Drawing public attention to the deplorable conditions of the East End and ridding London of Warren may be the only good deeds Jack the Ripper did, even if his motivation was somewhat less than altruistic.
CHAPTER TEN
MEDICINE OF THE COURTS
Dr. Llewellyn testified at the Mary Ann Nichols inquest that she had a slight laceration of the tongue and a bruise on the lower right jaw from the blow of a fist or the “pressure of a thumb.” She had a circular bruise on the left side of her face that may have been from the pressure of a finger.
Her neck had been cut in two places. One incision was four inches long, beginning an inch below the left jaw, just below the left ear. A second incision also began on the left side, but about an inch lower than the first incision and a little forward of the ear. The second incision was “circular,” Dr. Llewellyn stated. I don’t know what he meant by “circular” unless he was trying to say that the incision was curved instead of straight – or simply that it encircled her neck. It was eight inches long, severed all blood vessels, muscle tissue, and cartilage, and nicked the vertebrae before terminating three inches below her right jaw.
Dr. Llewellyn’s recital of the injuries to Mary Ann’s abdomen was as unspecific as his other determinations. On the left side were one jagged incision “just about at the lower part of the abdomen” and “three or four” similar cuts that ran in a downward direction on the right side of the abdomen. In addition, there were “several” cuts running across the abdomen and small stabs to her “private parts.” In his conclusion, Dr. Llewellyn said that the abdominal wounds were sufficient to cause death, and he believed they had been inflicted before her throat was cut. He based his conclusion on the lack of blood around her neck at the scene, but he failed to tell the coroner or the jurors that he had neglected to turn over the body. It is possible that he still didn’t know that he had overlooked – or failed to see – a large quantity of blood and a six-inch clot.
All injuries were from left to right, Dr. Llewellyn testified, and this led him to the conclusion that the killer was “left handed.” The weapon – and there was only one this time, he stated – was a long-bladed, “moderately” sharp knife used with “great violence.” The bruises on her jaw and face, he said, were also consistent with a left-handed assailant, and he theorized that the killer placed his right hand over Mary Ann’s mouth to stop her from screaming as he used his left hand to repeatedly slash her abdomen. In the scenario Dr. Llewellyn describes, the killer was facing Mary Ann when he suddenly attacked her. Either they were standing or the killer already had her on the ground, and he somehow managed to keep her from shrieking and thrashing about as he shoved up her clothes and started cutting through skin, fat, right down to her bowels.
It makes no sense for a calculating, logical, and intelligent killer like Jack the Ripper to slash open a victim’s abdomen first, leaving her ample opportunity to put up a ferocious struggle as she suffered unimaginable terror, panic, and pain. Had the coroner carefully questioned Dr. Llewellyn about the relevant medical details, a very different reconstruction of Mary Ann Nichols’s murder might have emerged. Maybe the killer did not approach her from the front. Maybe he never said a word to her. Maybe she never saw him.
A prevailing theory is that Jack the Ripper approached his victims and talked to them before they walked off together to an isolated, dark area where he suddenly and swiftly killed them. For quite some time, I assumed that this was the Ripper’s modus operandi (MO) in all cases. As countless other people have done, I envisioned the Ripper using the ruse of wanting to solicit sex to get the woman to go with him. Since sex with prostitutes was often performed while the woman’s back was turned to her client, this seemed like the perfect opportunity for the Ripper to cut her throat before she had any idea what was happening.