Jack the Ripper-The Secret Police Files

[Fisherman]

Actually, the term was used by an American publication in the mid to late 1800s.

Any idea when it first surfaced in Britain, Jon?

[Jon Guy]

Any idea when it first surfaced in Britain, Jon?

I don`t, sorry Christer.

Can you remember the details of when it was mentioned in that American publication ?

[Fisherman]

I don`t, sorry Christer.

Can you remember the details of when it was mentioned in that American publication ?

No, I can´t, Jon, sorry - I only remember the discussion half a year or so ago.

[Jon Guy]

The Bender family?

"Ripperana" editor Nick Warren, located a 19th Century example of the term serial murderer in a US publication, a hundred years before Ressler invented it !!.


I`ll have to go back and find it again.

[Abby Normal]

"Ripperana" editor Nick Warren, located a 19th Century example of the term serial murderer in a US publication, a hundred years before Ressler invented it !!.


I`ll have to go back and find it again.

prior to the 80s the most common term used in the US was mass murderer.

[Abby Normal]

I at least didn't realise it at first, having misread Hebbert's description (the dangers of reading these things on my phone), but I don't think I argued a certain stance



I think the "parcel" was made in order for the pieces to sink when thrown in the river. It obviously did not work very well.

So I don't think it was strictly necessary to aid dismemberment, but it might have been thought a convenient way of disposing of the uterus.

Hi Kattrup
look at it this way. we know that cutting up and removing body parts was of some significance to the killer-in both series.

there is a fascination there even before any "disposing" or leaving of the bodies/parts/

To me there is almost a ritualistic element to the way the body/parts are left. Some thrown in the river, in the basement of the new Scotland Yard, on the streets, in the garden of the Shelley estate.

there seems to be import to the killer not only of the parts he kept, and were never recovered, but to the parts he "discarded" or left.

In his own mind-was he polluting the city with the parts? trying to make a statement? marking his territory? taunting/ shocking the police and public?

I'm not sure but I think there is something going on here in both series more than merely trying to get rid of evidence.

[Abby Normal]

The torso cases were all cases where the joints were cut open and disarticulated, something that is rare according to Guy Rutty, who has written a book on the subject.

I need to clarify this further, because although the limbs were generally opened up at the joints and disarticulated, there were exceptions to that rule. For example, the 1873 Batterse torso WAS opened up at nearly all the joints and disarticulated. But not all of them:
"Contrary to the popular opinion, the body has not been hacked, but dexterously cut up; the joints have been opened, and the bones neatly disarticulated, even the complicated joints at the ankle and the elbow, and it is only at the articulations of the hip-joint and shoulder that the bones have been sawn through."

So we have to ask ourselves why a killer who was perfectly able to open up and disarticulate at the joints did not do so in all instances. I would suggest that part of the understanding of what the deeds were all about - the Ripper deeds included - lies in the answer to this question.

woooahhh-Not so fast there fishy!!!

Others seemed to have missed this but I'm not letting it slide.

what is the answer?

[Fisherman]

woooahhh-Not so fast there fishy!!!

Others seemed to have missed this but I'm not letting it slide.

what is the answer?

You are almost there in your post to Kattrup, Abby. The significance of the cutting itself, the fascination preceding the disposal, the ritualistic element...

That´s the primary bit.

The taunting, the shocking, the communication is secondary - it is a fringe benefit found and appreciated along the way.

If I am correct, that is...

[Abby Normal]

If Ripper and Thames Torso were one and the same, why were the Ripper killings all confined to such a small geographical area in contrast to the other series?

hi Harry
as with all the other similarities between the series we also have overlap in territory-The pinchin street torso. here we have a torso found in the street just like the ripper victims-and in the same area as the ripper victims.

I think the other torso victims had been lured to his bolt hole, probably in the vicinity of the East end somewhere, and the parts distributed, in wider area to where the ripper victims were found, because the places the parts/torsos were found had special significance for the killer.

[Sam Flynn]

How likely is it that a city, in a period when serial killing had not even been given a name since it was more or less unheard of, would be stricken by TWO serial killers - simultaneously?

Just because the term "serial killer" wasn't coined at the time, doesn't mean that "serial murders" didn't happen, Fish. Of course they happened, even if they weren't recognised as such. Similarly, of course there could have been multiple serial (and non-serial) killers at large at any given point in time.

It's not as if we had to wait for terms to be invented before things can happen. I mean, nobody had heard of bacteria in the Middle Ages, but that didn't mean that typhus, dysentery and cholera couldn't infect a town's population simultaneously.

[Fisherman]

Sam Flynn: Just because the term "serial killer" wasn't coined at the time, doesn't mean that "serial murders" didn't happen, Fish.

Eh - if you read my posting, you will find out that I speak of Gilles de Rais, Gareth. I know perfectly well that there were serial murders in all eras.

Of course they happened, even if they weren't recognised as such.

And THAT is the point I am pressing.

Similarly, of course there could have been multiple serial (and non-serial) killers at large at any given point in time.

Voilá! But should we expect them to do the exact same damage to the victims, in the exact same metropolis, even if we speak of very rare damage?

It's not as if we had to wait for terms to be invented before things can happen. I mean, nobody had heard of bacteria in the Middle Ages, but that didn't mean that typhus, dysentery and cholera couldn't infect a town's population simultaneously.

Very true. But since - like you say - serial murders were often enough not recognized for what they were, the surfacing of TWO such beasts who were very clearly serialists in the same metropolis was unexpected. It would be so even today - if they did the exact same damage to their victims in many a way.

But hey, when are you going to list the many, many similarities between the Napper murders and the Ash-Smith murder that are far more than between the Ripper and the Torso man? That information is sorely lacking on our former thread of debate.

[Sam Flynn]

But hey, when are you going to list the many, many similarities between the Napper murders and the Ash-Smith murder that are far more than between the Ripper and the Torso man? That information is sorely lacking on our former thread of debate.

I'm not playing that game, because it's fatuous. We can all make up fine-grained categories to fit/discount our pet theories; I daresay I've been guilty of doing so - rarely, but hopefully well informed - in the past, but I've gone beyond that.

Besides, if the Napper/Ash-Smith murders had Prof David Wilson and his criminology chums persuaded of their similarities - to say nothing of the statistical computer analysis - who am I to argue? And I don't blame them, either; if hindsight had not proven otherwise, they'd still have a strong case against Napper if you ask me.

[Fisherman]

Sam Flynn: I'm not playing that game, because it's fatuous.

You actually took the initiative to the game as such. You stated decisively that there were "much, much more similarities" between the Napper murders and the Ash-Smith murder.
You were then able to produce three (3) similarities to bolster your take.
I listed eleven (11) similarities between the Ripper murders and the torso murders.

If you don´t want to prolong the discussion, I can fully understand that, but don´t tell me that I am the one playing games, Gareth. Fair is fair.


Besides, if the Napper/Ash-Smith murders had Prof David Wilson and his criminology chums persuaded of their similarities - to say nothing of the statistical computer analysis - who am I to argue? And I don't blame them, either; if hindsight had not proven otherwise, they'd still have a strong case against Napper if you ask me.

Wilson was not exactly comparing to the Ripper/Torso cases, was he? He saw daytime attacks with multiple stabbings in areas not too far from each other, and that was it. Of course such cases have likenesses, but nowhere near the amount in the Ripper/Torso errand., Not in numbers and not in specificity and uniqueness.

[Sam Flynn]

Wilson was not exactly comparing to the Ripper/Torso cases, was he? He saw daytime attacks with multiple stabbings in areas not too far from each other, and that was it. Of course such cases have likenesses, but nowhere near the amount in the Ripper/Torso errand., Not in numbers and not in specificity and uniqueness.

There are few similarities of any substance between the Ripper and Torso murders, and there's nothing particularly unique or innovative about killers dumping torsos anyway. True evisceration murders - now that's a different kettle of fish, Fish.

[Fisherman]

There are few similarities of any substance between the Ripper and Torso murders, and there's nothing particularly unique or innovative about killers dumping torsos anyway. True evisceration murders - now that's a different kettle of fish, Fish.

You may have noticed that I pointed out that NONE of the Ripper/Torso murders are true evisceration murders as such. Conclusions have been leapt to far too easily, and alternative explanations have been overlooked. The Ripper/torso killer was something quite different from the ordinary eviscerator (who is often disorganized, by the way).

The Ripper was not an evisceration killer. He was another type of killer, who eviscerated not because he felt an urge to do so, but because it was sometimes part of the overall, larger agenda.

Taking away breasts is not eviscerating. Cutting the intercoastals open in the ribs is not eviscerating. Mutilating a face is not eviscerating. Cutting necks is not eviscerating. Stripping the flesh from a thigh is not eviscerating. Taking away the abdominal wall in flaps is not eviscerating - and when it was done, it was NOT done to allow access to the organs! That access is already there with the kind of cut that was provided.

Of course, these are just my views and they are not shaped to fit the overall thinking out here. I happen to think that we have all been wrong about this, and I do so against a backdrop that I have been looking into for a year or two, a backdrop that explains what we see on the murder sites, and that ties the Ripper and Torso murders neatly together.

It is ongoing research, so that is all I am going to say as of now. Apart from the fact that it is plain dumb not to recognize the eviscerations and the cuts from ribs to pubes -for example - as similarities" of substance".
Are you for real? You think a flurry of stabs is a more substantial likeness, then? And that nine to fourteen stabs as opposed to fifty or sixty is all the same...?

Goodnight.