Were Belle Elmore’s remains that proved she wasn’t related to her living relatives an

[Callmebill]

Er.
It’s a strange twist of fate that Belle Elmore’s remains were sent to Michigan University, the birth place of Hawley Harvey Crippen, for DNA investigation.
The filleted remains found in Hawley Crippen's coalhole were covered in lime, and buried in damp clay.
Inspector Walter Dew and Sergeant Mitchell dug up and about in the remains.
Dr. Marshall, the Divisional Surgeon, and Sir Melville Macnaghten, clutching several cigars, the chief of the Criminal Investigation Department, arrived at the burial site.
Five police officers removed the flesh from the grave.
July 13th, Police-constable Charles Fitts purchased a bottle of Neville’s disinfecting fluid; this was diluted with water and poured round the walls of the cellar; at that time the remains were still in the hole – common name carbonic acid or carbonate.
July 19th, Arthur Robinson, keeper of the Islington Mortuary Chapel, tossed carbolic powder on the remains in the shell (coffin) – not to be confused with carbonic acid.
Spilsury, Pepper, Wilcox, Marshall, Luff, Hayman, Turnbull and Wall, medical/scientific men, all handled the remains.
The skin was passed around the court in an uncovered soup bowl. Twelve good men probed the tissue with their bare hands.
Pine oil fixed the skin sample to glass slides.
Formaldehyde released the flesh from its antique base. A unique test was used after the first DNA extraction proved negative.
With that concoction of masculine professionalism the sample was open to contamination. No gloves, no white suits, no securing a murder site.
The DNA is as doubtful as the solicitor that represented the family, Giovanni Di Stefano. On 4th April 2014, eight and a half years were added to Giovanni Di Stefano’s fourteen-year sentence. The charges against Giovanni Di Stefano amounted to twenty-eight counts of fraud.

[Scott Nelson]

So what's your question?

[Callmebill]

DNA lasts from a week to a 10,000 years, depending on the conditions.
‘DNA extraction is especially difficult for soils containing clay. DNA from the lysed cells from sticking to humic acids. Once they stick, they are essentially gone at least in terms of getting the non-fragmented DNA.’ The killer buried the flesh in damp clay in Crippen’s cellar. The likelihood of contamination in ‘Cora’s’ slide sample is great, isn’t it? There’s the question.
The DNA test result proved that the slide was male, confirming Crippen’s innocence. If the sample is accurate, I doubt it proves he’s not guilty. Doesn’t it suggest he’s serial killer?

[jmenges]

Your first post illustrated why the skin sample tested my MSU was most probably contaminated and therefore produced very flawed results.

John Trestrail, who hired Foran's team of Michigan State students to do the testing, had been arguing that Crippen was innocent of the murder of Cora long before he gained access to the skin sample. He had an agenda. When he enlisted the help of the hobbyist genealogist Beth Wills to locate a living female descendant of Cora, she agreed to do so knowing that Trestrail's goal was to exonerate Crippen. She did sub-par work in this instance.

The MSU lab replicated the results of their test to "prove" they were correct NOT by testing a different skin sample, NOT by obtaining the Cora's hair samples, NOT by sending their slide to another independent lab unconnected with Trestrail, but by testing the SAME contaminated slide in the same MSU lab. This is not exactly 'peer review'.

If Crippen killed anyone besides Cora (and until further notice we should all assume he did kill Cora, burying her in his cellar) a most likely second victim is his first wife Charlotte Bell. Charlotte died under very mysterious circumstances. Her family said that she told them Crippen performed surgical experiments on her, neighbors reported hearing screams coming from their house, and the "doctor" who signed off on her cause of death was a quack homeopathic "doctor" friend of Crippen. Its my opinion that had Ethel Le Neve successfully escaped with him she would have ended up as his next victim. If Crippen was a "serial killer" it's not due to the remains in his cellar being male. Its that he was a serial wife-murderer.

JM

[Callmebill]

I agree with you.

Brilliant.
I agree with you. Charlotte Crippen's death is supicious. I read the article by her brother. What was it? The third time under the knife, he (Crippen) will kill me.
Between 24th January 1892 and Ist week September 1892. He lost one wife, had given away his son, and remarried.
In 1891, Crippen was returning to the states form England/Ireland. A young woman died on the boat.
Interesting that scopolamine, a remedy for sea sickness, is an alternative name for hysocine.

[jmenges]

Charlotte's brother is quoted as saying she told him words to this effect: "My husband is about to force me to the knife again, and I feel that this will be the last time. I want my relatives to know that if I die it will be his fault."

JM

[Callmebill]

The quote I've read says 'third time' each newspaper report varies.
Ethel Le Neve stayed in Sussex, either Brighton or Hove, for four months summer of 1909 - that's a long recovery time for a miscarriage or abortion. Have you read the account suggesting she gave birth?
If she did, maybe that would explain her behaviour in January?

[Semper_Eadem]

I know this is an older topic, but I always wondered why Crippen kept Cora around for so long? You would think he would of snuffed her before 1910 if he was an actual serial wife murderer. I used to think Crippen was innocent for this very reason.

Now I can not help but wonder if Cora had something on Crippen that kept his hands tied. They were married quite a while. I think about 10 years at least. Cora Crippen was reputed to be not the easiest woman to live with either. Yet he kept her around.