Was Mackenzie a copycat?

[GregBaron]

Multiple copiers...

Hi Greg
I've always been somewhat confused whenever some uses the term copycat when it comes to murder. Does it mean copycat in that someone thought the previous murders were "cool" and wanted to try it and therefore it seems similar or does it mean they had a total different motivation for killing and they tried to make it look like the previous murderers work to throw off suspicion? Which do you have in mind?

Actually Abby, your point is a good one. In fact both of your methods are part of the equation as is a third.

I remember reading some time ago about an Island where suicide became endemic among teenagers after one broke the ice! A very strange phenomenon.

Ted Bundy copied one of his heroes by executing a double murder in a single day. A copycat because he thought it was cool.

We all know of the type of throwing suspicion on another as RivkahChaya has delineated. The thread refers to this latter type although it could also be for the cool factor. How sick!


Greg

[DVV]

I remember having read (but can't remember where), concerning this murder, that it seemed the work of a "debilitated" ripper.
And that's how I see it.

It was he, but his heart wasn't in it.

[lynn cates]

Have a heart.

Hello David. Not the missing heart again? (heh-heh)

Cheers.
LC

[Stephen Thomas]

I've yet to see a convincing argument against her being a Ripper victim.

Try the likelihood that the authorities knew perfectly well that JTR was under lock and key or dead before McKenzie was murdered.

[Bridewell]

If Coles had been ripped to pieces Sadler would still likely have come under police suspicion due to his actions on the night of the murder. After all, they did try to fit him with the others despite the lack of abdominal mutilations on Coles.

They clutched at straws and hoped that Sadler would be identified as the killer. I think that's somewhat less than a fit-up.

[Bridewell]

To answer Greg's question : no, I don't think it was a copycat.
Imo she's a Ripper-victim.

By 'she' do you mean McKenzie or Coles?

[Bridewell]

Wow, DVV, you're a bold man...bye bye Druitt, Cohen, Tumblety...
who else? I think Koz was still walking the dog....?

Greg

It would be bye-bye William Bury too of course, alibi'd by his own execution.

[Bridewell]

[B]

It is, to my mind, a good reason to treat all the murders as individual crimes and then see how many WE would compile into the work of a single hand.

Phil

I agree. That's the way it should be done.

[Bridewell]

Try the likelihood that the authorities knew perfectly well that JTR was under lock and key or dead before McKenzie was murdered.

Was not Lawende used as an ID witness at a date subsequent to McKenzie's death? What would that be in aid of if the authorities knew perfectly well that JtR was under lock and key or dead?

[Michael W Richards]

The death of Alice Mackenzie suggests that there were at least 2 men who were capable of doing acts like these living in London in late 1888..unless her killer arrives sometime between Jacks run and her murder,... and the Police reaction to it proves that in the Spring of 1889 the Police did not know the identity of the man who killed in that same fashion that previous Fall.

Cheers

[Hunter]

They clutched at straws and hoped that Sadler would be identified as the killer. I think that's somewhat less than a fit-up.

I believe my use of the word 'fit' was a poor choice and led to a misunderstanding of my point. What I should have said was that they checked his alibis for the previous murders - normal procedure in a series of unsolved crimes that could have a possible link... as checking everyone known to the victim or was known to be in contact with the victim near the time of death was standard procedure despite a continuing chain of murders possibly committed by one individual.

[Wickerman]

Was not Lawende used as an ID witness at a date subsequent to McKenzie's death? What would that be in aid of if the authorities knew perfectly well that JtR was under lock and key or dead?

Hi Colin.
I don't think the police had one theory, possibly there were as many parallel investigations in progress as their were detectives available.

[Phil H]

The death of Alice Mackenzie suggests that there were at least 2 men who were capable of doing acts like these living in London in late 1888..unless her killer arrives sometime between Jacks run and her murder,... and the Police reaction to it proves that in the Spring of 1889 the Police did not know the identity of the man who killed in that same fashion that previous Fall.

Perhaps more, because the torso murdere was also never caught.

Unless one conflates the Torso killer with "Jack", there were at least two serial killers around in London at one time and the Pinchen St torso suggests the former was capable of entering the latter's territory. That said, Mckenzie does not look like to me the work of the perpetrator of the torso killings.

So with Mckenzie were are left with:

a) it was a murder of a random victim by an unknown hand at least partially copying "Jack's" technique; or

b) she was killed by "Jack" but he was weakened by illness, mental issues or some such problem; or

c) it was a "domestic" (killing by someone who knew Mckenzie) made to look like "Jack's work.

I don't see any other options.

(A) seems far-fetched; (c) seems improbable - I'd expect a copy cat to overdo things not underplay the mutilations; so we are left with (b).

Have I missed something?

Phil

[Fisherman]

Not much, Phil - I agree with most of this. I am not sure, however, if it applies that a copycat killer would overdo things!
I think that would depend on why the killing was carried out in the first place.

If it was carried out because the copycat killer liked what the original killer had accomplished and wanted to add his own work to the total picture, then yes, I agree that underplaying the mutilations should perhaps not be expected.

But if the victim was killed by somebody who did not like what he saw in the original killings, but who realized that copying what the original killer did could keep himself out of trouble, then I think that we could end up with smaller mutilations. The simple reason for this is that most people are opposed to mutilating on the whole, and find the prospect appalling and distasteful. Therefore, such a killer could perhaps hope that cutting a neck and tentatively opening up the stomach would be enough to do the trick.

But on the whole, as I said, I agree with you - a half-hearted or partly disabled Ripper attack may be the best solution to the MacKenzie riddle.

All the best,
Fisherman

[Garry Wroe]

Try the likelihood that the authorities knew perfectly well that JTR was under lock and key or dead before McKenzie was murdered.

But didn't Monro believe that McKenzie was a Ripper victim?