Prisoner 1167: The Madman Who Was Jack the Ripper

Prisoner 1167; The Madman Who Was Jack the Ripper

Trade paperback. Zustand: Very good. The format is approximately 5 inches by 7.75 inches. xvii, [1], 396, [2] pages. Illustrations. Bibliography. Archival Sources. Appendix A: Maps. Appendix B: Points to Ponder. Index. A fascinating true-crime study answers questions about an escaped prisoner from the lunatic asylum who was roaming the streets of London during the same period as Jack the Ripper, while also exploring the mystery behind the classified documents that could prove such a theory true. Presents evidence that suggests British authorities had Jack the Ripper in custody but released him and deliberately ignored information that might have led to his arrest and conviction for the murders of prostitutes. James Kelly was criminally insane, and was sent to Broadmoor in 1883 for stabbing his wife to death. He escaped in 1888. His own account of his subsequent adventures in England, France, Canada and the USA is a story in itself, but there is a gap. He was vague over where he was and what he did in 1888/9 - The months of the Ripper Murders. James Tully's persistent research has revealed damning evidence from previously secret files - some mysteriously culled - that during these months the police were well aware that Kelly could well be the Ripper, but they failed to find him and then deliberately covered up their mistakes. Backing his arguments with meticulous research into the exact evidence at the inquest, and a wealth of detail - Kelly's personality matches today's profiles of serial killers - James Tully presents an overwhelming case that here is the definitive answer to the greatest conundrum in the history of crime. Derived from a Kirkus review: This book details the careers of Jack the Ripper and asylum fugitive James Kelly, making a case that the two men are one and the same. Like many a Ripperologist before him, Tully has his own theory concerning the identity of 19th-century London's infamous slasher of prostitutes: James Kelly, `the only convicted, lunatic, throat stabbing woman killer who was known . . . to have been at large during 1888.'' In the book's most satisfying sections, based on exhaustive original research, Tully documents the life of this little-known Victorian, an upholsterer of illegitimate birth who manages a wily escape from Broadmoor Asylum, where he was sentenced for murdering his wife, only to discover he prefers his cell. Roaming Europe and America for decades, he periodically tries to give himself up but is foiled by the incompetence of the authorities until at last, in old age, he returns home to Broadmoor to die. That story would have made a nice moral tale in its own right, and it is followed by a lengthy recap of every bit of evidence about the Ripper murdersâ"mostly old news that does not add substantially to the case against Kelly. When the author finally gets to that case, it boils down to the fact that Kelly was available and had already stabbed one woman; why not more? No positive evidence links Kelly to the crimes. As the author depicts him, Kelly seems too pathetic and half- hearted a player to cast as the granddaddy of serial killers. Regarding the claim of an official cover-up, the chief evidence is the fact that some of the century-old files on Kelly have been partially destroyed. For those who can't get enough of the Ripper, this book will stuff the belly until the next one, with the next theory, comes along. First Carroll and Graf Paperback Edition. Presumed first printing thus. Artikel-Nr. 88570

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