John Richardson

[A P Tomlinson]

Thanks George - I love these videos. Also the ones by Edward Stowe (or Stow), when he walks around the area.

I think Ed's got a Special coming out soon.
Where he visits Bosnia and Herzogovina, and explains how a 65 year old man named Charles Allen Lechmere took his family on a Spring/Summer vacation to Sarajevo in 1914...

"Hey, we know he had the money... what more proof do you need?"

[Trevor Marriott]

Some references take longer to find....

There's a paragraph in, Police Work From Within, Hargrave Adam, 1914.



I thought I had read doctors were permitted to be in court while the layperson witness had to wait in a separate room. But this seems to have been in Scotland, and the above is for trials not coroner's inquests.
So, I wonder if what is written above applicable to England was in force in the 1800's.

One of the excerpts from the press at the time of the Kelly murder appears to suggest witnesses were kept in a separate outside (without) the courtroom. Unless it was just the female witnesses that were kept out of court, the males were allowed in?

"The inquest on Mary Jane Kelly began this morning at eleven o'clock, at Shoreditch town hall. There was no crowd at the doors, and little excitement. Without the coroner's court half a dozen wretched-looking women were sitting on half a dozen cane chairs waiting to be called; and for half an hour the gentlemen of the jury dropped one by one into the green-walled square, little room which is sacred to the coroner. A mahogany table, drawn up against the windows, was laden with hats, black bags and papers, belonging to the army of reporters. The jury, twelve very respectable-looking men, sat on the coroner's right on two rows of chairs. At eleven the coroner Dr Macdonald, took his seat".
Pall Mall Gazette, 12 Nov. 1888.

So, perhaps doctor Phillips was in the courtroom at the inquest, it's just a detail that I find of interest in general.

Once a witness has given their testimony they can be released they do not have to sit around unless they choose to do so

The article you have posted relates to a criminal trial not a coroners court and in this day and age that would not be permitted in any criminal trial and back then as is shown at the discretion of the court, and I would imagine a situation that would apply and still does today is that if a witness was called to give evidence and that evidence was not disputed and accepted by the defence and was to simply be read out then the witness could sit in court and listen to the proceedings.

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[The Rookie Detective]

Unless Richardson is considered a SUSPECT; the idea of establishing an accurate TOD for Chapman becomes redundant.

As a witness, he is unreliable.

But through no fault of his own.

Based on the "professional" opinion of Phillips on an earlier TOD; his version of events becomes questionable.

But through no fault of his own.

He openly and deliberately places himself at the exact spot where a woman is murdered and admits to carrying a knife to cut some troublesome leather from his boot.

But based on Phillip's earlier TOD, Richardson places himself there with Chapman laying on the floor by his left foot.

The earlier TOD therefore either proves that Richardson was the murderer, or was a complete moron who couldn't see a mutilated woman laying ON DISPLAY just inches away from him.

So was he an idiot or the killer?

Or was he telling the truth and Chapman wasn't there?

When we look at Philips, we would do well to look at him overall.

He is experienced no doubt and very knowledgeable no doubt.

But could he have been wrong?

If Philips is correct and Chapman was murdered earlier, ergo, before Richardson arrives, then that only leaves room for Richardson to be a suspect.

Richardson was either a murderous genius, with balls of steel who admitted to being there with a knife at the same time Chapman was there, or he was a man who failed to see Chapman.

The question is...If a man openly places himself at a murder scene holding a knife at a time when a woman is lying murdered, displayed, and mutilated, then why was he not considered a prime suspect?
What else would a man have to do to be seen as a suspect in the murder of Chapman?


It's rather telling that despite Philip's professional opinion of an earlier TOD, and Richardson confessing to being there at a time after Chapman was slain, the police didn't rate him as their number one suspect.

That only leaves room for the police to believe that he just somehow missed seeing her or that Philips was mistaken and Chapman was killed based on a later TOD which coincided with 2 other witnesses.

What is more believable...

1) Richardson completely misses seeing an openly displayed mutilated corpse lying inches away from him?

2) Richardson murdered her and used ballsy reverse psychology to tease the police by admitting he was there right next to her with a knife... but claiming he failed to see her?

3) Philips COULD have been wrong about his professional estimates.


In other words, we have...

Richardson, the moronic unobservant witness who missed seeing her
Richardson, the killer
Richardson, the truthful & reliable witness who disproves Philips estimated TOD

I would say to you all that if you don't consider Richardson as the murderer, then you only have 2 options left...and if you believe Philips, then by default you believe that Richardson somehow missed Chapman's mutilated body lying next to him.

The idea that he either poked his head through the back door, remained on the top step, leaned forward to observe the padlock, but didn't turn his head toward Chapman, sat down and cut the leather from his boot but faced away from her body the whole time etc...etc... is all just an incredible amount of nonsensical rubbish to try and somehow explain how he missed her.

The only way he could have missed her is if he genuinely didn't see her...but that doesn't need much explanation.

He just missed her and that's it.

However, the repeated and continued attempt to support an earlier TOD & try & somehow explain just how he missed her, then ironically becomes a way of supporting an argument for a later TOD.

It either comes naturally or it doesn't...and if it doesn't, then maybe you're wrong and your faith in Philip's "professional" opinion is misguided.


RD

[New Waterloo]

Not a criticism, just a point.

If you look at the photos of the front of 27/29 Hanbury Street you'll notice that there are three front doors practically next to each other.
If you lived back then you'd know that there were passages running through terraced properties granting direct access to the back without having to go through the main part of the rooms in the house. (The old nightsoilmen would have not been welcome dragging their treasures through the living areas...)

That central door was a doorway to such a yard. A lot of those passages were simply open, or may have had a gate at the yard end. Hanbury Street was built with doors to the passage, and a set of stairs leading to landings on the other levels.
The yard, and stair landing on occasion, was also known to "plenty" of nocturnal shaggers. (See my post #6132 above in reply to Lewis' query about whether they were at it between dawn and dusk.)

Thanks AP, yes that certainly does put more of a light on it. More like a passageway really but with a door. Hadn't realised that, although in Norwich we have many terraced houses with passage ways between. Not the same but I get what you are saying. I suppose that sort of knocks the idea a bit but still a lot more risky I would suggest than a nearby alleyway. I will give this some more thought.

Thanks AP

NW

[Paul Sutton]

It's been mentioned (I think) but what difference does extensive mutilation make to ToD estimates based on temperature of the hacked-up cadaver? Presumably, having internal stuff exposed to the outside temperatures makes a difference (also massive blood loss)? And not one on which there can have been much tabulation then - but now there must be studies.

Apologies if this simple question is very obvious to answer, or if it has been somewhere.

[A P Tomlinson]

It's been mentioned (I think) but what difference does extensive mutilation make to ToD estimates based on temperature of the hacked-up cadaver? Presumably, having internal stuff exposed to the outside temperatures makes a difference? And not one on which there can have been much tabulation.

Well, if the viscera is removed, a part of the stuff keeping the body warm is removed.
If there is a lot of blood removed, the same.
That reduces the size and volume of the "core" and means it has less heat storage capacity.

The small intestine is named so because it has a narrower "gauge" (for want fo a better word) than the large intestine not because it is smaller in volume.
It's BIG.
The small intestine is (in Chapmans case likely...) somewhere in the region of 5 metres long, and weighs about the same as a full face motrocycle helmet. It's just under 7% of the internal mass in the body cavity.
If you remove that and leave the gap open, along with the loss of blood, the air gets to a larger surface area within the cavity. That larger surface area combined with a smaller core would increase the rate at which a solid or fluid cools. (That's Physics.)

Philips was basing his estimation on a standard body temp decline. We know this because he states pretty clearly that he hadn't factored in loss of blood or the ambiant coolness of the yard.
No one will convince me, no matter how much they paid me, to ever accept that he did the equations in his head to figure out the alteration in the curve at which the temperature would decline when (typically) 6.98% of the typical internal body mass was sitting on the floor by the step, when he didn't even take blood loss or external tempearture into account, and didn't even take his thermometre out and hang it from a fence post to determine the bloody ambiant temperature. Didn;t need to stick it anywhere near the victim... a measure of the yards temperature would have been valiuable to further study at autopsy.
He had no idea to do even THAT!

I'm going to leave you to come to your own conclusions as to whether any of that would have caused a 1.5 degree C drop in temp comapred to the normal situations he would have encountered over his years. (But it would!!)

But... he was very confident in his own opinion was old George... so there's that.
Seems to be enough for some people and "Bugger basic physics... what can THAT tell us?"

[Hair Bear]

Unless Richardson is considered a SUSPECT; the idea of establishing an accurate TOD for Chapman becomes redundant.

As a witness, he is unreliable.

But through no fault of his own.

Based on the "professional" opinion of Phillips on an earlier TOD; his version of events becomes questionable.

But through no fault of his own.

He openly and deliberately places himself at the exact spot where a woman is murdered and admits to carrying a knife to cut some troublesome leather from his boot.

But based on Phillip's earlier TOD, Richardson places himself there with Chapman laying on the floor by his left foot.

The earlier TOD therefore either proves that Richardson was the murderer, or was a complete moron who couldn't see a mutilated woman laying ON DISPLAY just inches away from him.

So was he an idiot or the killer?

Or was he telling the truth and Chapman wasn't there?

When we look at Philips, we would do well to look at him overall.

He is experienced no doubt and very knowledgeable no doubt.

But could he have been wrong?

If Philips is correct and Chapman was murdered earlier, ergo, before Richardson arrives, then that only leaves room for Richardson to be a suspect.

Richardson was either a murderous genius, with balls of steel who admitted to being there with a knife at the same time Chapman was there, or he was a man who failed to see Chapman.

The question is...If a man openly places himself at a murder scene holding a knife at a time when a woman is lying murdered, displayed, and mutilated, then why was he not considered a prime suspect?
What else would a man have to do to be seen as a suspect in the murder of Chapman?


It's rather telling that despite Philip's professional opinion of an earlier TOD, and Richardson confessing to being there at a time after Chapman was slain, the police didn't rate him as their number one suspect.

That only leaves room for the police to believe that he just somehow missed seeing her or that Philips was mistaken and Chapman was killed based on a later TOD which coincided with 2 other witnesses.

What is more believable...

1) Richardson completely misses seeing an openly displayed mutilated corpse lying inches away from him?

2) Richardson murdered her and used ballsy reverse psychology to tease the police by admitting he was there right next to her with a knife... but claiming he failed to see her?

3) Philips COULD have been wrong about his professional estimates.


In other words, we have...

Richardson, the moronic unobservant witness who missed seeing her
Richardson, the killer
Richardson, the truthful & reliable witness who disproves Philips estimated TOD

I would say to you all that if you don't consider Richardson as the murderer, then you only have 2 options left...and if you believe Philips, then by default you believe that Richardson somehow missed Chapman's mutilated body lying next to him.

The idea that he either poked his head through the back door, remained on the top step, leaned forward to observe the padlock, but didn't turn his head toward Chapman, sat down and cut the leather from his boot but faced away from her body the whole time etc...etc... is all just an incredible amount of nonsensical rubbish to try and somehow explain how he missed her.

The only way he could have missed her is if he genuinely didn't see her...but that doesn't need much explanation.

He just missed her and that's it.

However, the repeated and continued attempt to support an earlier TOD & try & somehow explain just how he missed her, then ironically becomes a way of supporting an argument for a later TOD.

It either comes naturally or it doesn't...and if it doesn't, then maybe you're wrong and your faith in Philip's "professional" opinion is misguided.


RD

Hi RD. I would add one point. If Cadosche heard something but not the killer, and Long saw someone but not the killer, we are left with Phillips' 4:30am ToD and Richardson having left the property at around 4:50am. If Chapman was killed directly after (maybe they were hiding behind the blade of the door - yes, that's a joke), let's say 5:00am, Phillips' estimation would only be out by a half hour, which is pretty good.

[Hair Bear]

I went to bed about half-past nine, and was very wakeful half the night. I was awake at three a.m., and only dozed after that.

[I]On Saturday morning I called to Thompson at ten minutes to four o'clock.

HI PI1. That sounds like she was awake enough to know if anyone was in the passage between 3 and 4, so based on that it seems unlikely that anyone needing to start work at 4am would be the killer.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

HI PI1. That sounds like she was awake enough to know if anyone was in the passage between 3 and 4, so based on that it seems unlikely that anyone needing to start work at 4am would be the killer.

Should I understand that to mean that, like me, you are sceptical about Christer Holmgren's suggestion that Lechmere was in that passage between 3 a.m and 4 a.m. that morning?

[Hair Bear]

Our sleeping pattern is a modern day invention. In Victorian times the optimum sleeping pattern was considered to be going to bed for a few hours, getting up to do a few chores or whatever for a few hours, and then going back to bed for a few hours. Seems strange to us, but the idea of 8 hours continuous sleep being the optimum sleeping pattern, is a modern invention, an invention that the Victorians didn't know anything about.

Hi FM. My knowledge of Victorian life is admittedly dire, so I'm responding as a layman and not with any great expertise. As I understand it the Victorians worked very long shifts with one day a week off not two. Point in case being Pickfords, as their employees worked between 14-18 hours a shift. So unless you are speaking about housewives I don't see how your pattern fits into a working day.

[Hair Bear]

Should I understand that to mean that, like me, you are sceptical about Christer Holmgren's suggestion that Lechmere was in that passage between 3 a.m and 4 a.m. that morning?

I by no means rule out Lechmere (or anyone else), and don't really want this thread to spill over to someone beyond Richardson, but to answer your question, yes.

[Herlock Sholmes]

The testimony given at the inquest suggests that none of the four residents of number 29 mentioned used the outside lavatory during the night.

The reason you gave for that is exactly the same as the one I had in mind.

I did not invent anything.

The evidence suggests that residents avoided using the outside lavatory at night, just as I said they did.

And as you suggested, that was common practice.

My original point was that the outside loo wasn’t only likely to be used in the early morning (when the killer was there) but all through the night (when an earlier ToD) would have occurred. I made this point to show that no matter what time Chapman was killed the killer was in danger of interruption.

But, as ever, you just can’t accept something. You have to try and come up with a way of showing that it was wrong. You never mentioned the use of a pot. I mentioned it. But you said that it looked like Mrs. Richardson avoided using the outside loo at night before I mentioned that. So you were making a deduction purely on the fact that Mrs. Richardson hadn’t mentioned using the loo during the night.

It was a deduction that cannot be made. So my original point….a very obvious and simple point which should have been accepted in the first place…that a killer would have been at risk of interruption at any time, should stand as a fact.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

You never mentioned the use of a pot.

I mentioned it. But you said that it looked like Mrs. Richardson avoided using the outside loo at night before I mentioned that.

I did not mention it, but it is what I had in mind when I suggested that she avoided going into the yard at night.

I suggest that such avoidance was general.

Cadoche, for example, mentions going to the lavatory at about 5.20 a.m.

[GBinOz]

Thanks George - I love these videos. Also the ones by Edward Stowe (or Stow), when he walks around the area.

Hi Paul,

Be warned that Edward Stow, like Christer is persona non grata on this forum - not with me. I don't know Edward but I number Christer amongst my friends.

Cheers, George

[Herlock Sholmes]

Was he an actual detective? His posts seem interesting, so that would make sense. They're also concise and no nonsense.

Above all what strikes a newbie is the incredible sense of ownership some display, as if it's their territory. There's also bogus credentialism.

I don't doubt I'll be doing the same - probably already have - since the temptation to try and 'win' points is immense. That's why I take the piss so much. It's a serious and worthwhile area, but also riddled with absurdities and discussions akin to those on how many angels could dance on the head of a pin. No doubt some pedant will provide a copy and paste link, showing they can Google and cut/paste.

Another example of someone needlessly mocked is Christer. I'll take the piss out of Lechmere as a candidate, the poor sod. But Christer's approach seems exemplary to me - he's polite but forceful and his contributions (to a novice) seem huge. I think many are just jealous. He's also non-patronising and doesn't assert some fake authority. Obviously many disagree - this is just how it seems to an outsider.

The very worst aspect is the semantic obsession with proving words mean one thing or another - which can never be settled. Especially when someone goes mad over loose/ambiguous wording in another's post.

Ok, I’ll respond because this is clearly aimed at me (and perhaps others)

There are no hatred’s but there is irritation but there’s a very good reason for it. There is much in this case that is debatable and down to individual interpretation but some things are simply facts and when we see facts being constantly disputed because they don’t fit in with a preconception then they have to be called out. The biggest example of this (and it’s important) is that the actual authorities in forensic medicine tell us that the methods used by Phillips to estimate a ToD were unreliable. No one has said that he couldn’t have made a correct estimation but it means that he could also have been wrong. I, and others, have produced reams of categorical proof of this fact. And yet we still have laymen (as I am) disputing this by adding their own “yeah but’s,” or “I still don’t think’s.” So this is a constant source of irritation that has tainted the discussion. All because certain posters simply refused to accept something that should have been beyond debate.

I have no hatred or dislike of Trevor. We disagree on some things but you’ll find that many people disagree strongly with Trevor on certain subjects including people like Paul Begg. I have two main issues with Trevor (as he undoubtedly will have issues with me) One is that he assumes that his opinions should be accepted as fact and that no one but him can assess evidence. He often posts saying “I’ve already told you this….” Another is that he attempts to dismiss witnesses that don’t favour his viewpoint (often using generalities like ….’we know that witnesses can be mistaken,’ or by finding a minor discrepancy and using it dismiss the testimony as a whole) Numerous examples of this could be listed but I won’t bother.

Christer’s approach is exemplary?!! I’m sorry Paul but you haven’t had the experience of discussing the case with him over a length of time that others have. The constant talking down to people, the mockery of opinions (far more subtle than I’m ever guilty of) and the constant wriggling over various points. The manipulation of evidence. The twisting of the English language. I can’t think of a more consistently patronising poster. This is someone who left out the word ‘about’ to try and manufacture a gap of time and so incriminate Cross after all. Examples are numerous. This is someone who, on here admitted that the majority of journalists said that Cross had said that he’d left the house at ‘about 3.30,’ (which they did) and yet previously, in his book had said that the majority of journalists had said ‘3.30.’

You appear to reserve all of your criticisms for those who favour a later ToD Paul. I accept my own faults. But should we keep assuming that others are paragons?