Lawende and Long

[Herlock Sholmes]

The police use a system called ADVOKATE to assess witnesses (thanks to Trevor for posting the information) so I thought I’d apply it to two witnesses. The rarely doubted Joseph Lawende and the regularly doubted Elizabeth Long:


Amount of time under observation: How long did the witness have the person/incident in view?

Lawende 1 - Long 1 (both were in passing.)


Distance: What was the distance between the witness and the person/incident?

Lawende 1 - Long 2 (Lawende was across a street, Long was alongside the woman)


Visibility: What was the visibility at the time? Factors include the time of day/night, street lighting, etc.

Lawende 1 - Long 3 (Lawende was at night, Long was in daylight)


Obstruction: Were there any obstructions to the view of the witness?

Lawende 2 - Long 4 (neither were obstructed)


Known or seen before: Did the witness know, or had the witness ever seen, the person before? If so where and when?

Lawende 2 - Long 4 (neither knew the person they were seeing)


Any reason to remember: Did the witness have any special reason for remembering the person/incident? Was there something specific that made the person/incident memorable?

Lawende 2 - Long 4 (neither had any reason for paying attention specifically)


Time-lapse: How long has elapsed since the witness saw the person/incident?

Lawende 3 - Long 4 (I’m unsure when Lawende was interviewed by Long was after 3 days)


Error discrepancy: Are there any errors or material discrepancies between descriptions in the first and subsequent accounts of the witness?


Lawende 3 - Long 4


……


Then we add the very obvious fact that Lawende wasn’t even identifying Eddowes.


Lawende:

“The woman was standing with her face towards the man, and I only saw her back. She had one hand on his breast. He was the taller. She had on a black jacket and bonnet. I have seen the articles at the police-station, and believe them to be those the deceased was wearing…”


Long:

“I saw the woman's face. Have seen the deceased in the mortuary, and I am sure the woman that I saw in Hanbury-street was the deceased.”


Lawende identifies her by her jacket and hat. Long identifies the woman because she saw her face close up then saw the body in the mortuary. And yet we still hear Lawende being considered a more reliable witness? He simply saw a woman talking to a man close to where Catherine was murdered at around the right time.


So based on my own use of ADVOKATE (and others may disagree) this means that Long scores slightly higher than Lawende….a man whose reliability is rarely (if ever) questioned. So why is it the case that, in general, Lawende is treated as one of the strongest suspects in the case and yet Long is often treated as one of the most unreliable? I’d say that it’s because we can fairly accurately pin down Eddowes ToD (and therefore we know that she was in that general area at around that time) as opposed to Long in the Chapman case because Chapman’s ToD is disputed by Dr. Phillips estimation. But how heavily should this fact influence our assessment? Aren’t we guilty of simple thinking “surely it must have been her?” Must it have been her though?

Could Lawende have seen someone else? How unlikely would it have been? An actual circumstance that would account for Lawende seeing something else is far from as unlikely as we presume in my opinion. Similar circumstances repeat themselves millions of times a day across the world. I’d ask what would be inherently unbelievable in a scenario such as this:

‘A single woman walks along a street. A hundred yards or so ahead three men walk in the same direction. Across the street a man is talking to a women near the head of a passage. The three men pass by them. A very few seconds later the couple move off. The single woman gets to where they were, crosses the street and walks down the passage.’

This is hardly the stuff of Tolkien in terms of believability is it? I’m not stating this as a theory or as something that I particularly believe happened by the way. I’m not even suggesting that the couple weren’t likeliest to have been Eddowes and her killer. I’m just suggesting two things. That an alternative scenario shouldn’t be particularly difficult to believe and that we should judge all witnesses in the same way.


So my main point again…..why is Joseph Lawende considered a reliable, rarely challenged witness whilst Elizabeth Long is often dismissed as ‘probably mistaken?’

[Abby Normal]

The police use a system called ADVOKATE to assess witnesses (thanks to Trevor for posting the information) so I thought I’d apply it to two witnesses. The rarely doubted Joseph Lawende and the regularly doubted Elizabeth Long:


Amount of time under observation: How long did the witness have the person/incident in view?

Lawende 1 - Long 1 (both were in passing.)


Distance: What was the distance between the witness and the person/incident?

Lawende 1 - Long 2 (Lawende was across a street, Long was alongside the woman)


Visibility: What was the visibility at the time? Factors include the time of day/night, street lighting, etc.

Lawende 1 - Long 3 (Lawende was at night, Long was in daylight)


Obstruction: Were there any obstructions to the view of the witness?

Lawende 2 - Long 4 (neither were obstructed)


Known or seen before: Did the witness know, or had the witness ever seen, the person before? If so where and when?

Lawende 2 - Long 4 (neither knew the person they were seeing)


Any reason to remember: Did the witness have any special reason for remembering the person/incident? Was there something specific that made the person/incident memorable?

Lawende 2 - Long 4 (neither had any reason for paying attention specifically)


Time-lapse: How long has elapsed since the witness saw the person/incident?

Lawende 3 - Long 4 (I’m unsure when Lawende was interviewed by Long was after 3 days)


Error discrepancy: Are there any errors or material discrepancies between descriptions in the first and subsequent accounts of the witness?


Lawende 3 - Long 4


……


Then we add the very obvious fact that Lawende wasn’t even identifying Eddowes.


Lawende:

“The woman was standing with her face towards the man, and I only saw her back. She had one hand on his breast. He was the taller. She had on a black jacket and bonnet. I have seen the articles at the police-station, and believe them to be those the deceased was wearing…”


Long:

“I saw the woman's face. Have seen the deceased in the mortuary, and I am sure the woman that I saw in Hanbury-street was the deceased.”


Lawende identifies her by her jacket and hat. Long identifies the woman because she saw her face close up then saw the body in the mortuary. And yet we still hear Lawende being considered a more reliable witness? He simply saw a woman talking to a man close to where Catherine was murdered at around the right time.


So based on my own use of ADVOKATE (and others may disagree) this means that Long scores slightly higher than Lawende….a man whose reliability is rarely (if ever) questioned. So why is it the case that, in general, Lawende is treated as one of the strongest suspects in the case and yet Long is often treated as one of the most unreliable? I’d say that it’s because we can fairly accurately pin down Eddowes ToD (and therefore we know that she was in that general area at around that time) as opposed to Long in the Chapman case because Chapman’s ToD is disputed by Dr. Phillips estimation. But how heavily should this fact influence our assessment? Aren’t we guilty of simple thinking “surely it must have been her?” Must it have been her though?

Could Lawende have seen someone else? How unlikely would it have been? An actual circumstance that would account for Lawende seeing something else is far from as unlikely as we presume in my opinion. Similar circumstances repeat themselves millions of times a day across the world. I’d ask what would be inherently unbelievable in a scenario such as this:

‘A single woman walks along a street. A hundred yards or so ahead three men walk in the same direction. Across the street a man is talking to a women near the head of a passage. The three men pass by them. A very few seconds later the couple move off. The single woman gets to where they were, crosses the street and walks down the passage.’

This is hardly the stuff of Tolkien in terms of believability is it? I’m not stating this as a theory or as something that I particularly believe happened by the way. I’m not even suggesting that the couple weren’t likeliest to have been Eddowes and her killer. I’m just suggesting two things. That an alternative scenario shouldn’t be particularly difficult to believe and that we should judge all witnesses in the same way.


So my main point again…..why is Joseph Lawende considered a reliable, rarely challenged witness whilst Elizabeth Long is often dismissed as ‘probably mistaken?’

she shouldnt be, especially since she ided the body and lawende only ided the clothes. it probably has to do with lawende being used to id a couple suspects, ie, the police found him more reliable.

imho they both probably saw the ripper.

[Wickerman]

she shouldnt be, especially since she ided the body and lawende only ided the clothes. it probably has to do with lawende being used to id a couple suspects, ie, the police found him more reliable.

imho they both probably saw the ripper.

Are you saying your Red-neck(erchief)ed, Blotchy Peaked cap guy, was actually wearing a deerstalker?

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

Lawende identifies her by her jacket and hat. Long identifies the woman because she saw her face close up then saw the body in the mortuary. And yet we still hear Lawende being considered a more reliable witness? He simply saw a woman talking to a man close to where Catherine was murdered at around the right time.

I think you are understating the case for Lawende, Herlock.

The murder must have taken place a few minutes later - something like 3 minutes later - in order for the murderer to have done everything he did and escape from the Square in time, unless by an amazing coincidence the murderer was with Eddowes in the Square at the same time that Lawende saw the couple, in which case where did the couple go?

[Herlock Sholmes]

I think you are understating the case for Lawende, Herlock.

The murder must have taken place a few minutes later - something like 3 minutes later - in order for the murderer to have done everything he did and escape from the Square in time, unless by an amazing coincidence the murderer was with Eddowes in the Square at the same time that Lawende saw the couple, in which case where did the couple go?

Why is it relevant where the couple went? What I’m suggesting is the kind of happening that occurs day in day out in every town or city.

A couple stand talking. Three men pass. Five seconds after they pass the couple move on and Eddowes arrives. There would be no difference in time between the couple going down the passage and the lone woman going down. So my scenario gives the killer the same amount of time to kill Eddowes.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

Why is it relevant where the couple went? What I’m suggesting is the kind of happening that occurs day in day out in every town or city.

A couple stand talking. Three men pass. Five seconds after they pass the couple move on and Eddowes arrives. There would be no difference in time between the couple going down the passage and the lone woman going down. So my scenario gives the killer the same amount of time to kill Eddowes.

Why would Eddowes go down Church Passage alone?

Is it not much more likely that the woman seen with her hand on the man's chest would have gone with him down Church passage?

[Herlock Sholmes]

Why would Eddowes go down Church Passage alone?

Is it not much more likely that the woman seen with her hand on the man's chest would have gone with him down Church passage?

Why do we need to ask this question? We haven’t a clue where she was heading so cutting through Mitre Square might have been the quickest way.

I agree that it’s perhaps likely that the couple were Eddowes and her killer but I can’t see it as anything like a certainty because for it not to have been requires no extraordinary circumstances. Just people moving around the streets in a normal way. It only sounds strange if we view it as if it’s a sort of build up to the murder instead of just a short series of bog standard, unconnected events that ended with a murder.

I can’t put a percentage on it PI, and I agree with you in part, I just don’t think we should be too certain.

[PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR 1]

Why do we need to ask this question? We haven’t a clue where she was heading so cutting through Mitre Square might have been the quickest way.

I agree that it’s perhaps likely that the couple were Eddowes and her killer but I can’t see it as anything like a certainty because for it not to have been requires no extraordinary circumstances. Just people moving around the streets in a normal way. It only sounds strange if we view it as if it’s a sort of build up to the murder instead of just a short series of bog standard, unconnected events that ended with a murder.

I can’t put a percentage on it PI, and I agree with you in part, I just don’t think we should be too certain.

I agree with you in part too.

We must be careful not to make a habit of it.

[Herlock Sholmes]

I agree with you in part too.

We must be careful not to make a habit of it.

It is a bit of a rarity these days.

[Abby Normal]

Are you saying your Red-neck(erchief)ed, Blotchy Peaked cap guy, was actually wearing a deerstalker?

i have no idea what your talking about

[Doctored Whatsit]

Once again, I offer Swanson's official summary of the facts dated 6th November - Lawende "saw a man talking to a woman ... he could not identify the man, but also, the woman stood with her back to him ... he could not identify the body ... but to the best of his belief the clothing of the deceased, which was black, was similar to that worn by the woman whom he had seen, and that was the full extent of his identity."

It has been suggested that he changed his mind later, but on what basis, I cannot imagine. That is no positive endorsement of Lawende as a useful witness.

[Lewis C]

she shouldnt be, especially since she ided the body and lawende only ided the clothes. it probably has to do with lawende being used to id a couple suspects, ie, the police found him more reliable.

imho they both probably saw the ripper.

Hi Abby,

My take is that generally the police thought that both Long and Lawende saw the Ripper, but Lawende was more useful from the standpoint of suspect identification because he got a better look at him. If the question is, did Long see him, rather than can she identify him, then Long is at least as good a witness as Lawende.

[JeffHamm]

The police use a system called ADVOKATE to assess witnesses (thanks to Trevor for posting the information) so I thought I’d apply it to two witnesses. The rarely doubted Joseph Lawende and the regularly doubted Elizabeth Long:


Amount of time under observation: How long did the witness have the person/incident in view?

Lawende 1 - Long 1 (both were in passing.)


Distance: What was the distance between the witness and the person/incident?

Lawende 1 - Long 2 (Lawende was across a street, Long was alongside the woman)


Visibility: What was the visibility at the time? Factors include the time of day/night, street lighting, etc.

Lawende 1 - Long 3 (Lawende was at night, Long was in daylight)


Obstruction: Were there any obstructions to the view of the witness?

Lawende 2 - Long 4 (neither were obstructed)


Known or seen before: Did the witness know, or had the witness ever seen, the person before? If so where and when?

Lawende 2 - Long 4 (neither knew the person they were seeing)


Any reason to remember: Did the witness have any special reason for remembering the person/incident? Was there something specific that made the person/incident memorable?

Lawende 2 - Long 4 (neither had any reason for paying attention specifically)


Time-lapse: How long has elapsed since the witness saw the person/incident?

Lawende 3 - Long 4 (I’m unsure when Lawende was interviewed by Long was after 3 days)


Error discrepancy: Are there any errors or material discrepancies between descriptions in the first and subsequent accounts of the witness?


Lawende 3 - Long 4


……


Then we add the very obvious fact that Lawende wasn’t even identifying Eddowes.


Lawende:

“The woman was standing with her face towards the man, and I only saw her back. She had one hand on his breast. He was the taller. She had on a black jacket and bonnet. I have seen the articles at the police-station, and believe them to be those the deceased was wearing…”


Long:

“I saw the woman's face. Have seen the deceased in the mortuary, and I am sure the woman that I saw in Hanbury-street was the deceased.”


Lawende identifies her by her jacket and hat. Long identifies the woman because she saw her face close up then saw the body in the mortuary. And yet we still hear Lawende being considered a more reliable witness? He simply saw a woman talking to a man close to where Catherine was murdered at around the right time.


So based on my own use of ADVOKATE (and others may disagree) this means that Long scores slightly higher than Lawende….a man whose reliability is rarely (if ever) questioned. So why is it the case that, in general, Lawende is treated as one of the strongest suspects in the case and yet Long is often treated as one of the most unreliable? I’d say that it’s because we can fairly accurately pin down Eddowes ToD (and therefore we know that she was in that general area at around that time) as opposed to Long in the Chapman case because Chapman’s ToD is disputed by Dr. Phillips estimation. But how heavily should this fact influence our assessment? Aren’t we guilty of simple thinking “surely it must have been her?” Must it have been her though?

Could Lawende have seen someone else? How unlikely would it have been? An actual circumstance that would account for Lawende seeing something else is far from as unlikely as we presume in my opinion. Similar circumstances repeat themselves millions of times a day across the world. I’d ask what would be inherently unbelievable in a scenario such as this:

‘A single woman walks along a street. A hundred yards or so ahead three men walk in the same direction. Across the street a man is talking to a women near the head of a passage. The three men pass by them. A very few seconds later the couple move off. The single woman gets to where they were, crosses the street and walks down the passage.’

This is hardly the stuff of Tolkien in terms of believability is it? I’m not stating this as a theory or as something that I particularly believe happened by the way. I’m not even suggesting that the couple weren’t likeliest to have been Eddowes and her killer. I’m just suggesting two things. That an alternative scenario shouldn’t be particularly difficult to believe and that we should judge all witnesses in the same way.


So my main point again…..why is Joseph Lawende considered a reliable, rarely challenged witness whilst Elizabeth Long is often dismissed as ‘probably mistaken?’

Hi Herlock,

An interesting exercise and comparison, which got me pondering a few things.

Wouldn't Lawende's sighting, being a "back on view" of the woman, be considered a somewhat obstructed viewing?

Also, one could argue that given Lawende et co. did speak of not liking such types about mean they did sort of take special note of them? Similarly, given Long overhears and recalls a bit of conversation (the "Will you?"), that also suggests she took somewhat of a similar interest in her couple.

The above would shift Long up 1 points and Lawende would remain the same (lose 1 for obstructed view, but gain it back as couple became the focus of his attention, albeit briefly - but it wasn't just he walked passed and paid no attention at all.

Often these sorts of checklists will be associated with a fairly well detailed set of instructions as to how to score things, which we do not have, so things like Long's 3 days may still be considered quite a "short" interval, etc, so we could be making some coding errors here. As an exercise, though, I think the back on view for Lawende, at least, would be viewed as an obstructed view as identification is impaired without seeing the person's face. Long's identification of the man would be "obstructed", but her view of the woman wouldn't be, which differentiates the evaluation of them, and would lower the confidence one might have in her description of the man.

I suspect you are correct, though, that many are factoring in the ToD for Eddowes being clearly very close to the Lawende et al. sighting, while for Long the ToD is less obvious. However, I'm not sure one should allow one's theory of the ToD to influence how one evaluates the evidence about the ToD! The evidence should influence the theory, not the theory influence the evidence after all.

- Jeff

[Herlock Sholmes]

Hi Herlock,

An interesting exercise and comparison, which got me pondering a few things.

Wouldn't Lawende's sighting, being a "back on view" of the woman, be considered a somewhat obstructed viewing?

Also, one could argue that given Lawende et co. did speak of not liking such types about mean they did sort of take special note of them? Similarly, given Long overhears and recalls a bit of conversation (the "Will you?"), that also suggests she took somewhat of a similar interest in her couple.

The above would shift Long up 1 points and Lawende would remain the same (lose 1 for obstructed view, but gain it back as couple became the focus of his attention, albeit briefly - but it wasn't just he walked passed and paid no attention at all.

Often these sorts of checklists will be associated with a fairly well detailed set of instructions as to how to score things, which we do not have, so things like Long's 3 days may still be considered quite a "short" interval, etc, so we could be making some coding errors here. As an exercise, though, I think the back on view for Lawende, at least, would be viewed as an obstructed view as identification is impaired without seeing the person's face. Long's identification of the man would be "obstructed", but her view of the woman wouldn't be, which differentiates the evaluation of them, and would lower the confidence one might have in her description of the man.

I suspect you are correct, though, that many are factoring in the ToD for Eddowes being clearly very close to the Lawende et al. sighting, while for Long the ToD is less obvious. However, I'm not sure one should allow one's theory of the ToD to influence how one evaluates the evidence about the ToD! The evidence should influence the theory, not the theory influence the evidence after all.

- Jeff

Hello Jeff,

To be honest I’d considered the obstruction point but I was wary of being accused of trying to tip the balance but I agree that it’s at least worth mentioning.

Some people are just more observant than others of course (and I’m not talking Holmes-level observation either) and Mrs Long might have fallen into that category for all that we know. I actually did wonder if there is any study or evidence that might suggest suggest any general differences in observation levels between men and women but I couldn’t see any online. Unless we fall back on stereotypes of course…the nosey woman/the busybody…who’s more interested in what others are up to?

I also didn’t want to push the alcohol suggestion strongly either but the fact remains that Lawende had just left a club. For all we know he could have had eight pints which wouldn’t help observation or accurate recollection.

Whichever way we look at it though the assumption over the years appears to be…Lawende - good witness, Long - unreliable and probably wrong. The time ‘discrepancy’ between Long and Cadosch has undoubtedly played a large part in this though with the only suggestion being that Long might have heard the 5.15 bells rather than the 5.30 ones which most feel unlikely. That Cadosch and Long were both a mere 5 minutes or so ‘out’ shouldn’t be troubling though.

[A P Tomlinson]

Hello Jeff,

To be honest I’d considered the obstruction point but I was wary of being accused of trying to tip the balance but I agree that it’s at least worth mentioning.

Some people are just more observant than others of course (and I’m not talking Holmes-level observation either) and Mrs Long might have fallen into that category for all that we know. I actually did wonder if there is any study or evidence that might suggest suggest any general differences in observation levels between men and women but I couldn’t see any online. Unless we fall back on stereotypes of course…the nosey woman/the busybody…who’s more interested in what others are up to?

I also didn’t want to push the alcohol suggestion strongly either but the fact remains that Lawende had just left a club. For all we know he could have had eight pints which wouldn’t help observation or accurate recollection.

Whichever way we look at it though the assumption over the years appears to be…Lawende - good witness, Long - unreliable and probably wrong. The time ‘discrepancy’ between Long and Cadosch has undoubtedly played a large part in this though with the only suggestion being that Long might have heard the 5.15 bells rather than the 5.30 ones which most feel unlikely. That Cadosch and Long were both a mere 5 minutes or so ‘out’ shouldn’t be troubling though.

I don't think it would qualify as an obstructed view since he didn't identify her, but rather the clothes and he had a pretty unobscured view of those.