Why Didn't the Police Have Schwartz and/or Lawende Take a Look at Hutchinson?

[Batman]

No, she isn't. She's barely even the link to Mary Jane Kelly.
No, let's not say, even for now, that they stayed in the shed. There is one, probably spurious, report of one other victim crashing out in a shed off Dorset Street, and that was probably just a shed. There is no evidence whatsoever that any of the other victims, or anyone else, crashed out in McCarthy's colloquially-named "shed", which was not a shed at all, but the front room of #26.

https://forum.casebook.org/showthread.php?t=10973

I'll go with Paul Begg on this.

Begg, *Paul. Jack the Ripper: The Facts (Kindle Location 5256). Chapter 16.

[MrBarnett]

No, it seems more likely that she lied to Flemming and not Barnett who seems to be there enjoying hookers coming around to stay until he gets kicked out.

Also in the hypothesis, Flemming is finding out all this stuff from his victims.

Also, Flemming seems to be mentally unbalanced.

In this hypothesis, what kind of life was she leading when she met Flemming?

Sorry, I keep doubling up my posts!

[Batman]

https://forum.casebook.org/showpost.php?p=458076&postcount=51

[MrBarnett]

Barnett makes this claim...

THE RATCLIFF HIGHWAY,
... Then she went to Pennington-street, I believe, and lived in a bad house there. In connection with that house she mentioned the name of Joseph Flemming, a mason's plasterer, of whom she said she was very fond. He used to often visit her. I picked up with her in Commercial-street one night when we had a drink together, and I made arrangements to see her on the following day, which was a Saturday. We then agreed to live together, and I took lodgings in a place in George-street, not far from where the George-yard murder was committed. I then lived with her up to when I left her, just recently.

So Flemming used to frequently visit her in a brothel on the corner of Pennington Street and Breezers Hill, but had no idea she was a prostitute?

[Bridewell]

Hello Harry,

If the police had no reason to consider Hutch as a suspect then why does practically everyone on these boards consider his story and behavior highly suspicious?

c.d.

Perhaps because the police were able to interview Hutchinson (may even have known him?). We also pass judgement on the lighting conditions which we can only guess at but which Abberline and Badham will have known from personal experience.

There is also the pressure that the police were under to take into account. One possible consequence is that they may have been less critical in their thinking when presented with a witness who gave a detailed description. Another is that, under the same pressure, they put their own pressure on a witness to give more detail and to remember more than he could. That's not something which should happen but I can see how it might have come to pass.

[MrBarnett]

So Flemming used to frequently visit her in a brothel on the corner of Pennington Street and Breezers Hill, but had no idea she was a prostitute?

I should add that at the time that corner of the East End was a major red-light district, containing dozens of ‘brothels’ and scores of prostitutes.

[Bridewell]

Hutchinson offers no description of MJK.

Hutchinson's statement offers no description. That doesn't mean that Badham and/or Abberline didn't question him on the point, which would have been the proper course of action. If they did so, and satisfied themselves that MJK was indeed the person he claimed to have seen (or, better still, verified that he did indeed know her) inclusion of a description in a statement might have been seen as superfluous. MJK and Hutchinson may even have been known to the police as associates.

[Batman]

So Flemming used to frequently visit her in a brothel on the corner of Pennington Street and Breezers Hill, but had no idea she was a prostitute?

Who is the corroborating source?

[Batman]

Perhaps because the police were able to interview Hutchinson (may even have known him?). We also pass judgement on the lighting conditions which we can only guess at but which Abberline and Badham will have known from personal experience.

There is also the pressure that the police were under to take into account. One possible consequence is that they may have been less critical in their thinking when presented with a witness who gave a detailed description. Another is that, under the same pressure, they put their own pressure on a witness to give more detail and to remember more than he could. That's not something which should happen but I can see how it might have come to pass.

I tend to think this is the point. That Abberline knows more than we do. So we defer to Abberline. Sugden points out that making Hutchinson into a fame seeker isn't so easy.

[MrBarnett]

Who is the corroborating source?

For what?

That MJK lived there? Mrs Buki and Mrs McCarthy.

That it was a brothel? Charles Booth and others.

That Flemming visited her there? Mrs McCarthy seems to have known him (or of him).

[Batman]

https://www.casebook.org/timeline.kelly.html

This is what I was going by.

It said she was working in a West End Gay house in 1884.

Talks a bit about where she lived.

In 1886 near the end, she met Fleming. In 87 they moved into Thrawl St. The following year she meets Barnett and she moved in with him in April. 1887.

Seems she never stopped meeting Fleming though.

[MrBarnett]

https://www.casebook.org/timeline.kelly.html

This is what I was going by.

It said she was working in a West End Gay house in 1884.

Talks a bit about where she lived.

In 1886 near the end, she met Fleming. In 87 they moved into Thrawl St. The following year she meets Barnett and she moved in with him in April. 1887.

Seems she never stopped meeting Fleming though.

But according to ‘Mrs Phoenix’, after leaving Breezer’s Hill in late 1886 Kelly moved to the Commercial Road, from where she was frequently reported as living a ‘gay life’. And Mrs McCarthy tells of her returning to Breezers Hill (probably 79, Pennington Street) one night with a ‘strange man’ and asking for a room for the night in exchange for 2s. She was clearly still working as a prostitute after leaving the Highway.

Barnett wasn’t sure whether it was Flemming or Morganstone who Kelly was with immediately before him.

[Wickerman]

Eh? I don't remember that.

"Detective-Inspector Abberline has interviewed a girl named Kennedy, who states that about half-past 3 on the morning of the murder she went to her parent's house, which is opposite the room occupied by Mary Jane Kelly, and on reaching the court she saw a woman talking to two men. Shortly afterwards, when inside her father's house she heard a cry of "Murder" in a woman's voice, and she alleges the sound came from the direction of Kelly's room."
Times, 12 Nov. 1888.

In some more complete press accounts the Wednesday evening encounter was preceded by: "Kennedy has been questioned by the police as to what she had heard during the night,..."

So it is nothing we are not familiar with.

[Roy Corduroy]

Good evening Caped 1,

Joseph Fleming meets the criteria much better.

Why is there so little about him out there?

Fisherman (Mr. Holmgren) wrote a Ripperologist article profiling Joe Fleming as a Ripper suspect. You can use the emagazine index feature I suppose to find it.

Plus there is this informed discussion including Debra Arif on a thread (click) by the late Chris Scott. The topic: who was Joe Fleming.

This thread (click) on the same topic includes a discussion with Bob Hinton, the man who put George Hutchinson on the map. (as a suspect)

I for one don't know of one single thing that precludes Joe Fleming being Jack the Ripper. He went mad a few years after the murders, you know.

I hope this is helpful to you. Although this is, of course a major league hi-jack of what is supposed to be a thread weighing the possibility that George Hutchinson was Jack the Ripper. That's why we are in the Suspect section. Where Hutchinson, George has his own slot.

But I guess it's OK. The George Hutchinson Suspect threads go on for days, day turns into night, with no discussion whatsoever of Hutch's suspect status. We have reached a state of Hutch Nirvana where the talk is cleansed of all that. We just talk forever. To infinity and beyond. While all the other suspects, including Joe Fleming, cool their heels. Far, far away somewhere.

Go figure

Roy

[Batman]

Good evening Caped 1,



Fisherman (Mr. Holmgren) wrote a Ripperologist article profiling Joe Fleming as a Ripper suspect. You can use the emagazine index feature I suppose to find it.

Plus there is this informed discussion including Debra Arif on a thread (click) by the late Chris Scott. The topic: who was Joe Fleming.

This thread (click) on the same topic includes a discussion with Bob Hinton, the man who put George Hutchinson on the map. (as a suspect)

I for one don't know of one single thing that precludes Joe Fleming being Jack the Ripper. He went mad a few years after the murders, you know.

I hope this is helpful to you. Although this of course a major league hi-jack of what is supposed to be a thread weighing the possibility that George Hutchinson was Jack the Ripper. That's why we are in the Suspect section. Where Hutchinson, George has his own slot.

But I guess it's OK. The George Hutchinson threads go on for days, days turn into night, with no discussion of Hutch's suspect status. We have reached a state of Hutch Nirvana where the talk is cleansed of all that. We just talk forever. To infinity and beyond. While all the other suspects, including Joe Fleming, cool their heels. Far far away somewhere.

Go figure

Roy

Brilliant! Thank you.