Torso Killer discussion from Millwood Thread

[Sam Flynn]

I should like to ask Dr. Phillips whether there is any similarity in the cutting off of the legs in this case and the one that was severed from the woman in Dorset-street? Dr. Phillips. - I have not noticed any sufficient similarity to convince me it was the person who committed both mutilations, but the division of the neck and attempt to disarticulate the bones of the spine are very similar to that which was effected in this case.

So either Phillips was mistaken or there was an attempt to disarticulate Mary Kellys spine.

He's probably thinking of Annie Chapman and misremembering her as Mary Kelly. Again, however, I would point out that the Pinchin Street torso's head was clean off, so there was no arguably "attempted" disarticulation in her case; it was a "successful" one.

[Abby Normal]

I still don't know how I should put the two series together in my mind. While I think that the Ripper wanted his victims to be found or at least did not care at all whether they were found or identified, Torsoman must have cared about identifiability enough to go the extra mile and chop up the bodies into easier-to-carry and harder-to-identify segments that got dumped in the river or hidden away. "Hidden" is the key word for me here, this just isn't Ripper-style for me.

About the word "parts" that you think I have slipped into the quote from Gerard's dissertation, this wasn't intentional, I just assumed that there were body parts involved as well. After re-reading the article and some others, I have to agree with you that it were mostly complete corpses that got washed ashore. I did not want to alter the facts to make a point.

Hi Bolo

While I think that the Ripper wanted his victims to be found or at least did not care at all whether they were found or identified, Torsoman must have cared about identifiability enough to go the extra mile and chop up the bodies into easier-to-carry and harder-to-identify segments that got dumped in the river or hidden away. "Hidden" is the key word for me here, this just isn't Ripper-style for me.

Pinchin was hidden? jacksons leg thrown into the shelley yard hidden? Whitehall torso put in a construction site with dozens of workers about hidden?
sorry-no.

And I agree with fish that the dismemberment is a practical AND a psychological matter. theres over lap there.

I still don't know how I should put the two series together in my mind

.

Imagine this-you have a serial killer who enjoys cutting up and into female bodies-a total post mortem type serial killer. He has his own chop shop a private place where he can indulge his utmost dark fantasies. maybe has a cart. he lures prostitutes back to this place, kills them, cuts them up, removes organs. god knows what he does with them now-but some "ritualistic" and or sexual element involved. maybe he keeps some parts a while longer than others, but the time comes when he has to get rid of them. he takes them out and throws them in the river. Theyre found. its in the press. this excites him too. he continues, but now hes starting to enjoy the dumping parts too and the excitement it creates. so he starts dumping in different places, places that might have special meaning to him. and as it progresses its also getting more weird and public. Perhaps the time comes he dosnt have access to his chop shop for whatever reason and or he really wants to up the thrill factor so he starts killing in public. He cant dismember with these, because its not practical to carry around a saw or stuff a head in his pocket, but he can still post mortem mutilate and take internal organs away. Now he really gets public/press excitement. and the whole time he still has female body parts as trophies to take home and play with. He continues to do both, as the mood and circumstances dictate and the series end the same time with pinchin and mckenzie for whatever reason.

[RockySullivan]

He cut the face from a skull, for God´s sake - who on earth with purely practical incentives would do such a thing? The elaborate and precise cutting it required is something I know of no parallel to.

Someone who wanted the persons face removed so they wouldn't be identified, obviously.

[Fisherman]

you can't have your fish and eat it too.

Meaning you do not understand what I am talking about. Oh, alright.

[Fisherman]

My point is that serial killers will go through all the trouble of dismembering a victims and spread their remains far apart but then leave them with their clothes or identifying marks.

That is an extremely bad point. It would mean that they take great precautions not to have their victims identified, and then they leave means to identify them by anyway.

Apparently, YOU can have YOUR cake and eat it...?

[Fisherman]

He's probably thinking of Annie Chapman and misremembering her as Mary Kelly. Again, however, I would point out that the Pinchin Street torso's head was clean off, so there was no arguably "attempted" disarticulation in her case; it was a "successful" one.

"Attempt" refers to Kelly, and Phillips goes on to say that the disarticulation was "effected" in the Pinchin Street case. And clearly, Phillips was able to compare where the cuts to the spine were in Kellys case to where the head was taken off in the Pinchin Street case, how the knife waws angled and so on. There is nothing strange about it, and Phillips words himself in a totally adequate manner.

[Fisherman]

Someone who wanted the persons face removed so they wouldn't be identified, obviously.

Do you agree that first taking the face off and then shredding it into tiny bits would have made the job a lot better if disenabling an ID was the aim?

Do you agree that the killer at this stage would in all probability have known that parts thrown in the river were likely to be found?

Do you agree that a cut away face makes identification much easier than one cut to shreds like in Kellys case?

Good. Then you agree that you are wrong and that there is nothing obvious at all about how disenabling an ID was the killers aim.

[RockySullivan]

sounds like Jack learned a lesson from that face stretched out on the block.

[Sam Flynn]

Pinchin was hidden? jacksons leg thrown into the shelley yard hidden? Whitehall torso put in a construction site with dozens of workers about hidden?
sorry-no.

If not hidden, they weren't easily accessible. None of those body parts were left in the middle of a public right of way, the remaining parts were chucked into a fast-flowing river, and the heads were never found. That's different behaviour to that exhibited by the Ripper, to say nothing of the fact that the torso victims were evidently killed and dismembered elsewhere, before being transported to a dump-site. In contrast, all the Ripper victims where killed where their bodies were found.

[Fisherman]

If not hidden, they weren't easily accessible. None of those body parts were left in the middle of a public right of way, the remaining parts were chucked into a fast-flowing river, and the heads were never found. That's different behaviour to that exhibited by the Ripper, to say nothing of the fact that the torso victims were evidently killed and dismembered elsewhere, before being transported to a dump-site. In contrast, all the Ripper victims where killed where their bodies were found.

And the fact that both killers on at least one occasion both:

took out uteri
took out hearts
took out lungs
cut away a section of the colon
cut away the abdominal wall in large flaps
took rings from the fingers of victims
cut from sternum to pubes
abstained from inflicting physical torture
were considered skilled with the knife by examining medicos
killed or dumped bodies in the same city, on one occasion even in the same district
worked simultaneously

... is nothing but a bunch of coincidences? Please, PLEASE answer that question with either a yes or no!

You seem to believe that no serial killer can use more than one way of going about his business. Do you need me to post examples to the contrary? If you believe that no serial killer can go between dismemberment and no dismemberment, do you want me to post examples to the contrary?

Is it unlikely that a serial killer will both dismember and not dismember and not dismember? Yes. So what does it take to reveal such a character? It takes proof that he used inclusions that overlapped inbetween the two series. And the more rare these inclusions are, the more certain we can be of a common originator.

Case solved.

[Fisherman]

sounds like Jack learned a lesson from that face stretched out on the block.

And what would that lesson be?

[bolo]

Hi Sam, Abby, Fisherman, all,

If not hidden, they weren't easily accessible. None of those body parts were left in the middle of a public right of way, the remaining parts were chucked into a fast-flowing river, and the heads were never found. That's different behaviour to that exhibited by the Ripper, to say nothing of the fact that the torso victims were evidently killed and dismembered elsewhere, before being transported to a dump-site. In contrast, all the Ripper victims where killed where their bodies were found.

you took the words right out of my mouth.

I used "hidden" in my previous post to describe my impression of the introverted torso killings vs. the extroverted Ripper murders that I would label as "open". Of course there are serial killers who used both dismemberment and disembowelling to act out their delusions but many of them were less flexible when it comes to getting rid of the bodies or covering their tracks. Some of them went to great lengths to make detection and ID of the bodies/body parts difficult while others left the bodies of the victims where they killed them. However, the number of cases where the killer was very careful with hiding the bodies to hinder ID in one case and totally indifferent towards detection and identification in another does not seem very high as far as I can see.

Then there is the reaction of the general public to the crimes. While the Ripper murders kicked off a mass psychosis, the torso killings did not have the same impact, even though press coverage was quite thorough. I think the anonymity of the victims and the way the bodies or parts were found played a role here, it just didn't make people feel threatened the way the Ripper killings did. In some cases, the doctors couldn't even tell if or how the victims were killed. If Torsoman really was out for publicity as it has been mentioned before, he didn't do a very good job in my opinion.

[Fisherman]

Hi Sam, Abby, Fisherman, all,



you took the words right out of my mouth.

I used "hidden" in my previous post to describe my impression of the introverted torso killings vs. the extroverted Ripper murders that I would label as "open". Of course there are serial killers who used both dismemberment and disembowelling to act out their delusions but many of them were less flexible when it comes to getting rid of the bodies or covering their tracks. Some of them went to great lengths to make detection and ID of the bodies/body parts difficult while others left the bodies of the victims where they killed them. However, the number of cases where the killer was very careful with hiding the bodies to hinder ID in one case and totally indifferent towards detection and identification in another does not seem very high as far as I can see.

Then there is the reaction of the general public to the crimes. While the Ripper murders kicked off a mass psychosis, the torso killings did not have the same impact, even though press coverage was quite thorough. I think the anonymity of the victims and the way the bodies or parts were found played a role here, it just didn't make people feel threatened the way the Ripper killings did. In some cases, the doctors couldn't even tell if or how the victims were killed. If Torsoman really was out for publicity as it has been mentioned before, he didn't do a very good job in my opinion.

The whole point is that the torso killer did NOT "go to great lengths" to hide his victims identities, Bolo. If he HAD, he would not have left body marks on his victims such as moles and scars. He would not have served up an intact face, ready for mounting on a dummy. He would not have seen to it that his body parts were allowed to float ashore all over London, giving the police the possibility to establish height, weight, age, complexion, hair color and so on, allowing them to see whether the women had given birth etcetera. Far from hiding these ID markers, he swamped the police and press with them.

Contrary to what you say about the Londoners not feeling threatened by the torso killer (wherefrom did you get the idea...?), I´d say that since the victims were not identified, many, many more women had reason to feel threatened. The Ripper only killed in the East End, and only prostitutes, so 99 per cent of Londons women had no reason to fear him. The Torso killer? VERY different story, because it was not known that he had his sight set on any particular type of woman and it was not known where he procured victims.

The whole reason for the Ripper scare lies in the size of the press coverage. And when you say that the Torso killer didn't do a very good job if he was after publicity, how does that particular view change if you work from the perception that the Torsoman and the Ripper were one and the same? Have you given that any thought? Has it occurred to you that a perceived lack of sufficient coverage in the press may be part of the incentive for the Torso killer to add street murders to his agenda? And that this is why the Ripper murders were perpetrated? No?
If you try that line of thinking, then note how it may well be that the torso murders were the ones that fulfilled his fantasies to the fullest, allowing him to carry out his ritualistic desires to the full, and that this was the reason that the torso murders did not seize but instead occurred alongside the Ripper murders!

It is an interesting exercise, I can promise you that much.

If I am wrong, then its just two cases of serial murder in the same town at the same time, involving numerous similarities like eviscerations of uteri, hearts and lungs, the cutting away of abdominal walls and the cutting out of colon sections, coupled with ripping from sternum to pelvis and the occasional ring theft. Nothing strange about that, eh? Surely, every town has had its siamese serial killer twins?

Move on, everybody, nothing to see here!

[RockySullivan]

The whole point is that the torso killer did NOT "go to great lengths" to hide his victims identities, Bolo. If he HAD, he would not have left body marks on his victims such as moles and scars. He would not have served up an intact face, ready for mounting on a dummy. He would not have seen to it that his body parts were allowed to float ashore all over London, giving the police the possibility to establish height, weight, age, complexion, hair color and so on, allowing them to see whether the women had given birth etcetera. Far from hiding these ID markers, he swamped the police and press with them.

That's fish **** my main man, Ripper did a hell of a job of making sure those girls weren't id'd. Could these girls be tied back to him, but not the Ripper victims?

[bolo]

The whole point is that the torso killer did NOT "go to great lengths" to hide his victims identities, Bolo. If he HAD, he would not have left body marks on his victims such as moles and scars. He would not have served up an intact face, ready for mounting on a dummy. He would not have seen to it that his body parts were allowed to float ashore all over London, giving the police the possibility to establish height, weight, age, complexion, hair color and so on, allowing them to see whether the women had given birth etcetera. Far from hiding these ID markers, he swamped the police and press with them.

Contrary to what you say about the Londoners not feeling threatened by the torso killer (wherefrom did you get the idea...?), I´d say that since the victims were not identified, many, many more women had reason to feel threatened. The Ripper only killed in the East End, and only prostitutes, so 99 per cent of Londons women had no reason to fear him. The Torso killer? VERY different story, because it was not known that he had his sight set on any particular type of woman and it was not known where he procured victims.

The whole reason for the Ripper scare lies in the size of the press coverage. And when you say that the Torso killer didn't do a very good job if he was after publicity, how does that particular view change if you work from the perception that the Torsoman and the Ripper were one and the same? Have you given that any thought? Has it occurred to you that a perceived lack of sufficient coverage in the press may be part of the incentive for the Torso killer to add street murders to his agenda? And that this is why the Ripper murders were perpetrated? No?
If you try that line of thinking, then note how it may well be that the torso murders were the ones that fulfilled his fantasies to the fullest, allowing him to carry out his ritualistic desires to the full, and that this was the reason that the torso murders did not seize but instead occurred alongside the Ripper murders!

It is an interesting exercise, I can promise you that much.

If I am wrong, then its just two cases of serial murder in the same town at the same time, involving numerous similarities like eviscerations of uteri, hearts and lungs, the cutting away of abdominal walls and the cutting out of colon sections, coupled with ripping from sternum to pelvis and the occasional ring theft. Nothing strange about that, eh? Surely, every town has had its siamese serial killer twins?

Move on, everybody, nothing to see here!

A killer who dismembers a body and dumps the parts, some of them wrapped in parcels, in a river or more or less hidden spots, wants to prevent detection and ID. It seems quite off to me to think that someone works for hours to chop up a body and then uses the tide and flow of a river to sort of make his deeds known in a random way.

Yes, I have given the assumption that one man was responsible for both the torso and Ripper killings a good long thought and even took into consideration that the switch to street murders could have happened to boost publicity. I also pondered on Abby's idea of a temporary chop shop accommodation, read Hebbert's Exercise In Forensic Medicine and several dozen press articles on casebook but still can't make heads or tails of it. Among other problems, the idea that one man was the author of both the torso and Ripper killings goes against the theory of progression/learning curve from case to case. If we add Tabram to the Ripper murders, the killer went through a learning and testing process (consciously or subconsciously) which included a switch from stabbing to slashing and increasingly intense mutilations and organ removal. This spanned a period from August 1888 to November. Given the injuries inflicted on Polly, the killer probably did not have the necessary experience to go any further or got disturbed (yes, I know... Crossmere... please let us not elaborate on that in here...).

Depending on which torso cases you want to include in your theory, the 1887 case showed a degree of skill that I don't see in Polly's case. Doesn't it seem odd to you that an accomplished dismemberer of 1887 needs at least two goes at the start of his 1888 street killer career to get the mutilation thing right?

About the press coverage of the Ripper and torso cases, I did not say that the Londoners did not feel threatened by the torso killings at all but public echo pales in comparison to the Ripper murders, and that's a fact, just compare the press releases for each case and the public hysteria that got worse with every new case. The torso killings were a long row of anonymous body parts that got washed ashore or were found on land, it just wasn't the same as the Ripper killings where each victim had a name and came from the midst of the poorest part of London where thousands of other people in the very same situation fought for survival every day. The torso killer victims may have come from the same ranks but since not even the doctors and police could put a name to them, public reception wasn't as emotional as in the Ripper cases.

This has not changed until today. Just go and ask people about Jack the Ripper and they will most probably know him while only true crime buffs will know the torso killings. The linking of both series seems to be a relatively new phenomenon, and even though I agree with you that there are a few interesting similarities between the cases that make it worth keeping at it, I'm still not convinced.

I'm looking forward to the upcoming book on the matter that hopefully will shed some more light on it.