If Schwartz Lied ...

[DJA]

Abby Normal Meets Dracula

[JeffHamm]

The Daily News 2 Oct kind of blew his cover ;-)

"Julius Minsky, a Police Jew and a member of the club, states that at the time when the alarm was raised, just after one o'clock, there were some 20 or 30 members in the club room upstairs."

Oh, that's a nice find. So a club member, who was a police officer, confirms the alarm was raised at 1 o'clock. Must we continue?


Look, as I understand it, the conspiracy is that the club was concerned about being implemented in the murder of Stride and wanted to deflect suspicion away from the club members so they would not be shut down. Ok, sure, I get that.


So apparently, this is the plan they came up with, and presumably the thinking behind their reasoning. The idea is that the body was actually found at 12:40, so the club, in order to divert attention away from it's club members feels the best way to do this is to get people to believe the body was found at 1 o'clock rather than at 12:40.

Moreover, their plan to shift the finding of the body by 20 minutes included the following:
1) Get Schwartz to tell the police he saw Stride alive at 12:45ish (ok, note that's shifting the time) being assaulted outside the club by one man who had a Jewish accomplice by the name of "Lipski" to avoid drawing suspicion towards the Jewish club members. It requires no explanation to explain the logic behind the conspiracy's plan to implicate a Jewish offender when trying to divert attention from the Jewish club members.

2) Delay reporting the finding of the body until around 1 o'clock because finding a body at 12:40 would be too suspicious, but we'll all stand outside for 20 minutes around the body. Clearly, no explanation required and this won't attract any attention over that time.

3) Leave the body undisturbed where it was found, with everyone standing around it for 20 minutes, because everybody knows that finding a body in the ally beside the club at 1 o'clock is not going to draw attention to the club, but finding a body in the ally beside the club at 12:40 would. This is common sense and requires no explanation as to why when the body is found trumps where the body is found in terms of the focus of what the conspiracy is covering up. (Thanks to fiver for making this very astute point, that the coverup seems to be about the when, not the where)

4) Run around the neighborhood shouting "Murder" or "Help" or "police" or whatever it was right away (around 12:40) presumably to avoid drawing attention to the club at that critical time. Try and cover up your stated time by making a relative statement about a police officer (i.e. I did this about 5 minutes before they arrived) hoping someone will recognize that must mean closer to the non-suspicious time of 1 o'clock.

Of course, none of this makes any sense. It has to be the worst conspiracy plan ever, what they did is all so counter to what a conspiracy plan would look like, have to look like, that we can consider that theory refuted because it is so logically self contradictory - it refutes itself.

- Jeff

[Abby Normal]

Oh, that's a nice find. So a club member, who was a police officer, confirms the alarm was raised at 1 o'clock. Must we continue?


Look, as I understand it, the conspiracy is that the club was concerned about being implemented in the murder of Stride and wanted to deflect suspicion away from the club members so they would not be shut down. Ok, sure, I get that.


So apparently, this is the plan they came up with, and presumably the thinking behind their reasoning. The idea is that the body was actually found at 12:40, so the club, in order to divert attention away from it's club members feels the best way to do this is to get people to believe the body was found at 1 o'clock rather than at 12:40.

Moreover, their plan to shift the finding of the body by 20 minutes included the following:
1) Get Schwartz to tell the police he saw Stride alive at 12:45ish (ok, note that's shifting the time) being assaulted outside the club by one man who had a Jewish accomplice by the name of "Lipski" to avoid drawing suspicion towards the Jewish club members. It requires no explanation to explain the logic behind the conspiracy's plan to implicate a Jewish offender when trying to divert attention from the Jewish club members.

2) Delay reporting the finding of the body until around 1 o'clock because finding a body at 12:40 would be too suspicious, but we'll all stand outside for 20 minutes around the body. Clearly, no explanation required and this won't attract any attention over that time.

3) Leave the body undisturbed where it was found, with everyone standing around it for 20 minutes, because everybody knows that finding a body in the ally beside the club at 1 o'clock is not going to draw attention to the club, but finding a body in the ally beside the club at 12:40 would. This is common sense and requires no explanation as to why when the body is found trumps where the body is found in terms of the focus of what the conspiracy is covering up. (Thanks to fiver for making this very astute point, that the coverup seems to be about the when, not the where)

4) Run around the neighborhood shouting "Murder" or "Help" or "police" or whatever it was right away (around 12:40) presumably to avoid drawing attention to the club at that critical time. Try and cover up your stated time by making a relative statement about a police officer (i.e. I did this about 5 minutes before they arrived) hoping someone will recognize that must mean closer to the non-suspicious time of 1 o'clock.

Of course, none of this makes any sense. It has to be the worst conspiracy plan ever, what they did is all so counter to what a conspiracy plan would look like, have to look like, that we can consider that theory refuted because it is so logically self contradictory - it refutes itself.

- Jeff

jeff hamm aka the voice of reason

[Herlock Sholmes]

Oh, that's a nice find. So a club member, who was a police officer, confirms the alarm was raised at 1 o'clock. Must we continue?


Look, as I understand it, the conspiracy is that the club was concerned about being implemented in the murder of Stride and wanted to deflect suspicion away from the club members so they would not be shut down. Ok, sure, I get that.


So apparently, this is the plan they came up with, and presumably the thinking behind their reasoning. The idea is that the body was actually found at 12:40, so the club, in order to divert attention away from it's club members feels the best way to do this is to get people to believe the body was found at 1 o'clock rather than at 12:40.

Moreover, their plan to shift the finding of the body by 20 minutes included the following:
1) Get Schwartz to tell the police he saw Stride alive at 12:45ish (ok, note that's shifting the time) being assaulted outside the club by one man who had a Jewish accomplice by the name of "Lipski" to avoid drawing suspicion towards the Jewish club members. It requires no explanation to explain the logic behind the conspiracy's plan to implicate a Jewish offender when trying to divert attention from the Jewish club members.

2) Delay reporting the finding of the body until around 1 o'clock because finding a body at 12:40 would be too suspicious, but we'll all stand outside for 20 minutes around the body. Clearly, no explanation required and this won't attract any attention over that time.

3) Leave the body undisturbed where it was found, with everyone standing around it for 20 minutes, because everybody knows that finding a body in the ally beside the club at 1 o'clock is not going to draw attention to the club, but finding a body in the ally beside the club at 12:40 would. This is common sense and requires no explanation as to why when the body is found trumps where the body is found in terms of the focus of what the conspiracy is covering up. (Thanks to fiver for making this very astute point, that the coverup seems to be about the when, not the where)

4) Run around the neighborhood shouting "Murder" or "Help" or "police" or whatever it was right away (around 12:40) presumably to avoid drawing attention to the club at that critical time. Try and cover up your stated time by making a relative statement about a police officer (i.e. I did this about 5 minutes before they arrived) hoping someone will recognize that must mean closer to the non-suspicious time of 1 o'clock.

Of course, none of this makes any sense. It has to be the worst conspiracy plan ever, what they did is all so counter to what a conspiracy plan would look like, have to look like, that we can consider that theory refuted because it is so logically self contradictory - it refutes itself.

- Jeff

That sums it up nicely Jeff

Oh, that's a nice find. So a club member, who was a police officer, confirms the alarm was raised at 1 o'clock. Must we continue?

We shouldn’t really need to Jeff. It’s been game over for ages. Joshua’s find hammers in the final nail. Will Michael accept this? Of course not. He’s already thinking of a way trying to sidestep this.

[DJA]

The Daily News 2 Oct kind of blew his cover ;-)

"Julius Minsky, a Police Jew and a member of the club, states that at the time when the alarm was raised, just after one o'clock, there were some 20 or 30 members in the club room upstairs."

Julius Minsky details 1891 census

Julius Minsky born 1869 Sewalk Russia. Tailors Presser, living at 175 Brady Buildings MEOT. with relatives Haris (cigar maker) and Nellie Schwalb and family.
Pat .... (our very own Paddy)

[harry]

While Schwartz,like most witnesses,may not have been perfect in his recollection of happenings,it is likely he was telling the truth as he remembered it.We have an interpretation of what he said,which further hampers one's knowledge of the true facts,but there is enough to suggest an incident in which Stride fell or was pushed to the ground.Whether she fell face down or on to her back is not known.She may only have fell to her knees.No injuries were apparant that shows a violent impact with the ground,so thrown down might well be over stated.If so,it lessens the chance that BS was guity of an assault without provocation,and that would lead to another consideration.That is ,that there was only one attack on Stride,the one that killed her.

[caz]

Jeff’s right of course. Elizabeth Tanner, Catherine Lane and Charles Preston were hardly vital witnesses and yet they appeared at the Inquest and so we would expect Schwartz to have been called as well. That said, I think Colin’s right too, in saying that on the question of ‘how’ Stride died, Schwartz could have added precisely zero and on the ‘when,’ the most he could have contributed was to show that she was alive at 12.45 and dead at 1.00. So he’s narrowing it down from Smith’s sighting.

Jeff also made a great point on the suggestion that Schwartz wasn’t included at the Inquest because the Police had no faith in his evidence. Apart from the obvious facts that the Inquest began the day after the murder and that the police were looking for a Mr Lipski and that they subsequently took a man in for questioning and that senior Police officials were still discussing Schwartz as a witness into November we still have to consider the other ropey witnesses called to various Inquests. Unless the Police could categorically have proven Schwartz a liar (which they obviously couldn’t) then any slight doubts that they might have had surely couldn’t have been reason enough to have excluded him.

So might Schwartz have asked to be excused from appearing if he felt that he might have been in danger of reprisals from BS Man? Could the Coroner, when weighing up the ‘benefit’ of Schwartz appearing and the ‘risk’ to Schwartz of appearing, he might have excused him? Might he even have factored in the difficulty and even the added expense of using an interpreter and thought that Schwartz absence wouldn’t have been much loss to the aims of the Inquest? I don’t know? Or, as I’ve previously suggested, Schwartz couldn’t have been called to an Inquest if the police couldn’t find him to do it. ‘Disappearing’ was much easier in those days than it is today. If Schwartz was afraid (with or without good reason of course) he could have been anywhere. How much time and manpower would the police have expended combing the capitol for Israel Schwartz? Hardly any I’d suggest.

None of us can state the reason for Schwartz absence from the Inquest with anything like certainty. We can only conjecture. We are on solid ground though when we say that it wasn’t because the Police disregarded him. The written evidence dismisses that suggestion conclusively.

So when we look at Schwartz on the whole we have to wonder why Michael is so insistent that he knows why Schwartz was absent. He’s not conjecturing like the rest of us. No, he knows. So why this obviously unfounded certainty? The answer is very obvious of course. It’s because he needs evidence to discredit Schwartz and this is an opportunity. It’s an unfounded one but it’s an opportunity nonetheless to plant the seed. And because the evidence doesn’t support it all that he has left to do is to keep on repeating it as if he was there and he knows it to be a fact. It’s not an a fact. My suggestion that Schwartz might have gone into hiding isn’t a fact either. It’s merely a suggestion on my part. The difference between my suggestion and Michael’s is that mine can’t be completely dismissed by the facts.

That just about covers it for me, Herlock, although I can think of another two factors, which combined with all you mention may have swung it for Schwartz and caused the Coroner to feel that no tangible benefit was likely to come from his enforced attendance, while there were potential disadvantages. I'm thinking of the fact that not only was his account inherently ambiguous and open to interpretation, but it also featured that one incendiary word "Lipski", which in any context would give the authorities a headache, while trying to get the most likely meaning out of the witness, in public, using a reliable interpreter/translator.

None of these problems existed with all the willing English speaking witnesses who were called, who could have been sure of what they saw and heard, but still mistaken on times and details, or largely irrelevant to the who, where, when and how, but better than nothing.

I don't think this is a black and white situation, so I can see Colin and Jeff both giving us valuable insights.

I meant to add, if anyone thought Schwartz was in any way the right person for the job, and his story the right story to tell, if the purpose was to deflect the blame for the latest murder away from the Jews and the Berner Street club, they failed mightily and should have had a check up from the neck up. What a load of pony.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

lol. vampires??

Yeah, when I read Michael's quaint expression, I got the image of Ingrid Pitt in my mind and can't now get shot of her.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

Oh, that's a nice find. So a club member, who was a police officer, confirms the alarm was raised at 1 o'clock. Must we continue?


Look, as I understand it, the conspiracy is that the club was concerned about being implemented in the murder of Stride and wanted to deflect suspicion away from the club members so they would not be shut down. Ok, sure, I get that.


So apparently, this is the plan they came up with, and presumably the thinking behind their reasoning. The idea is that the body was actually found at 12:40, so the club, in order to divert attention away from it's club members feels the best way to do this is to get people to believe the body was found at 1 o'clock rather than at 12:40.

Moreover, their plan to shift the finding of the body by 20 minutes included the following:
1) Get Schwartz to tell the police he saw Stride alive at 12:45ish (ok, note that's shifting the time) being assaulted outside the club by one man who had a Jewish accomplice by the name of "Lipski" to avoid drawing suspicion towards the Jewish club members. It requires no explanation to explain the logic behind the conspiracy's plan to implicate a Jewish offender when trying to divert attention from the Jewish club members.

2) Delay reporting the finding of the body until around 1 o'clock because finding a body at 12:40 would be too suspicious, but we'll all stand outside for 20 minutes around the body. Clearly, no explanation required and this won't attract any attention over that time.

3) Leave the body undisturbed where it was found, with everyone standing around it for 20 minutes, because everybody knows that finding a body in the ally beside the club at 1 o'clock is not going to draw attention to the club, but finding a body in the ally beside the club at 12:40 would. This is common sense and requires no explanation as to why when the body is found trumps where the body is found in terms of the focus of what the conspiracy is covering up. (Thanks to fiver for making this very astute point, that the coverup seems to be about the when, not the where)

4) Run around the neighborhood shouting "Murder" or "Help" or "police" or whatever it was right away (around 12:40) presumably to avoid drawing attention to the club at that critical time. Try and cover up your stated time by making a relative statement about a police officer (i.e. I did this about 5 minutes before they arrived) hoping someone will recognize that must mean closer to the non-suspicious time of 1 o'clock.

Of course, none of this makes any sense. It has to be the worst conspiracy plan ever, what they did is all so counter to what a conspiracy plan would look like, have to look like, that we can consider that theory refuted because it is so logically self contradictory - it refutes itself.

- Jeff

Great post, Jeff, although to be strictly fair to Michael, I think his reasoning is that on finding the body at 12.40, just two or three of the club members/staff panicked and tried to delay raising the alarm, to give them some breathing space to work out a plan of damage control/limitation. If Michael is right, it didn't work, and was never going to work, and it was the most inept cunning plan since Baldrick was coming up with cunning plans. Adding Schwartz of all people to the mix, to inject a bit of spice, and feeding him a story that put the blame on their fellow Jews instead of deflecting it away from them, was a stroke of comic genius that should have got them a job scriptwriting for Fawlty Towers: "Don't mention the Jews or Lipski - I did it once - I think I got away with it".

This is my little contribution to Michael's long and winding road, trying gamely to explain how Louis D conceived and gave birth to this cracked conspiracy.

He must be feeling as lonely as a bar steward on Father's Day.

Love,

Caz
X

[Herlock Sholmes]

Yeah, when I read Michael's quaint expression, I got the image of Ingrid Pitt in my mind and can't now get shot of her.

Love,

Caz
X

I once met Ingrid Pitt.

Just thought I’d add a completely pointless fact.

[Al Bundy's Eyes]

Great post, Jeff, although to be strictly fair to Michael, I think his reasoning is that on finding the body at 12.40, just two or three of the club members/staff panicked and tried to delay raising the alarm, to give them some breathing space to work out a plan of damage control/limitation. If Michael is right, it didn't work, and was never going to work, and it was the most inept cunning plan since Baldrick was coming up with cunning plans. Adding Schwartz of all people to the mix, to inject a bit of spice, and feeding him a story that put the blame on their fellow Jews instead of deflecting it away from them, was a stroke of comic genius that should have got them a job scriptwriting for Fawlty Towers: "Don't mention the Jews or Lipski - I did it once - I think I got away with it".

This is my little contribution to Michael's long and winding road, trying gamely to explain how Louis D conceived and gave birth to this cracked conspiracy.

He must be feeling as lonely as a bar steward on Father's Day.

Love,

Caz
X

Hi Caz,

I was going to say much the same, the club conspiracy isn't about where the body was found. The time issue is the club members deliberating over what to do. So the twenty minutes bump round is them deciding on their course of action. That alone doesn't stand up to scrutiny, but does make a bit of sense if you imagine a concerned club looking to deflect blame. The idea that it took twenty minutes to come up with the Schwartz deflection scheme and set it in motion is, well....Schwartz went to the police with a tale of 'BS man' addressing his accomplice as 'lipski', so at least one was Jewish. And if Wess is to blame for this mis-translation, it's an even more balls awful plan.

As is, I'm willing to believe Schwartz was wrong, or had the right Street at the wrong time, or the right time on the wrong street. Or made the whole thing up, it's irrelevant to the club conspiracy, because the club members, the police, the gentiles, all add up the same without his statement. Schwartz doesn't contribute to Stride being killed at a little before one AM, but he sure as hell doesn't disprove it.

"But he wasn't at the inquest". Indeed, he wasn't. If he was available, I believe he would have been there, absolutely. But what would he actually add? 12:45, a guy throws Liz down and addresses his accomplice as the very Jewish 'Lipski'. Clubs off the hook there, eh?

Maybe the reason Schwartz wasn't at inquest is because the club silenced him for cocking up the police report? Now there's a theory.

[JeffHamm]

Great post, Jeff, although to be strictly fair to Michael, I think his reasoning is that on finding the body at 12.40, just two or three of the club members/staff panicked and tried to delay raising the alarm, to give them some breathing space to work out a plan of damage control/limitation. If Michael is right, it didn't work, and was never going to work, and it was the most inept cunning plan since Baldrick was coming up with cunning plans. Adding Schwartz of all people to the mix, to inject a bit of spice, and feeding him a story that put the blame on their fellow Jews instead of deflecting it away from them, was a stroke of comic genius that should have got them a job scriptwriting for Fawlty Towers: "Don't mention the Jews or Lipski - I did it once - I think I got away with it".

This is my little contribution to Michael's long and winding road, trying gamely to explain how Louis D conceived and gave birth to this cracked conspiracy.

He must be feeling as lonely as a bar steward on Father's Day.

Love,

Caz
X

Hi caz,

Thanks. I admit, other than there being a conspiracy whose goal is to protect the club, it's not really clear to me what Michael's idea is as I can't find a clear explanation as to what they were hoping to achieve, and how what they did was supposed to further that aim. The focus has been on arguing that despite the club members indicating the body was found at 1 o'clock, he says it was really found at 12:40; and that Schwartz was also set up to tell a story to shift the time towards 1. And all of this is supposed to somehow deflect attention away from the club for fear the police would shut them down.

If, however, the idea is that reporting the body was initially delayed to engage in damage control, but that delay plan failed as only a few club members were in on it, then why get Schwartz to go to the police the next day (particularly with a story that implicates a Jewish offender)? I can't really make heads nor tails of what the conspiracy was conspiring about or what they hoped to achieve, other than misrepresent the time at which the body was found. And that, as a goal, makes no sense to me.

And we also now know that one of the club members was a police officer who was there on the night in question. So any attempt to interfere with a murder would not be in the club's interest, as the police are right there already. Oddly, we don't get testimony from him at the inquest about the discovery of the body, which is a bit odd. Are we now to believe the police didn't believe this police officer?


- Jeff

[Herlock Sholmes]

All of a sudden there’s silence from the Grassy Knoll.

[Joshua Rogan]

And we also now know that one of the club members was a police officer who was there on the night in question. So any attempt to interfere with a murder would not be in the club's interest, as the police are right there already. Oddly, we don't get testimony from him at the inquest about the discovery of the body, which is a bit odd. Are we now to believe the police didn't believe this police officer?

Oh dear, perhaps I shouldn't have posted the snippet about Minsky. It was meant to be a lighthearted joke after the perfectly reasonable suggestion that the police would have infiltrated the club if they considered it full of dangerous anarchists. Perhaps Minsky was indeed a police informant, but it seems much more likely that the Daily News article is simply a misprint and should actually be "Polish jew".
Sorry.

[DJA]

He was a 19 year old Russian.
I'll go along with the paper mucking up though.