The Cases That Haunt Us

by Mark Olshaker

  As closely as the police could reconstruct, Liz Stride was seen at the Queen’s Head pub at around 6:30 P.M. on September 29, then returned to Flower and Dean Street at about 7 P.M. Around 11 P.M., two laborers saw her leaving the Bricklayers’ Arms pub on Settles Street between Whitechapel Road and Commercial Road. She was with a man who appeared to them to be very properly British, about five feet five. The two men called out teasingly to Liz to be careful in case her escort was Leather Apron. Forty-five minutes later, another laborer saw her with apparently the same man on Berner Street. After the couple kissed, the man said to her, “You would say anything but your prayers.” Fifteen minutes after that, fruit merchant Matthew Packer sold a half pound of grapes to a man he believed to be the one others saw with Liz. It was raining, and he noted that the couple stood outside, across Berner Street from his shop, for almost half an hour. They were still there when Metropolitan Police Constable William Smith noted a couple that matched the other descriptions.

  Like the previous crimes, this one also gets fuzzy. Dock worker James Brown saw a couple he thought was Liz Stride and her client leaning up against a wall on Fairclough Street. She was saying, “Not tonight. Maybe some other night.” When Brown saw Stride’s body at the mortuary, he stated he was certain that was the woman he had seen.

  Yet at the same time, a Hungarian Jewish immigrant named Israel Schwartz was returning to the International Workingmen’s Club on Berner Street when he thought he saw a man throwing Liz Stride to the ground. He crossed the street, at which point the man shouted “Lipski!” at him, an anti-Semitic epithet referring to a Jewish murderer who had recently been hanged. Schwartz said he noticed another man nearby lighting his pipe and, fearful of being mugged, ran away. He gave a complete account to the police, and when he was taken to Stride’s body in the mortuary, he also identified her as the woman he had seen.

  It was only about fifteen minutes after Schwartz’s encounter that Louis Diemschutz encountered the body in approximately the same place. Was it, in fact, Elizabeth Stride that Schwartz had seen? If so, was she killed by the man who threw her down? Or did she get away from him only to be fatally attacked by another? Could this person have been the second man Schwartz saw lighting his pipe? Perhaps that man and the one who threw Liz down had nothing to do with each other. In any event, neither of them matched the description of the man in the couple Constable Smith had seen fifteen minutes earlier.

  When you can’t resolve conflicting witness statements—and it happens with great regularity—you try to put them all in the back of your mind and move on with other evidence, forensic or behavioral, that seems more solid and reliable. Then, if any other lead opens up, you can go back to what the witnesses thought they saw and see if any of it fits in.

  The Mitre Square victim was identified with less difficulty than Elizabeth Stride. She was wearing and carrying all of her worldly possessions, and among them was a mustard tin containing two pawn tickets. One of them was in the name of Anne Kelly, close to the name Mary Anne Kelly given by a woman who had been picked up drunk on the pavement at eight-thirty Saturday night and taken to Bishopsgate police station to sleep it off. The following Tuesday, an unemployed market porter named John Kelly went to the police, fearing that the pawn tickets belonged to his common-law wife, Catherine Kelly, also known as Catherine Conway, whose first husband had been a soldier named Thomas Conway. The victim turned out to be the woman Kelly feared, though the name she was most commonly known by was her nickname Kate and her own maiden name, Eddowes. In a pathetic replay of earlier victims, Conway had left her eight years before over her drinking. She and Kelly, though desperately poor, apparently got on well together.

  They had just gotten back on Thursday from a trip to Kent where they had been paid for picking hops, something like migrant farm labor. This was a common activity for East Enders. It got them out into the fresh air while giving them a little money for their efforts. When Kate and Kelly had returned, still nearly broke, they spent a night together at the Shoe Lane Workhouse, where she was well-known. On Friday, Kate gave Kelly a few pennies to stay at a doss-house on Flower and Dean Street while she went to the Mile End Workhouse to try to squeeze out another night before they’d put her to work. On Saturday, she met Kelly back at Shoe Lane and took a pair of his boots to pawn, receiving two shillings and sixpence.

  The couple used the money to buy groceries and have breakfast, and then, broke again, Kate went to try to find her daughter to borrow money, but couldn’t find her. The next time she was accounted for was that evening, when City Police Constable Louis Robinson found her lying drunk on the pavement. When she couldn’t stand up on her own, that’s how she ended up at Bishopsgate police station.

  She woke up about half past midnight and asked to be released. Constable George Hutt promised to let her go when she was “capable,” finally opening the door for her at 1 A.M., when he thought it would be too late for her to get any more to drink.

  “I shall get a damned fine hiding when I get home,” she said, testifying to the domestic violence that was rampant then.

  At about 1:35 A.M., Joseph Lawende, a cigarette salesman, Harry Harris, a furniture dealer, and Joseph Levy, a butcher, believed they saw Kate Eddowes at one of the entrances to Mitre Square, talking amicably to a man. But none of the three of them saw her face, only what she was wearing.

  That was the last sighting of Catherine Eddowes alive.

  LINKAGE

  Now, the first thing we have to ask ourselves as profilers is, were the two murders of the Double Event related? The initial response would be yes, but before we jump to conclusions, let’s look at the behavioral evidence.

  The crimes were committed within a twelve-minute walk of each other, within about a twenty-to-thirty-minute period. The victimology was similar in both cases. What are the chances that there would be two lust killers operating in the same area at the same time, with virtually the same modus operandi—or MO? I used to get asked that kind of question quite frequently by detectives, and then later on if I testified in court trying to link several cases together to show a pattern of behavior.

  We were able to argue this quite successfully in the 1993 trial of Cleophus Prince Jr., accused of murdering six women in San Diego. We felt Prince was extremely dangerous, and if the prosecution could prove he was guilty of all six murders, rather than merely the one they had solid DNA evidence on, then this would qualify under California law as “special circumstances,” which would make it a capital case. If that could be established, then there’d be no chance of Prince’s getting out on the street again to wreak more human destruction. By showing the similarity of victimology, modus operandi, signature elements, weapons, and locations, we showed the jury how it was beyond reason that two or more different offenders who happened to have identical behavioral traits could be operating in the same San Diego area at the same time.

  But is that what we’re talking about here in the Double Event in Whitechapel? What are the chances of two lust killers operating at the same time and place? Well, we have a couple of issues to consider.

  In the first place, Stride’s throat was cut and there was deep bruising on her face and neck, but she was not mutilated in the same way as Nichols, Chapman, and Eddowes. According to the terminology we would use at Quantico, the MO is the same, but the signature appears to be different. MO and signature are two of the most important terms we deal with. Both are used in evaluating behavior and tracking UNSUBs. But they’re two distinct aspects of a crime. MO refers to the techniques the offender employs to commit the crime. Signature refers to the elements not necessary to carry out the crime, but what the offender has to do to satisfy his emotional needs. If a bank robber tapes over the lens of a surveillance camera, that’s MO. If he feels a need to tear his clothes off and dance naked before that same camera, that’s signature. It doesn’t help him commit the crime—in fact, in this case, it hurts him—but it’s something he has to do to make the experience emotionally satisfying.<
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  Let’s take a more serious example of these two elements, and we can get it right from the Whitechapel murders. The killer blitz-attacked Annie Chapman because that’s what he thought he had to do to neutralize her so he could commit murder. But then when the murder’s been accomplished, the victim dead, he needs to mutilate her. This is very much what we refer to as a signature crime. The murder is not a means to an end, such as robbery or political statement. It is done so the offender can rip her up to satisfy his psychosexual needs.

  Okay then, is there a reasonable way of explaining this divergence of signatures between Stride and the previous three victims? Sure there is. His name is Louis Diemschutz. A logical reason why the UNSUB did not butcher Liz Stride after he’d killed her is that Diemschutz surprised him and he had to flee before his work was completed. But then, his bloodlust was not sated, so he had to go find another woman, a vulnerable prostitute, to mutilate. This next time, with Kate Eddowes, he had his way. In fact, maybe he had so much time that he actually wrote a cryptic message on the wall of Goulston Street for his pursuers to find and interpret.

  This is good criminological analysis so far. But we’ve got another issue, one potentially more serious than the divergence of signature elements. It is clear from the postmortem examination of Elizabeth Stride that she was killed with a short-bladed knife, not a long-bladed one as was obviously used on Nichols and Chapman. Maybe this isn’t a problem. The killer would likely own more than one knife, particularly if he was in either the livestock or the leather trade. But from a crime analysis perspective, this is a problem. Why? Because Catherine Eddowes was also killed with a long-bladed knife.

  If the short knife had been used on the second victim of the evening, whether or not it was used on the first, we wouldn’t have a linkage problem. That would mean either that the UNSUB had simply changed knives for whatever reasons of MO, or that after the first killing, he thought he could be traced by the long knife and had better switch to another one. But as it is, the long knife is used slightly later in the evening on Eddowes, referring us straight back to Nichols and Chapman but not necessarily to Stride.

  Could this mean there was another killer out that night? It could. In fact, a number of Ripperologists think that it does.

  Maybe it was a copycat. But so close in time and place? Wouldn’t it be awfully coincidental that the copycat struck and then less than half an hour later the original killer struck close by? Yes, coincidences do happen in this business, but I think it is highly unlikely. Based on the victimology, the MO, and the location, I would advise the Metropolitan and City Police to link the Stride murder with the three (and possibly four) others.

  But then, what’s the behavioral answer for the use of the short knife with Stride? I don’t know. It doesn’t add up. Did the UNSUB take two knives with him on a whim, then, when he killed Elizabeth Stride, decide that the short one didn’t work as well? Could be. This is not an exact science. People, criminals included, do all sorts of things for no particular conscious reason, and this is difficult to factor into your analysis. From my experience, every major case seems to have loose ends. If you’re a detective or a profiler, you get used to this ambiguity. You don’t like it, but you learn to live with it.

  “DEAR BOSS”

  If the Annie Chapman murder sent the East End into a spasm of terror, the Liz Stride and Kate Eddowes killings sent all of London into paroxysms. And now, the evil finally had a name.

  By Monday, October 1, the world became aware of the contents of two communications—a letter and a postcard—mailed four days apart from two separate locations in east London to the Central News Agency and reprinted in the morning Daily News and evening Star. By that point, they’d already been forwarded to Scotland Yard for analysis, and the police would disseminate them on their own with the expectation that someone would recognize the wording or handwriting and come forward. The letter, written in red ink and crayon, with a flowing, properlooking handwriting, read:

  25 Sept 1888

  Dear Boss,

  I keep on hearing the police have caught me but they wont fix me just yet. I have laughed when they look so clever and talk about being on the right track. That joke about Leather Apron gave me real fits. I am down on whores and I shant quit ripping them till I do get buckled. Grand work the last job was. I gave the lady no time to squeal. How can they catch me now. I love my work and want to start again. You will soon hear of me with my funny little games. I saved some of the proper red stuff in a ginger beer bottle over the last job to write with but it went thick like glue and I cant use it. Red ink is fit enough I hope ha. ha. The next job I do I shall clip the ladys ears off and send to the police officers just for jolly wouldnt you. Keep this letter back till I do a bit more work, then give it out straight. My knife’s so nice and sharp I want to get to work right away if I get a chance.

  Good luck.

  yours truly

  Jack the Ripper

  Don’t mind me giving the trade name

  There was a second postscript attached sideways, and this was the part written in red crayon:

  Wasn’t good enough to post this before I get all the red ink off my hands curse it No luck yet. They say I’m a doctor now ha ha.

  This became known forever more as the “Dear Boss” letter, and the first appearance of “Jack the Ripper,” a name that quickly superseded the “Whitechapel Murderer” in public dialogue and private nightmare.

  The other communication, referred to as the “Saucy Jacky” postcard, was also written in crayon and read:

  I was not codding dear old Boss when I gave you the tip, youll hear about saucy Jacky s work tomorrow double event this time number one squealed a bit couldnt finish straight off. had not time to get ears for police thanks for keeping last letter back till I got to work again.

  Jack the Ripper

  So the phantom monster had finally communicated with the world and given out his bloodcurdling name. Or had he?

  Let me say here that although the police were immediately suspicious of the communications, many Ripperologists, after careful consideration, continue to believe that the “Dear Boss” letter and “Saucy Jacky” postcard are authentic. After some analysis of my own, I go with Scotland Yard and believe them to be fakes.

  The process we use to evaluate communications from UNSUBs, such as ransom notes and letters to the police, is known as psycholinguistic analysis. It is not a handwriting analysis—we can get other experts to do that for us when we think we need it—but rather stresses the actual use of language, the style, and of course, the underlying message.

  Of all the self-styled Jack the Ripper “copycats” over the years, perhaps the most famous and notorious was the so-called Yorkshire Ripper, who bludgeoned and stabbed women, mostly prostitutes, in the north of England from 1975 through 1980. There had been eight deaths, three other women had escaped, and the case had become the largest manhunt in the history of British law enforcement when I happened to be in England to teach a course at the Bramshill police academy, their equivalent to Quantico, about an hour outside London. The police had already conducted literally tens of thousands of interviews.

  As might be expected in a case of this enormity, both the police and the media had received a number of letters purporting to be from the Ripper. They were all evaluated, but I don’t think the police placed much evidentiary value on any of them. But then a two-minute tape cassette arrived by mail to Chief Inspector George Oldfield, taunting the police and promising to strike again. Just as the “Dear Boss” letter had been reprinted in newspapers throughout England, the Oldfield tape was played everywhere—on television and radio, on toll-free telephone numbers, even over the PA systems at soccer matches—in the hope that someone would recognize the voice and identify the UNSUB.

  I’d heard a copy of the tape back at Quantico, and after classes at Bramshill one evening, they asked me what I thought. I asked them to describe the scenes to me. It seemed the UNSUB maneuvered to get his fem
ale victims into a vulnerable position, then, like the Whitechapel Murderer, he’d blitz-attack them, in this case with a knife or hammer. And as in Whitechapel, he’d mutilate them after death. I thought the voice on the tape was pretty articulate and sophisticated for someone who got his ultimate satisfaction out of life from killing and mutilating prostitutes, so I said, “Based on the crime scenes you’ve described and this audiotape I heard back in the States, that’s not the Ripper. You’re wasting your time with that.” In my business, it is extremely important to be able to evaluate any and all behavioral clues so that the police do not waste their time and always limited resources. With a serial offender, wasted time equals wasted lives.

  The actual perpetrator of these crimes would not communicate with the police in this fashion. He’d be an almost invisible loner in his late twenties or early thirties with a pathological hatred of women, a school dropout, and possibly a truck driver since he seemed to get around the countryside quite a bit. When thirty-five-year-old truck driver Peter Sutcliffe was arrested on a fluke on January 2, 1981, then admitted and was proved to be the Yorkshire Ripper, he bore little resemblance to the individual who had made and sent the tape. The impostor turned out to be a retired policeman who had a grudge against Inspector Oldfield.

  I suspect something similar was going on with the “Dear Boss” letter. But the letter is clever and legitimate enough that it has led on a lot of people for over a hundred years. So, like the Oldfield tape, I believe it had to be forged by someone who knew how the game was played. The most likely candidate would be a reporter, a conclusion we can arrive at from several directions.