RipperCon-Baltimore 2016

[mklhawley]

Brian has written an engaging account of going to RipperCon in Baltimore. Here's a sample:

Baltimore, Baseball and Boogeymen: My trip to RipperCon, Jack the Ripper–True Crime Conference, April 8–10
By Brian Young

“Oh really… A Jack the Ripper conference….how…..interesting.” Those were last words said to me by the woman sitting next to me on the plane the entire way to Baltimore. But I didn’t mind. I was excited to be on my way from Buffalo, New York, to my very first Ripper conference! Besides, I was used to that reaction, as I’m sure we all are, when our interest in Jack the Ripper comes up.

For those of you who may think RipperCon would be nothing more than “all you ever needed to know about Jack but were afraid to ask” I’m here to set the record straight. Sure you will get your fix of the Ripper, but there was much more to it than that.…

Watch for Brian Young's entire report on RipperCon upcoming in the June issue of the Whitechapel Journal!

Perfect person to report on the weekend! Great job, Brian!

Sincerely,
Mike

[Steadmund Brand]

Thanks Mike...I tried!!

Was so much fun listening to the panel discussion again....for those who haven't it's a must....thank you again Jonathan, great job putting them out...and special thank you to Robert Anderson....see it did work...and sound great!!

Steadmund Brand

[ChrisGeorge]

Thanks Mike...I tried!!

Was so much fun listening to the panel discussion again....for those who haven't it's a must....thank you again Jonathan, great job putting them out...and special thank you to Robert Anderson....see it did work...and sound great!!

Steadmund Brand

Here's the link to the panel discussion:



Available now to stream or download courtesy of Jonathan Menges and Mr. Anderson:

http://www.casebook.org/podcast/listen.html?id=128

[GUT]

Just listed to the panel discussion, interesting.

Mike tells me I have to give his another listen.

[jmenges]

Team Syphilis' Baltimore talk on the Long Island Serial Killer is now available to stream or download here:

http://www.casebook.org/podcast/listen.html?id=129

Thanks for listening to this fascinating talk and extra bonus conversation about Lisk with Prof. Charles Tumosa.



JM

[RockySullivan]

Great job on the LISK talk Mr. Anderson! I was really impressed with how much info you covered in such a short time. My only regrets are that you didn't discuss the drifter who is suspect number 1 in my opinion due to some of the press reports from 2011. I believe this individual is the link between Shannan and the Gilgo 4. Also you made the frequently repeated error of not mentioning the male victims. News article on the case will always ignore these bodies but they are the most significant. What's interesting is that the killer dumped the dismembered torso of Jane Doe 2000 but dumped her male "friend" without dismembering him very nearby. Very interesting. Here are some reports for those interested in the male victims. There are MANY but I am just posting here about John Doe 2000 and 2003:

NIGHTMARE ON L.I.E. – LATEST NUDE BODY HINTS AT SERIAL SLAY
By Lisa Pulitzer November 11, 2003 | 5:00am
A mushroom hunter yesterday led police to a nude body buried under a tangle of leaves and branches off the Long Island Expressway – not far from a heavily wooded area where the bodies of two nude, headless and handless women were found dumped.

Police, who believe there may be a serial killer at work in the area, said it was too soon to tell if there’s a connection between yesterday’s grisly find in Manorville and the two unsolved decapitation murders – one discovered last July, the other in November 2000.

“At this point there’s no way of knowing if there’s a link,” said Detective Lt. Jack Fitzpatrick, commander of the Suffolk homicide squad.

–– ADVERTISEMENT ––



Although the mushroom hunter, who asked to remain anonymous, first spotted the body a week and a half ago, he didn’t tell police about his discovery until yesterday.

He told The Post he was “too terrified,” but finally spoke up because he was “having nightmares.”

He led cops to the corpse in dense woods just west of the Edwards Avenue exit of the LIE, yesterday morning.

Investigators left the body undisturbed, under a pile of leaves, branches and brush, while they combed the area for clues.

They said they would not be able to determine whether it belonged to a man or woman – and whether it was intact – until they finished their crime-scene search.

The mushroom hunter told The Post he thought the victim was a girl “because the feet were small.” He said he also didn’t see any fingers on the body, but thought they may have been buried under the brush.

Fitzpatrick said it was not clear whether the body had been buried by naturally falling foliage and tree limbs, or by someone trying to hide a murder.

The body was found 400 yards south of the LIE, near Toppings Path – about three miles east of the woods where the bodies of the two decapitated women had been dumped.

Their remains were located a mile apart, just north of the LIE, near Halsey Manor Road.

Because both were nude, headless and handless, and had been similarly mutilated, police believe they may have been victims of a serial killer.

Investigators also have also been checking for links between the two brutal slayings and a 1997 murder in Hempstead Lake State Park in which a woman, whose hands, feet and head had been chopped off, was dumped in woods near the Southern State Parkway.

The victim in the most recent of the three murders was described as white or Hispanic, 20 to 30 years of age, 5-foot-5, between 110 and 125 pounds, with brown hair.

She had a black and red tattoo of an eagle on the right side of her back – that her killer had attempted to gouge out – and wore a purple and silver decal on a toe. Her body was discovered on July 26 by a woman walking a dog.

In woods less than a mile away, the partially decomposed body of another woman was found in November 2000.

The victim was described as white, 35 to 40 years old, between 5-foot-1 and 5-foot-5, with brown hair.

HIGHWAY TO HELL

November 2002 in Manorville

In woods north of Long Island Expressway, near Halsey Manor Road

Partially decomposed nude body of unidentified decapitated woman, her arms severed, found; believed to have been dumped a month earlier.

July 26, 2003 in Manorville

In woods north of Long Island Expressway, less than a mile south of November 2002 dumped murder victim

Nude body of unidentified decapitated woman, her arms severed, found.

(for artist: this is east of other Manorville sites, just before LIE exit 71/Edwards Av

Nov. 10, 2003 in Manorville

In woods south of Long Island Expressway, near Toppings Path, three miles east of earlier Manorville crime scenes

Nude body found by mushroom hunter under leaves and branches.

http://www.doenetwork.org/media/news18.html

Two bodies. Found two miles away from each other two years ago. No one knows who they were or where they came from.

On November 19th, 2000, hunters came across the decapitated body of a female that had been placed in garbage bags and left in a wooded area near Halsey-Manor Road in Manorville. Four days later and only a couple of miles away, a young male corpse was also discovered by hunters, approximately one-and-a-half miles east of the Shirley exit (68) on the Long Island Expressway. The man’s body, described as white or Hispanic, five-and-a-half to six feet tall, 130-150 pounds, with a surgical staple imbedded in his chin, was disrobed of all clothing save a pair of Gap boxer shorts. He was later revealed to have been a victim of strangulation. Both bodies were likely there for some time, particularly the female, who police believe was murdered as early as that September. Just over two years later, the victims still remain unidentified, and thus, the case has not even come close to being solved.

“Unfortunately, the investigation sort of starts and stops with the discovery of the bodies and the subsequent analysis—if there’s no way of identifying who that individual is,� says Detective/Lieutenant Jack Fitzpatrick, commanding officer for the homicide squad of the Suffolk County Police Department. “Some identification of who these people are will certainly give us an opportunity to backtrack and figure out what happened and why. Without identification, there’s not a lot to go on.�

While murder is not a common occurrence in the primarily tranquil territory surrounding Shirley and Manorville, the heavily wooded area near the highway could have made the ideal dumping grounds for someone who committed the crime outside of the region. “If you looked at this stretch of road, you might say, ‘Nobody will ever go there,’� says Fitzpatrick.

Fitzpatrick and the homicide department are not considering the possibility of a connection between the cases, including the chance of a serial killer roaming the South Shore.

The question then remains: What is being considered? In cases like this, while one would like to cling to the idea that someone out there is missing a loved one who disappeared without a trace, there are many instances of missing runaways, hitchhikers and even prostitutes who have no discernible ties to any families or friends. So when the search for them is silenced amongst possible family and the community, who is going to act as their voice?

At this point, the Suffolk County Police Department has continued to put out “Crimestopper� alerts and is offering a cash reward of up to $1,000 for any information that leads to an arrest (800-220-TIPS). Beyond that, they have essentially thrown up their hands (although Fitzpatrick is still withholding the image of a tattoo located on the female victim for verification purposes if they ever get a call through Crimestoppers). When asked if they have sought assistance through the Doe Network, a volunteer organization dedicated to unidentified victims’ cases, Fitzpatrick said, “We do that on occasion, but I think there’s less possibility here of success. It’s a time-consuming process. Usually, we just send them to the FBI.�

Todd Matthews, media director for the Doe Network, seemed a bit skeptical of this assertion, stating, “If the police want something left unexplained, then that’s fine. [But] we work with them. We could have it done this afternoon.� As long as the police provide a reconstructed image or picture of the victim, the Network’s Project EDAN (Everyone Deserves a Name) can create free facial reconstructions by professional forensic artists who donate their services to this cause (private investigators, medical examiners, journalists and police officers also donate their time). These images can be found on their website, www.doenetwork.org, which offers a worldwide forum to expand the search for anonymous victims. The Doe Network has had a hand in identifying three previously unidentified victims and has a database of more than 700 potential matches.

Granted, in instances such as the two in question, especially when a decapitation is involved (as with the female), that may be easier said than done. But within the cavalcade of cases that come into any police department, there is bound to be a constant re-prioritizing, with older, yet-unsolved cases probably finding their way to the bottom of the pile quick.

This is fairly alarming, considering that New York has the third-largest number of unidentified remains next to California and Florida. In fact, Matthews admitted that the Doe Network has “really not gotten a good response from New York,� adding that, “they’re telling me these cases are impossible, but they’re not. If they don’t have the resources, we’ll do it out of our pockets.�

[Fantomas]

Fascinating podcast recordings from this event - as ever! However most intriguing was Mikita Brottman's presentation on The Yorkshire Ripper. Being a Glasgow boy of an age with Mikita, I was born "North of the Wall" in the 1970s but still recall Sutcliffe's crimes gripping Scotland.

I holidayed in Morecambe in the early eighties and recall the waxworks to which Mikita referred. New information that chilled yet intrigued me.

Part of me wanted to rail against Brottman's feminist history view that all working class Northern men were embryonic Yorkshire rippers and could tip over into his level of violence. True there was a pervasive mysoginy in the popular culture of the age but this was I feel a sweeping and damning presumption that dismisses the many caring and genteel wirking class men I grew up with. Was it not working class northern UK trade unions who championed initial stages of equal pay and conditions for women in late 1970s and early 1980s UK - prompted in part by reports of women being caught shoplifting and prostituting themselves spiked in the mid 1970s. Was it not in fact a female middle/upper-class championing female Prime Minister who further hobbled the working class and police and almost thwarted the catching of Sutcliffe - however indirectly?

To err slightly in the "conspiracy theory" camp, recent revelations that Jekyll and Hyde UK TV host Jimmy Savile was interviewed about Irene Anderson's murder, had casts made of his teeth and the fact Irene Anderson was found a stone's throw from Savile's apartment block begin to put him in the frame with Sutcliffe. In fact some theorists postulate that Sutcliffe was a (to double reference conspiracy theory) latter day Netley to Savile's nouveau riche, decadent sado-masochist psychotic. I would put it to Brottman that in fact the Yorkshire Ripper murders while a grotesque reflection of "clip her round the ear and sh*g her" working class male stereotype of the 1970s, the murders might more clearly fit the profile of a woman-hating eccentric with time and money to spare. Not to let Sutcliffe off the hook but Brottman is right (and is it Rumbelow who argues the West Yorkshire police were not incompetent at her lecture?) when delineating the WY Police incompetence.

Savile was very good friends with the hierarchy of the West Yorkshire police - how did the WY police suddenly find Sutcliffe after years of bumbling callousness and laccadaisical investigation? Were they thrown the accomplice of the true culprit?

So, I end with as provocative a presumption as Brottman made about the uk Northern working class men of the 1970s and 1980s. However her speech - owing as it did an acknowledged debt to Gordon Burns (another UK TV host - misdirecting for a pal?) was enthralling and I now seek out her Maximum Security book club publication.

[Trevor Marriott]

how did the WY police suddenly find Sutcliffe after years of bumbling callousness and laccadaisical investigation? Were they thrown the accomplice of the true culprit?

Sutcliffe was arrested because two uniform police officers just happened to be in the right place at the right time, and checked a vehicle parked in a layby in a secluded area, which turned out to be on false number plates, and contained Sutciffe and an intended victim. The murder weapon, his hammer was found later when police went back to the layby location.

https://www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[Fantomas]

Interesting. The Yorkshire Ripper murders are not too far in time from the Battle of Orgreave where police revelled in being the stipendiary army of the state and fought Brottman's presumed "brute working class men". It is not a great leap to consider Savile, his friendships to WY constabulary and the trace links all have to a case that was bungled and bumbling for years, the reputations and names of victims rode roughshod over that had a sudden epiphany of Holmesian proportions at a chance encounter. I accept that this is the reported narrative but I can't help finding it problematic.

[jmenges]

Not to let Sutcliffe off the hook but Brottman is right (and is it Rumbelow who argues the West Yorkshire police were not incompetent at her lecture?) when delineating the WY Police incompetence.

I believe you mean Martin Fido.

Thanks for your comments. I'm not sure I'm following how the 'conspiracy theory' that involves Saville is supposed to work? Not unlike the Netley/Royal/Masonic theory, it faces a problem when the victims were attacked and murdered at or near the spot where they were found with no evidence that any of them were discovered at secondary crime scene (dumped).

All the best,

JM

[ChrisGeorge]

Part of me wanted to rail against Brottman's feminist history view that all working class Northern men were embryonic Yorkshire rippers and could tip over into his level of violence. True there was a pervasive mysoginy in the popular culture of the age but this was I feel a sweeping and damning presumption that dismisses the many caring and genteel wirking class men I grew up with. Was it not working class northern UK trade unions who championed initial stages of equal pay and conditions for women in late 1970s and early 1980s UK - prompted in part by reports of women being caught shoplifting and prostituting themselves spiked in the mid 1970s. Was it not in fact a female middle/upper-class championing female Prime Minister who further hobbled the working class and police and almost thwarted the catching of Sutcliffe - however indirectly?

Hello Fantomas

I was in the audience in Baltimore and having grown up in Liverpool in the Sixties (before re-emigrating to the U.S. in 1968), I am doubtful about Ms. Brottman's implication that all working class males wanted to knock their womenfolk around. Yes, of course, that was true of some brutes, but not, I think, true of all working class men in England or Yorkshire at the time of the Yorkshire Ripper murders.

Best regards

Chris

[Fantomas]

Thankyou JM and Chris. Maybe a thorough investigation of just why Savile is often mentioned in the same breath as Sutcliffe, why Savile apparently befriended Sutcliffe in Broadmoor plus why he was implicated in the Glasgow Bible John killings is required.

[jmenges]

Now available to stream or download from the following link:

http://www.casebook.org/podcast/listen.html?id=131

Thank you for listening!



JM

[ChrisGeorge]

Hi Jonathan

Great work once again, Jonathan. Thanks.

All the best

Chris

[Mayerling]

Excellent discussion on Conan Doyle, Holmes, and Jack the Ripper. I'm only sorry I was unable to attend it.

Conan Doyle, like Holmes, was a student of crime, frequently writing stories that had traces of actual crimes in them (particularly the Holmes' stories, but including others). He even wrote some essays about actual crimes, like the murders of George Townley in 1863 and of William Godfrey Youngman in 1860. His interpretations were questionable sometimes, but they were always interesting.

Jeff