Murders after MJK

[Phillip Walton]

Could Jack have carried on committing murders after Mary Jane Kelly? Could he have changed his MO because things were getting too hot? What started me thinking about that was a newspaper report of a killing in a similar manner to JTR but without the mutilations. Could he have carried on killing but stopped mutilating his victims because it was too risky?
EDIT. I am talking about the report in the Los Angeles Herald of 18th July 1889.

[Lynn Cates]

????????

Hello Phillip.

"a killing in a similar manner to JTR but without the mutilations."

Ummm?

Cheers.
LC

[Howard Brown]

Could he have carried on killing but stopped mutilating his victims because it was too risky?
-Phil Walton-

I think it was possible, Phil.

Edited because I misread Phil's question...
I believe the Ripper murdered after Kelly anyway...Alice Mackenzie.
Afterwards, its possible he committed another murder or murders...although I think he didn't.

[Fusty Luggs]

After Mary

Could Jack have carried on committing murders after Mary Jane Kelly? Could he have changed his MO because things were getting too hot? What started me thinking about that was a newspaper report of a killing in a similar manner to JTR but without the mutilations. Could he have carried on killing but stopped mutilating his victims because it was too risky?
EDIT. I am talking about the report in the Los Angeles Herald of 18th July 1889.

I reckon he did kill after Kelly. Then stopped. Can killers suddenly stop murdering? Like drug addicts, some stop injecting

[Howard Brown]

Can killers suddenly stop murdering?
Fusty Luggs

One of the intentionally misleading positions of those in the field of profiling/ law enforcement is that they, serial killers, cannot.
Of course they can.

[Anna Morris]

Apart from arguing whether or not serial killers actually stop, we could discuss the periodicity of their murders. A number of them have taken long breaks between series of murders. BTK in Kansas was one. Gary Ridgway right here in the northwest, took breaks, changed MOs and when he thought his perverted acts (aside from killing) were getting out of control, he changed his life to cut down on temptation. He likened serial killing to drug addiction. The strange thing about him is that he was passionless about killing. It was just something he did.

Cold cases keep turning up killers who may technically qualify at serial killers when they were younger, but who subsequently married and lived normal lives.

I think JtR was driven with some frenzy we don't understand. I think the Double Event made it very hard to operate and I have an idea he was really careless and messing up around the time he got MJK. After that? Maybe the police made sure he was watched, in an asylum, or dead one way or another. In short he may never have had another chance to kill.

However it appears MacNaughten came up with the, "five and five only" comment and I think he was thinking of Druitt. Perhaps it was more than one of his suspects that were available for "five and five only" murders. I think Frances Coles was killed by criminal associates, but there isn't any reason to absolutely rule out Alice McKenzie if we don't limit ourselves to the C-5.

[Adam Went]

I agree with Anna's point that there's plenty of examples of serial killers who have taken quite a long time between victims. In the case of Ripperology, we generally go about as far as Frances Coles in 1891 and that's about it. I think it's quite possible that Jack was responsible for murders after this time, and don't necessarily agree with the view that he must have stuck to the same M.O. I suppose the argument could be made there that I have to say that because my preferred suspect is still George Chapman, but I do think that we would perhaps do well to look further into other murders from the 1890's.

Cheers,
Adam.

[Amy Ince]

Hi all,

I was reading through this thread and found it very interesting

It made me think of something I read years ago when reading about serial killers.

Over time their methods become more sophisticated and I always thought that if JTR did continue to kill, he probably adapted his methods over time.

Also, I read somewhere that murderers with low self esteem tend to target people from lower social backgrounds. Maybe after all of his success in Whitechapel his confidence grew and he began to take more risks with upper class women.

Just a thought,

Amy

[Howard Brown]

Over time their methods become more sophisticated and I always thought that if JTR did continue to kill, he probably adapted his methods over time.
-Amy Ince-

Hi Amy !

While that theory might hold true for some, we could easily find just as many serial killers who got sloppy after the early successes.....Gacy & Dahmer come to mind and they had the advantage of having homes to work out of.....a sloppiness which led to their eventual apprehension.

[Amy Ince]

That's true Howard

After all, most serial killers who get caught make a sloppy mistake at some point.

JTR was never caught though (to our knowledge), that's one of the many reasons he is so interesting!

When it comes to Gacy, most of his victims were either prostitutes or young men down on their luck. His last victim was a young man who was from a more stable background and this lead to his downfall. He had grown so confident in his abilities he had chosen a more risky victim, who would definitely be missed by family.

Maybe the ripper made a mistake like this after Whitechapel?

Amy

[Adam Went]

Hi Amy,

Some people make the mistake of assuming that Jack's mental state had deteriorated so far by the time of the MJK murder that he would have been incapable of killing again after that, as he must have died or been incarcerated. I think this is a pretty narrow view, as it's fair to say that he probably was suffering from some kind of mental condition but it depends on whether it was something that was a degenerative condition, or something which occurred periodically - schizophrenia, for instance.

Cheers,
Adam.

[Amy Ince]

Hi Adam,

I see what you mean. JTR could have been a paranoid schizophrenic. Peter Sutcliffe, (The serial Killer who claimed he killed prostitute's because he had received messages from God) suffered from this condition, but I have no doubt he would have continued killing, and may have lived an outwardly normal life if he had managed to not get caught. He was only arrested over fake number plates on his car, but this lead to the discovery of his crimes.

Amy

[Jeff Leahy]

Its unlikely that schizophrenia alone would be the cause of the killings, although it might affect the way the killings occurred...

But schizophrenics are bye and large not dangerous or at least no more dangerous than other people in society

Serial killer bye and large suffer personality disorders and combining these with schizophrenia and even possibly drugs and or alcohol, can induce psychosis.

Schizophrenia is more likely to be the reason Jack stopped killing than started, its the period of the illnesses onset that is of interest in terms of the murders and potential suspects

Yours Jeff

[Amy Ince]

Hi Jeff

Yes very unlikely. There are lots of schizophrenics in the world, and they do not become serial killers.There would have to be many accompanying factors involved if JTR was a schizophrenic, and I have never particularly thought he was.

It is a possibility, but then again most JTR related idea's are just possibilities.

Amy