UK UK - Jack the Ripper, London 1888, East End, in and around Whitechapel District UNSOLVED

PrayersForMaura

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ONE of the greatest murder mysteries of all time – the identity of Jack the Ripper – may soon be revealed by DNA technology developed in Australia.

Scientist Ian Findlay was to use the new test on saliva the notorious serial killer could have left behind if he licked the stamps on the envelopes of letters he sent to London police.

Prof Findlay's method, called Cell Track-ID, is able to extract and compile a DNA fingerprint from a single cell or strand of hair up to 160 years old.

Hair believed to be from Catherine Eddowes – one of at least five prostitutes Jack the Ripper was known to have butchered in London's East End during his reign of terror in 1888 – will also be tested. Prof Findlay, based at Queensland's Griffith University, said if DNA was found intact on the stamps, it could be compared to DNA from the descendants of suspects.

More: http://www.thecouriermail.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,17127430%255E1702,00.html
 
Now that is interesting. Back then the killer would have no reason not to lick the stamp as dna analysis was never even dreamed of.

And it would be evidence instead of all the speculation and theories. My question is who's dna will they compare it too. It would be dificult to exhume the bodies of all the suspects. Perhaps they could compare it to distant relatives?
 
Wouldn't it be amazing and cool, if they could finally solve this case?
Wow!

fran
 
I recently read the updated story on ctv's crime library, intriguing to say the least. I really never thought they could ever solve this mystery in my lifetime even with the help of forensics because so much evidence in that case no longer exists.
The piece of kidney sent is an excellent clue and determined to be human at the time but no way to preserve that back then to show it came from the victim. Patricia Cornwell did forensic testing on letters that were believed to be from Jack the ripper, in short I don't believe her theory.
 
PrayersForMaura said:
ONE of the greatest murder mysteries of all time – the identity of Jack the Ripper – may soon be revealed by DNA technology developed in Australia.

Scientist Ian Findlay was to use the new test on saliva the notorious serial killer could have left behind if he licked the stamps on the envelopes of letters he sent to London police.

Prof Findlay's method, called Cell Track-ID, is able to extract and compile a DNA fingerprint from a single cell or strand of hair up to 160 years old.

Hair believed to be from Catherine Eddowes – one of at least five prostitutes Jack the Ripper was known to have butchered in London's East End during his reign of terror in 1888 – will also be tested. Prof Findlay, based at Queensland's Griffith University, said if DNA was found intact on the stamps, it could be compared to DNA from the descendants of suspects.

More: http://www.thecouriermail.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,17127430%255E1702,00.html


DNA testing was done on various Jack the Ripper letters by none other than Patricia Cornwell. She used approximately 3 million dollars of her own money to determine her theory that Walter Sickert (famous painter) was indeed Jack the Ripper. She wrote a book on it and has the DNA proof. So it confuses me why certain people refuse to believe what she found..... :waitasec:
 
blueclouds said:
DNA testing was done on various Jack the Ripper letters by none other than Patricia Cornwell. She used approximately 3 million dollars of her own money to determine her theory that Walter Sickert (famous painter) was indeed Jack the Ripper. She wrote a book on it and has the DNA proof. So it confuses me why certain people refuse to believe what she found..... :waitasec:

Yeah, I thought this was already done on the stamp. :waitasec:
 
blueclouds said:
DNA testing was done on various Jack the Ripper letters by none other than Patricia Cornwell. She used approximately 3 million dollars of her own money to determine her theory that Walter Sickert (famous painter) was indeed Jack the Ripper. She wrote a book on it and has the DNA proof. So it confuses me why certain people refuse to believe what she found..... :waitasec:
I don't know, I'm just posting the story I found.
Sorry.
 
blueclouds said:
DNA testing was done on various Jack the Ripper letters by none other than Patricia Cornwell. She used approximately 3 million dollars of her own money to determine her theory that Walter Sickert (famous painter) was indeed Jack the Ripper. She wrote a book on it and has the DNA proof. So it confuses me why certain people refuse to believe what she found..... :waitasec:
I read Cornwell's book and thought she made a very compelling argument for her theory that Walter Sickert was Jack the Ripper. The fact that she sank so much of her own money into this project shows me she was very determined to unmask the identity of Jack the Ripper.

But shortly after her book was released, numerous "experts" on Jack the Ripper discounted her theory, claiming Cornwell ignored information that proved that Sickert could not be Jack the Ripper. More than likely this was just sour grapes on the part of the so-called "experts", but it would be nice if an independent party could do DNA testing and either confirm or reject Cornwell's theory.
 
Apparently, there were rumors that 'Jack' was a member of the Royal Family....and that's why he was never 'caught'.

I will try to find a source for this.
 
Wow, I have never heard that Brefie.
The Royal Family is seriously flawed, nothing would surprise me when it came to them.
 
Brefie said:
Apparently, there were rumors that 'Jack' was a member of the Royal Family....and that's why he was never 'caught'.

I will try to find a source for this.
I had heard that too. With all the inbreeding and "weirdness", I wouldn't put it past a royal family member to go all freaky... I do strongly lean towards Sickert as the killer, one of the many things being he NEVER painted anything from imagination - everything was from what he saw in life. Some of his paintings mirror the dead bodies ICK... And Patricia Cornwell also states that Sickert didn't stop killing, just that the British police kept the further killings quiet and never deliberately "linked them" to the killer as to not cause any further panic.

I also heard about the AMERICAN DOCTOR "Francis Tumblety" - it was big news in America at the time but the British police hushed it up over there... :waitasec: Don't know why.

There's a possibility that this will never be completely resolved.
 
PrayersForMaura said:
ONE of the greatest murder mysteries of all time – the identity of Jack the Ripper – may soon be revealed by DNA technology developed in Australia.

Scientist Ian Findlay was to use the new test on saliva the notorious serial killer could have left behind if he licked the stamps on the envelopes of letters he sent to London police.

Prof Findlay's method, called Cell Track-ID, is able to extract and compile a DNA fingerprint from a single cell or strand of hair up to 160 years old.

Hair believed to be from Catherine Eddowes – one of at least five prostitutes Jack the Ripper was known to have butchered in London's East End during his reign of terror in 1888 – will also be tested. Prof Findlay, based at Queensland's Griffith University, said if DNA was found intact on the stamps, it could be compared to DNA from the descendants of suspects.

More: http://www.thecouriermail.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,17127430%255E1702,00.html
Actually, there is a strong belief that the Ripper letters weren't by the killer, but a hoax by a journalist looking to boost circulation of his paper while thumbing his nose at the authorities at the same time.
 
Brefie said:
Apparently, there were rumors that 'Jack' was a member of the Royal Family....and that's why he was never 'caught'.

I will try to find a source for this.
There are several fictionalized accounts of this theory, involving the Duke of Clarence (affectionately known as "Eddie"). At least two movies have been made about it--one a Sherlock Holmes movie from the 1980s, the title of which escapes me, but had James Mason as Dr. Watson. The other is the Johnny Depp film FROM HELL, which is awful. However, I recommend the source material for the movie, the graphic novel by Alan Moore & Eddie Capmpbell, also called FROM HELL. Eddie isn't the actual killer, but the murderer was ordered by Queen Victoria to get rid of wittnesses to a royal indiscretion. The graphic novel is very well reserached, and comes complete with extensive footnotes.
 
PrayersForMaura said:
I don't know, I'm just posting the story I found.
Sorry.
lol, I don't think she meant you. Interesting story, for sure. Thanks for posting it!
 
Dark Knight said:
lol, I don't think she meant you. Interesting story, for sure. Thanks for posting it!
Thanks DK. I didn't mean her. :blowkiss: Sometimes I'm a bit abrubt in my printing, smack me if you want. (I'm used to it ;)
 
Historian claims to ID Jack the Ripper

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa - An eminent South African historian believes he has stumbled on the identity of Jack the Ripper. Charles van Onselen said at first he wasn't sure he wanted to publicize the conclusions he drew when he noticed parallels in the century-old, unsolved Ripper case and the background of Joseph Silver, who terrorized women as "King of the Pimps" in Johannesburg.

"I was left with a choice: I have got intelligent speculation, which I think is pretty long way down the track to proving that this guy was the Ripper. Do I include or exclude it? "If I include it, it buggers up the book and people get excited for the wrong reasons. If I exclude it and a really sharp professional spots it ... I had to explore this possibility," he said, sitting in his tree-filled garden, about 3 miles from where Silver reigned, in a city still regarded as one of the most crime-ridden in the world.

The publicity around van Onselen's "The Fox and The Flies: The World of Joseph Silver, Racketeer and Psychopath", published in April, has made much of Silver being Jack the Ripper, the notorious Victorian serial killer who murdered at least five East London prostitutes in 1888.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070502..._the_ripper;_ylt=AoGBshShxP0XJUlEEOCjcGpvaA8F
 
Ooh! Good catch, Buzz! I'll read all about it this evening. Thanks for posting this. :)
 
I do think this guy is onto the true identity of Jack The Ripper.

I'm terrible about stuff like that. (Whenever I'm unsure of a case, I mean.)
I tend to lean toward whatever the author thinks :D

I'll be able to look into it a little more tonight.
 

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