Did jack kill liz stride?

[Michael W Richards]

All proven prostitutes, all seem to not have had theft as a motive, all had broken relationships, all were women, very very few cut throats for women in this time period, all circumstances for each murder seem to have been different... all... enough for me to lean to JTR.

Mike

Only 2 cases have "evidence" that solicitation was involved the night they were murdered, the "evidence" being witness testimony...its only clear that 2 women had items other than organs taken from them, one some cloth from her apron, and the other some rings, we have no way of knowing if theft was involved in at least 2 of the others, we can only guesstimate what money or valuables they may or may not have had....the fact that they were all women is no surprise, considering the time of day and the fact that only 1 woman had a bed to sleep in without paying for it that night....during that same Fall of Terror I know of 3 additional throat slittings, 2 suicides and one on the night of the so-called Double Event, I also know of several reports of men with knives accosting women throughout this period, before, and after, its misleading to suggest that violent acts with knives were not common, they were in fact the most common weapon used among the cases tried at the Old bailey over the preceding years...throat slitting wasnt rare, slitting them twice was...I dont know what you intended by citing different circumstances, why not cite the different weapons used or the wounds made?

You lean because you feel its the right call...not because there is hard factual evidence that supports your "hunch" Mike. Thats partly my earlier point.

Cheers

[Michael W Richards]

Hello Michael. Proven? Well, very good evidence for Polly and Annie.

Theft? Annie did have her rings stolen.

Different circumstances? Polly and Annie all but said what they were about and both were severely impaired.

Cheers.
LC

Agreed on point 1, theft cannot be seriously put forward as a motive for the murder of Annie Chapman, the one Canonical the medical authority was confident enough to declare was killed so her killer could acquire what he took.

Polly and Annie Lynn, as you well know, are the ONLY 2 Canonical Victims that could be "grouped" by their killers traits. Considering the brief lapse of time between the murders and the choice for a more private venue in the second case, they seem to be sequential.

Cheers mate

[Michael W Richards]

[I]

What about…
5. The victims were all prostitutes
6. They were all killed late at night or very early in the morning – when most people were asleep.

Clearly........with virtual certainty,....one can see that no single killer killed all the victims within that file,... more than 11.

These 11?
Smith
Tabram
Nichols
Chapman
Stride
Eddowes
Kelly
Mylett
Mackenzie
Pinchin Street
Coles
I can see all being by one hand – although equally I may excluded one or two.

5. The women were a mixture of Unfortunates and Prostitutes, and we have the word of witnesses in the cases of Polly and Annie that they were indeed soliciting that last night. We do not have that kind of evidence for Liz, Kate or Mary Jane. Although guesswork seems to be going trend on this.
6. Unfortunates have no place to sleep unless they pay for it that same night. So they are homeless, and out on the streets at night. Why that time of day should be no mystery really.

Emma...attacked by multiple assailants, no throat slit
Martha....killed with 2 weapons, one used only once.
Alice is the only murder after the Fall of Terror that resembles a "Ripper" killing, and that opinion seems to have been shared by the authorities.

As for the torso, you will note that there are several cases of Torso's being found over a few year period, it would appear that the unique nature of that crime and the infrequent appearances of bodies would suggest that one person was responsible for them. With 1 killer there is a limit to the prime opportunities that he is seeking to acquire his prey, with multiple killers acting independently, there will be multiple opportunities.

Here is my personal take on killers....People kill for different reasons. Those individual People also kill people in different ways, sometimes using different weapons. But all killers who continue to kill are killing for the same reason...sometimes in futility. Because in many cases it is to recapture the feeling. One that can only be felt to its maximum one time. The first time. When the consequences are still unknown.

In these cases we only see 2 murders that the medical authorities were confident to state were linked by their killer, and in the second case, they even cited the motive they believed the killer had for killing the woman. Thats powerful...and often underestimated.

Why was Liz Stride killed....can anyone say? Its easy to speculate about interruptions that are not present in any evidence, or to discard the education we have regarding the man who killed Polly and Annie. Its easy to imagine a blood thirsty killer acting out his rage in a second murder for his inability to fulfill his desires in his first kill of the evening. Why do you think Dear Boss was written? To capitalize on those same assumptions. To use those fears to the authors own advantage,... in this case to sell more newspapers.

Isnt it possible that someone sinister used those same assumptions and fears to elude suspicions...to misdirect the ensuing investigations?

This is strictly hypothetical....but if for example a high ranking spy was discovered as having killed one or more of these women, someone who had worked against and for the government, someone who could reveal many things about how the government mishandled money and agents, things the government had no intention of making public...ever....what if one or more of the killings involved some of his anti government activities, covering up some tracks or silencing some loose cannons...think Parnell....would the police take the man into custody, hold him without a trial, then perhaps institutionalize him..and never reveal what they had done and who this man was?

Monro had some interesting comments about the cases and the impact the truth would have had on the powers that be. And he is arguably the most secretive of all the secret agent types involved with these cases....and there is a bunch of them. Guys focused on anti-terrorism and International espionage.

Again, I dont espouse this fiction as the solution, I only use it to demonstrate that there could be explanations for these things that need not involve a mad-blood-thirsty-ex-medically-trained-gutter-dweller killing 5 women in different fashion, with different knives.

Cheers

[lynn cates]

sharp reply

Hello Edward. Well, your #3 is solid enough. I'll never deny the fact that a knife was involved in each murder.

Cheers.
LC

[Lechmere]

Mixture of unfortunates and prostitutes? Was there a difference?
The police regarded them all as prostitutes. I will go with their opinion.

The significance of the time the crimes were committed wasn’t a commentary of the victim’s circumstance – more of an indicator that the perpetrator was the same person.

You are assuming a similar MO at all times.
I would not necessarily make that assumption.
No one has any real idea what type of knife was used for any of the murders.

(Lynn - it wasn't my 3rd but I'll go with it - even if it was missing with Mylett)

[lynn cates]

theft

Hello Mike. Thanks.

No, theft was not a motive--in my humble opinion.

Cheers.
LC

[Nick Spring]

In my humble opinion I think Stride was a victim of the Whitechapel murderer.

Strides murder gets clouded with all sorts of issues and questions, which yes are all valid.

However murder was not common in the East End at that time.

It's just too much of a coincidence that 2 murders happened within an hour of each other.

It just fits.

Nick

[Michael W Richards]

The fact that the Police referred to any of the victims other than Mary Jane or Polly as Prostitutes is a generalization, and not necessarily accurate.

Only Polly and Mary seem to have relied on Prostitution as a sole source of income, ...Liz, Kate and Annie could fairly have been referred to as Unfortunates, as we have evidence that they earned funds in other ways. Unfortunates need not be on the streets nightly, Prostitutes...particularly ones with a fondness for drink, surely did.

Thats one reason to question Strides being out that night....she was sober, although she liked her drinks it appears, and she left her dwelling with enough money to pay for her bed. So..unlike Polly, she wasnt forced to return to the streets to find more money because she drank her bed money away a few times.

Cheers

[Wickerman]

A woman who hawkes trinkets by day but sells herself at night, is still a prostitute. A woman who chars by day but walks the streets by night, is still a prostitute. It does not matter if she has another source of income, in fact many, perhaps most, streetwalkers in the LVP had day jobs that didn't pay well enough. Therefore supplementing their income by walking the streets was common.

[The Good Michael]

A woman who hawkes trinkets by day but sells herself at night, is still a prostitute. A woman who chars by day but walks the streets by night, is still a prostitute.

Not in fairy tales and romance. Say it ain't so!

Mike

[c.d.]

Whether these women were prostitutes or unfortunates is a question of semantics. Prostitute or unfortunate, they were willing to go off to a dark, secluded spot with a man they had never met before and engage in sexual activity.

c.d.

[Wickerman]

As 'unfortunate' was the Victorian PC term for a prostitute, I'm not sure what is being suggested here.

[El White Chap]

Hardship, poverty and desperation more often than not will force people to sometimes have to do things that they otherwise wouldn't do out of their own free will.

Very easy for any of us to point the finger and label them as x,y or z without actually possessing the ability to understand that life, the choices available, or indeed having been in a similar position of being "an unfortunate" before.
We must remember that the vast majority of women in the east end during the time of the Whitechapel Murders didn't even have a place to call their own and would be glad just to have enough money to pay to lean against a rope upright with dozens of others strangers just to get a few hours kip.

If an individual has been 'forced' into a certain lifestyle, let's say for example, someone who is a victim of sex trafficking, does that make them a prostitue or sex worker? It's easy to paint life in just black and white when there are also mid tones of grey in-between.

[c.d.]

As 'unfortunate' was the Victorian PC term for a prostitute, I'm not sure what is being suggested here.

Hello Wickerman,

Apparently Jack only killed prostitutes not unfortunates. Therefore, if you can somehow show that Stride was an unfortunate rather than a prostitute, she could not have been a Ripper victim. Of course the obvious fly in the ointment here is that Jack was somehow capable of making that distinction.

c.d.

[c.d.]

Hello El White Chap,

No one here is giving lectures on morality or condemning these women for the choices they made. The bottom line is that they ended up dead because of the choice they made. Why they made that choice and whether they were forced to do so is pretty much irrelevant.

c.d.