Mary Kellys cadaver would not be out of place....

Youre the bold sections Sam....I thought that fitting..

So the excision of eight or so organs counts for nothing, Mike?.....Not at all, but he only kept one. The rest were placed about Mary Jane. There can be no reasonable claim that suggests any of the organs that he left behind had the same significance to him as the single organ that he takes with him. And that coveted organ was a gender neutral one. I believe Jack killed women for a reason, beyond the most obvious in terms of likely prey. There were derelict men around too....he could have slit a few of those. He didnt apparently, and that is important I feel.

We have no idea what his "objectives" were at any part in the series........You may not Sam, but I tend to believe and the physicians comments support a belief that his objective with the first 2 killings was to acquire what he did only on the second try. It was suggested that the extraction of said organ was likely the reason itself for the kill. You may not like or agree with that aspect of these cases, but your argument, as youve rightly pointed out in your own way, is with the men who made the statements, not with my use of them.

There's nothing quite like time-pressure to focus the mind........only if its a mind that knows what it wants in the first place.

Possibly, but he'd have been somewhat desensitized if he was the same person who inflicted the entirely spurious facial wounds on Catherine Eddowes........I suppose that might be true, however even Kates terrible wounds pale in comparison to what was done in room 13. Besides,....I dont believe the man that killed Kate killed Mary Jane, so I have no conflicts there.

Cheers Samuel

[richardnunweek]

Hi,
I am amazed that the perpretrator of kellys murder, even managed to reach the end of Dorset street after that bloodbath, he must have been a raving lunatic, who would have almost certainly had given himself away, not only in the amount of bloodstains, but his overall manner.
He must have had a means of escape which would have involved someones help, or at the very least a place of safety close by.
That is of course if JTR , was kellys killer, but if the murder involved a copycat killing, and the intention was to blame the former for the ghastly deed, then he could have been as sane as you or I, and the violence was simply done for self presevation , not from an act of madness.
Regards Richard.

[Sam Flynn]

I think if anything her mutilation shows us a man without an objective beyond cutting.....

So the excision of eight or so organs counts for nothing, Mike?

Jack the Ripper showed different objectives at the start of this alleged series...

We have no idea what his "objectives" were at any part in the series.

a focus even....

There's nothing quite like time-pressure to focus the mind.

Might have even shocked himself that he could do that.

Possibly, but he'd have been somewhat desensitized if he was the same person who inflicted the entirely spurious facial wounds on Catherine Eddowes.

Michael,

I see your point very clearly. People who are sane do strange things under stress. I guess my point is that this was more than just preserving freedom Michael. This was more along the lines of exploration, both of the body and of limits (if that makes sense). This particular scene does not strike me as a sane man covering his tracks, nor does it strike me as a medical student checking out the body. That is not the feeling I get from it at all. It feels infinitely more like someone interested in what is in there for a completely different reason than medical study.

P.S. I realize that what happened to MJK occurred after she was dead, but that does not make the occurrence any less atrocious (to my p.o.v. anyway).

Thank you, Michael.

Hey D,

My take on this scene is that the man who cut Mary up was transfixed by the experience of doing so.....lost, if you will. He does things to the corpse that seem only to satisfy some curiosity...like how would the thigh look without flesh on it....maybe he liked the curious look of that leg....bone leading to supple calf of a once attractive woman. The placement of extracted items.

I think if anything her mutilation shows us a man without an objective beyond cutting......Jack the Ripper showed different objectives at the start of this alleged series...a focus even....the killer in room 13... to me... was trying to deface her corpse and got lost while doing so.

Might have even shocked himself that he could do that.

Cheers again D

[dmann30]

Michael,

I see your point very clearly. People who are sane do strange things under stress. I guess my point is that this was more than just preserving freedom Michael. This was more along the lines of exploration, both of the body and of limits (if that makes sense). This particular scene does not strike me as a sane man covering his tracks, nor does it strike me as a medical student checking out the body. That is not the feeling I get from it at all. It feels infinitely more like someone interested in what is in there for a completely different reason than medical study.

P.S. I realize that what happened to MJK occurred after she was dead, but that does not make the occurrence any less atrocious (to my p.o.v. anyway).

Thank you, Michael.

Michael,

I would like to be sure I understand that you do not believe the person who did that to MJK was at the very least a little bit not right in his head? That if you or I were a butcher, one of us would just feel like going into someone's room and performing those atrocities? I do not agree that the person who did this was completely insane - there was something resembling method to the madness - but honestly Michael, I am not buying that he was sane either, IMO of course.

Hi dmann,

Sadly we have history to show us that many killers did what they did after the murder itself as a means of preserving their freedom.

I think of a man in Toronto a few years back who wanted to rape a small girl, and when he acted on that impulse, he then felt compelled to cut her into pieces and put the parts duffel bags.. so he could dispose of the remains without exposing himself to being caught.

Mary was cut to pieces after she was murdered...her killer may have only slashed at her a bit then slit her throat to accomplish her murder, so perhaps everything that makes people sick by merely looking at the pictures of Mary Jane was done to a dead woman...which at that point in time, isnt far removed from the types of things med students did and still do to cadavers.

Could a sane man who killed in a moment of anger do that afterwards? Do killers cut up and bury murder victims? Do they pour acid on the bodies? Do they cut off fingers so there can be no fingerprints to check? Do they pull out the teeth of a dead woman they said they once loved for the same reason?

We both know all those answers are yes.

Cheers dmann

[dmann30]

Michael,

I would like to be sure I understand that you do not believe the person who did that to MJK was at the very least a little bit not right in his head? That if you or I were a butcher, one of us would just feel like going into someone's room and performing those atrocities? I do not agree that the person who did this was completely insane - there was something resembling method to the madness - but honestly Michael, I am not buying that he was sane either, IMO of course.

[Sam Flynn]

I would think that since the American doctor was refused his samples by legitimate sources he might have to resort to less than legitimate ones.

But that's making one huge leap of faith, Mike - anyone purporting to procure said organs would have been taking an enormous risk by getting a presumably desperate-for-cash loony to do his dirty work for him in such an extravagant manner.

Even if Baxter's story were true, the anonymous American's request was made quite some time before the Ripper murders - if it ever happened, that is, and I have some niggling doubts that it did. All that aside, it remains a fact that there were far less dangerous ways of securing samples of said organ than cutting women open in the public streets.

The whole idea is preposterous. And so saying, it's back into my imaginary Tardis I go, to kick Wynne Baxter's irresponsible arse once again.

The salient point is that the publicity did. How was the average man in the street going to know about about this (alleged) approach by that American quack otherwise?

Hi Sam,

I would think that since the American doctor was refused his samples by legitimate sources he might have to resort to less than legitimate ones. The streets were full of men that could acquire things, some that acquired them at the point of a knife.

Cheers Sam

[Sam Flynn]

Yes Sam, the idea to link the Ripper event and the incident came after the killing...

The salient point is that the publicity did. How was the average man in the street going to know about about this (alleged) approach by that American quack otherwise?

[Paddy Goose]

the stump of the uterus left behind was only 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch.....taking the kidney might have been to throw off the hunters.

I feel a good urp coming on. A real technicolor urp. For dinner we had turkey tettrazini, green peas, sweet potatoes and fresh garden salad.

Paddy

As I've said umpteen times before, the £20 "Uterus Monthly" idea didn't come to light until AFTER Annie was killed, owing to that irresponsible twonk Wynne Baxter spouting his ludicrous theory in full earshot of the press.

Yes Sam, the idea to link the Ripper event and the incident came after the killing....but the actual incident itself took place before the killings, so the premise of an offer to buy uteri as a possible catayst for killing Annie wasnt just Baxters cwazy thinkin.... there was a real story that predated the killings to establish a foundation for that "idea".

And despite the fact that you hate the Burking idea for any of the Ripper killings, or that the real Ripper series might actually be confined to only the victims that share the above motivation for the murders itself....both are still very possible scenarios using only the existing evidence.

We have the medical opinions that the obtaining of a uterus was a possible motivation for only the murders of Mary Ann Nichols and Annie Chapman, and we have a verified story that a Teaching Hospital in the area was approached in 1887 by an American Doctor seeking samples of uteri to accompany his research papers back to the US, willing to pay the extraordinary figure of 20L per sample.

Kate Eddowes may have been killed for the same reason, the stump of the uterus left behind was only 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch.....taking the kidney might have been to throw off the hunters.

Cheers Sam

[Sam Flynn]

In the case of Annies killer Chris, whose to say he didnt make himself 20L for his troubles.

As I've said umpteen times before, the £20 "Uterus Monthly" idea didn't come to light until AFTER Annie was killed, owing to that irresponsible twonk Wynne Baxter spouting his ludicrous theory in full earshot of the press.

As I have said before, where's the thrill if you do it as your day job?

Chris

In the case of Annies killer Chris, whose to say he didnt make himself 20L for his troubles,.....quite a bit of Victorian era dosh.

All the best Chris.

[ChrisGeorge]

Oh, I don't like the "madman" cop-out either, Mike. It's just that, in this case, it's not a cop-out at all. Few, if any, ripper-type murderers - either before 1888 or since - have had any connection with what might loosely be called "the anatomical trades".

As I have said before, where's the thrill if you do it as your day job?

Chris