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Casebook: Jack the Ripper - Message Boards » General Discussion » Alternative Ripperology: Questioning the Whitechapel Murders (by David Radka) » Archive through May 01, 2004 « Previous Next »

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Alan Sharp
Chief Inspector
Username: Ash

Post Number: 578
Registered: 9-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 10:16 am:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Notice the sophistical intonation of Mr. Palmer's questions. Generally, sophists think truth is a relative matter of language uses, and the purpose of language uses is to persuade others.

Recognising that David is not necessarily saying here that sophistry is a bad thing, however he may be relying on the fact that the word has certain negative connotations in a modern context.

The terms "Sophist" and "Philosopher" both have their basis in Classical Greece. A Philosopher was a man who shared his wisdom freely with those who sought enlightenment. A Sophist was a professional teacher who shared his wisdom generally with those who sought political advancement, in return for money. Sophists were therefore considered lesser.

That said, it must then be remembered that Philosophers like Socrates and Plato accepted as the basis for many of their arguments, as an accepted truth, that the world was under the control of the Gods, that the sun, moon and stars were Gods, and that solar eclipses were omens and portents from the Gods which required interpretation.

The Sophist Philolaus, on the other hand, was roundly derided for expressing his opinion that the sun, moon and stars were rocks larger than the whole Hellenistic world which only looked small because they were far away, that the sun glowed because it was on fire, the stars also but they were further away and so looked much smaller, that the moon glowed because of the light from the sun, and that solar eclipses occurred because the moon moved between the earth and the sun.

Just something to ponder when wondering whether Philosophy or Sophistry might be the better form of deduction.
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Kelly Robinson
Sergeant
Username: Kelly

Post Number: 21
Registered: 2-2004
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 2:10 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Hi Ally,
Sorry to backtrack to the crime library insults, but I got a really big kick out of the text that says Christie relieved stress by gardening, and two sentences later that he had a horror of dirt. I'd love to see how he managed to garden!
Kelly
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Ally
Chief Inspector
Username: Ally

Post Number: 568
Registered: 4-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 2:21 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Isn't it just mind boggling, Kelly? The whole thing is like that. The writer is supposedly well known--Katherine Ramsland-- but she can't string together a cohesive paragraph to save her butt.


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D. Radka
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Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 9:06 am:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

1. "I have 'The Encyclopedia Of Serial Killers' here before me and I cannot locate a CLeckley."

>>Well, this is precisely why I'm such a good Ripperologist. If the name Cleckley had been associated with "serial killers" before, all the little chandala thugs inhabiting--I might have said infesting-- our field would have followed the association long ago, and we wouldn't be here today. What I've merely done, in case you haven't figured it out yet, is ORIGINATE, in a logical way, an association between the world's preeminent psychiatrist of psychopathy, Cleckley, and the detailed evidence of the Whitechapel murders. I go straight from Cleckley's scholarly book to Berner Street, Mitre Square, etc. Quite a little contribution, that.

Copyright David M. Radka 2004
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D. Radka
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Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 10:30 am:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

"I speak English and I was quite disappointed in all the big words you chose to use. The majority of those words I have never heard of. I have never even heard any human being use most of those. Those big words took the joy out of your essay."

>>If I start using big words here on the message boards, please let me know and I'll adjust the practice. I guess the need to use compressed language in the Summary, where I was trying to shoehorn a lot of perspective into a small space, made me do it excessively. On the other hand, as Natalie says, you have to use precise technical language some of the time in order to be unequivocal. So we can't get rid of it entirely.

Copyright David M. Radka, 2004
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D. Radka
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Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 10:49 am:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

"What I can't work out, and please forgive me if you've covered this somewhere, is why whoever it was went to all that trouble to mutilate all those women in the first place just to frame Aaron. I don't understand why he wouldn't have just killed them as if Aaron was framed properly then he still would have gone down for murder so why all the mutilations?"

>>The reason why he began killing with Tabram, and the reason why he mutilated, have nothing to do with framing Aaron. The murderer had no idea of framing Aaron until he saw the public and the police pounce on John Pizer as Leather Apron following the Hanbury Street crime. These events are what suggest to him the opportunity of framing Aaron to score the reward money. Since he's got Aaron Kosminski, a Polish Jew, sitting in his kitchen anyway, and since he doesn't like the guy because he's a schizophrenic freak imposed on him by his wife, why not make some money off him? Put him to good use for once, instead of having to chase after him everywhere and listen to his bizarre mumblings. If the police will believe in Pizer, certainly they'll believe in Aaron, since Aaron is an obvious boob-shooby nut case far beyond Pizer, plus Aaron plays with himself, a sure sign of sexual dementia. Piece of cake, really.

Copyright David M. Radka, 2004.

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D. Radka
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Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 9:24 am:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

"However, you still do NOT list a suspect. You have narrowed the field to some sort of relative to Aaron Kosminsky. That's it. No concrete suspect."

>>As I've said before, A?R is designed to avoid the key defects of Ripperology as it has been practiced as a --cough-- intellectual activity for the past century. These defects include the unsupported belief that empirical information is the central arbiter of all thought on the case. This belief, rampant throughout the field, generates one hoax after another after another. All anyone has to do is dig up some empirical dirt--any kind of quasi-related dirt--make up a story and poof! One million dollars of royalties later, everyone is even more dissatisfied (except for the happy author and publisher.) Get what I mean? It's a business. To combat this abuse, I posited an IDEA as the central arbiter, an idea from OUTSIDE the case evidence, psychopathy. Don't dive into the realm of the concrete too soon, or you'll get stuck there like millions of hapless others have. Be patient.

Copyright David M. Radka 2004
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D. Radka
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Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 9:31 am:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

CORRECTION: The Summary holds that the murderer knew Stride antecedent to her murder, and positioned her at the IWEC so that she could be attacked there before a witness. In my rather liberal ruminations of last evening, I suggested that perhaps this need not have been the case, and that Stride may have merely shown up when she did at the IWEC to try to hook a punter leaving at closing time. This is of course a mistake on my part. If Stride didn't know the man who attacked her, she wouldn't have willingly accompanied him behind the green gates following the first attack. My apologies.

Copyright David M. Radka, 2004
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D. Radka
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Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 9:48 am:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

"Who does Cleckley, whom I note is an author, cite as being a psychopath who behaved in a similar fashion to your suspect."

>>The psychopathic personality is an extremely hardened, crystallized reaction-type form, unbudgeable by any type of psychiatric treatment. A part of the pathology is the great difficulty psychopaths have in being any different from one another. A psychopath from Sumeria in remote BC is so similar in how he reacts to what is put before him to the psychopath who lives across from you on your street as to stun the rational mind. Normal people differ significantly one from the other. There are a large number of reaction types within the realm of the normal. In the most fundamental sense, then, while normal people have both the need and ability to adapt to life, and to succeed or fail in doing so, the psychopath doesn't. His personality development halted short of any any positive adaptiveness. He essentially maintains the same infantile personality he was born with throughout life.

Therefore ALL of Cleckley's psychopaths are like mine. None of them commit murder, but all of them do what they do as the same behavior pattern that the Whitechapel murderer had.

Copyright David M. Radka, 2004

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D. Radka
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Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 10:11 am:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

"You said that he had to go and find some chalk...wherever...the markets...a store...anyway,
my question is this: If he had the whole double
event planned out like you say,why wouldnt he have just simply brought a stick of chalk with him if he knew he was going to write a message?"

>>He didn't know he was going to write a message until he experienced the phenomena of the Duke Street sighting. He likely thought he'd get a single Jew he didn't know emerging from the Imperial Club to be his witness, or perhaps 2 or 3 such Jews in a group. This is a rather ordinary, pedestrian, everyday kind of assumption to make under the circumstances. But what he actually got was 1 Jew he knew walking together with 2 other Jews the Jew he knew knew, but whom he didn't personally know. This is what sets up the urgent need for the graffitus and hence the chalk. The murderer is not in a position to be able to know whether or not Levy may off-handedly say something about knowing him to his compatriots. If he says nothing, then the murderer only needs to extort someone who he knows, and graffitus may not be necessary. But if Levy says something, then he needs to extort all three under complex circumstances, and stronger measures are necessary to address the issues. Essentially, the lack of the chalk in the pocket of the murderer while in Duke Street is an indication of unpreparedness on his part, it shows the degree to which he was winging it as he went along that night. He needs to wait for specific developments before he realizes what needs to be done next--then he has to make arrangements to get it done. This is further a sign of psychopathy, in the form of maladaptive over-confidence and pomposity.

Copyright David M. Radka, 2004
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D. Radka
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Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 2:38 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

"The thing I find, and I don't mean this in a horrible accusing way, but since David hasn't actually named a specific suspect I feel that it is a way of making it so we can't say, "well, no because so-and-so was here", or be able to try to find evidence against the suspect in question."

>>You are basically blaming me for doing something wrong, for wronging my readers somehow, because I don't give them the opportunity of researching a particular suspect that I name, so as to see if he were available in Whitechapel to commit the murders, etc. This, according to mainstream Ripperology, is taken to be a key article of faith between the Ripperologist and the reader--since everyone can "check up on" the suspect and see that he is okay, available during the Terror, and oddball enough to be considered, therefore the reader figures the writer can be trusted. Baloney! About 50 years ago, the crank writers figured readers out! They then began their obnoxious parade of phoney suspects, all of whom were okay, available during the Terror, and oddball enough to be considered! See how the BS works? How many are like this, off the top of your head? D'Onston, Maybrick, Sickert, the Prince, many more. All you've got to do is trace D'Onston to London Hospital during those days, and you'll have hundreds of thousands of sad sack believers to sell to, despite poor overall theorization.

Unfortunately, evidence currently available doesn't allow me to trace the murderer further than Aaron Kosminski's greater family at this time, with a reasonable liklihood of either Abrahams or Lubnowski within that group. What is wrong with that? Am I not being honest and fair to my reader? What other Ripperologist treats you more honorably?

Copyright David M. Radka 2004

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D. Radka
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Posted on Friday, April 30, 2004 - 9:57 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

"I would be be even more delighted if Mr. Radka could point to a similar case in the history of serial sexual or lust murder."

>>If we can't do this, then what does it mean? Does it mean that there is no foundation for what I'm claiming under the rubric of sexual serial or lust murder? Or does it mean that the rubric we use of sexual serial or lust murder is itself inadequate or at least not appropriate to all circumstances? After all, sexual serial or lust murder is not psychiatry, it is for the most part police work.

Copyright David M. Radka, 2004

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Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna

Post Number: 1711
Registered: 8-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 4:42 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

"After all, sexual serial or lust murder is not psychiatry, it is for the most part police work."

Exactly. And that's why it's appropriate. Police officers work from what they know and the knowledge they have gained from other cases. Experience beats everything. The theorists - stuck behind the academic walls and and their oak desks - have to construct a subjective reality from their experiments and textbooks. Personally, I have no problem with declaring whom I trust the most.
Oh but I forgot... you don't approve of the empiric methods...

All the best
Mr Andersson

Glenn Gustaf Lauritz Andersson
Crime historian, Sweden
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Natalie Severn
Chief Inspector
Username: Severn

Post Number: 765
Registered: 11-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 5:07 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Hi Glenn
Well if the police investigation of 1888 is anything to go by then you"ve got to be joking!
They don"t seem to have had a clue who he was and have all contradicted one another over the years in who they "guessed" was the prime subject.
The police investigation into the Yorkshire ripper not that long ago [by comparison] was just as inept and they had actually interviewed him and let him go [when he committed more murders]
several times I think, until the chap who was leading the investigation resigned [as did Warren before him].He was only apprehended eventually
by accident[someone bothering to look in a bin and saw the hammer hidden there].
Best Natalie
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Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna

Post Number: 1713
Registered: 8-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 5:26 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Well, Natalie,

The police does mistakes - no one is perfect. But at least they from experience know the environment and the kind of people they are dealing with. The fact that mistakes are made and that people are slipping through on occasion is human.

The theorists are no alternative - they work from a theoretical ground that has nothing to do with reality, but which they have to construct. They hardly get it right anyway; if the police had failed to the same extent as academics and theorists have done in police cases, we really would be in big trouble.It is from the theorists and armchair detectives, that the most hillarious and far-fetched theories are originating from, and that is no mystery.

The police investigation of 1888 is nothing to go by, and I have never claimed such a thing. They hardly had the appropriate tools or knowledge about serial killers in order to deal with the problem.

All the best
Glenn Gustaf Lauritz Andersson
Crime historian, Sweden
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Natalie Severn
Chief Inspector
Username: Severn

Post Number: 766
Registered: 11-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 5:56 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Glenn,If you are talking about Jack the Ripper then I do not think they knew the kind of person to look for.They were stumped.indeed if you are talking about the Yorkshire Ripper they were stumped there too for a long time.
These were exceptional cases over here ---its not as though there are mutilating serial killers coming out in England like a rash every so often with the police making one or two mistakes in just a few instances [because they"re only human etc]
The police do solve murders over here but they
are not very often [thank goodness called upon to solve such cases as JtR and the Yorkshire ripper presented.And in fact when given these particular murders to solve in the first case they did not and in the second there were several c*ck ups.I
understand that this is the main reason the services of profilers are now being used more often.
Best Natalie
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Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna

Post Number: 1716
Registered: 8-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 6:23 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Hi Natalie.

As I said, the police of 1888 didn't know what to look for. I think to focus on the police attempts of that time is neither fair or valid. They practically had to catch the Ripper red-handed, if they were going to be successful, considering their lack of technical means and empiric knowledge. They are actually a perfect example of what happens when you don't have the necessary experience - but the theorists couldn't have done it better. To judge police work in general from the impossible situation they had to deal with in 1888 is hardly relevant.

Still, the FBI in US and CID in Britain are the only significant experts that have experience in dealing with serial killers. I prefer to rely on them rather than academics who haven't been ten feet from their desks.

Profilers are not used to such an extent as we are inclined to think. Their methods are not all highly regarded by the police forces, and I have this information directly from people in the force. Profiling is based on very narrow generalizations and is a completely subjective approach that rarely leads to any capture of serial killers. They are wrong most of the time, and when they are right, it is mostly sheer luck and common sense.

Serial killers are hard to catch in general - also today in our modern age - but that doesen't mean that the theorists can do it better. If anybody can do it, it is those who work with the problem daily on the field, not the academics (especially since different academics by nature contradicts and hardly agree with each other anyway).

All the best

(Message edited by Glenna on May 01, 2004)
Glenn Gustaf Lauritz Andersson
Crime historian, Sweden
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Caroline Anne Morris
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Caz

Post Number: 1049
Registered: 2-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 6:37 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

One million dollars of royalties, David?

I don't think even Cornwell managed that, did she, if you mean royalties after the publisher's advance was earned out.

And we know the fates have not been kind to the other rare-as-hens'-teeth best-selling ripper authors claiming a solution, with or without a named suspect.

I worry about anyone who would solve this case for adulation, respect, fame or fortune. IMHO, they only stand a chance if they do it for victims everywhere.

Love,

Caz
X

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Natalie Severn
Chief Inspector
Username: Severn

Post Number: 768
Registered: 11-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 6:48 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Hi Glenn, thanks for the reply.I was just off to bed and when I last looked to see where you were you were chatting with a little group on the cannibal thread! Joking aside, the subject was relevent in a sense because Victorian Whitechapel
would have been so different in some ways[especially regarding "street Theatre"]I know it sounds as though I am being facetious here but I know the Victorians did go in for lots of this by way of "mime artists" "pavement artists" "Punch and Judy shows" all sorts of street acts in fact which makes me wonder if the ripper too being very much "of his time" was chasing the zeitgeist in the "shows" he put on?Its just a thought but it was when I read something on another thread that it made me wonder about it.
But I do accept your point about the police being handicapped by the lack of forensics,DNA etc
----and their own attitudes and prejudices at that time.
Best Natalie
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Scott Nelson
Detective Sergeant
Username: Snelson

Post Number: 66
Registered: 2-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 6:58 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

This will not shown up in my up-coming piece in the Rip but I believe I have located Lewis Levy, a relative of Joseph Levy's in the 1891 census. Lewis was a cigar-maker at lived at no. 8 Mitre Street in the 1861 census (it was in back of this house that Eddowes was killed in Mitre Square. In the 1891 census Lewis was living at no. 5 Sion Square, two doors away from Woolf Abrahams and his family. Lewis was the son of the fruit merchant, Ann Levy, who lived for many years at no. 29 Mitre Street in the 1840s - 1860s. Lewis was born in 1826. Searches I have conducted for similarly-named adult males of that age and occupation are nil, strongly suggesting that this is the same guy.
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Glenn L Andersson
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Glenna

Post Number: 1718
Registered: 8-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 7:03 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Scott,
Interesting stuff. Thanks.

Hi Natalie,

Well, if I had a bit of sanity in me, I would hit the sack as well now. But I'm going to stay up to watch an old Dracula movie with Christopher Lee (who is no more scary than a squirrel). One can never get enough laughs in life.
Have a good night's sleep.

All the best

(Message edited by Glenna on May 01, 2004)
Glenn Gustaf Lauritz Andersson
Crime historian, Sweden
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Natalie Severn
Chief Inspector
Username: Severn

Post Number: 770
Registered: 11-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 7:13 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Thanks for that Stuart.Very interesting!

Thats right Glenn! Enjoy "Dracula"! I think Christopher Lee is great !

Best Natalie
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Donald Souden
Inspector
Username: Supe

Post Number: 228
Registered: 10-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 7:24 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

Caz,

I had the same reaction you did to the $1,000,000 in royalties. My last royalties check would have bought dinner for two at a good restaurant, but only if I stinted on the tip. Of course, we may not have considered the "star quality" Mr. R. would bring to a publisher -- and if you need proof, just ask him.

Don.
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Jeffrey Bloomfied
Inspector
Username: Mayerling

Post Number: 345
Registered: 2-2003
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 9:59 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

I hope you don't mind me asking David, because I have not read everything on this set of threads (and you may have explained this), but why are you copywriting (or supposedly copywriting) your answers or responses to the questions here?

Secondly, have you ever heard of a man named John Taylor?

Jeff
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D. Radka
Unregistered guest
Posted on Saturday, May 01, 2004 - 9:37 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostView Post/Check IPPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)Ban Poster IP (Moderator/Admin only)

1. "What does "fronting" mean as in question 6 "fronting variously Edward Hyde and Dr. Henry Jekyll"?"

>>Keep in mind we're talking about a psychopath, not a schizophrenic. I don't mean to say that the murderer has a "Jekyll and Hyde personality," whereby he has two different, well-articulated people living inside of him, one of which is good and the other evil. Instead I mean that the murderer has a project going on in which he, in a very superficial sense, "puts on the skin" of a figure when he sees an opportunity to get what he wants. He doesn't "become" that person in any meaningful sense, instead he simplistically puts on a mask of that person for awhile, then tosses it away when its no longer interesting to him. The murderer gets into Jekyll and Hyde because they are very popular at the moment, they are the center of attention of most of London, so, in that he wants to be the center of attention, he uses them as a front and gets what he wants that way. He utterly lacks the subjective integrity necessary to comprehend that he's really not achieving anything on his own merits. Have a look at Stanley, one of Cleckley's most fascinating case histories, for a similar example. Notice what Stanley does when he learns his former girlfriend is headed for Europe.

2. "In question #7 are you saying that the killer was aware of and jealous of the play that was being done in the West End? You say that the bodies were "dislayed in the streets as theatre-goers left following the performance". Of course none of those theatre goers were anywhere near where the actual Ripper victims were displayed. What is your point here?"

>>He was aware of the play, I wouldn't say in a jealous sense, but in what is for him a realistic sense. Realistically, Jekyll and Hyde were big time for awhile, and he wants to be big time, so he plays Jekyll and Hyde. The audience is there, the streets are there, J&H terrify people, get them to pay attention, are the center of attention--it's all there for him, so he just projects through it. He pathologically cobbles together a plan out of existing public reactions to commandeer the desired effect for himself. Foolish and childish, yes; delusional, no. The theatre-goers walked out into the streets and carried the terror with them, whispering fearfully amongst themselves as they walked, he uses the streets to make terror. That is the connection. No, the Lyceum is not terribly near the murder sites, but these matters were covered in the papers--the play was a big sensation. Plus, a number of theatre-goers proceded to the Whitechapel pubs following performances, and he might have contacted some of them there.

3. "Quesation #11- Levy was a butcher,according to the A-Z. Why would the killer communicate to him in the "language" of tailors and expect him to understand it? I question your use of the term "universal" in characterizing the meanings of the eye, the blush,etc."

>>Because a psychopath is basically a pompous a**, that's why. The odds that Levy or the other two Jewish men are going to get the message in time, decode and understand it are prohibitively low, but the murderer is not constitutionally set up in terms of personality to be able to appreciate that. He narcicisstically believes there is an excellent chance everything he does will be successful, because he wants it to be. If he wants Levy to understand tailoring symbols, then as far as he is in the least concerned, he will. Sorry, can't agree concerning the universality of the eyes, the blush and the wink. Everyone knows that the organ of witnessing is the eye, that a blush connotes embarrassment and guilt, and a wink conspiracy. They are universal symbols. The presence of all three together further underscores their universality and the correctness of my interpretation.

4. "Question #11 Discrete removal of the apron... Do we know that exactly half the apron was taken? It seems only recently that on this board we were talking about the piece of apron being bigger than a scrap. Where is the size of the piece of apron found in Goulston St. documented?"

>>Begg has written of it, I can't at the moment remember where, possibly on the old web boards now on CD ROM. Essentially he said that the murderer took extra time and care to pull his knife lengthwise through the muslin, cutting it essentially in half, instead of merely cutting the apron off at the stays, which would have been much faster and easier. I am not sure there is specific documentation that the part of the apron found in Goulston Street was exactly half the apron, however if it were not, this would only mean that the murderer failed to cut it exactly in half, not that he didn't intend to do so. The fact that the murderer allocated extra time to divide the apron lengthwise despite fierce time pressure in Mitre Square is what is decisive here.

5. "Question # 16- was there ever anyone who claimed a reward or made significant profit at the time of the killings?

>>The reason why the Home Office wouldn't post a reward for JtR was because several years before it did post a reward on a big case, and the result was a fraudulent attempt to collect it. Londoners have a disturbing history of concocting plots to turn in their neighbors, aunts and uncles, even their parents when a reward is posted. Hundreds of people wrote letters to the police trying to do this during the terror. But no, as far as I know, no reward was ever paid on JtR.

6. "Question # 21- How would the psychopath know about the stage Irish accent? Did people of his class ever to to stage productions (aside from Jewish or Yiddish theater)?"

>>The stage Irish accent was used frequently in theatres--remember, they didn't have TV then, and going to a theatre or music hall was frequently done, and even poor people attended. He may have heard the accent repeated in the streets. He may also have had some work in a theatre, possibly as a costume maker, boot maker, etc., at which time he would be able to hear rehearsals. I wouldn't imagine him closed off from theatres--after all, he lived in Whitechapel.

Copyright David M. Radka, 2004

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