Official: Jack the Ripper identified

[Buttercup McToots]

Official: Jack the Ripper identified
By Stewart Tendler

Scotland Yard has taken possession of a policeman’s memoirs which names the serial killer


PRIVATE handwritten notes by the man who led the hunt for Jack the Ripper naming the chief suspect were given to Scotland Yard’s Black Museum yesterday.
Chief Inspector Donald Swanson kept quiet for years but in retirement, frustrated that the murderer had escaped justice, could not resist scribbling notes in the margin of his boss’s memoirs, naming the man that they both believed had become the world’s most famous serial killer.



http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,29389-2269526,00.html

[WCGreen]

1. It was Bill Clinton....

HE traveled back in a time machine and did the nasty deeds...

I heard it on Fox....

[thinkingwoman]

2. uh, no, but close...

It was the Clenis! :rofl:

[WCGreen]

3. It is funny....

The way they blame everything on Clinton and the so called crocked penis...

[thinkingwoman]

14. Yeah, it never goes away

100 years from now there will still be frothers claiming something new is all his fault. Luckily they'll be marginalized blip on the political landscape by then.

[durrrty libby]

4. Aww.. the poor clenis sure takes a beating.......

The Today show will interview Big Dog in Africa tomorrow.

I saw a preview with Campbell Brown.

Anyway he looks great. Had a red with white stripe polo shirt.

[thinkingwoman]

12. I think being an ex-president agrees with him

He looks so much happier and healthier nowadays!

[rock]

10. Well, wherever you find the Clenis, Clinton is not far away

Not more than a few feet (if you get my drift).

[thinkingwoman]

13. LOL!

You mean it's not detachable? ;-)

[Beausoir]

5. Interesting article. Thanks for it.

This story always chills me to the bone.

I took a murder mystery tour in Whitechapel several years ago. I've never forgotten it.

[acmavm]

6. So this certainly screws up Patricia Cornwall's theory that it

was Walter Sickert, doesn't it?

[tenshi816]

9. According to a book review in one of the

UK papers at the time Cornwell's book came out (a real paper, not a tabloid!), Sickert was quietly living in France when some of the Ripper murders occurred and was nowhere near Whitechapel. The review also said that Patricia Cornwell was aware of this, but wrote her book in "don't bother me with the facts, I've already made up my mind" mode (paraphrasing, BTW).

I'm pretty sure the review in question was in the Sunday Times, but I honestly can't remember for certain.

[acmavm]

16. Oh I'm sure you're right. I was given the book (I would never have paid

for the thing) and as I was reading it I thought it was pretty shakey.

[tenshi816]

18. Heh, you're like me - I was given a copy too,

and I wouldn't have bought it either. I've enjoyed Patricia Cornwell's fiction in the past, but I really feel she was way off base with this non-fiction effort, which basically stinks of character assassination.

If you're interested, here's an article that also refers to the UK Sunday Times review I mentioned, quoting this paragraph from it:

The Ripper murders started on August 6, 1888. Sturgis has recently written in the Sunday Times (London) that Sickert was not in London at the time of two Ripper murders:

In fact, for much of the late summer of 1888 he was staying with his mother and brother in France, 20 miles from Dieppe. The exact dates of his holiday cannot be fixed but he probably left London in the middle of August – one drawing is dated August 4 and after that there are no references to his being in town. On September 6, six days after the murder of the Ripper's first victim and two days before the murder of the second, Sickert's mother wrote to a friend about the happy time they were having. It seems Sickert may have stayed until early October as he painted a picture of a local butcher's shop flooded with late summer light; he titled it "The October Sun."

Edited for typo

[LostinVA]

7. They still don't know who did it -- this is only a guess

One based on Victorian-style investigative techniques and little evidence. And, one that has been made before.

John Douglas did an interesting FBI profile of Jack the Ripper....

[Lerkfish]

8. agreed. This just lists their prime suspect. I had heard a theory that

it was a minor member of the royal family, and they scapegoated an insane person to spare the royal family embarrassment.
Its hard to tell, either way.

[Mir]

11. I find it kind of interesting

that a Polish Jewish man was named as the primary suspect. There could have been I think some kind framing of a Jew to stir up anti-Semitism as well as shift suspiscion. After all, I think that during this time another horrible murder was committed against a woman and the murderer was a Jewish man who was nicknamed "Leather Apron" for whatever reason. Also, there was a scribbling on a wall close to one of the Ripper murders that read "The Jews are the men who won't be blamed for nothing." It was quickly removed by police out of fear that it would stir up anti-Semitism in the community. So I think that these things when combined with the relative eloquence of some of the letters sent to the police suggest a more sophisticated killer trying to make it look like a crazed foreign Jew was responsible. The mystery continues...

[MadHound]

15. This isn't a positive ID

At best it is a guess based on a witness who refused to positively ID Kosminski. There are actualy a couple of serious facts that would disqualify Kosminski. The first is that the man had no atanomical knowledge whatsoever. He was a crazed former hairdresser, one who was highly unlikely to have the anatomical knowledge demonstrated by the Ripper. Police at the time and since have always said that due to the precise dismemberment of the bodies that whoever did the crimes had to have anatomical knowledge, either from being a butcher, or more likely somebody from the medical field. This disqualifies Kosminski, since he only cut hair, not flesh, muscle and tendons.

Secondly, though he was crazy and eventually committed to an asylum, those who knew Kosminski stated that he was of no danger to anybody with the possible exception of himself.<http://www.casebook.org/ripper_media/book_reviews/non-fiction/cjmorley/107.html>

Frankly at this point in time I doubt that we'll ever find out for sure who Jack the Ripper was.

[Raine]

17. THANKS

for posting this, I'm a big follower of this and other unsolved crimes.

EDIT: typo