Casebook Examiner No. 3 (August 2010)

[mariab]

Hi Caz, I hope you're having a nicer day than I! (Pots of ugly job-related stress for me today.)
Caz, when Le Grand planted the grapestalk on October 1, 1888 (for which we have enough evidence that he did), he would have NOT yet known for a fact that there were no grapes found at the murder scene. There was a rumour, started with Diemshitz et al, that grapes were found in Stride's hand, which was not corroborated as false but several days later.

Caz wrote:
Stride’s killer, who would have been in the best position to know if the grapes - and therefore Packer’s customer - were mythical and, crucially, to know that the police must have known it too.
I'm not necessarily convinced that Le Grand was Stride's killer, although at this point I'm considering him as a viable suspect. (Not “THE MAIN suspect“!) In addition to this, Le Grand was clearly cunning, but essentially very much a dumbshit, as many of his actions illustrate.
In my opinion, “disinformation frenzy“ and “conjuring up the Packer suspect“ are a very accurate description.
Caz wrote:
What possible advantage was there for the killer to risk getting Packer to tell a story like that, if it was going to be obvious to the police that it was based on a rumour they already knew was untrue?
Among else, the ‘advantage‘ that even today we are still considering, or at least discussing the lodger suspect.

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Caz. I don't know that Stride's killer would have known for sure what, if anything, she was holding in her hand. Had the Ripper read that she was holding grapes, how are you certain he would have yelled 'No she was not!' instead of 'Oh, really? I didn't notice.' No, with Chapman and Eddowes, the Ripper would have known, but we don't see Le Grand planting grapes at those crime scenes, do we?

So, in short Jack the Ripper (Le Grand, for our purposes here) reads that Stride held grapes and cachous. He goes to the nearest grape salesman (next door to Dutfield's Yard) and asks if he sold grapes to Stride. He says no, but they hit it off. So, he does what he's done for years, and pays Packer to lie to say that he did, still working under the assumption that the POLICE BELIEVE Stride had grapes (and why should he think otherwise?). He pays Packer to offer up a fake suspect, and pays the sisters to lie about the bloody grapestalk. The plan WOULD have been damn good if Stride had indeed been holding grapes. And it still did quite well since your boy Yost put out a book trying to argue for Packer's veracity (a waste of time), and many other movies and books include the grapes as though Packer was telling the truth. The police apparently took the grape angle seriously enough to have this inquired into at the inquest.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[caz]

Caz, when Le Grand planted the grapestalk on October 1, 1888 (for which we have enough evidence that he did), he would have NOT yet known for a fact that there were no grapes found at the murder scene. There was a rumour, started with Diemshitz et al, that grapes were found in Stride's hand, which was not corroborated as false but several days later.

Precisely my point, Maria. Le Grand picked up on the rumour first, planted the grapestalk so the story would bear a little fruit, then encouraged Packer to have a little whine -- about the coppers not asking him if anyone suspicious had bought his grapes.

But if Le Grand (Tom's Pipe Man) killed Stride himself, after witnessing BS man shoving her to the ground and shoving off, would he really have been fooled by a false rumour that she had been holding grapes at the time? And yet his cunning plan to invent a grape-buying suspect for the police to go looking for would have depended on those grapes being found with the victim, so it just doesn't make sense unless he assumed that was the case. So why would he have bothered planting a grapestalk near the scene? In short, grapes present, no stalk required; grapes absent, no point inventing suspect.

Love,

Caz
X

[caz]

No, with Chapman and Eddowes, the Ripper would have known, but we don't see Le Grand planting grapes at those crime scenes, do we?

You're right there, Tom. We don't even see Le Grand planting himself at those crime scenes. But why would we unless he was actually there? As for planting grapes, I thought it was just a stalk they found. Wasn't that your point - no grapes? Yet now you are forgiving Le Grand, supposedly the last man to see Stride alive, for believing there could have been. Even the police are forgiven for initially taking the grapes seriously. I wondered when they would start creeping back onto the menu, in spirit at least. Better than flushing Le Grand down the pan, eh?

And not so much of the 'your boy Yost'. Yost is not my boy and I'd prefer it if nobody got that impression.

Love,

Caz
X

[mariab]

Hi Caz,
you might be simply underestimating Le Grand's intelligence. He was one for complicated (too complicated schemes), but clearly not the brightest bloke. He heard “grapes“, he thought “I'll give you a grape stalk, and make you run around in circles“. He doesn't sound like someone who had clear thoughts about the long term consequences of his acts.
Who on earth is Yost?!
Getting ready for work, already late, a won-der-ful Saturday, no different than a Monday. And I even got my stupid Chicago boss on my back, who, after engaging in a dispute all night, now plays the victim. Bloody Yankees! The world would be better without them!

[The Grave Maurice]

Who on earth is Yost?!

Maria,

In my opinion, you can't follow this game if you don't know the players. Dave Yost was one of three authors of the very influential book The News from Whitechapel. He also wrote the, perhaps, somewhat more controversial Elizabeth Stride and JtR: the Life and Death of the Reputed Third Victim. He is a very talented writer.

You might want to consider the advantages of reading more.

[mariab]

To The Great Maurice:
Thank you, I now recall about David Yost having written one of the 3 books on Stride, and from the context on this thread I get it that Yost is lobying for Packer having been truthful, so it's safe to say that I won't be reading Yost's book on Stride. I'm deeply ashamed of never having heard of The news from Whitechapel, and at some point I might read it, even though the author's beliefs in his book about Stride puzzle me greatly.
The Great Maurice wrote:
You might want to consider the advantages of reading more.
Wow! I consider this ironic since I've been working non stop since several weeks for 19 hour days, conducting research at the Paris Opéra under the most hurried, stressful conditions (under the threat that they'll close again any time now, due to the dust accumulating from the intense construction on the Opéra façade, NOT mentioning the horrible, scratchy noise by the machines, and try to read fragments of music when disturbed by such noise for 4 hours daily), and in the evenings I'm stuck with completing a long French article (due for publication soon) on my findings and on my reconstruction of the genesis of Rossini's Le Comte Ory. I have Sugden here and I wanted to finally be able to read it, but after the French article I'm on deadline for a proposal for both some French/German funding and for a conference (thankfully, the same proposal fits both, and it's also derivative of my dissertation, so in can be done in a single evening).
Besides all this, my surfboard is lying under the couch, unused, and my ice skates I was hoping to use very early today for an early session at the Bercy ice rink (before it gets horribly crowed and one can forget about jumps), but I didn't feel like getting up at 7.00 a.m. today, and I slept deeply for almost 10 hours instead. Plus, I have my Chicago boss who manages to eat away much of my evening time, although now it's gone back to the “lovey-dovey“ stage of “your work is terrific, enjoy a rest day, bla bla“.
As my French apartment owner says, “It's relaxing watching people work like ants, now that I'm retired“. So I guess that catching up on my readings in Ripperology might have to wait a little bit, until my real work and real-job-related-readings are done, so that I'm in a position to pay next month's rent and expenses (like Mary Kelly!). I'm not even considering (what's left of) my social life and sports at this point...
(Wow! It sure feels cathartic to complain a big bunch once in a while, so I guess that I should thank The Great Maurice for providing me with this opportunity.)

[The Grave Maurice]

Maria,

As you say, I was only suggesting that using any available time to read the JtR literature is not misspent.

Sorry to hear that you are having to work so hard, although I can't be too sympathetic toward anyone who gets to spend as much time in Paris as you do. Makes me very envious. How are things on the Boul' Mich?

[mariab]

To The Great Maurice:
No problem at all. It's OK about the hard work, and I despise myself for being so whiny. Paris is lovely, only too crowded. I'm just back from an evening with the girls in a beautiful, warm night (after also watching the movie The Runaways, of all things, which opened in Paris this week), and I'm slightly feeling the booze. We shared a shellfish casserole and yummy brochettes de veau, and my female guitarist friend was chasing me around rue Coquillère until I tried to climb one of the rare trees in Paris, so it was not an evening of very mature activity.
Are you referring to the Boul' Mich on Michigan Ave., Chicago, or to the one in the Quartier Latin in Paris?
Now to email back my boss, who never sleeps (although it's still early evening in Chicago).
And I truly can't wait to read Sugden, only it'll have to wait until my deadlines are met.

[Stewart P Evans]

Who?

...
In my opinion, you can't follow this game if you don't know the players. Dave Yost was one of three authors of the very influential book...

But who are 'the players' and how does one qualify to be 'a player'?

[The Good Michael]

Maria,

Please spare us the commentary about how difficult your life is. I'm kind of sick of it with the Paris this, and German boss that, and having to eat quiche every day. You irritate the pi$$ out of me.

Have a nice day.

Mike

[mariab]

Stewart Evans wrote:
But who are 'the players' and how does one qualify to be 'a player'?
Good question. I'm very interested in reading The news from Whitechapel, but should a book on Stride considering Packer's testimony as truthful make it to the “official“ reading list for Ripperology?

[corey123]

Hello Maria,

Any book is worth reading unless told otherwise. I have to say I agree with Maurice, News from Whitechapel, Jack the Ripper in the Daily Telegraph is a wounderful book.

[mariab]

Hello Corey,
is News from Whitechapel, Jack the Ripper in the Daily Telegraph mainly a discussion of The Daily Telegraph reports about the Ripper case, arranged by 3 different writers/editors? Apologies if my assumption is totally off, as a newbie! In case my guess is correct though, I must say I'd be more interested in reading the original Daily Telegraph reports and form my own opinions and analysis. My next step in Ripperology is managing to find a bit of time to read Sugden – but it probably won't happen before a couple of weeks.
By the by, did you manage to go do research at the National Archives as you wanted? And I'm looking forward to reading your article in Examiner 5, and your “mysterious“ profile on the Ripper that Wescott found so fitting to his Le Grand!
As for my own research (in musicology, NOT in Ripperology!), I've been working since 9.30 a.m. non stop today, identified a hand of a collaborator for a Rossini opera in 10'min., but had to fight a substitute librarian (with a speech and mental impediment, no idea how she got the job, but this is France!) for half an hour until she finally split and let me photograph the source, and later I found out about the existence of another 13 rolls of microfilms, in addition to the 18 rolls I've already gone through so far pertaining to another bunch of sources. Now I'm about to call it a night, while having convulsions from sheer exhaustion.

[corey123]

Hello Maria,

I never interened to go to the National Archives. I believe Tom has misled you onto the details of my essay.

It is not a profile. However, a small part of it discusses my personal psychological evaluation of the murderer. Let me give you a hint to what it may entail to. Ted Bundy. That is as much as I plan to reveil of it (apart from what is already commonly known of my theories ).

However, yes research on the details of my essay are going smoothly. If you wish to inquire any more about the deeds you can PM me.

Yours truly

p.s Yes your summery is a bit off. The book contains many full accounts of the Daily Telegraph without bias. It is a resource book not a theororist book. Do, when you have a chance, check it out. It is a bit pricey but worth every penny.