also seems unlikely that the police stopped investigating her death after 18 September. Unfortunately, the police records are lost, so we are dependent on the newspapers.

"A house-to-house investigation and inquiry has been made in all the streets adjoining Buck's-row, but with no tangible results." - 3 September 1888 Morning Post

So the police did check every house and speak to the inhabitants in Buck's Row and the surrounding streets. It's just that Spratling didn't do it all by himself.

Here's a few more bits on what the police did.

"Inspector Helson - We have had a constable in the street for a week, but nothing was gained by it." - 18 September 1888 Morning Post

"About six o'clock that day he [Inspector Spratling] made an examination at Buck's- row and Brady-street, which ran across Baker's-row, but he failed to trace any marks of blood. He subsequently examined, in company with Sergeant Godley, the East London and District Railway lines and embankment, and also the Great Eastern Railway yard, without, however, finding any traces. A watchman of the Great Eastern Railway, whose box was fifty or sixty yards from the spot where the body was discovered, heard nothing particular on the night of the murder. Witness also visited half a dozen persons living in the same neighbourhood, none of whom had noticed anything at all suspicious. One of these, Mrs. Purkiss, had not gone to bed at the time the body of deceased was found, and her husband was of opinion that if there had been any screaming in Buck's-row they would have heard it. A Mrs. Green, whose window looked out upon the very spot where the body was discovered, said nothing had attracted her attention on the morning of Friday last." - 4 September 1888 Daily Telegraph

"About six o'clock that day he [Spratling] made an examination at Buck's- row and Brady-street, which ran across Baker's-row, but he failed to trace any marks of blood. He subsequently examined, in company with Sergeant Godley, the East London and District Railway lines and embankment, and also the Great Eastern Railway yard, without, however, finding any traces. A watchman of the Great Eastern Railway, whose box was fifty or sixty yards from the spot where the body was discovered, heard nothing particular on the night of the murder. Witness also visited half a dozen persons living in the same neighbourhood, none of whom had noticed anything at all suspicious. One of these, Mrs. Purkiss, had not gone to bed at the time the body of deceased was found, and her husband was of opinion that if there had been any screaming in Buck's-row they would have heard it. A Mrs. Green, whose window looked out upon the very spot where the body was discovered, said nothing had attracted her attention on the morning of Friday last." - 4 September 1888 Daily News

[Fisherman]

That last part is rather pathetic I have to say. ‘Absolute bulk’ and ‘most of’ are the same I agree but you used them on two opposing positions.

Can you really believe that this gets you off the hook?

You deliberately made a false claim on your book. There’s no getting away from it.

There IS no hook, and there never was. The claims from your side that I would intentionally have missed or tried to mislead, that I would be lying, that I would be deceitful, fraudulent and intent on fooling people into believing in Lechmere as the killer are all totally baseless and nothing but a very sad subjective suggestion.

If you can prove any of the above, then go ahead. But the fact of the matter is that all of it is your INTERPRETATION of my mindset, motives and engagement in the Ripper saga, nothing else. It is a figment of your imagination that I sat on my chamber and decided to try and keep people out of the know that Lechmere said that he left home at "around" 3.30, so that I could lull them into believing in my take on things, for example. I did nothing of the sort, I didn't give it a seconds afterthought, I simply acknowledged that 3.30 was the time he mentioned and I used in in a theoretical discussion to show where it takes us IF we work from that time. I even added that we need to be careful about the timings, since the clocks of the era were not always correct, just as I quoted the "near 3.30" from a newspaper in the book, supplying the readers with that piece of information. It is right there, in the book you claim I used to try and hide it away.

And the thing is, Herlock, if our brains are wired in that kind of a direction, we CAN perhaps anyway come up with the idea that I had sinister intentions with my book. The problem is that if our brains are wired differently, we would never make such an assumption at all. So in the end, how we look on it all boils down to what kind of people we are, if you take my meaning. But the salient point here is that regardless of which way our brains are wired in, nobody is going to be able to prove that I am either a villain OR a benevolent character by way of scrutinizing it in my book.

I could of course, as a consequence, start a discussion here about what is worst: having worked from the timing 3.30 in a theoretical construction clearly stating that IF he left home at 3.30, then ..., or having claimed that such a thing proves you a liar and a deceptive poster. Who can be proven to have worded himself that makes him a liar? You or me?

But I am not interested in conducting such a discussion, in spite of how I know that you cannot prove your claim. I genuinely do not want such things to be the focus of our discussion out here. And therefore I am not going to pursue it.

It's up to yourself to draw whichever conclusions you can think of from that.

[Fisherman]

It's also in the Nottingham Evening Post, but no doubt this comes from the Pall Mall Gazette originally.

What I actually wrote is "multiple sources have Paul deposing at the inquest that he walked through Buck's Row at 3.45 or that he left home shortly before 3.45, which for all intents and purposes means the same thing."

Considering Paul proximity to Buck's Row, if he believed that he left home at 'shortly before 3.45' we can be confident that he would also believe that he had passed through Buck's Row at 3.45, which gels with both the PMG version and his earlier statement in Lloyd's.

There's no point in quibbling about it. We are in agreement about what he said. We disagree about how confident we should be about his accuracy.

Have you ever, R J, said that "It was exactly XX.XX as that happened" without knowing quite well that it WAS exactly XX.XX? Do people say such a thing without knowing that they are correct? It is not a question of Paul "believing" that he passed through Bucks Row at 3.45, it is a question of him establishing as a fact that he DID pass down Bucks Row at EXACTLY 3.45. Which means that the timing is not and never was "an estimate" at all.
You have the sequence Paul leaves home at shortly before 3.45, therefore he knows that he will be in Bucks Row at 3.45. I have it the other way around; he KNEW that he was in Bucks Row exactly at 3.45, therefore he knows that he must have left home shortly before. THERE, at home, is where the estimate can be found, not in Bucks Row, because there, he very clearly establishes, he was at exactly 3.45.
If he had said that he left home at exactly 3.43, therefore he was in Bucks Row shortly after, you would have a point. But instead I am the one having a point here, based on what WAS said.
But of course, for your take on things to work, you must erase Pauls certainty and make him - how did you word it? - "wildly off". Because in your thinking, three PCs must beat one carman. But that was not so for Baxter, who was able to fix the 3.45 timing, or a timing not far off it. So he went for another three people, Thain, Llewellyn and Paul. And if we are saying that three PCs cannot be wrong, then why is it that a doctor, a PC and a carman MUST be?


Actually, I don't see any crying need to comment further.

I made my position known, and you made your rebuttal over on this thread, which seems a bit off-topic to me.

Simply put, I don't agree with your assessment, and you don't agree with mine, but I'm happy to give you the last word.

I'm happy to take it.

In conclusion, I believe Charles Cross gave a reasonably accurate time of departure and there is nothing suspicious in his account. It is impossible to know, but I think he probably left home around 3.32 or 3.33, arriving at the scene of the murder around 3.40 or 3.41, which would coincide with Abberline's analysis, and meshes nicely with the accounts and timings given by Mizen, Thain, and Neill.

No, it does not. Because John Thain also said he run to fetch Llewellyn , and Llewellyn said that John Thain arrived at his place at around 3.55-4.00. And, of course, we then get a set of people, Thain, Paul and Llewellyn, who all agreed about a version that took the time at which the body was found to around 3.45, not 3.40.
And if this was all we had, we would be having a tie, R J, between you and me. But as it happens, the coroner also noted that there were two camps, and he therefore investigated the matter and found that camp 2 was the correct one. And this he could only have done with the help of one or two timepieces, those employed by Paul (who was able to nail an exact time) and Llewellyn (who in all probability owned a clock or two or three that could be checked in retrospect, just as Pauls given time source could).
So there is really no competition here. It is a done deal, and Lechmeres proposal to have left home at around 3.30 becomes a very precarious thing on account of this.
I am not saying that you are not free to latch on to the timing that Baxter was able to dismiss, but I am saying that it can never be a good idea to do so.

I see Robert Paul as off about 5 minutes in his reckoning. What he said cannot be correct unless all the other witnesses (and the most trustworthy contemporary commentator, Inspector Abberline) were all wrong. Considering it’s only a matter of being off by 3 or 4 minutes and we have no idea on what Paul based his statement, it becomes a fool’s errand to obsess over it or to give it undue weight.

The "most trustworthy commentator", had no reason to think that the PCs were wrong, R J, because when the 19th of September report was compiled, the coroner had not yet delivered his summary at the inquest, which was when he opted for the later time. From the outset, everybody was happy to accept that Neil found the body (which was wrong), that he did so at 3.40 (which was wrong) and that there were never any two men in place before Neil (which was wrong). They were all one happy family at that stage, and if Lechmere was the killer, he could never have suggested to have left home at a time that tallied with 3.45 instead of 3.40. It is therefore an excellent argument for guilt on his behalf, that he chose 3.30 as his departure time, against the background of a belief that the the body was found at 3.40.

You really must have Paul five minutes off, must you not? Because otherwise .... ugh!

Common sense tells us that when there are four other witnesses, and a contemporary commentator (Abberline) whose accounts can all mesh nicely, it is the odd man out who must be considered the untrustworthy source.

Common sense tells me that we should not speak of four witnesses against the one, when it is in fact three witnesses against three others (you need to be aware that since Lechmere said "around" 3.30, all bets are off, as per Herlock Sholmes). Then again, common sense is not all that .. well, you know! Furthermore, common sense also tells me that if there were a collection of witnesses who could have agreed on a timing in retrospect, then that collection would be the three PCs. Plus common sense tells me that once Baxter checked the timepieces involved, he had no problems ruling out your take on common sense in favor of mine. In fact, we know he did.

Paul may have been simply mistaken or misremembering, but beyond this there are subjective elements that cannot be entirely ignored because human beings are profoundly social creatures. We care about what other people think, and Paul would have been aware that this episode was not a 'good look' for him. He left a woman on the pavement, and it turned out that she had been brutally murdered. As such, his excuse is that he was running late for work would seem more plausible in his own mind and to his own conscience if he stretched the truth and claimed he didn't enter Buck's Row until 15 minutes before 4 o'clock---which, as I already explained--is wildly unlikely considering the accounts of Mizen, Thain, and Neill, and the analysis by Inspector Abberline.

But not so wildly unlikely as to stop the coroner from establishing that Paul was correct.

People who do shift work--including police constables--become more and more aware of the time as their shifts are coming to an end. Like, everyone else, they want to go home. And Mizen, who was knocking people up, would have been acutely aware of the time, also. I see no reason to give Paul more weight than Mizen or anyone else.

I'll hold off commenting further until something interesting comes up. This is well-trod ground. The horse has been flogged.

It is not about a horse. It is about a cow that has been CALLED a horse, R J. But I understand why you are reluctant to discuss the matter any further. And I am fine with that, there is absolutely no need, since the time was fixed to 3.45 by a collection of independent data, some of which must have been the timings of Paul and Llewellyn.

I am often enough quite willing to say that there can be no knowing. But that does not apply when there IS knowing, and there is in this case. I don't think it is a question of two equally good suggestions. I don't think we have to suggest anything at all, because it is a settled matter. Whether or not it was exactly 3.45 as the body was found can, to a degree, be discussed, but whether or not the findings of the coroner established the PCs or Paul/LLewellyn/Thain as the true version cannot.

[Fisherman]

Your attempt at the Appeal To Authority Fallacy is noted.

I prefer to judge people's conclusions based on their use of facts and logic.

Or as the old saying goes "A mule that had been on 100 campaigns with Frederick the Great is still a mule."

And why would the conclusions of the many ones who believe Lechmere was the killer be based on their use of facts and logic?

You see, Fiver, this is what you always do, shift the contexts to suit your suggestions.

And then we end up discussing anything but the case - which is not your strong point anyway. You are much better at playing games, I find.

[Fisherman]

If you really believed that being found alone with a body was enough to convict, then you'd convict John Reeves for killing Marta Tabram, John Davis for killing Annie Chapman, Louies Diemshutz for killing Elzabeth Stride, PC Watkins for killing Catherine Eddowes, and Thomas Bowyer for the murder of Mary Jane Kelly.

But to you, being alone with the body is only enough to convict if the suspect is Charles Lechmere/

Of course, this whole charade was totally unnecessary from the outset, since I never said or beleived that being found alone with a body was enough to convict. Although I do not rule out ads such that people HAVE been convicted on that factor alone, of course.

HH Holmes killed his lovers. So did Severin Klosowski. And that's just off the top of my head from people suspected of being the Ripper.

Another example is Belle Gunness. Other well known examples are Mary Ann Cotton, George Joseph Smith, and John Christie.

These are all examples of people who killed multiple spouses, with the one exception of Christie. And we know that for example Smith did so for economical reasons. You forgot the perhaps best known example of this type of killer, the frenchman Landru, who advertised for spouses and killed seven of them for the exact same reason as Smith. And as Cotton. And as Gunness.
In actual fact, the only killer you have left from your list when we rule the economically motivated killers out, is John Christie, who DID kill his wife Ethel. The two had married in 1920, then separated in 1924, whereupon the reunited in 1934. Christie is one of the rare exceptions to the rule that serial killers will not kill their spouses, whereas the other examples you provide are of killers who seemingly gained economically from killing their spouses. And they therefore belong to another category of killers than the traditional serial killers where the murders themselves are the real driving force.

What I said therefore still applies; serial killers (driven by an urge to kill), will generally not harm their spouses. And the Ripper was very clearly not driven by economical considerations, but instead by a wish to kill and cut up women (go ahead, if you wish, and claim that he could also have been driven by a wish to sell organs, but that would be just as poor an argument as the one you made above).

[Fisherman]

You are wrong. Robert Paul said when he left home at the inquest and he didn't use the word exactly in that testimony. His number was an estimate.

"Robert Paul said he lived at 30 Forster street, Whitechapel. On the Friday he left home just before a quarter to four, and on passing up Buck's row he saw a man in the middle of the road, who drew his attention to the murdered woman." - 18 September 1888 Daily News

"Robert Paul, a carman, said on the morning of the crime he left home just before a quarter to 4. He was passing up Buck's Row and saw a man standing in the middle of the road." - 22 September 1888 East London Advertiser

"Robert Paul, Forster street, Whitechapel, said - I am a carman, and on the morning of the murder I left home just before a quarter to four. As I was passing up Buck's row I saw a man standing in the roadway," - 18 September 1888 Evening Standard

"John Paul, of 30, Foster-street, Whitechapel, said he was a carman. On Friday, August 31st, he left home at about a quarter to four o'clock to go to his work in Spitalfields." - 22 September 1888 Illustrated Police News

"Robert Paul said he lived at 30, Forster-street, Whitechapel. On the Friday, he left home just before a quarter to four...." - 23 September, 1888 Sunday Dispatch

"Robert Paul said he lived at 30, Forster-street, Whitechapel. On the Friday, he left home just before a quarter to four...." - 23 September, 1888 Sunday People

"Robert Paul, a carman, said that he was passing along Buck's-row at a quarter to four on the morning in question...." = 18 September 1888 Pall Mall Gazette

"Robert Paul, Forster-street, Whitechapel. -- I am a carman, and on the morning of the murder I left home just before a quarter to four." - 18 Spetember 1888 Morning Advertiser

"Robert Paul, a carman, said that he was passing along Buck's-row at a quarter to four on the morning in question, when a man stopped him and showed him the body of a woman lying in a gateway." - 18 September 1888 Pall Mall Gazette

"Robert Baul [Paul], a carman, of 30, Foster-street, Whitechapel, stated he went to work at Cobbett's-court, Spitalfields. He left home about a quarter to 4 on the Friday morning and as he was passing up Buck's-row he saw a man standing in the middle of the road." - 18 September 1888 Times

It's clear that Robert Paul was estimating the time. You aren't just ignoring the times given by PCs Thain, Neil, and Mizen. You aren't just ignoring half of what Coroner Baxter said. You aren't just ignoring Inspector Abberline's report. You're ignoring Robert Paul's inquest testimony, where he did not say that 3:45am was "exact".

I am not ignoring his inquest testimony at all. I am saying that in his Lloyds interview, he said "exactly 3.45" and I am saying that he must have had a reason to say "exactly", because we do not use that phrasing without knowing the exact time.
I am furthermore saying that the coroner examined the matter in detail and was able to establish that Pauls timing was in line with how the body was found at 3.45, or not far off that time.
The inquest testimony is an example of Paul estimating when he left his home. And that estimation fits perfectly with the knowledge that he was in Bucks Row at exactly 3.45.

[Fisherman]

Good afternoon Fisherman,



Right, but not here on Casebook they haven't.

All we get here is you insisting the police didn't bother to inquire if Pickford's had a Charles Cross in their employ. You've been doing this for a decade now. Your theory still has no starting point.

Nope, I have never said that the police did not bother to inquire if Pickfords had a Charles Cross in their employ.

I have, however, always said that there is no law of nature that establishes that the police MUST have inquired if Pickfords had a Charles Cross in their employ, and I have added that I personally don't think that they did.

There is also the option that they DID check with Pickfords, only to find out that Pickfords confirmed that they did have a Charles Cross in their employ. There has always been a possibility that the carman did call himself Cross at work but Lechmere everywhere else. And what I cannot decisively rule out, I leave on the table.

However, if the police did go to Pickfords to check the carman out, then they must have taken an interest in him as a possible suspect. And they would accordingly have run him through the registers, only to find out that he was NOT called Cross, but instead Lechmere.
And that would have gone into the reports. But it did not do so.

The starting point of the theory is how Charles Lechmere was found all alone in Bucks Row, standing close to a freshly killed Ripper victim that was still warm and bleeding.

I can think of few better starting points, to be honest.

[Herlock Sholmes]

There IS no hook, and there never was. The claims from your side that I would intentionally have missed or tried to mislead, that I would be lying, that I would be deceitful, fraudulent and intent on fooling people into believing in Lechmere as the killer are all totally baseless and nothing but a very sad subjective suggestion.

If you can prove any of the above, then go ahead. But the fact of the matter is that all of it is your INTERPRETATION of my mindset, motives and engagement in the Ripper saga, nothing else. It is a figment of your imagination that I sat on my chamber and decided to try and keep people out of the know that Lechmere said that he left home at "around" 3.30, so that I could lull them into believing in my take on things, for example. I did nothing of the sort, I didn't give it a seconds afterthought, I simply acknowledged that 3.30 was the time he mentioned and I used in in a theoretical discussion to show where it takes us IF we work from that time. I even added that we need to be careful about the timings, since the clocks of the era were not always correct, just as I quoted the "near 3.30" from a newspaper in the book, supplying the readers with that piece of information. It is right there, in the book you claim I used to try and hide it away.

And the thing is, Herlock, if our brains are wired in that kind of a direction, we CAN perhaps anyway come up with the idea that I had sinister intentions with my book. The problem is that if our brains are wired differently, we would never make such an assumption at all. So in the end, how we look on it all boils down to what kind of people we are, if you take my meaning. But the salient point here is that regardless of which way our brains are wired in, nobody is going to be able to prove that I am either a villain OR a benevolent character by way of scrutinizing it in my book.

I could of course, as a consequence, start a discussion here about what is worst: having worked from the timing 3.30 in a theoretical construction clearly stating that IF he left home at 3.30, then ..., or having claimed that such a thing proves you a liar and a deceptive poster. Who can be proven to have worded himself that makes him a liar? You or me?

But I am not interested in conducting such a discussion, in spite of how I know that you cannot prove your claim. I genuinely do not want such things to be the focus of our discussion out here. And therefore I am not going to pursue it.

It's up to yourself to draw whichever conclusions you can think of from that.

My ‘claim’ is proven. It can’t be otherwise.

You said on here that it was absolutely clear the the majority of newspapers said ‘around 3.30.’ In Cutting Point however you said that the majority said ‘3.30.’

This wasn’t an accidental omission of a word or the slight misquoting of a sentence it, was a positive statement that was the opposite of what was actually the case. Was it simply the worst example of counting ever?

So how, when you were writing Cutting Point, did you read all of the newspaper versions and come to the wrong conclusion (on something that wasn’t even close?)

Its a ‘mystery’ isn’t it?

[Paddy Goose]

Good morning Fisherman,

Nope, I have never said that the police did not bother to inquire if Pickfords had a Charles Cross in their employ.

Yes you have said exactly that - the police did not bother to inquire if Pickfords had a Charles Cross in their employ. You've been insisting on it for a decade now. Right here on Casebook every time it came up n debate.

But you've never proven it.

The starting point of the theory is how Charles Lechmere was found all alone in Bucks Row, standing close to a freshly killed Ripper victim that was still warm and bleeding.

Oh I see, since there are mostly new people here posting now, you have "moved to goalposts" as they say.

No the starting point was, of course, always the "name" thing. Before that, Charles Cross was ... well, he was just Charles Cross. The name thing was the "aha' moment. Turns out the name thing is a dud. You can't prove the police did not ascertain he was in fact known as Charles Cross at work.

Face it Fisherman, your theory, which begins with the "name" thing, never got liftoff. It's too bad really, because you thought you finally found your very own Hutch. With an assist from Ed, of course.

[Fiver]

Serial murder is often set off by stress. Lets listen to what Nicola Malizia says in her thesis ”Serial Killer: The Mechanism from Imagination to the Murder Phases”:

”Becoming a serial killer is a long, drawn-out process, not a discrete event. A theory that has attempted to integrate cultural, developmental, psychological, and biological concepts is Stephen Giannangelo’s diathesis-stress model (1996). The theory states that all serial killers have a congenital propensity to behave and think in ways that lead to serial killing, if combined with environmental stressors. ”

And here we see Fisherman quoting a source out of context instead of giving us the whole picture.

"A theory that has attempted to integrate cultural, developmental, psychological, and biological concepts is Stephen Giannangelo’s diathesis-stress model (1996). The theory states that all serial killers have a congenital propensity to behave and think in ways that lead to serial killing, if combined with environmental stressors. This combination leads to the development of self-esteem, self-control, and sexual dysfunction problems. These problems feed back on one another and lead to the development of maladaptive social skills, which moves the person to retreat into his private pornographic fantasy world. As he dwells longer and longer in this world, he enters a dissociative process in which he takes his fantasies to their moral limits. At this point, the killer seeks out victims to act out his fantasies, but the actual kill never lives up to his expectations or to the thrill of the hunt, so the whole process is repeated and becomes obsessive-compulsive and ritualistic."

So are there indications of Lechmere having self-esteem problems? Lechmere had the confidence to approach a stranger on a dark street in a known dangerous place. Fisherman's version of Lechmere has even less problems with self-esteem - repeatedly choosing to take unnecessary risks

How about indications of lack of self-control? Lechmere held a steady job for decades, later opened his own business, and left his family a significant sum of money. He had no known record of criminal behavior, either. Fisherman's version of Lechmere has the self-control to bluff Paul, the police and everyone else and to preplan his murders hours in advance so his timing will throw off the suspicions of people who weren't even born yet.

And sexual dysfunction seems rather unlikely for a man who had 11 children, with the last born to his wife in 1891.

Lets also note that Fisherman's source is not Nicola Malizia's "Serial Killer: The Mechanism from Imagination to the Murder Phases”.

Stress is often something a budding serial killer experiences a something that robs him of the one quality serial killers are so very often addictive to: control

The source Fisherman used does not discuss the sort of environmental stressors that could trigger serial killing. Malazia alludes to them in a way that appears to indicate that Malazia believes these stressors happen before adulthood.

"As a result of their reliance on fantasy, and as a result of childhood abuse, the future killer has developed a series of negative personality traits which results in only increased isolation. These traits include a preference for autoerotic activity, aggression, chronic lying, rebelliousness, and a preference for fetish behavior.The killer’s initial difficulty in distinguishing between reality and fantasy continues to grow. Fueled by the negative personality traits, and inability to distinguish fantasy from reality, the future killer fails to adequately develop social relationships. The early isolation, leading to antisocial acts, is fueled by the acts, and increased isolation results. The isolation and antisocial behavior build into a feedback cycle, resulting in more violent behavior on the part of the killer, and even greater isolation from society. The lack of punishment resulting from the future killer’s violent behavior is a type of reinforcement. The killer’s childhood fantasies and thinking patterns stimulate only themselves, and while reducing tension, serve only to further their alienation. The social isolation, the result of early antisocial behavior and fantasy, only increases the child’s reliance on fantasy. This isolation is reformed into even greater anger against society. The killer’s early reliance on fantasy leads to violent acts, and childhood abuse leads toward anger against society. Anger produces violent acts, which in turn increases the child’s isolation. The increased isolation leads to even more anger, antisocial acts, and a vastly increased dependence on fantasy. The self-feeding cycle of isolation, anger and fantasy only serves to catapult the future killer even farther away from what society views as normal, and even closer to the act of homicide. By the time of sexual development, and autoerotic experimentation, fantasy is well on its way to it’s final role, that of sole coping device." - Nicola Malizia, ”Serial Killer: The Mechanism from Imagination to the Murder Phases”

Very few people engage in full time work before the age of sexual development. Fisherman's theory that stress induced by harsh working conditions can lead to to serial killing is not supported by the source that Fisherman claimed or by the source that Fisherman actually quoted.

And even if it did, that doesn't point to any of the roughly 68,000 carmen working in the London area, let alone Charles Lechmere.

[Fiver]

I am not ignoring his inquest testimony at all. I am saying that in his Lloyds interview, he said "exactly 3.45" and I am saying that he must have had a reason to say "exactly", because we do not use that phrasing without knowing the exact time.

You clearly said:

You are calling Robert Pauls 3.45 timing an "estimate" on three occasions in your post. But the 3.45 timing was never given as an estimate at all. It was instead given as an exact timing: "It was exactly a quarter to four when I passed up Buck's-row to my work as a carman for Covent-garden market".

This is the only occasion where we have the 3.45 timing given by Paul, and it is from Lloyds Weekly of the 2nd of September, not from the inquest.

That's you saying that Paul never gave his timing at the inquest. Do you not understand what the English words "only" and "Not" mean?

Once we look at the inquest testimony, it is clear that Robert Paul gave an estimate, not the exact timing that you claim.

All you have shown is your deliberate selective presentation of the evidence. You ignore Robert Paul's inquest testiony, which makes it clear that his time was an estimate, not the exact timing you claim. You ignore the three police officers time estimates, which disagree with Paul's time estimate. You selectively quote Coroner Baxter, who clearly said that Nichols body was found before 3:45am. You ignore Inspector Abberline's analysis of all of the testimony, where he concludes Nichols body was found about 3:40am.

You deliberately don't give people all of the facts. If you were to present the whole picture, it would show the time gap exists only in your imagination.

[Fisherman]

You're probably basing your statement on the following.

"Inspector Spratling said he had been making inquiries into the matter. He had not been to every house in Buck's-row, but if anything had come to light down there he would have heard of it. He had seen all the watchmen in the neighborhood, and they neither saw nor heard anything. The board school ground had been searched, but nothing likely to throw any light on the matter was discovered." - 18 September 1888 Pall Mall Gazette.

So as of 18 September, Spratling had not personally visited every house in Buck's Row. But he was not the only person assigned to investigating Nichols death. It also seems unlikely that the police stopped investigating her death after 18 September. Unfortunately, the police records are lost, so we are dependent on the newspapers.

"A house-to-house investigation and inquiry has been made in all the streets adjoining Buck's-row, but with no tangible results." - 3 September 1888 Morning Post

So the police did check every house and speak to the inhabitants in Buck's Row and the surrounding streets. It's just that Spratling didn't do it all by himself.

Here's a few more bits on what the police did.

"Inspector Helson - We have had a constable in the street for a week, but nothing was gained by it." - 18 September 1888 Morning Post

"About six o'clock that day he [Inspector Spratling] made an examination at Buck's- row and Brady-street, which ran across Baker's-row, but he failed to trace any marks of blood. He subsequently examined, in company with Sergeant Godley, the East London and District Railway lines and embankment, and also the Great Eastern Railway yard, without, however, finding any traces. A watchman of the Great Eastern Railway, whose box was fifty or sixty yards from the spot where the body was discovered, heard nothing particular on the night of the murder. Witness also visited half a dozen persons living in the same neighbourhood, none of whom had noticed anything at all suspicious. One of these, Mrs. Purkiss, had not gone to bed at the time the body of deceased was found, and her husband was of opinion that if there had been any screaming in Buck's-row they would have heard it. A Mrs. Green, whose window looked out upon the very spot where the body was discovered, said nothing had attracted her attention on the morning of Friday last." - 4 September 1888 Daily Telegraph

"About six o'clock that day he [Spratling] made an examination at Buck's- row and Brady-street, which ran across Baker's-row, but he failed to trace any marks of blood. He subsequently examined, in company with Sergeant Godley, the East London and District Railway lines and embankment, and also the Great Eastern Railway yard, without, however, finding any traces. A watchman of the Great Eastern Railway, whose box was fifty or sixty yards from the spot where the body was discovered, heard nothing particular on the night of the murder. Witness also visited half a dozen persons living in the same neighbourhood, none of whom had noticed anything at all suspicious. One of these, Mrs. Purkiss, had not gone to bed at the time the body of deceased was found, and her husband was of opinion that if there had been any screaming in Buck's-row they would have heard it. A Mrs. Green, whose window looked out upon the very spot where the body was discovered, said nothing had attracted her attention on the morning of Friday last." - 4 September 1888 Daily News

No, Fiver, all the inhabitants of Bucks Row had not been questioned on the 17th of September. We have Sprawling telling us this in no uncertain terms:

Inspector Spratling. -- I have been making inquiries into this matter.

The Coroner. -- have you been to every house in Buck's-row?

Witness. -- No; but if anything had come to light down there we should have heard of it. I have seen all the watchmen in the neighbourhood, and they neither saw nor heard anything on the morning in question. The Board school ground has been searched, but nothing likely to throw any light on the matter was discovered.

Inspector Helson. -- We have had a constable in the street for a week, but nothing was gained by it.

Here we may see that Sprawling denied that every house had been visited, and Helson adding that what they instead did was to place a PC in Bucks Row, in case any of the inhabitants would come forward and add information. That, however, did not happen.

Your strange idea that the coroner would only have been interested in whether Sprawling personally had checked all the houses in Bucks Row, is an idea you have gotten from the Pall Mall Gazette. Other papers worded themselves differently, as for example the Morning Advertiser quoted above. There, the term "you" can be read as describing Sprawling himself OR the police. And when Sprawling answers, he is described as saying that "we" would have heard of it ("we", the police), if anything had come to light. As you know, the Pall Mall Gazette had Sprawling saying that "he" would have heard of it, if anything had come to light.

To understand what is going oin here, it needs to be pointed out is that you are suggesting that the coroner only asked if Spratling personally had been to all the houses in Bucks Row, that Spratlings answer only involved where he himself had been, but that all the houses HAD been visited - by somebody else that Sprawling.

That is your suggestion.

However, I would propose that when the coroner, having been told that the houses had not all been visited, said "Then that will have to be done", Sprawling would have told the coroner that it HAD been done, but by other policemen than himself. He would not want to leave the coroner with the impression that the houses had not been visited.

I therefore conclude that the snippet you quoted from the Morning Post does not prove that the houses in Bucks Row had all been visited. To begin with, it does. not even speak of Bucks Row, it speaks of the adjoining streets:
"A house-to-house investigation and inquiry has been made in all the streets adjoining Buck's-row, but with no tangible results."

This you elevate to another status than it stands for:

"So the police did check every house and speak to the inhabitants in Buck's Row and the surrounding streets."

Ooops - suddenly Bucks Row is added. By you.

But would the police not check Bucks Row if they checked the adjoining streets? Well, that depends on what the police were looking for. Inquiries and investigations were certainly made about rumors of a blood trail in Brady Street:

A very general opinion is now entertained that the spot where the body was found was not the scene of the murder. Buck's-row runs through from Thomas-street to Brady-street, and in the latter street what appeared to be bloodstains were found at irregular distances on the footpaths on either side of the way. Occasionally a larger splash was visible, and from the manner in which the marks were scattered it seems as though the person carrying the mutilated body had hesitated where to deposit his ghastly burden, and had gone from one side of the road to the other until the obscurity of Buck's-row afforded the shelter the shelter sought for. The street had been crossed twice within the space of about 120 yards. The point at which the stains were first visible is in front of the gateway to Honey's-mews, in Brady-street, about 150 yards from the point where Buck's-row commences. Some of the police investigating the case declare that very few bloodstains were seen when they first visited the spot.
(the Echo, September 1)

Equally, there were rumours of screams and commotion in the same street:
It is not unlikely that the deceased met her death in a house in or near Brady-street, for some persons state that early in the morning they heard screams, but this is a by no means uncommon incident in the neighbourhood, and, with one exception, nobody seems to have paid any particular attention to what was probably the death struggle of the unfortunate woman. The exception referred to was Mrs. Celville [Sarah Colwell], who lives only a short distance from the foot of Buck's-row. According to her statement she was awakened by her children, who said someone was trying to get into the house. She listened, and heard a woman screaming "Murder, Police!" five or six times. The voice faded away as though the woman was going in the direction of Buck's-row, and all became quiet.
(the Echo, September 1)

As we can see, Mrs Colville made a statement to the police, so we know that they took interest in the inhabitants of Brady Street.

The idea that the coroner was only interested in Spratlings doings and that Sprawling would not have informed the coroner that full investigations had been done in Bucks Row if that was the case, is not up to scratch.

But this is the way you do your homework, is it not? Picking and choosing carefully before you present your "truth".

[Fisherman]

My ‘claim’ is proven. It can’t be otherwise.

Actually, you CAN be wrong. Strange though it may sound.

You said on here that it was absolutely clear the the majority of newspapers said ‘around 3.30.’ In Cutting Point however you said that the majority said ‘3.30.’

This wasn’t an accidental omission of a word or the slight misquoting of a sentence it, was a positive statement that was the opposite of what was actually the case. Was it simply the worst example of counting ever?

So how, when you were writing Cutting Point, did you read all of the newspaper versions and come to the wrong conclusion (on something that wasn’t even close?)

Its a ‘mystery’ isn’t it?

Again "the absolute bulk" IS the majority, Herlock. And it does not in any way prove any intention to mislead on my behalf. Far from it. It does not even prove that I meant different things! It would be doing the rounds in Cloud Cukoo land to claim otherwise.

Very obviously, somebody who is incapable of understanding how the absolute bulk is always the majority, never the minority, can get it into his head to start raving about lies and deception on account of that - we all know that by now. But embarrassing yourself does not alter the facts.

You are going to have to present something else to prove your claim, or retract it.