Was Bond right about the cut linen?

[j.r-ahde]

Hello Fisherman!

Obviously we have made the same conclusion from a different angle;

MJK was the peak of Saucy Jacky!


My angle is; unlike the others, she was young, attractive, etc... Maybe he had also heard about her reputation of being good in self-defence and got an extra kick out of it too!

Also I don't find her being a lefty that impossible, thinking about the injuries on her left arm!

All the best
Jukka

[Fisherman]

Hi Jukka!

"Why would have Saucy Jacky wanted to use the sheet to cover the cuts?"

My take on it was that he wanted the cuts to cover the face, before he could stomach looking at it. He was - to my mind - closely aquainted to Kelly, and his motive for killing her was radically different than the motives for the preceding cases (where the motive lay in the killing itself) - once again to my mind, of course!

The best!
Fisherman

[j.r-ahde]

Hello Fisherman!

Your suggestion makes sense in the way, that "Murder! Oh murder!" has been described as a faint cry!

But the thing I find fishy( ), is:

Why would have Saucy Jacky wanted to use the sheet to cover the cuts?!

All the best
Jukka

[Fisherman]

Hi Harry!

Your suggestion is something I have seen before. I think that it must be challenged in at least two ways:
1. Kelly was lying on the sheet that we are speaking about. That means that it would have been a question of reaching behind herself in order to grab hold of the sheet if she was right-handed and did it with that hand. It would also mean that she would have grabbed the sheet with the back of her hand facing the sheet - an awkward thing to do.
Of course, she may have used her left hand, letting it travel over her body to grab hold of the sheet, and then pulling it over herself. It cannot be excluded as a possibility, but I think that both these suggestions are kind of awkward.
2. The sheet was "much cut" after the strike. That means that a large number of cuts were made through it - reasonably, many enough to correspond with the damage done to her face. Now, if the sheet simply fell back over her face as you suggest, it would have been distinctly difficult to cut through, since cloth needs a bit of a stretch to facilitate cutting through it. What I am suggesting is that the killer did not only put the cloth over her face - he kept it in place as he cut, and the combination of Kelly lying on it and him stretching it over her face, was what made him able to cut through it with ease. If he had not held it, it would reasonably have fallen from her face with the strokes of the blade.

Anybody who thinks this over will soon enough realize that no matter if he was standing at the side of the bed or if he was straddling her, such a thing would be easiest to do for a left-handed person, grabbing the fabric with his right hand and pulling it over her face first, only thereafter to cut with his left hand. But it may just as well have been done the other way around - he may have leant in over her, grabbed the sheet with his LEFT hand, pulled it over her, and arched his left arm over her head, cutting with his right.

The best!
Fisherman

[harry]

If Kelly had woken to find someone near or on the bed,she might instinctively had raised herslf from a prone position,at the same time holding the sheet up but slightly away from her body.A futile but fear driven attempt to put a barrier between them So the killer would have initialy struck through the sheet at the face or throat,and the sheet would have fallen back over the face .Hence the cuts and the blood on the sheet,which was then removed for further mutilation.

[Fisherman]

Hi Richard!

Well, to be honest, my scenario does not involve the sheet in any suffocation. My proposal is that he may well have partly suffocated her, but not using the sheet, though. After that he would have cut her throat in the top left hand corner of the bed, resulting in the blood-splashes on the partition wall. This is followed by his lifting her into position for cutting and eviscerating her, and only then, as he sets about cutting her face, does he lift the sheet up over her. My suggestion is that this was done because he had a personal relation to Kelly, and found it hard to destroy her face.
But just like you say, Richard, the "Donīt knows" about are plentyful indeed...!

Thanks for chiming in, Richard! And all the best!
Fisherman

[richardnunweek]

Hi,
Must agree with you fisherman, my interpretation was her killer attacked Mary whilst she was sitting on the edge of the bed at a split moment she was facing away from him.
He placed his right hand over her mouth, and pushed her down on the bed, and using his left hand pulled up the sheet nearest the partition and partly suffocated her before using his knive.
Naturally just speculation, there are just two many 'Dont knows' here.
Regards Richard.

[Fisherman]

Sam writes:
" I think that Bond noticed knife-cuts in the blood-soaked undersheet at the top right-hand corner of the bed, and misinterpreted what he saw."

Sam, I canīt for the life of me understand why it would lead Bond to a misinterpretation if the cuts were in the undersheet? It was the only sheet apparently around in the scenery that the Ripper left us with. Kelly was lying on it, and in the area between her head and the partition wall, it was much bloodsoaked and cut. Bondīs contention was that the cuts owed to the Ripper having pulled the sheet over Kellys face as he cut it. From that statement we can deduce that the cuts were NOT in the area immediately next to Kellys head, but instead some distance away - so far away, in fact, that if one lifted the sheet in the top corned closest to the wall and pulled it back over Kelly, then the cut area would end up over her face.
The corresponding distance in this case would have been one of the two pointers Bond used to make his statement.
The other one would have been that the mattress underneath the cut area of the undersheet was NOT cut in a fashion that corresponded with the cuts in the sheet. In fact, it was probably not cut there at all.
Neither of these points are pressed in Bondīs report, but logically they must have been what led him to his deduction. Even if - and I donīt recommend it! - we allow ourselves to theorize that a man of Bonds experience for some reason did not check the mattress for corresponding cuts, we are still left with the fact that the cuts in the sheet would NOT let themselves be interpreted as having been made when the sheet was over Kellys face UNLESS the distance between her head and the cut area matched. And if they did, then the cut area would have been positioned a fair distance from Kellys face. As she lay on the sheet, and as the killer must have wrapped it over her, it goes without saying that the area close to her head would have gone undamaged by the blade. Accepting that the diametre of a female head is roughly about 20 centimetres, we are faced with a probable distance between head and sheet cuts of about 20-25 centimetres. And when we find a woman lying with a carved-up face in a bed, plus an undersheet that is undamaged (as far as we know) at the part close to her head, whereas it is much cut and bloodied at an area some 20-25 centimetres to the the side of her - and ONLY to the one side, mind you! - then I think it is about time to give Bond recognition for what he deducted.

In your reasoning, Sam - and I am a very big fan of your reasoning in very nearly all cases - I see no rational explanation to WHY you choose to regard Bonds deduction as a tediously repeated obvious mistake. I only see a preconceived wiew that a killer would not do a thing like this. And that is going about it the wrong way altogether, if you take my meaning. Although it is very unprobable that Mother Teresa would burn her own church down, when you find her standing beside the smoking ruins with a used match in her hand it is OK - and wise - to look for alternative scenarios. But it is not OK to say that since it would be totally unexpected for her to do such a thing, she simply must be innocent.

The best,
Fisherman

[Sam Flynn]

It seems to me that you think that the act of putting the sheet over Kellys face would have been so strange a thing to do since he did not hesitate to turn her into such a mess as he did, that this means that Bond could not possibly have been right.

Not at all, Fish. I think that Bond noticed knife-cuts in the blood-soaked undersheet at the top right-hand corner of the bed, and misinterpreted what he saw.

[Fisherman]

I donīt misunderstand you at all, Sam! I know fully well that this is your wiew of things. I merely pointed out that your answer was an answer to another question than the one I had put to you.
I am a little bit uncertain as to which part you identify as the hen and which you name the egg, though. It seems to me that you think that the act of putting the sheet over Kellys face would have been so strange a thing to do since he did not hesitate to turn her into such a mess as he did, that this means that Bond could not possibly have been right.
I read the evidence the other way around - Bonds words - to my mind - urge us to accept that the sheet was over her face as it got cut, and therefore I think it is to do things backwards to start with the suggestion that the Ripper would never have done such a thing as Bond suggested.

But misunderstand you, Sam, I do not - you leave little room for such things - and more.

The best,
Fisherman
(who is off to bed presently - I bid you a good nightīs sleep, Sir!)

[Sam Flynn]

"I do, Fish - simply that Dr Thomas "Sherlock" Bond had a vivid imagination and took speculation too far. "

With all respect, Sam, that is no alternative explanation to why the killer would put the sheet over Kellys face if it was not to avoid seeing it as he cut away.

You seem to misunderstand me, Fish. I strongly believe that there was no sheet over her face - at any point - during her murder.

[Fisherman]

Sam writes:

"I do, Fish - simply that Dr Thomas "Sherlock" Bond had a vivid imagination and took speculation too far. "

With all respect, Sam, that is no alternative explanation to why the killer would put the sheet over Kellys face if it was not to avoid seeing it as he cut away. And the "vivid imagination" of Bondīs is something that is of no interest at all if he did check the mattress for corresponding cuts - and I really think he did do just that.

"why does he then go on to make such a god-awful mess of the rest of her, without feeling the need to cover her up as he went along? Why, indeed, does he bother putting the bedsheet back down again?"

Once again, the facial features would be the ones most needed to cover if he had a problem to cut her that he needed to overcome. And once the face was cut beyond recognition, using the sheet as a cover, the problem of looking into her face would be a problem lost - for there was no longer any face to look at.

The best, Sam!
Fisherman

[Sam Flynn]

Apart from him having a very bad relation with that sheet, I fail to see any alternatives. Perhaps you do, though?

I do, Fish - simply that Dr Thomas "Sherlock" Bond had a vivid imagination and took speculation too far. He did, after all, pen one of the earliest "profiles" of a killer. Full credit to Bond's efforts in this regard - not only for the "profile" itself, but also for giving us a little insight into his own psychology.

[Sam Flynn]

This all, Sam, works from the presumption tat he first pulled the sheet, and then started cutting. My take on it is that he first cut her throat, and only thereafter pulled the sheet over her face and cut it.

... but why does he then go on to make such a god-awful mess of the rest of her, without feeling the need to cover her up as he went along? Why, indeed, does he bother putting the bedsheet back down again?

[Fisherman]

Sam writes:

"without resorting to the dubious premise that covering a face is in any way indicative of a connection between killer and victim"

Just how "dubious" is it, Sam? If he DID cover her face, what other alternative reasons can we come up with, but the one that he knew her? There would not spurt any blood from the face onto him.

Apart from him having a very bad relation with that sheet, I fail to see any alternatives. Perhaps you do, though?

The best,
Fisherman