One Incontrovertible, Unequivocal, Undeniable Fact Which Refutes the Diary

[erobitha]

Have to say, that was an excellent summary of the situation Caz and is tune with how I see it unfolded also.

The thing with those pro Barrett hoaxers is that do not factor in with any logic, how humans actually behave in the real world. When you apply the context of Mike’s life to the story, it becomes rather apparent to us who do not believe it was a Barrett hoax, that our viewpoint is the most likely.

The testimonies of a proven liar to one side, Mike’s story came with zero proof he hoaxed anything. Yet, we have documented proof that electricians who drank in the same pub as Mike were at James Maybrick’s old home the exact same day Mike rings Doreen.

That evidence speaks far more truth than Mike ever could.

[caz]

On balance, I don't think Mike Barrett ever had any intention of telling the truth - never mind the whole truth and nothing but the truth - regarding what little he knew about the diary's origins.

There is no evidence that by June 1994 Mike was feeling so guilty and ashamed of his behaviour over the previous couple of years that he went to Harold Brough and tried to make amends with an honest confession to faking the diary.

On the contrary, the evidence indicates that Mike had been spending all his diary book royalties as fast as the money was reaching his bank account, with nothing to show for it but his overtly drunken behaviour. There is no sign of him making any mortgage payments and, worse, he would soon be owing Shirley his share of the expenses and legal costs involved in getting their bestseller onto the shelves in October 1993, and the monies would be taken off at source from any future royalty payments due, leaving him more skint than he ever was in 1992, when he had Anne to keep the roof over their heads, and desperately unhappy to have lost the wife and daughter who had meant everything to him - at least before the diary turned his life upside down.

Telling Brough that he had faked the diary would not have helped Mike's dire financial situation, but it might have given him some satisfaction to stick two fingers up to the diary people if they were going to bleed him dry one way or another [no royalties for anyone, so no way of screwing the expenses out of him] and hope for a reaction out of Anne in the process. When that reaction came in the form of telling Feldman she had given the diary to Mike via Tony Devereux, one might well imagine the anger and frustration Mike would have felt at being so thoroughly shafted.

So did Mike's thoughts then turn to how he could get revenge for this act of marital betrayal, while trying to save his home from imminent repossession? Is there evidence that he was hoping to sell his story to the highest bidder: How We Faked the Diary and Fooled The World, and bag himself a second bestseller?

The answer would appear to be yes. But Mike's lack of ability as a writer would inevitably let him down, and nobody in the business was willing to take a punt on him having a coherent, comprehensive, credible and evidence-based story to tell, when all the indications were that he was baying at the moon.

If anyone wants to do it for Mike today, and finally present the coherent, comprehensive and above all credible account of the when, who, what, how and why of it all, which he always failed to do, I'll be all ears, like King Charles. They now have 15 tapes and a typescript to help them describe the entire process leading up to Monday 13th April 1992, when Mike took the diary to London and waved his old life goodbye.

In the meanwhile, the 9th March 1992 double event will remain on the table as no coincidence, with someone other than Anne Barrett responsible for the handwriting in the diary.

Love,

Caz
X

[Iconoclast]

In January 1995, Mike is telling poor Alan Gray that he put the scratches in the watch himself ... and by September 1996 ... Mike is now jumping on Martin Fido's 'bandwagon hoax' bandwagon, calling it predictable that a second Maybrick-related fake, like the watch, would emerge following his and Anne's fake diary.

So, correct me if I'm wrong here, Caz, but you seem to be suggesting that Mike Barrett just kept on telling people whatever he thought they wanted to hear, yes? Whether his audience was big or small, he was always sensing which way the wind was blowing in that moment to see which way to swing the story to keep people listening to his bombastic nonsense? Is that a fair summary of your thinking?

And you feel he was lying whenever it suited him because he didn't think there would be any consequences to his lying?

That would be interesting as that would tally with my own personal view of Mike Barrett which is that he was a particularly lazy sod who didn't want to work and who had ideas well above his station in life and who liked - nay, craved - attention, especially of the variety which his role in the scrapbook story generated.

But as the new year follows the old one, Mike continues to be Alan's flexible friend, and by September 1996 he has picked up a few more handy hints. Shame the same cannot be said for Alan, when Mike's watch story appears to have completely changed, for the benefit of Alan's shiny new paying client, Stan Dandeliver [geddit?].

I love it!

Of course, an added advantage by 1996 is that Robbie Johnson has gone to meet Tony Devereux, so Mike can tell lies about both of them now with less fear of having his head stoved in.

One might call it the dividend of death which Mike happily cashed in whenever he had an audience to 'convince' (by 'convince', I obviously mean 'bore to death').

[caz]

Afternoon Ike,

If the 1891 diary was the gift to Barrett believers that keeps on giving, could the watch be said to be the gift that keeps on 'ticking' away?

In January 1995, Mike is telling poor Alan Gray that he put the scratches in the watch himself before sending it over the water to Wallasey, on a ferry 'cross the Mersey [thank you, Gerry Marsden] or more likely in the vehicle of a trusted "friend" via the tunnel [take a bow, Eddie Lyons]. After this, Alan doesn't sound too surprised to find that Mike has given him a number for Tony Devereux's house in Fountains Road that doesn't exist.

Now you might be surprised, but faking the watch is not actually the most idiotic lie Mike ever told. There was at least some method in the madness. After all, if the scratches are old, it follows as night follows day that Anne and Mike didn't write the diary. It's as simple as that. So he has to have a plan to stop the boats - sorry - the watch.

But as the new year follows the old one, Mike continues to be Alan's flexible friend, and by September 1996 he has picked up a few more handy hints. Shame the same cannot be said for Alan, when Mike's watch story appears to have completely changed, for the benefit of Alan's shiny new paying client, Stan Dandeliver [geddit?]. Mike is now jumping on Martin Fido's 'bandwagon hoax' bandwagon, calling it predictable that a second Maybrick-related fake, like the watch, would emerge following his and Anne's fake diary.

Of course, an added advantage by 1996 is that Robbie Johnson has gone to meet Tony Devereux, so Mike can tell lies about both of them now with less fear of having his head stoved in.

Love,

Caz
X

[Iconoclast]

... and yet - despite the obvious risks - she turned over all of the evidence for the purchase to researcher and relative stranger Keith Skinner (I think it was Keith) so the cheque book and the bank statement and the flaming red 1891 diary itself. Extraordinary stupidity or extraordinary confidence, I just can't decide which.

Just for the record, Mr Skinner has just updated my comment, above:

"Plus - Anne went out of her way to help Shirley and me find out who the cheque was payable to enabling Shirley to trace a "Mr M Earl" somewhere in Thame, Oxford in 1995 (without the aid of the internet) - and for me to pick up the trail in 2004 and locate the advertisement in Bookdealer."

So - all-in-all - it looks like the most extraordinary confidence was oozing through the woman when she almost arrogantly provoked anyone and everyone by blatantly admitting all relevant details of the red-diary-con. For someone with not a scrap of history in the game, she was astonishingly flagrant in her advertising of the thing that Algernon Orsam cites as the principal (only?) reason he thinks Mike Barrett organised the hoax of the century. She had some gonads that woman, I'd say!

Or else she and her hubby didn't hoax anything at all and that she therefore had absolutely nothing whatsoever to fear from revealing what she revealed about the irrelevant 1891 maroon diary?

Honestly, I can't decide ...

[Iconoclast]

It's okay, because Palmer will no doubt assure the readers that Mike had very little input in 1992, recalling even less about the process by 1999. Anne had worn the trousers, composing up to 90% of the text, including all the lines to be crossed out, then copying it into 63 pages of the photo album using disguised handwriting, between 1st and 12th April, and finally making sure the typescript would be in a form that was safe to print out and hand over. Mike mostly stood behind her with the cattle prod when she was working too slowly or taking too many tea breaks.
Anne only wore the skirt when she needed something from him - typical woman, eh? - to wit the highly suspicious and incriminating 1891 diary. But she then forgot that it was suspicious or incriminating - what an airhead, eh? - and gave it away.
Love,
Caz
X

Quite right - what an utter airhead! She had been central to a huge hoax for which she could have been charged and incarcerated leaving her young daughter in the care of some branch of the family (God forbid, maybe even her dad) or social services, and yet - despite the obvious risks - she turned over all of the evidence for the purchase to researcher and relative stranger Keith Skinner (I think it was Keith) so the cheque book and the bank statement and the flaming red 1891 diary itself. Extraordinary stupidity or extraordinary confidence, I just can't decide which.

On the subject of diaries, I am currently compiling a Jack the Ripper diary on my old Amstrad word prosser in which I have Robert Louis Stevenson confessing to having been the Whitechapel fiend but I need a convincing vehicle to put it in so I have this morning sought out a book dealer who can find me the following:

‘Unused or partly used diary dating from 1885-1895, must have at least 20 blank pages’

Now, if I get desperate I am willing to accept, say, an 1896 diary because I'm certain that 'diaries' in the late Victorian period were actually what we now call 'notebooks' - that is, it never occurred to the printers to put actual dates in them. I should probably check my facts there but frankly I can't be arsed to and I'm sure I'll be proven to be right even if I did.

Oh - hold on - I know a bloke down in London who recently said he had a tiny red diary from 1891 and that it had each day of 1891 very clearly printed in it. Damn!

Oh well, if one materialises, I'll accept it anyway and then get Mrs Iconoclast to pay for it ...

[caz]

More great clarity from the master hoaxer.

It's okay, because Palmer will no doubt assure the readers that Mike had very little input in 1992, recalling even less about the process by 1999. Anne had worn the trousers, composing up to 90% of the text, including all the lines to be crossed out, then copying it into 63 pages of the photo album using disguised handwriting, between 1st and 12th April, and finally making sure the typescript would be in a form that was safe to print out and hand over. Mike mostly stood behind her with the cattle prod when she was working too slowly or taking too many tea breaks.

Anne only wore the skirt when she needed something from him - typical woman, eh? - to wit the highly suspicious and incriminating 1891 diary. But she then forgot that it was suspicious or incriminating - what an airhead, eh? - and gave it away.

Love,

Caz
X

[erobitha]

With reference to Palmer's speculation above, Don Rumbelow actually asked Mike Barrett about his thoughts on the creative process at the infamous C&D Club interview. Rumbelow asks Mike about the mind of a professional writer. I remembered this moment reasonably vividly from my listening of the tape because Mike was unable to answer Rumbelow's questions and didn't appear to know what he was talking about which made me laugh. I noted Rumbelow's increasing exasperation at Mike's diversionary tactics and in the end Rumbelow gave up. I post the transcript below in case anyone would really like to understand the brilliant literary machinations that underpinned Mike Barrett's hoaxed diary of Jack the Ripper and which have so inspired Lord Algernon Orsam and his acolyte RJ Palmer.

DR: Mike, you say that you’re a professional writer, then – as a professional writer – you’ll know that one of the tricks of a professional writer is that it takes a writer a little time to get into the subject. Therefore, one of the pieces of advice you’re always given -
MB: [Inaudible] Can I ask you a question?
DR: Hang on, hang on. Is to, is to, is to delete the first paragraph or the first page. Now -
MB: - no, you don’t do that -
DR: - if you look at the dairy -
MB: - you don’t do that -
DR: - did you have a run in and – if so – did you delete, what did you actually delete?
MB: Okay, then, you want to know if I’m a writer?
DR: - no, I didn’t ask that, I asked what [inaudible] you deleted.
MB: - you said, you doubt my profession- -
KS: I said, no. I said -
MB: [Inaudible] my professionality [sic] -
DR: - I said you’re a professional writer -
MB: - right -
DR: - you told me you were -
MB: - okay, now -
DR: - so I’ve asked you, without running into [inaudible] -
MB: - you’ve asked me a question, right, can we, can we just forget the diary just for one second?
DR: - no, ‘cause that’s what -
MB: - no, just for one second, can we forget the diary?
DR: I’d rather not, I’d rather stay with it -
MB: - I’d prefer to forget the diary for sixty minutes, sixty seconds -
DR: - only on the understanding that we come back in sixty seconds -
MB: - right, fine, okay. When you want to write, you’re going to write, and when you’re going to write you’re going to write from the heart, and I mean from here, okay, so – once upon a time – Michael Barrett says, long story, [inaudible], and Robert [Robert Smith] listen to this, Robert listen to it, what’s the three best things that makes an international bestseller?
DR: You’ve already said that, yeah, we’ll, we’ll [inaudible] -
MB: Sex, religion, [inaudible] -
DR: Yeah, well, we’re not interested in that at the moment. I’m actually interested in what you wrote in the first part of the diary that you, what was your run in?
MB: What was my run in?
DR: Yes, ‘cause this piece, this deletion –
[Barrett and Rumbelow talk over one another during which Barrett appears to repeat the word ‘rendezvous’ a number of times]
DR: - so what was your run in? How did you get going? You didn’t just start on that page that we’ve actually got. What did you actually -
MB: - [inaudible], Baxendale report, Robert.
DR: We’re not, we’re not into Baxendale -
MB: - hang on, you’re not the Ripper -
DR: - [inaudible] -
MB: - he’s my publisher -
DR: - you come up here to answer [inaudible], you made yourself out as the author, we want to know what you actually put in as content, you know, a reasonable broad stroke -
MB: - what do you mean, what I put in the content?
DR: - before you run in to the text. What did you actually write?
[Barrett and Rumbelow talk over one another during which Barrett again appears to refer to the word ‘rendezvous’]
DR: There was a page you had to start with. What was page one?
MB: ‘Rendeyvous’ was the first opening word -
DR: - no, no, it’s not –
MF: - it’s hallway down the first page -
MB: - thank you very much, thanks for that, I’ve made a mistake -
DR: - no, you had to have a rendezvous.

I do hope that's cleared everything up for you all.

Ike

More great clarity from the master hoaxer.

[Iconoclast]

And according to Barrett's secret affidavit (for those who don't dismiss it out of hand) he states that the idea of the diary dates back to Devereux (and Devereux had Mike's copy of Tales of Liverpool, so that supports this claim) and he further states that the idea had been formulating for some time and that he had at the very least some rough notes or outline. Sounds like he's describing how many writers work. The idea formulates over many months.

With reference to Palmer's speculation above, Don Rumbelow actually asked Mike Barrett about his thoughts on the creative process at the infamous C&D Club interview. Rumbelow asks Mike about the mind of a professional writer. I remembered this moment reasonably vividly from my listening of the tape because Mike was unable to answer Rumbelow's questions and didn't appear to know what he was talking about which made me laugh. I noted Rumbelow's increasing exasperation at Mike's diversionary tactics and in the end Rumbelow gave up. I post the transcript below in case anyone would really like to understand the brilliant literary machinations that underpinned Mike Barrett's hoaxed diary of Jack the Ripper and which have so inspired Lord Algernon Orsam and his acolyte RJ Palmer.

DR: Mike, you say that you’re a professional writer, then – as a professional writer – you’ll know that one of the tricks of a professional writer is that it takes a writer a little time to get into the subject. Therefore, one of the pieces of advice you’re always given -
MB: [Inaudible] Can I ask you a question?
DR: Hang on, hang on. Is to, is to, is to delete the first paragraph or the first page. Now -
MB: - no, you don’t do that -
DR: - if you look at the dairy -
MB: - you don’t do that -
DR: - did you have a run in and – if so – did you delete, what did you actually delete?
MB: Okay, then, you want to know if I’m a writer?
DR: - no, I didn’t ask that, I asked what [inaudible] you deleted.
MB: - you said, you doubt my profession- -
KS: I said, no. I said -
MB: [Inaudible] my professionality [sic] -
DR: - I said you’re a professional writer -
MB: - right -
DR: - you told me you were -
MB: - okay, now -
DR: - so I’ve asked you, without running into [inaudible] -
MB: - you’ve asked me a question, right, can we, can we just forget the diary just for one second?
DR: - no, ‘cause that’s what -
MB: - no, just for one second, can we forget the diary?
DR: I’d rather not, I’d rather stay with it -
MB: - I’d prefer to forget the diary for sixty minutes, sixty seconds -
DR: - only on the understanding that we come back in sixty seconds -
MB: - right, fine, okay. When you want to write, you’re going to write, and when you’re going to write you’re going to write from the heart, and I mean from here, okay, so – once upon a time – Michael Barrett says, long story, [inaudible], and Robert [Robert Smith] listen to this, Robert listen to it, what’s the three best things that makes an international bestseller?
DR: You’ve already said that, yeah, we’ll, we’ll [inaudible] -
MB: Sex, religion, [inaudible] -
DR: Yeah, well, we’re not interested in that at the moment. I’m actually interested in what you wrote in the first part of the diary that you, what was your run in?
MB: What was my run in?
DR: Yes, ‘cause this piece, this deletion –
[Barrett and Rumbelow talk over one another during which Barrett appears to repeat the word ‘rendezvous’ a number of times]
DR: - so what was your run in? How did you get going? You didn’t just start on that page that we’ve actually got. What did you actually -
MB: - [inaudible], Baxendale report, Robert.
DR: We’re not, we’re not into Baxendale -
MB: - hang on, you’re not the Ripper -
DR: - [inaudible] -
MB: - he’s my publisher -
DR: - you come up here to answer [inaudible], you made yourself out as the author, we want to know what you actually put in as content, you know, a reasonable broad stroke -
MB: - what do you mean, what I put in the content?
DR: - before you run in to the text. What did you actually write?
[Barrett and Rumbelow talk over one another during which Barrett again appears to refer to the word ‘rendezvous’]
DR: There was a page you had to start with. What was page one?
MB: ‘Rendeyvous’ was the first opening word -
DR: - no, no, it’s not –
MF: - it’s hallway down the first page -
MB: - thank you very much, thanks for that, I’ve made a mistake -
DR: - no, you had to have a rendezvous.

I do hope that's cleared everything up for you all.

Ike

[caz]

I suppose the best way to get to the bottom of Marvin Pearl's business practices, and find out how the Browns could have been sent a small glass goldfish bowl if what they actually needed was a large robust carrier for Monty Brown, would be to contact Mr Pearl himself, and not trust anything claimed by the enfants terribles, or their furry sidekick.

Perhaps Palmer could then post his findings here, instead of having to hope against hope that Mr Pearl's position has been poorly interpreted, not only by that awful bit of skirt, Mrs Snips, but also by Kiefer Skinless and Jimmy Johnson & The Bandwagon.

Love,

Monty's Mum
X

[caz]

Imagine this, dear readers, because it's not a million miles away from what some have tried to make of Martin Earl's brief encounter with Michael Barrett...

Mr Brown phones Marvin Pearl of Pet Carriers, to ask if he has in stock a sturdy cat carrier. It will be for our larger-than-average, feisty feline called Monty, for his upcoming appointment with the vet, Rupurrt Pooh. Marvin says sorry, not at present, but as soon as one comes in he will let Mr Brown know.

After a couple of weeks Mr Brown gets the call he has been waiting for, and is told that the carrier is priced at £25 but can be sent to him on approval in time for Monty's dreaded appointment. No description is given, or more likely Mr Brown is only half listening at the time, as he is busy choosing tracks for his next show at Sid Valley Radio.

What can possibly go wrong with such a simple request?

Cutting a long shaggy dog story short, the parcel from Pet Carriers duly arrives but when Mr Brown opens it, the carrier is obviously too small so he says: "Oh sugar lumps", puts it towards the back of the hall cupboard and makes a mental note to drive to the next car boot sale up the road, where he finds just what the vet would have ordered, if Monty wouldn't.

A month after the appointment, Marvin Pearl phones again, asking for his £25, as Mr Brown has had the carrier long enough. "Oh sugar lumps!", says Mr Brown to Mrs Snips [that's me, that is]. "I clean forgot about it. Cheque please!" Before Mrs Snips obliges [and she is very obliging], she rummages in the hall cupboard and lifts out the small goldfish bowl that her idiot husband was sent weeks ago by some idiot from Pet Carriers.

But of course, the intention was obviously to provide Monty with the most suitable vehicle in which to transport him to Rupurrt Pooh. It was all just lost in translation. Could have happened to anyone.

Love,

Mrs Snips
X

[caz]

Once again, Ike, I have to wonder why Mike would have named one of his hoaxing co-conspirators - albeit the dead one - as the person who gave him the diary.

It must have been obvious to him that Tony Devereux and his surviving friends and family members would be the first line of enquiry to help establish a provenance, and sure enough that came to pass, with Shirley eager to make contact as soon as possible to establish what they could tell her.

The only 100% foolproof way of knowing that nothing incriminating could come from that direction was if Devereux had been in the "no effing bugger alive" category, never knowing of any such diary's existence, either in physical form or the planning stages. That would not have been the case if Devereux had been in on the whole hoaxing caper, because the Barretts would have been risking everything right from the start if he had let just one word about it slip out, for instance during Janet's visit in January 1991, when she asked to borrow Tales of Liverpool: "Take it, lass, it's a good read. But bring it back on the weekend, like, because it belongs to Bongo and he might need it again for his research into whether Jack the Ripper could have been a Scouser, and what 'ave yer."

Should Janet Devereux not also be under suspicion, for having expressed an interest in a 'Maybrick' book, a year and a bit before Mike called Doreen about his diary?

Apparently, that's all it takes to see through a Maybrick hoaxer.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

Let me make a prediction at this point, Caz. Your very telling question (above) is deeply awkward if you believe the man was telling the truth, the whole truth, and what have you so I suspect that your question will either be totally ignored or else someone will claim that he had the diary but he didn't give it to Gray because he wanted to keep him dangling so that he had a bit of company during the long, pissed-up days of the mid-nineteen nineties.

Watch this space ...

What I'd like to know, Ike, is precisely when Mike is meant to have gone round to Anne's new home, a few days or weeks before January 1995, eagerly clutching his 'ProFF' in the form of the little red 'DAirRY', which he is ready to sacrifice in exchange for a fumble on the kitchen table. What [or should that be who?] came first, I wonder? Pass the parcel or hide the sausage? Their divorce came through on 7th December 1994, and just five days later Alan Gray was recording his latest visit to Mike, who was at the Liverpool Royal Infirmary, being treated for a severed artery, which he had sustained while attempting to break into Anne's new home. He must have been fuming at how easily a man who had always worn the trousers had been conned out of his 'ProFF' by a bit of skirt.

But more to the point, the 'skirt' must have really, really wanted that red diary, mustn't she? What kind of abused wife, who was divorcing her husband, would be prepared for one final bit of how's yer father, just to get her hands on a tiny 1891 diary, which she doesn't destroy but freely hands over to a researcher she has had relatively little to do with up until then, along with all the information needed to trace the purchase back to March 1992, when Mike first phoned Martin Earl.

If Mike was as mad as a box of frogs, he was painting his ex wife as certifiable - and people still believe him!

Love,

Caz
X

[Iconoclast]

And according to Barrett's secret affidavit (for those who don't dismiss it out of hand) he states that the idea of the diary dates back to Devereux (and Devereux had Mike's copy of Tales of Liverpool, so that supports this claim) and he further states that the idea had been formulating for some time and that he had at the very least some rough notes or outline. Sounds like he's describing how many writers work. The idea formulates over many months.

If you ever wonder why I keep at this, year after year, facing the opprobrium of the many, then please digest the pieced-together logic above. There's absolutely nothing evidential in it whatsoever. A bloke in Liverpool helps another bloke in Liverpool with a bit of shopping or whatever and possibly loans the housebound lad a book about Liverpool murders because he's got it and they both come from Liverpool. It's not exactly damning, is it? Compared with - say - the October 10, 1888, Diego Laurenz postcard to the Liverpool Echo, for example? Liverpool bloke possibly loans Liverpool bloke book about Liverpool murders set against Liverpool bloke sends postcard denying some act in Dublin had been Jack the Ripper's and signing off Diego (James) Laurenz (Florence). But despite the disparity in weight of these two events, Palmer and Orsam fixate on the implausibly inoffensive loaning of a book to a housebound mate and conveniently ignore the rather more telling evidence in the case which would point them firmly in the direction ofJames Maybrick. Does this seem fair and balanced to you, dear readers?

From Mike's years publishing public interest stories for Celebrity magazine, Mike would have had a good idea that a diary from Jack the Ripper would need to be at least 20 pages to achieve the big payday he so obviously wanted.

This is classic diversion tactics. The use of 'years' is designed to imply Mike Barrett was a seasoned hack when he patently wasn't. The use of 'publishing' is designed to imply that Mike Barrett was central to his cheap articles making it into print when he patently wasn't. The use of 'public interest' is intended to raise the substance of his lightweight so-called celebrity discussions to the level of Pulitzer material when it patently wasn't. And all of these intensive years grinding away at sixteen articles (wow - an average of four a year, what a professional!) is apparently all it takes to quantify how many blank pages one would need to write a hoaxed confessional of Jack the Ripper when it patently isn't.

This is why I do not go away and have no intention of ever going away until the truth is resolved. I do it for you, dear readers. And I do it for Truth. So sue me.

[Iconoclast]

You seem to keep forgetting that the diary was a literary hoax, Ike.

Fire over the incontrovertible facts which prove it, then. You and Orsam have failed miserably in your attempts to do this these last few years. Please don't just rinse and repeat the unproven stuff, nor the "one-off instance" stuff which has yet to be categorically proven. Ah, but then you're left with nothing bar your prejudices and that's not evidence. And Caz 'admitting' to a literary hoax is hardly groundbreaking given that she's been saying it for years - but I still don't think you get to call it 'admitting' because that implies something which is self-evident has finally been agreed by someone when nothing has been self-evidently proven (bar your prejudices in this case).

And according to Barrett's secret affidavit (for those who don't dismiss it out of hand) he states that the idea of the diary dates back to Devereux (and Devereux had Mike's copy of Tales of Liverpool, so that supports this claim) and he further states that the idea had been formulating for some time and that he had at the very least some rough notes or outline. Sounds like he's describing how many writers work. The idea formulates over many months.

Making stuff up like this does not make an argument stick. Barrett made it up and here you are 30 years later citing it as God-given truth and desperately seeking inferences which are not givens to bolster the fragile framework of your suppositions. Others may not see it, but I see it clearly, every time you choose to take this tack to shift innocent events into the realms of the devious and nefarious.

From Mike's years publishing public interest stories for Celebrity magazine, Mike would have had a good idea that a diary from Jack the Ripper would need to be at least 20 pages to achieve the big payday he so obviously wanted.

It sounds really good, doesn't it? Mike Barrett publishing, and not just publishing but public-interest stories. The reality is - as well you know - far far too facile for you to make a proper argument out of it, but that doesn't stop you.

I must really go now.

But you won't go because you know you have failed miserably to make a winning argument.

I give it an hour ...