Jack the Ripper unmasked...126 mystery solved by amatuer slueth.....

[Cidersomerset]

Jack the Ripper unmasked: How amateur sleuth used DNA breakthrough to identify
Britain’s most notorious criminal 126 years after string of terrible murders

new Sunday 7th September 2014 at 10:38 By david-icke



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WORLD EXCLUSIVE: Jack the Ripper unmasked: How amateur sleuth used DNA
breakthrough to identify Britain's most notorious criminal 126 years after string of
terrible murders
DNA evidence on a shawl found at Ripper murder scene nails killer
By testing descendants of victim and suspect, identifications were made
Jack the Ripper has been identified as Polish-born Aaron Kosminski
Kosminski was a suspect when the Ripper murders took place in 1888
Hairdresser Kosminski lived in Whitechapel and was later put in an asylum

By Russell Edwards For Mail On Sunday

Published: 22:01, 6 September 2014 | Updated: 23:55, 6 September 2014

‘It is the greatest murder mystery of all time, a puzzle that has perplexed
criminologists for more than a century and spawned books, films and myriad
theories ranging from the plausible to the utterly bizarre.

But now, thanks to modern forensic science, The Mail on Sunday can exclusively
reveal the true identity of Jack the Ripper, the serial killer responsible for at least
five grisly murders in Whitechapel in East London during the autumn of 1888.

DNA evidence has now shown beyond reasonable doubt which one of six key
suspects commonly cited in connection with the Ripper’s reign of terror was the
actual killer – and we reveal his identity

A shawl found by the body of Catherine Eddowes, one of the Ripper’s victims, has
been analysed and found to contain DNA from her blood as well as DNA from the
killer.The landmark discovery was made after businessman Russell Edwards, 48,
bought the shawl at auction and enlisted the help of Dr Jari Louhelainen, a world-
renowned expert in analysing genetic evidence from historical crime scenes.

Using cutting-edge techniques, Dr Louhelainen was able to extract 126-year-old
DNA from the material and compare it to DNA from descendants of Eddowes and
the suspect, with both proving a perfect match.

The revelation puts an end to the fevered speculation over the Ripper’s identity
which has lasted since his murderous rampage in the most impoverished and
dangerous streets of London.

In the intervening century, a Jack the Ripper industry has grown up, prompting a
dizzying array of more than 100 suspects, including Queen Victoria’s grandson –
Prince Albert Victor, the Duke of Clarence – the post-Impressionist painter Walter
Sickert, and the former Liberal Prime Minister William Gladstone.


GUILTY: A DNA sample has proven Polish immigrant Aaron Kosminski was Jack the Ripper



It was March 2007, in an auction house in Bury St Edmunds, that I first saw the
blood-soaked shawl. It was in two surprisingly large sections – the first measuring
73.5in by 25.5in, the second 24in by 19in – and, despite its stains, far prettier than
any artefact connected to Jack the Ripper might be expected to be. It was mostly
blue and dark brown, with a delicate pattern of Michaelmas daisies – red, ochre
and gold – at either end.

It was said to have been found next to the body of one of the Ripper’s victims,
Catherine Eddowes, and soaked in her blood. There was no evidence for its
provenance, although after the auction I obtained a letter from its previous owner
who claimed his ancestor had been a police officer present at the murder scene and
had taken it from there.

Yet I knew I wanted to buy the shawl and was prepared to pay a great deal of
money for it. I hoped somehow to prove that it was genuine. Beyond that, I hadn’t
considered the possibilities. I certainly had no idea that this flimsy, badly stained,
and incomplete piece of material would lead to the solution to the most famous
murder mystery of all time: the identification of Jack the Ripper.



Gruesome: A contemporary engraving of a Jack the Ripper crime scene in London's Whitechapel

When my involvement in the 126-year-old case began, I was just another armchair
detective, interested enough to conduct my own extensive research after watching
the Johnny Depp film From Hell in 2001. It piqued my curiosity about the 1888
killings when five – possibly more – prostitutes were butchered in London’s East End.

Despite massive efforts by the police, the perpetrator evaded capture, spawning
the mystery which has fuelled countless books, films, TV programmes and tours of
Whitechapel. Theories about his identity have been virtually limitless, with
everyone from Prince Albert Victor, the Duke of Clarence, to Lewis Carroll being
named as possible suspects. As time has passed, the name Jack the Ripper has
become synonymous with the devil himself; his crimes setting the gruesome
standard against which other horrific murders are judged.

I joined the armies of those fascinated by the mystery and researching the Ripper
became a hobby. I visited the National Archives in Kew to view as much of the
original paperwork as still exists, noting how many of the authors of books
speculating about the Ripper had not bothered to do this. I was convinced that
there must be something, somewhere that had been missed.

By 2007, I felt I had exhausted all avenues until I read a newspaper article about
the sale of a shawl connected to the Ripper case. Its owner, David Melville-
Hayes,believed it had been in his family’s possession since the murder of Catherine
Eddowes, when his ancestor, Acting Sergeant Amos Simpson, asked his superiors if
he could take it home to give to his wife, a dressmaker.

Incredibly, it was stowed without ever being washed, and was handed down from
David’s great-grandmother, Mary Simpson, to his grandmother, Eliza Smith, and
then his mother, Eliza Mills, later Hayes.

In 1991, David gave it to Scotland Yard’s Crime Museum, where it was placed in
storage rather than on display because of the lack of proof of its provenance. In
2001, David reclaimed it, and it was exhibited at the annual Jack the Ripper
conference. One forensic test was carried out on it for a Channel 5 documentary in
2006, using a simple cotton swab from a randomly chosen part of the shawl, but it
was inconclusive.

Most Ripper experts dismissed it when it came up for auction, but I believed I had
hit on something no one else had noticed which linked it to the Ripper. The shawl is
patterned with Michaelmas daisies. Today the Christian feast of Michaelmas is
archaic, but in Victorian times it was familiar as a quarter day, when rents and
debts were due.

I discovered there were two dates for it: one, September 29, in the Western
Christian church and the other, November 8, in the Eastern Orthodox church. With
a jolt, I realised the two dates coincided precisely with the nights of the last two
murder dates. September 29 was the night on which Elizabeth Stride and Catherine
Eddowes were killed, and November 8 was the night of the final, most horrific of
the murders, that of Mary Jane Kelly.


Found at the scene: Russel Edwards holds the shawl he bought in 2007, allegedly
handed down from a policeman who took it from the scene, which had the
incriminating
DNA on it


I reasoned that it made no sense for Eddowes to have owned the expensive shawl
herself; this was a woman so poor she had pawned her shoes the day before her
murder. But could the Ripper have brought the shawl with him and left it as an
obscure clue about when he was planning to strike next? It was just a hunch, and
far from proof of anything, but it set me off on my journey.

Before buying it, I spoke to Alan McCormack, the officer in charge of the Crime
Museum, also known as the Black Museum. He told me the police had always
believed they knew the identity of the Ripper. Chief Inspector Donald Swanson, the
officer in charge of the investigation, had named him in his notes: Aaron Kosminski,
a Polish Jew who had fled to London with his family, escaping the Russian pogroms, in the early 1880s.

Kosminski has always been one of the three most credible suspects. He is often
described as having been a hairdresser in Whitechapel, the occupation written on
his admission papers to the workhouse in 1890. What is certain is he was seriously
mentally ill, probably a paranoid schizophrenic who suffered auditory hallucinations
and described as a misogynist prone to ‘self-abuse’ – a euphemism for
masturbation.

McCormack said police did not have enough evidence to convict Kosminski, despite
identification by a witness, but kept him under 24-hour surveillance until he was
committed to mental asylums for the rest of his life. I became convinced Kosminski was
our man, and I was excited at the prospect of proving it. I felt sure that modern science
would be able to produce real evidence from the stains on the shawl. After a few false
starts, I found a scientist I hoped could help.

Dr Jari Louhelainen is a leading expert in genetic evidence from historical crime scenes,
combining his day job as senior lecturer in molecular biology at Liverpool John Moores
University with working on cold cases for Interpol and other projects. He agreed to
conduct tests on the shawl in his spare time.

The tests began in 2011, when Jari used special photographic analysis to establish what
the stains were.

Using an infrared camera, he was able to tell me the dark stains were not just blood,
but consistent with arterial blood spatter caused by slashing – exactly the grim death
Catherine Eddowes had met.

But the next revelation was the most heart-stopping. Under UV photography, a set of
fluorescent stains showed up which Jari said had the characteristics of semen. I’d never
expected to find evidence of the Ripper himself, so this was thrilling, although Jari
cautioned me that more testing was required before any conclusions could be drawn.


Obsession: Russell Edwards points to Hambury Street where one of the murders took place

He also found evidence of split body parts during the frenzied attack. One of
Eddowes’ kidneys was removed by her murderer, and later in his research Jari
managed to identify the presence of what he believed to be a kidney cell.

It was impossible to extract DNA from the stains on the shawl using the method
employed in current cases, in which swabs are taken. The samples were just too old.

Instead, he used a method he called ‘vacuuming’, using a pipette filled with a
special ‘buffering’ liquid that removed the genetic material in the cloth without
damaging it.

As a non-scientist, I found myself in a new world as Jari warned that it would also
be impossible to use genomic DNA, which is used in fresh cases and contains a
human’s entire genetic data, because over time it would have become fragmented.

But he explained it would be possible to use mitochondrial DNA instead. It is passed
down exclusively through the female line, is much more abundant than genomic
DNA, and survives far better.

This meant that in order to give us something to test against, I had to trace a direct
descendant through the female line of Catherine Eddowes. Luckily, a woman named
Karen Miller, the three-times great-granddaughter of Eddowes, had featured in a
documentary about the Ripper’s victims, and agreed to provide a sample of her DNA.

Jari managed to get six complete DNA profiles from the shawl, and when he tested
them against Karen’s they were a perfect match.

It was an amazing breakthrough. We now knew that the shawl was authentic, and
was at the scene of the crime in September 1888, and had the victim’s blood on it.
On its own, this made it the single most important artefact in Ripper history:
nothing else has ever been linked scientifically to the scene of any of the crimes.

Months of research on the shawl, including analysing the dyes used, had proved
that it was made in Eastern Europe in the early 19th Century. Now it was time to
attempt to prove that it contained the killer’s DNA.





The suspects: The long line of men believed to be Jack the Ripper include, from left to
right, Prince Albert Victor, Edward VII's son, allegedly driven by syphilis-induced
madness, Queen Victoria's doctor, a Jewish shoemaker

Jari used the same extraction method on the semen traces on the shawl, warning that
the likelihood of sperm lasting all that time was very slim. He enlisted the help of Dr
David Miller, a world expert on the subject, and in 2012 they made another incredible
breakthrough when they found surviving cells. They were from the epithelium, a type of
tissue which coats organs. In this case, it was likely to have come from the urethra
during ejaculation.

Kosminski was 23 when the murders took place, and living with his two brothers and a
sister in Greenfield Street, just 200 yards from where the third victim, Elizabeth Stride,
was killed. As a key suspect, his life story has long been known, but I also researched
his family. Eventually, we tracked down a young woman whose identity I am protecting
– a British descendant of Kosminski’s sister, Matilda, who would share his mitochondrial
DNA. She provided me with swabs from the inside of her mouth.

Amplifying and sequencing the DNA from the cells found on the shawl took months of
painstaking, innovative work. By that point, my excitement had reached fever-pitch.
And when the email finally arrived telling me Jari had found a perfect match, I was
overwhelmed. Seven years after I bought the shawl, we had nailed Aaron Kosminski.

As a scientist, Jari is naturally cautious, unwilling to let his imagination run away
without testing every minute element, but even he declared the finding ‘one hell of a
masterpiece’. I celebrated by visiting the East End, wandering the streets where
Kosminski lived, worked and committed his despicable crimes, feeling a sense of
euphoria but also disbelief that we had unmasked the Ripper.

Kosminski was not a member of the Royal Family, or an eminent surgeon or politician.
Serial killers rarely are. Instead, he was a pathetic creature, a lunatic who achieved
sexual satisfaction from slashing women to death in the most brutal manner. He died in
Leavesden Asylum from gangrene at the age of 53, weighing just 7st.

No doubt a slew of books and films will now emerge to speculate on his personality and
motivation. I have no wish to do so. I wanted to provide real answers using scientific
evidence, and I’m overwhelmed that 126 years on, I have solved the mystery.

Shawl that nailed Polish lunatic Aaron Kosminski and the forensic expert that made the
critical match

By Dr Jari Louhelainen



Evidence: Russell points to the part of the shawl where DNA was found

When Russell Edwards first approached me in 2011, I wasn’t aware of the massive
levels of interest in the Ripper case, as I’m a scientist originally from Finland.

But by early this year, when I realised we were on the verge of making a big discovery,
working on the shawl had taken over my life, occupying me from early in the morning
until late at night.

It has taken a great deal of hard work, using cutting-edge scientific techniques which
would not have been possible five years ago.

To extract DNA samples from the stains on the shawl, I used a technique I developed
myself, which I call ‘vacuuming’ – to pull the original genetic material from the depths
of the cloth.

I filled a sterile pipette with a liquid ‘buffer’, a solution known to stabilise the cells and
DNA, and injected it into the cloth to dissolve the material trapped in the weave of the
fabric without damaging the cells, then sucked it out.

I needed to sequence the DNA found in the stains on the shawl, which means mapping
the DNA by determining the exact order of the bases in a strand. I used polymerase
chain reaction, a technique which allows millions of exact copies of the DNA to be
made, enough for sequencing.

When I tested the resulting DNA profiles against the DNA taken from swabs from
Catherine Eddowes’s descendant, they were a match.

I used the same extraction method on the stains which had characteristics of seminal fluid.

Dr David Miller found epithelial cells – which line cavities and organs – much to our
surprise, as we were not expecting to find anything usable after 126 years.

Then I used a new process called whole genome amplification to copy the DNA 500
million-fold and allow it to be profiled.

Once I had the profile, I could compare it to that of the female descendant of
Kosminski’s sister, who had given us a sample of her DNA swabbed from inside her mouth.

The first strand of DNA showed a 99.2 per cent match, as the analysis instrument could
not determine the sequence of the missing 0.8 per cent fragment of DNA. On testing
the second strand, we achieved a perfect 100 per cent match.

Because of the genome amplification technique, I was also able to ascertain the ethnic
and geographical background of the DNA I extracted. It was of a type known as the
haplogroup T1a1, common in people of Russian Jewish ethnicity. I was even able to
establish that he had dark hair.

Now that it’s over, I’m excited and proud of what we’ve achieved, and satisfied that we
have established, as far as we possibly can, that Aaron Kosminski is the culprit.

Dr Jari Louhelainen is a senior lecturer in molecular biology at Liverpool John Moores University and an expert in historic cold-case forensic research.

© Russell Edwards 2014

Naming Jack The Ripper, by Russell Edwards, will be published by Sidgwick & Jackson on September 9, priced £16.99.


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz3CczokGih
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[Pam]

That was really a fun read!!!!Thanks, Cidersomerset.

[jake gittes]

While it may prove to be his DNA on the shawl, it does not prove he was the murderer. It could have just come from (sorry) one of the prostitute's "Johns" and the shawl was used to, well, you know, clean up. Would a hairdresser be able to perform postmortem surgical procedures with the precision that 'Ripper' was said to have done?

[Cidersomerset]

Would a hairdresser be able to perform postmortem surgical procedures with the precision that 'Ripper' was said to have done?

Before there were many doctors available, the Barber/Surgeon was a combined profession especially in the lower class's, Although I'm not
sure if they were still around in this period ?......












He may of had some medical training before coming to England ? But the
two professions seemed to have been separated well before 1890.....


Barbers in the British Isles in the Middle Ages[edit]

Formal recognition of their skills (in England at least) goes back to 1540,[2] when
the Fellowship of Surgeons (who existed as a distinct profession, but were still
not "Doctors/Physicians" for reasons including that, as a trade, they were trained
by apprenticeship rather than academically) merged with the Company of Barbers,
a London livery company, to form the Company of Barber-Surgeons. However, the
trade was gradually put under pressure by the medical profession and in 1745, the
surgeons split from the Barbers' Company (which still exists) to form the Company
of Surgeons. In 1800 a Royal Charter was granted to this company and the Royal
College of Surgeons in London came into being (later it was renamed to cover all of
England – equivalent Colleges exist for Scotland and Ireland as well as many of the
old UK colonies, e.g. Canada).[3]

Few traces of barbers' links with the surgical side of the medical profession remain.
One is the traditional red and white barber's pole, or a modified instrument from a
blacksmith, which is said to represent the blood and bandages associated with their
older role. Another link is the British use of the title "Mr" rather than "Dr" by
surgeons (when they become qualified as surgeons by e.g. the award of an MRCS
or FRCS diploma). This dates back to the days when surgeons did not have a
university education (let alone a doctorate); this link with the past is still retained
despite the fact that all surgeons now have to gain a basic medical degree and
doctorate (as well as undergoing several more years training in surgery) – they no
longer perform haircuts, a task the barbers have retained.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barber_surgeon

[Curt]

It seems an interestingly timed revelation with all the bad press 'the Jews' are getting these days- and in light of what's currently happening in Israel. I'd also wonder whether this guy mightn't have just been a 'john' - as Jake pointed out.

Having said all that, this is pretty fascinating evidence and it might very well point to this man's guilt. It would be odd if one of the prime suspect's DNA just happened to have been found on the victim's clothing without him very likely being guilty.

This is all very interesting stuff.

[Cidersomerset]

It seems an interestingly timed revelation with all the bad press 'the Jews' are getting these days- and in light of what's currently happening in Israel. I'd also wonder whether this guy mightn't have just been a 'john' - as Jake pointed out.

Having said all that, this is pretty fascinating evidence and it might very well point to this man's guilt. It would be odd if one of the prime suspect's DNA just happened to have been found on the victim's clothing without him very likely being guilty.

This is all very interesting stuff.

My immediate thought was Polish immigrant which is a
very touchy subject with all the East Europeans who
have flooded the job market here for the past few years.
Then add Jew as well and we have the ultimate 'baddy'
profile over here at the moment. I think that is
coincidence..LOL..Which is why Nigal Farage is the
flavour of the month , but if you read thread below
he is in the US at the moment doing interviews
with Fox news and having a private meeting with
Ruport Murdoch......

https://projectavalon.net/forum4/show...lticulturalism

[Cidersomerset]

Video version.......

Identity of Jack The Ripper finally ‘revealed’ with the help of DNA evidence

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=SCF708Q45Ns

Published on 7 Sep 2014

Jack the Ripper unmasked: How amateur sleuth used DNA breakthrough
to identify Britain's most notorious criminal 126 years after string of terrible murders

DNA evidence on a shawl found at Ripper murder scene nails killer
By testing descendants of victim and suspect, identifications were made
Jack the Ripper has been identified as Polish-born Aaron Kosminski
Kosminski was a suspect when the Ripper murders took place in 1888
Hairdresser Kosminski lived in Whitechapel and was later put in an asylum

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/artic...

[Cardillac]

the UK Daily Mail's report is complete clap-trap;

come on folks, use LOGIC-

if/IF the true identity of the Ripper is a 'commoner' of some sort, why is his/her identity sealed forever by Scotland Yard?!-

read Scotsman John Hamer's "The Falsification of History" for starters and his chapter on Jack the Ripper, just for starters;

the UK Daily Mail article (complete with a bogus lithograph of one of his victims) fails to mention is a specific MOTIVE (other than random kookiness) behind the atrocities but Hamer does;

if one hasn't read the book I'll give you a hint: Dr. Gull was actually the 'Ripper' (but he wasn't acting alone- he was just the one cutting out their genitals among many other things) and Queen Victoria's art teacher for her grandchildren Walter Sickert was being black-mailed by all of the victims- long story- read the book-

Larry

[Nasu]

I don't see any mention of them testing the descendants of the other suspects, which is od, don't you think? It means, based on his hunch of that suspect, he went forward, luckily he found exactly what he was looking for.. Is it just me or is this quite a big coincidence?... Great post... N

[Taurean]

Only £11.89 from Amazon!

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Naming-Jack-...ussell+edwards