John Richardson

[Herlock Sholmes]

He did not tell the inquest that he thought it possible, let alone likely, that Chapman had died as late as 5:30 AM.

He accepted that it could have been later than he’d estimated.

[Herlock Sholmes]

So, Lawende is a reliable witness in your opinion?

Who knows?

[Herlock Sholmes]

You did not take into consideration body fat.

Chapman obviously had more fat than Eddowes.

And yet the Doctor considered her malnourished:

There was no appearance of the deceased having taken alcohol, but there were signs of great deprivation, and he should say she had been badly fed.

[Fleetwood Mac]

The doctors' estimate in the cases of Nichols, Stride, and Eddowes was that they had died minutes earlier, not hours earlier.

In the case of Mary Kelly, the doctors' estimate was that she had died hours earlier.

They were right in all four cases.

That does not suggest incompetence.

I'd agree.

They weren't idiots nor operating in prehistoric times.

Did they have all of the information we, or medical people, have at our disposal? Of course not.

Has science moved on since their time? Of course.

Could they discern a body that had been dead for at least two hours? That's a different question. And, Dr Phillips leaves us other information that suggests he may well have been right, such as Annie's stomach contents and that information isn't subject to the age. Ask how and why Annie was eating again after 2am and you will not get a reasonable option. The best you will get from these posters is: "she stole food from the kitchen and was wandering around with potatoes in her stockings".

The same doctor knew that Liz was dead 'within an hour'.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

With Chapman, her finger nails were turgid, she had vertical scratches down the side of her neck, indicative of her trying to remove something tight, like a cord?
Swollen tongue, clenched fingers, black blood (blood without oxygen) in her brain, all indications of her being strangled.
Not the kind of death someone accepts without a fight.
Perhaps Dr Brown did not offer the same amount of details on Eddowes?

He noted that the fingers were slightly bent and no spurting of blood on the bricks or pavement around.

Phillips, on the other hand, noticed smears of blood on the fence.

It seems that Eddowes was strangled too.

[Herlock Sholmes]

You have. That's what you generally do. Whether it's TOD, clocks or whatever. You read something and then you use it dogmatically rather than consider the nuances of the situation.

You've read that it is difficult to give a precise TOD and from there you've supposed two and two = five, i.e. nobody knew what they were talking about.

As I said to you, Dr Phillips did not attempt to give a precise time of death. He leaves us with the claim that he could discern a body that had been dead for at least two hours when he saw one. In contrast to Liz.

Dr Phillips stated 'at least two hours and probably more' which by anyone's standards is not an attempt to give a precise TOD.

And you still show that you haven’t read properly anything that I’ve said. I’ll try again……..I have never at any point in time said, dogmatically or otherwise, that Phillips wasn’t competent or that he couldn’t at times get a ToD correct. What I have said, because it’s backed up by a Mount Everest of expert opinion, that we shouldn’t rely on accuracy. That because the methods that he used weren’t reliable we have to accept the possibility of error. The only dogmatism is coming from you. Phillips was a competent Doctor therefore he must have been correct. It’s up to you if that’s the way you think but don’t expect agreement.

So again….

From Simpson's Forensic Medicine, 13th edition (updated by Jason Payne James and others)

This is a standard up-to-date textbook on the subject and not a pamphlet written by Frank from The Queen’s Head:

'...a body is not a uniform structure: its temperature will not fall evenly and, because each body will lie in its own unique environment, each body will cool at a different speed, depending on the many factors surrounding it.'

They are applying this to the modern era. To now. With over a 100 years of advanced knowledge over Dr Phillips. And yet you go with ‘Phillips must have got it right?’ That’s your thinking?

Then from the same standard textbook. Again with a 100 years of medical advances over Dr. Phillips:

“as rigor is such a variable process that it can never provide an accurate assessment of the time of death. Extreme caution should be exercised in trying to assign a time of death based on the very subjective assessment of the degree and extent of rigor."

This is aimed at those using Forensics in the modern era. In 2011 to be exact. But you prefer to believe that the method is in accurate now but it was somehow accurate in 1888? And why? Because Phillips was a ‘competent’ Doctor.

If that’s your thinking then there’s no hope for reason.

[Herlock Sholmes]

Hi Herlock,

I'm surprised that you should find this insulting, unless you are unfamiliar with the computer jargon meaning that you can't get a good result from incorrect data.

Cheers, George

Hello George,

Fair enough. I accept that you weren’t being insulting. My apologies. I was wrongly ‘lumping you in’ with Fishy.

[Lewis C]

The doctors' estimate in the cases of Nichols, Stride, and Eddowes was that they had died minutes earlier, not hours earlier.

In the case of Mary Kelly, the doctors' estimate was that she had died hours earlier.

They were right in all four cases.

That does not suggest incompetence.

Did anyone say or imply that the doctors were incompetent? Even the most competent doctor in the world cannot do better than what the methods of the time permit him to do.

Witness testimony made it possible to give accurate estimates of the TOD for Nichols, Stride, and Eddowes. I don't think we know for sure what time Kelly died.

[Fleetwood Mac]

And why? Because Phillips was a ‘competent’ Doctor.

He was a very experienced doctor in his age. The most experienced of all of those doctors mentioned.

He immediately understood Liz was killed within an hour; he immediately understood that Annie had been dead for at least two hours.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

The same doctor knew that Liz was dead 'within an hour'.

Dr Blackwell arrived at the scene of the murder at 1:16 AM.

He estimated that the victim had died between 20 and 30 minutes earlier, i.e. between 12:46 and 12:56 AM.

Dr Phillips was called to Leman Street Police Station at 1.20 a.m. and then to Berner Street - a total of 1 1/2 miles.

He estimated that Stride had died within an hour of his arrival on the scene.

The two estimates are not far apart.

[Fleetwood Mac]

Dr Blackwell arrived at the scene of the murder at 1:16 AM.

He estimated that the victim had died between 20 and 30 minutes earlier, i.e. between 12:46 and 12:56 AM.

Dr Phillips was called to Leman Street Police Station at 1.20 a.m. and then to Berner Street - a total of 1 1/2 miles.

He estimated that Stride had died within an hour of his arrival on the scene.

The two estimates are not far apart.

They're not, agreed, but Dr Phillips' estimate is more conservative, which if anything speaks of someone who new the pitfalls of estimating TOD, and so when he said: "at least two hours.......", he was confident.

[Lewis C]

Why would he have failed to see the supply of water with which to clean his hands, when he was about to go out into the street, where his blood stains might be seen by other people?

Three possibilities are that he may have had another way to clean his hands; he may have been able to hide his hands, such as putting them in coat pockets; and something may have happened that told him that he better get out of there immediately.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

Three possibilities are that he may have had another way to clean his hands; he may have been able to hide his hands, such as putting them in coat pockets; and something may have happened that told him that he better get out of there immediately.

Another possibility is that he did not notice it because of the dark.

[Herlock Sholmes]

He was a very experienced doctor in his age. The most experienced of all of those doctors mentioned.

He immediately understood Liz was killed within an hour; he immediately understood that Annie had been dead for at least two hours.

And I’ll repeat, I’ve never said that Phillips was incapable of ever being right. Only that it can’t be treated as a certainty. Are you claiming that if a Doctor gets something right once or twice it means that they are infallible?

[Herlock Sholmes]

Dr Blackwell arrived at the scene of the murder at 1:16 AM.

He estimated that the victim had died between 20 and 30 minutes earlier, i.e. between 12:46 and 12:56 AM.

Dr Phillips was called to Leman Street Police Station at 1.20 a.m. and then to Berner Street - a total of 1 1/2 miles.

He estimated that Stride had died within an hour of his arrival on the scene.

The two estimates are not far apart.

And how do you know that whilst he was at the yard one of the police officers told him that a bloke (Eagle) had passed through the yard 20 or so minutes before the body was found and that there wasn’t a body there?