Jack the Ripper & The Torso Murders

[Herlock Sholmes]

It’s perhaps a nitpick but why are ‘cut out uteri’ and ‘opened up abdomens from sternum to groin’ counted as two points of similarity? One was necessary to achieve the other. We might as well add ‘didn’t mind getting blood on his hands.’

[FrankO]

So he either took it away with himself, or he cut it out for the joy of cutting a heart out and then discarded of it.

Or he emptied the thorax for practical reasons. The Buxton case shows us that we can't dismiss this possibility.

And in the Rippers case, we actually cannot tell whether or not he took the heart from the Kelly scene with any special intent.

We don't know what his intent was once he'd got away from the scene, but seeing that he could have left it behind at the scene, we do know he had some intent and we may also assume that it was special to him. And we know that special intent wasn't some practical reason, as practical would have been that he left it behind.

Just as the Torso killer may have thrown it to a hungry dog passing, the same applies for the Ripper. There are no certainties at all involved here, but for the one that both murders involved the excision of the heart. Which of course means that the only certain thing is that we have a similarity of a very rare kind on record here too. I genuinely believe that is as far as it goes.

Indeed, it's a similarity in the sense that the hearts were cut out and it can't go any further than that; it tells us nothing about Torso Man having the same or similar intent with it as the Ripper, when we do know the Ripper had some intent other than a practical one.

Yes, I could of course not claim that we have two examples of excised uteri, could I?

Of course you couldn't, but that doesn't mean you had to claim that I concluded that only one uterus was cut out.

[FrankO]

Do you consider these matters even remotely likely to be purely coincidental? Or are you thinking along the copycat suggestions we sometimes get - even from the victorian police! Or do you look upon it in some other fashion?

As we’ve been there & done that all before, I don’t intend to discuss this all anew with you or all the way, Christer. According to you, the rarity of the similarities outweighs the differences. I place the slider, if you will, much more towards the differences (because of the rarity clinging to the differences). Therefore, and also because of the general interest in anatomy of the era, I lean towards there being two blokes having a similar sort of appetite.
That’s the fashion in which I look upon it, as you well know.

What I am instead saying, is that it is unforgiveable that the similarities have never been looked upon as telling us all that the LIKELY thing is a common killer.

I don’t see it as unforgiveable, as I’m a forgiving guy, but I do see it as an interesting and, therefore, welcome idea without agreeing that it’s a likely thing. But you got that.

After that, it is all good and well to have all sorts of hunches about the matter. But as long as there is absolutely nothing to prevent the suggestion of a single killer being the correct one, I would say that ripperology has acted with no respect for the laws of logic in this matter for more than a hundred years.

I’m not going to speak for Ripperology. I’m just going to say that nobody, neither you or me, is going to get more than a hunch in the sense that we make our own observations and interpret & evaluate everything according to our own ‘rules’ (all the things I mentioned earlier: norms & values, sense of logic, etc.). So, your view is no less a hunch than mine.

The similarity lies in how neither killer provided evidence of being able to decapitate by way of knife in 1888.

Yes, but they both also didn’t provide any evidence of being able to cut off a finger either. Or eat the liver. Or cut out a tongue. Other similarities perhaps? I’m kidding, of course. But seriously, does the absence of being able to decapitate mean that they actually weren’t able to? Or does it, as long as we know nothing of their intentions/wishes, mean nothing other than that the Ripper didn’t decapitate with his knife and Torso Man did in the Jackson case?

Contrary to this, the Torso killer used a saw (but managed to do it by knife in September of 1889!), whereas the Ripper seemingly failed to take heads of by way of knife. And I actually think - but may of course be wrong - that there were signs of a possible effort to decapitate in the Eddowes case too.
So this is where something that has often been put forward as a dissimilarity ("Hey, Fisherman - the Torso killer took off heads, but the Ripper tried and failed, that MUST prove two killers!")
NOT so!
Ergo, I am not stretching anything at all, I am depicting the evidence.

Yes, but the evidence is still that the Ripper didn’t decapitate, it doesn’t say whether he was able to or not. It’s your assumption that he wasn’t, but was he, really? We don’t know and can’t say.
What I find striking in this regard is that Torso man didn’t cut any abdomens open, let alone cut them away in flaps until after Mary Jane Kelly. We can’t say he wouldn’t have been able to. So, did he do it because he wanted to copy the Ripper? Or just because he wanted to cut out the embryo? Or because, as has been suggested, there are only so many ways to cut open an abdomen?

And, as you can see, I have no problems at all to find explanations for it that are both logical and well known within the ranks of serial killers.
I would say that thinking up alternative reasons for why both killers - out of sheer coincidence - cut out uteri, opened up abdomens from sternum to groin, stole rings from victims, cut away the abdominal walls from victims in large panes, were called skilled cutters, worked in the same town and in overlapping times, and targetted prostitutes, is a much harder exercise, and with much less of a chance to make a lasting impression on me with no evidence to support it.

You have no examples of one serial killer who went from low risk & frequency to a complete series of high risk & frequency and then turn back to low risk & frequency and you have no evidence either to support any of your alternative explanations of why he temporarily made that change and then turned back to ‘torso mode’. As long as you don’t have either, I will remain unconvinced, however incomprehensible that will seem to you.

Two eviscerating serial killers who did the same extremely rare things to their victims, and who both stayed uncaught? What are the odds, Frank? one in a hundred? Or less?

It’s a fact that Torso Man did much less mutilation with the knife than the Ripper and I think we can safely say that Torso Man had much more time with his victims than the Ripper. That’s what I’m also looking at when evaluating things. Also, as the Ruxton case shows, we have to wonder if any missing or separately found organs/intestines in the case of Torso Man tells us he had the same sort of infatuation with organs as the Ripper had.

There are heaps of examples of serial killers who engaged in thrill killings to spice up their regular menus. There are examples of serial killer who scout the media to see if their deeds are given the space they hope for, and examples of those who changed their deeds in order to gain that publicity. And there are of course examples of killers who have killed both in safe surroundings and in risky locations. Given how many of these killers are opportunists, that should not surprise anybody.

OK, could you list them for me once you’re reinstated? I’d be very interested in seeing whether they fit with what we see with Torso Man and the Ripper.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Yes, absolutely correct chronology.

In my post I failed to highlight clearly that the killer didn't alternate during the Canonical 5 murders....but after Kelly, he took a pause, and then the timeline picks up again precisely how you have listed it.
The murder sequence then alternates between Ripper and Torso style application over the course of the next few years.
The last torso style killing occurred in 1902 in Lambeth.

However, I believe that on November 5th 1892, the Ripper tried, but failed, to murder Emily Smith in an attack beside a railway arch of the Great Eastern Railway at Shadwell station which at the time was a construction site and partially boarded up.

If you read the case of Emily Smith and see for yourself. I believe this was the Ripper and had he of been successful in murdering Emily, then that would have been the 3rd murder on the Great Eastern Railway.

Pinchin Street Torso
Frances Coles
Emily Smith (failed)

The question is, why the gap after Kelly?

Now it has always been assumed that Kelly was the Rippers swansong...but what if that's not correct?

What if the killer regarded his slaying of Kelly as a failure.

There's also the fact that there were no murders in 1890...but why?

The Canonicals would say he died
The Non-Canonicals might say he was incarcerated.

But I believe he may have moved area for work purposes or he got married and started a family.

If we include 1873 as his first kill, and the include 1902 as his last, that's nearly 30 years.

The Ripper was likely to have been around 36 when he killed 5 unfortunates in an unbroken series in 1888.

And therefore aged around 21 when he made his first kill in 1873.

That would then make him around 50 when he committed his last Torso kill in 1902.

His birth year between 1851 - 1853

That's a 30 year killing career spanning his 20's to his 50's


My key point is that there were NO torso killings committed between Nichols and Kelly.

The discovery of the Whitehall Torso is not the most relevant point, its the date she was murdered that is important, and the lack of clarity has been clouding the series for far too long.

It is almost certain that the killer worked at the NSY construction site.

The man last seen with Jackson looked like a Navvy. (Important to remember that her killer made a mistake by her being identified by her tattoo)

It is also significant that the Whitehall Torso was almost certainly placed in the cellar vault within a few hours of the Ripper double event.

Now there's also a chance that the murder of Stride wasn't the same killer and that the real killer places the Torso and then went from Whitehall to Mitre Square.

Has the perception of the double event been distorted all this time?

When we look at this case from the outside in, it gives us a different perspective that to tear down the walls and look from the inside out.

The idea that the killer was a Jew or a madman was rhetoric propaganda stirred up by the press at the time. anti-Semitism played a part in shrouding what was actually going on.

The killer wrote the GSG as a way of saying that the killer wasn't Jewish but used irony in his statement to make his point at appearing to blame the Jews.

There's also a chance that there were 2 men involved.

Tabram and Mylett hint at that quite strongly.

And so could there be an element of truth in that the Torso and Ripper killing were different, because they involved 2 men?

Brothers

Father and Son

Work colleagues

Ex-military comrades

The dumping of the Whitehall Torso would have likely taken more than one person.

There was a report of 3 men seen by the wall of the Whitehall construction on the Saturday night that the Torso was alleged to have been dumped.

One of the men was seen to attempt to scale the perimeter of the site and was stopped by a policeman.

He was later cleared, presumably convincing the officer that he was a worker at the site, and producing an alibi.

But the issue is that theres always been an age old problem when the police say a suspect has an alibi, because that's not always the case and in reality many killers slip through the net (the Yorkshire Ripper was interviewed countless times before being caught, because he had an "alibi ')

If you read the report of the man seen trying to scale the wall, combined with the fact that it occurred the same night that the Torso was almost certainly dumped, then that's a coincidence that simply can't be explained away by the police clearing the man because he supplied a so-called "alibi."

If this was the man who placed the torso, and 2 other men were with him and the cart they had at the time, it then completely changes our perception of who the killer or killers were.

There's also another scenario that I believe may be a possibility; that the man or men who placed some of the torso parts over the series, weren't necessarily ths killer.

We also have the John Arnold (Cleary) incident that proves that someone knew about the Pinchin St murder BEFORE the torso was actually dumped.

Was he tipped off?

Was he complicit in the murder?

I would suggest that the real killer tipped him off.

But there were 2 different incidents involving tip-offs that were made public BEFORE any torso was actually found.

To me, that would imply that the Torso killer was eager to push his work through the press and to try and highlight that he had murdered a woman and was going to dump a body.

The appearance and statement made by Arnold goes a long way to suggest that the Torso killer wanted his moment in the spotlight by getting someone to declare a torso would be found before it actually was even placed at the location.

That does not indicate a man who tried to hide what he had done, but rather a man who was trying to promote his work ahead of time.


Even after all this time, there's so much more to learn from this case, and we've only really scratched the surface.


RD

How do we know when the Whitehall torso was killed?

[The Rookie Detective]

Hi RD,

I agree that Herlock didn't get all the details quite right, but if you count McKenzie and Coles as Ripper murders, it looks to me like he did go back and forth, if the same man committed all the murders. I believe the following murders happened in this order: Kelly, Jackson, McKenzie, Pinchin Street, Coles. And it does seem right to figure McKenzie and Coles as probable Ripper murders if the Torso murders are, since Coles' and especially McKenzie's murders seem to have more in common with the C5 murders than the Torso murders do.

Yes, absolutely correct chronology.

In my post I failed to highlight clearly that the killer didn't alternate during the Canonical 5 murders....but after Kelly, he took a pause, and then the timeline picks up again precisely how you have listed it.
The murder sequence then alternates between Ripper and Torso style application over the course of the next few years.
The last torso style killing occurred in 1902 in Lambeth.

However, I believe that on November 5th 1892, the Ripper tried, but failed, to murder Emily Smith in an attack beside a railway arch of the Great Eastern Railway at Shadwell station which at the time was a construction site and partially boarded up.

If you read the case of Emily Smith and see for yourself. I believe this was the Ripper and had he of been successful in murdering Emily, then that would have been the 3rd murder on the Great Eastern Railway.

Pinchin Street Torso
Frances Coles
Emily Smith (failed)

The question is, why the gap after Kelly?

Now it has always been assumed that Kelly was the Rippers swansong...but what if that's not correct?

What if the killer regarded his slaying of Kelly as a failure.

There's also the fact that there were no murders in 1890...but why?

The Canonicals would say he died
The Non-Canonicals might say he was incarcerated.

But I believe he may have moved area for work purposes or he got married and started a family.

If we include 1873 as his first kill, and the include 1902 as his last, that's nearly 30 years.

The Ripper was likely to have been around 36 when he killed 5 unfortunates in an unbroken series in 1888.

And therefore aged around 21 when he made his first kill in 1873.

That would then make him around 50 when he committed his last Torso kill in 1902.

His birth year between 1851 - 1853

That's a 30 year killing career spanning his 20's to his 50's


My key point is that there were NO torso killings committed between Nichols and Kelly.

The discovery of the Whitehall Torso is not the most relevant point, its the date she was murdered that is important, and the lack of clarity has been clouding the series for far too long.

It is almost certain that the killer worked at the NSY construction site.

The man last seen with Jackson looked like a Navvy. (Important to remember that her killer made a mistake by her being identified by her tattoo)

It is also significant that the Whitehall Torso was almost certainly placed in the cellar vault within a few hours of the Ripper double event.

Now there's also a chance that the murder of Stride wasn't the same killer and that the real killer places the Torso and then went from Whitehall to Mitre Square.

Has the perception of the double event been distorted all this time?

When we look at this case from the outside in, it gives us a different perspective that to tear down the walls and look from the inside out.

The idea that the killer was a Jew or a madman was rhetoric propaganda stirred up by the press at the time. anti-Semitism played a part in shrouding what was actually going on.

The killer wrote the GSG as a way of saying that the killer wasn't Jewish but used irony in his statement to make his point at appearing to blame the Jews.

There's also a chance that there were 2 men involved.

Tabram and Mylett hint at that quite strongly.

And so could there be an element of truth in that the Torso and Ripper killing were different, because they involved 2 men?

Brothers

Father and Son

Work colleagues

Ex-military comrades

The dumping of the Whitehall Torso would have likely taken more than one person.

There was a report of 3 men seen by the wall of the Whitehall construction on the Saturday night that the Torso was alleged to have been dumped.

One of the men was seen to attempt to scale the perimeter of the site and was stopped by a policeman.

He was later cleared, presumably convincing the officer that he was a worker at the site, and producing an alibi.

But the issue is that theres always been an age old problem when the police say a suspect has an alibi, because that's not always the case and in reality many killers slip through the net (the Yorkshire Ripper was interviewed countless times before being caught, because he had an "alibi ')

If you read the report of the man seen trying to scale the wall, combined with the fact that it occurred the same night that the Torso was almost certainly dumped, then that's a coincidence that simply can't be explained away by the police clearing the man because he supplied a so-called "alibi."

If this was the man who placed the torso, and 2 other men were with him and the cart they had at the time, it then completely changes our perception of who the killer or killers were.

There's also another scenario that I believe may be a possibility; that the man or men who placed some of the torso parts over the series, weren't necessarily ths killer.

We also have the John Arnold (Cleary) incident that proves that someone knew about the Pinchin St murder BEFORE the torso was actually dumped.

Was he tipped off?

Was he complicit in the murder?

I would suggest that the real killer tipped him off.

But there were 2 different incidents involving tip-offs that were made public BEFORE any torso was actually found.

To me, that would imply that the Torso killer was eager to push his work through the press and to try and highlight that he had murdered a woman and was going to dump a body.

The appearance and statement made by Arnold goes a long way to suggest that the Torso killer wanted his moment in the spotlight by getting someone to declare a torso would be found before it actually was even placed at the location.

That does not indicate a man who tried to hide what he had done, but rather a man who was trying to promote his work ahead of time.


Even after all this time, there's so much more to learn from this case, and we've only really scratched the surface.


RD

[Abby Normal]

Based on your reasoning, Edmund Kemper and Herbert Mullin must have been the same man. The differences between the Torso killings and the Ripper killings outweigh their similarities, as noted by the doctors who actually examined the victims.

um no. they are convicted serial killers of two seperate SOLVED cases. lol. really fiver cmon. and btw california is like the serial killer capital of the world. a far cry from old london, when even murder was rare.

and by the way your now arguing with a ghost. as if you hadnt noticed fish has been banned.

[Fiver]

What we are left with is therefore a simple choice: Are evisceration victims in the same town and general time and with very rare damage done to their bodies more likely to be victims of one killer or two or more killers?

Based on your reasoning, Edmund Kemper and Herbert Mullin must have been the same man. The differences between the Torso killings and the Ripper killings outweigh their similarities, as noted by the doctors who actually examined the victims.

[Fiver]

It is also reasoned that the cutting was different and of varying skill - a point that dissolves when we acknowledge that the deeds were very likely carried out under very different conditions in terms of light, time access and so forth. A third point is that one killer dismembered, and the other did not. But we know that there was seemingly an effort to decapitate Kelly, and that the killer failed to do so by way of knife. And we also know that Hebbert informs us that the Torso killer only advanced to being able to decapitate by way of knife in September of 1889, making this matter a similarity between the series, not a dissimilarity.

Doctors of the time reasoned that the cutting was of different skill and said so in their testimony. The Ripper had plenty of light and time in the Kelly murder, yet he clearly showed himself hopelessly inept at removing heads, something the Torsoman had shown practiced skill at in 1887.

[Fiver]

Moreover, it was thought that one victim of the four was carried manually to the dumping site, implicating that this victim was dumped not far from where the killer lived or had a bolthole, and that victim was the Pinchin Street victim, where sack imprints were found on the dumped torso.

You again ignore the bigger picture to try to force the facts to fit your theory. Parts were found in Battersea Park, on the grounds of the Shelley Estate, and on the construction site of New Scotland Yard. All of those, especially the last, were clearly carried manually to their dumping sites. Yet you don't insist that the Torsoman lived or had a bolthole near Battersea Park, or the Shelley Estate, or New Scotland Yard. After all, that wouldn't fit your theory.

[Lewis C]

But that is not factually correct Herlock...

There were NO Torso murders throughout the entire Canonical 5 timeline.

The Whitehall Torso was placed in the vault within hours of the double event and discovered a few days later...

But the murder itself occurred BEFORE Nichols.

And that is one of the key points that has been overlooked.

The belief that the killer murdered the Whitehall victim AFTER Chapman, is NOT correct.

He murdered the Whitehall Torso victim BEFORE the Canonial Ripper victims.


On that basis, he didn't change backwards and forwards between M.O because there were no Torso victims during the Autumn of Terror.

And that is a key point that nobody has seemed to have acknowledged.


On that basis, the Torso killer's spell as the Ripper is what gained him fame...

The Kelly murder was a hybrid of the two, and I would suggest that the killer lived very close to Miller's Court.

He tried to take Kelly's head, but I believe he may have been disturbed by Bowyer doing his 3am rounds into Miller's Court.

The idea that he had all the time in the world with Kelly, is not necessarily true.

He also tried to cut her face off, take her nose, slit her eyes etc... But he knew he couldn't dismember her and so took his rage and frustration out on her.

I believe the Torso killer worked as a Navvy on the Commercial Street tramway, which required him to lodge locally in Whitechapel for the duration of the job.
The work began and ended in the autumn of 1888.

There was a gap after Kelly where he had to reset...and from there he alternated Ripper and Torso style kills at his leisure.


He also worked on the construction of the Great Eastern Railway, because he murdered Coles and dumped the Pinchin St torso under arches of the GER.

He also worked on the Canalways, hence why he was able to deposit body parts on multiple occasions.

He also worked on the NSY building as a builder, in Stone work/Carpentry/Marble/Concrete etc...

The Board of Works signed off a lot of the work that he did as a Navvy contractor for the Canals/Railway/Civil building projects, and the connection to George Lusk having been a builder at the Board of Works simply cannot be overlooked.

Lots of connections there if you but open your mind to the possibilities.


The idea that the killer was a madman, a Jew, or a Maybrick-type figure, is simply rhetoric pushed by the people in power at the time.

The last Ripper murder was recognized as Coles but there were attempted Ripper style attacks much later.

And the Torso killer murdered a woman in 1902, but this time boiled and dumped the entire body in a pile outside Doultons factory in Lambeth.


There's so much more...watch this space


RD

Hi RD,

I agree that Herlock didn't get all the details quite right, but if you count McKenzie and Coles as Ripper murders, it looks to me like he did go back and forth, if the same man committed all the murders. I believe the following murders happened in this order: Kelly, Jackson, McKenzie, Pinchin Street, Coles. And it does seem right to figure McKenzie and Coles as probable Ripper murders if the Torso murders are, since Coles' and especially McKenzie's murders seem to have more in common with the C5 murders than the Torso murders do.

[Fiver]

So, lets make up two sets of two murders each, and see what the built in similarities and differences can tell us.

The only thing your made up examples prove is that you can make up examples. They are useless for analyzing anything about the Ripper or Torso cases.

A dissimilarity can never prove two different perps, regardless of what that dissimilarity is. It is impossible, regardless of what that dissimilarity is. Some will say that if two murders are perpetrated far apart but at the same time, then we must have two different killers. That is true, but "at the same time" is not a dissimilarity, it is a similarity.

Contrary to this, a similarity can and will often prove a single perpetrator. It of course depends on the character of the similarity, but generally speaking, the rarer it is, the more certain we may be of a single perpetrator. And the more similarities there are, the more certain we may be of a single perp. If we have a combination of many similarities, some or all of them of a very rare kind, it is a done deal that a single killer must be the working premise, unless there is something to weigh the similarities up. And that something will never be a dissimilarity, but instead something like how it can be proven that one person is guilty of a murder in the first series, but has an alibi for the murders in the second series.

A single similarity can never prove anything. More similarities make it more likely the same perpetrator is involved. A dissimilarity makes it more likely that multiple killers are involved. More dissimilarities make it even more likely that multiple perpetrators were involved.

In some points, we cannot determine if there were similarities. Most Torso victims were not identified, so we can't tell if there's a common victimology. The Ripper clearly took trophies from his victims, we have no idea if the Torsoman did so. The Ripper killed by strangling and then cutting throats - we have no idea how the Torso victims were killed.

Points of similarity are:
Knives were used in both the Ripper and Torso murders.
Organs were removed from the bodies.

Points of dissimilarity are:
The Ripper killed over a very small section of East London. The Torsoman scattered body parts for miles up and down the Thames.
The Ripper was active for a few months. The Torsoman was active for years, possibly decades.
The series do not begin or end at the same time.
The Ripper severely mutilated soft tissues. The Torsoman disarticulated bodies for easier transport.
The Torsoman was highly skilled at disarticulating limbs and severing heads. The Ripper was a bungling amateur.
The Ripper posed bodies. The Torsoman did not.
The Ripper posed organs around bodies. The Torsoman did not.
The Ripper made no attempt to hide his victims identities. The Torsoman clearly did - none of the heads were found.
The Ripper left his victims where he killed them. The Torsoman did not.
The Ripper spent no time disposing of his victims bodies. The Torsoman spent days, possibly weeks, disposing of bodies.
The Ripper was a much bigger risk taker - he escaped detection by a minutes, possibly even seconds in the Nichols, Stride, and Eddowes murders. The Pinchin Street Torso was found a half hour after deposit, but many other bits weren't found until days or even weeks afterwards.
The Torsoman discarded many parts of his victims into rivers or canals. The Ripper didn't.

If you believe the letters (I don't.) then the Ripper sent taunting letters and trophy organs to the press. The Torsoman did neither.
If you think the Goulston Street graffito was written by the Ripper (I don't) then the Ripper deliberately left that message for the police. The Torsoman didn't do anything like that.

[Abby Normal]

speaking of heads...

was peeling the face off the skull
and depositing another horribly
disfigured skull and face
in front of a very public building
an attempt to hide
and get rid of?


or leaving your handi-work in Frankensteins backyard,
the caverns of the new police building,
in the middle of pinchin
an attempt to hide?

lol.! ok. dont think so.


was sending a thousand little ships of flesh down the Thames
and other dark canals an act of discretion?
alot found!
and giving the most abdomans the kiss
of a vertical gash
a sign of dueling maniacs?

I think not.

but perhaps.

[John Wheat]

I tend to think it’s because nothing particular new is happening there’s a desire to make something happen. That’s the only thing that I can think of that explains it. Not simply the fact of considering a possibility, which there’s nothing wrong with, but the fact of such over-confidence in the face of such a raft of huge differences. There appears to be a new rule. It seems to be - one point for a dissimilarity but three points for a similarity, as a way of tipping the balance to favour a theory.

You might be right Herlock. I find it annoying to be honest.

[The Rookie Detective]

Hi Herlock,

this common claim about the 'rarity' of serial killers working side-by-side in the same time & place doesn't carry any weight among people who grew up in the Pacific Northwest in the 1970s-1990s.

In Seattle alone, there must have been nearly a dozen of these reprobates whose murders overlapped. Some lived in the area for years--others just passed through--including Ted Bundy, the Green River Killer, Robert Lee Yates, etc. Along, of course, with "one-off" murders by other depraved individuals.

And Seattle had 1/5th the population of Victorian London.

I give no credence whatsoever to this line of thinking.

RP

With sincerest respect, the level of officially recorded serial killers in the US, is higher than all the other countries in the world combined.

Think about that fact for a moment and then try and apply that to the current discussion.

Comparing the United States to Victorian London is completely out of relative context.

Serial killers in the US - around 3200
Serial killers in the UK - around 160

The UK the 2nd highest in the world

Its like comparing the rarity of gun crime in New Zealand in 1902, to the gun crime in the state of Mississippi in 2023... it's simply not a fair and balanced argument.

The Ripper and Torso killings can't be compared to 1990's Seattle when talking about the rarity of crimes committed by serial killers.


Let's not forget that the only reason the Ripper is still talked about today is because he was never caught.

A serial killer like Amelia Dyer, who may have murdered around 400 children, makes the Ripper look like a boy scout.

There's nothing special about this guy, he just got lucky in not being caught.

RD

[Herlock Sholmes]

**** isn't it.

I tend to think it’s because nothing particular new is happening there’s a desire to make something happen. That’s the only thing that I can think of that explains it. Not simply the fact of considering a possibility, which there’s nothing wrong with, but the fact of such over-confidence in the face of such a raft of huge differences. There appears to be a new rule. It seems to be - one point for a dissimilarity but three points for a similarity, as a way of tipping the balance to favour a theory.