Introduction
Victims
Suspects
Witnesses
Ripper Letters
Police Officials
Official Documents
Press Reports
Victorian London
Message Boards
Ripper Media
Authors
Dissertations
Timelines
Games & Diversions
Photo Archive
Ripper Wiki
Casebook Examiner
Ripper Podcast
About the Casebook

 Search:



** This is an archived, static copy of the Casebook messages boards dating from 1998 to 2003. These threads cannot be replied to here. If you want to participate in our current forums please go to https://forum.casebook.org **

Brighton trunk murder 1887

Casebook Message Boards: Beyond Whitechapel - Other Crimes: Brighton trunk murder 1887
Author: jennifer pegg
Sunday, 03 March 2002 - 04:47 am
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of pageLink to this message  Click here to view profile or send e-mailClick here to edit this post
hello everyone,
i am trying to find out a little more about the so called brighton trunk murder. all i know is that the trunk of a woman was found possible in brighton train station in 1887.
does anyone know anything else about it?
was the murderer caught?
jennifer

Author: cue
Sunday, 03 March 2002 - 07:00 am
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of pageLink to this message  Click here to view profile or send e-mailClick here to edit this post
HI
There were two in 1934, first one unsolved the second one a man was tried and aquitted, but confessed 40 years later.
THE MAMMOUTH BOOK OF UNSOLVED CRIME
BY ROGER WILKES

The womans body was found in a trunk left at the station.


cue

Author: cue
Sunday, 03 March 2002 - 07:53 am
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of pageLink to this message  Click here to view profile or send e-mailClick here to edit this post
Couldn't find anything from 1887 about Brighton trunk murders.


cue

Author: Jack Traisson
Sunday, 03 March 2002 - 10:50 pm
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of pageLink to this message  Click here to view profile or send e-mailClick here to edit this post
Hi Jennifer, Cue,

There were actually two railway trunk murders in 1934 (Brighton and King's Cross Railway Stations), as well as the other case Cue mentioned, where a man named Mancini was acquitted.
The two involving the train stations have been dubbed by some as the perfect crime.
A brief overview of the Brighton Trunk Murders can be found at the MEPO site, here:
http://www.met.police.uk/history/mancini.htm

As for 1887, Jennifer, I have only been able to find one murder in Brighton for that year:

9.7.1887 10 Cavendish Street.

Sarah Wilton, aged 35.

"On the morning of the day in question, wheelwright William Wilton smashed his wife's head with a hammer and then slit her throat with a table knife. She was often drunk; they frequently quarrelled."

Which, as you can see, doesn't appear to be a trunk murder, and is, in fact, very ordinary.

Cheers,
John

Author: jennifer pegg
Monday, 04 March 2002 - 05:43 am
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of pageLink to this message  Click here to view profile or send e-mailClick here to edit this post
thqanks everybody that would appaer to vbe the case from 1887 i refered to .it must have been a confused interenet site i was looking at that mixec this with the trunk murders.
jennifer

Author: Monty
Monday, 04 March 2002 - 07:52 am
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of pageLink to this message  Click here to view profile or send e-mailClick here to edit this post
Jack,

Re Mancini,

Wasnt that the first time a photofit was used ?

And didnt he admit to it just before he died a very old man ?

Monty
:)

Author: stephen borsbey
Monday, 04 March 2002 - 12:44 pm
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of pageLink to this message  Click here to view profile or send e-mailClick here to edit this post
if anyone is interested in victorian murders
generally i recommend THE HANGMANS RECORD
which gives details of all murders from 1868 -1901 . very interesting details are given of each crime in each year. and the hangmans name plus
grisly details of the hanging.( sometimes it went wrong). dont read it whilst eating.
regards steve.

Author: stephen miller
Monday, 04 March 2002 - 03:13 pm
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of pageLink to this message  Click here to view profile or send e-mailClick here to edit this post
Hi Monty
I don't know about the photo fit but Mancini did confess to the murder of Violet Kay in 1976 in a Sunday Newspaper
from steve

Author: Jeff Bloomfield
Monday, 04 March 2002 - 09:07 pm
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of pageLink to this message  Click here to view profile or send e-mailClick here to edit this post
Mancini was defended at his trial by the great
Norman Birkett, one of the premier barristers
in Great Britain in the 20th Century. He was
acquitted, but years later admitted that he killed
his girlfriend accidently in an argument, and
panicked. He had a police record, and figured
a court might convict him of her murder. So
he packed her body up in a trunk, deposited the
trunk in Brighton Railway Station, and then took
a train for London. Tony figured he would get
lost among the teeming millions in London, before
anyone noticed anything odd about the trunk.
Imagine his surprise within a week when the
newspapers revealed the discovery of a woman's
body in a trunk at Brighton Railway Station. The
following day a second body was found in a second
trunk-that was Violet Kay's body. Tony was soon
arrested, facing charges in two murders.

If ever a killer deserved a chance to beat some
other villain with a baseball bat, it was Tony
Mancini. Jonathan Goodman wrote an essay on the
case - it seems that Scotland Yard did trace the
unidentified woman to a doctor in the Brighton
area who performed abortions (she was a less than
lucky patient). The Yard is very thorough when
it knows who is a criminal, and were carefully
laying its plans for the arrest of said doctor.
Unfortunately, a local detective decided to confront and arrest the doctor himself, without
clearing it with the Yard. What happened was
fit for a comic scene in a movie. Having confronted the doctor with "the facts", the doctor
took out a large address book, and in front of
the idiot detective called one ex-patient after
another - many of whom were upper crust ladies.
Within a day or so, Scotland Yard was informed it
would have to drop further investigation of the
unsolved Brighton murder, and stop bothering the
doctor. Eventually he was stricken from the
medical rolls twenty years later, but he was
pretty wealthy by that time.

Jeff


Add a Message


This is a private posting area. A valid username and password combination is required to post messages to this discussion.
Username:  
Password:

 
 
Administrator's Control Panel -- Board Moderators Only
Administer Page | Delete Conversation | Close Conversation | Move Conversation