Was the Mad Barber Aaron Kosminski Really Jack the Ripper? Don’t be too Sure.

Some men have written their names in the history books by their sheer evil actions. But some men go way beyond that, and transform themselves into legends and myths, to the point where, centuries after they have died, their names still send shivers down people’s spines.

A great example is the unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper, who 137 years ago roamed the notorious Whitechapel slums, bringing unbelievable pain and mutilating deaths in attacks typically involving prostitutes who crowded London’s East End.

A fiend that may or may not have existed, ‘Jack’ was either a devilish individual, or else a composite character made by investigators’ misunderstanding of the killings of multiple men just as evil.

Eleven separate Whitechapel murders shock the United Kingdom and the world, starting from April 1888 up until 13 February 1891. Out of these, five murders, known as the ‘canonical five’, are widely believed to be the work of one killer – the Ripper.

But to begin with, most physical evidence regarding the case was destroyed by the bombs dropped from the Messerschmitt and Junkers of the German Luftwaffe from September 1940 to May 1941 during the WW2 blitz of London.

The rumors that the ‘canonical’ murders were connected intensified in September and October 1888. The five victims were called Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, and Mary Jane Kelly.

Out of the 80,000 that overcrowded the Whitechapel parish, these five women won a hellish lottery of sorts, and were ‘gifted’ the worst imaginable deaths.

Eye-witnesses in the 19^th century were every bit as bad as they are today, and each gave differing descriptions: some said that the suspected killer was fair, others dark; some said that he was shabbily dressed, others described him as elegantly well-dressed.

(Or, perhaps, there was more than one killer, and the descriptions were all precise.)

Many times, during this century and a half, investigators or historians and ‘experts’ have declared to have uncovered the true identity of the Ripper – and the trend continues today.

This last week it arose that English historian and author Russell Edwards is saying that DNA found on a shawl recovered from the scene of one of ‘canonical’ slayings was tested and revealed that ‘Jack’ was in fact a 23-year-old Polish immigrant named Aaron Kosminski — a barber who died in a mental institution in 1919.

New York Post reported:

“’When we matched the DNA from the blood on the shawl with a direct female descendant of the victim, it was the singular most amazing moment of my life at the time’, Edwards told ‘Today’ in Australia.

‘We tested the semen left on the shawl. When we matched that, I was dumbfounded that we actually had discovered who Jack the Ripper truly was’.

[…] ‘It was a voyage of discovery, with many twists and turns’, Edwards said. ‘The adventure was thrilling from beginning to end and I was lucky to experience it’.”

Descendants of the five victims are reportedly pushing the Scotland Yard to do an official inquest and to legally name the killer, since he has allegedly been revealed. BUT…

Several people, both online and on ‘expert’ circles, have questioned Edwards’ findings, pointing to allegations that he has faked finding proof to historical murders before.

Its pays to take a look at some aspects of the original investigation and speculate on why the killer was not caught right then and there.

The modus operandi of the British police then is not unlike today’s methods: massive house-to-house inquiries, loads of collected Forensics, suspects were identified, traced, and either investigated more closely or scrapped from the inquiry.

Reportedly, more than 2,000 people were interviewed, with ‘upwards of 300’ people investigated and as much as 80 people detained.

Butchers, slaughterers, surgeons, and physicians were prime suspects because of the manner of the mutilations.

Such a high-profile case (even Queen Victoria had theories about who the Ripper would be) demanded highest level of attention from authorities, and you ended up with a clusterfuck of jurisdictions between the Metropolitan Police Whitechapel (H) Division, the Central Office of the Scotland Yard and the City of London Police, too.

The murders became increasingly more severe as the series of attacks proceeded, and the obsession of the public grew in tandem.

But what if there was never any Jack the Ripper? What if the 5 ‘canonical’ murders had more than one culprit – maybe even five?

Some suspects, such as Jacob Isenschmid and John Pizer, looked good for a specific crime but were dismissed when they presented solid alibies for other murders of the series.

If the basic premise of ‘one killer for the five attacks’ was wrong, it would explain why ‘the killer’ was never caught.

Police surgeon Thomas Bond was one of the authorities to establish that all five murders ‘no doubt were committed by the same hand’.

Bond disagreed that the murderer possessed scientific or anatomical knowledge, and not even ‘the technical knowledge of a butcher or horse slaughterer’.

He speculated the Ripper to be a man of solitary habits, subject to ‘periodical attacks of homicidal and erotic mania’, and further believed the character of the mutilations to indicate ‘satyriasis’.

Also, unlike stated in the New York Post quoted above, no evidence existed that the perpetrator engaged in sexual activity with any of the victims.

Fast- forward to the 21^st century, DNA analysis has attempted to tie Polish Whitechapel barber Aaron Kosminski to crime scene evidence, but the science used to advance this claim has been put under suspicion.

The mitochondrial DNA was recovered from the uncorroborated crime scene evidence (a shawl many say did NOT believe to the victim), and compared with undisclosed descendants of Kosminski (who had no children).

Also, in forensic investigations, mtDNA can act as a powerful tool for EXCLUDING individuals but not INCRIMINATING them.

So, even if the shawl was a legitimate forensic object from the attack, all we could say is that it’s not impossible that Kosminski was connected to it.

The study linking Kosminski could not be replicated and the original data could not be located, so the Journal of Forensic Sciences published an official expression of concern.

The main theory behind the end of the Ripper crime series is that the culprit’s must have died, been imprisoned, institutionalized, or emigrated away from the UK.

Maybe he never existed to begin with.

Paul Serran

Paul Serran is a writer, especially interested in geopolitics, living in Brazil.

Paul Serran

Paul Serran is a writer, especially interested in geopolitics, living in Brazil.

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