SYDNEY DAILY TELEGRAPH November 5, 2005.

"Australian scientist and DNA expert Ian Findlay will use a powerful new technique to try to unmask the real Jack the Ripper, writes Kate Murray:

Professor Findlay, of Griffith University in Queensland hopes his new cell track ID will be able to profile the DNA of both the killer and one of his victims, prostitute Catherine Eddowes.

The revolutionary method needs only one cell or a single strand of hair to produce a DNA profile of the owner, and has been proven to work on cells 160 years old--16 times better than the limit of conventional DNA testing. Most DNA profiles require several cells to create a "fingerprint" and existing techniques cannot be used on old or damaged DNA.

But Professor Findlay used the Cell Track technique to test a brooch containing a 160 year old hair--and discovered that the single strands of hair belonged to four different people, three women and a man.

"With these ancient hairs we didn't think they would work and they just worked so well", said Findlay, who is also chief scientist at the Gribbes Molecular Science independant laboratory.

After his success with the brooch, a private collector in Britain contacted Findlay with a lock of hair believed to belong to Eddowes, who was murdered on September 30, 1888.

More than 600 letters claiming to be from the Ripper were sent to London police during his reign of terror. Most are believed to be hoaxes but two contained body parts--one a piece of kidney and the other a piece of earlobe. Those letters could unlock the mystery.

When the hair and letters arrive from England it could be just a week before the Ripper's identity is revealed.

Since the Ripper was around in the 1880's it could be possible to identify him from his current descendants. Several men were suspected of being JTR and if a genetic fingerprint is obtained from the envelopes, the descendants will be contacted for a match......."



Pretty incredible but if the Ripper is a complete unknown, then I guess we'll never discover his identity as we don't know who his descendants are. Not sure if all the descendants of the known suspects will agree to assist either. What do you think of it, Steve?

Fascinating stuff Mark, I can see a lot of potential pitfalls but who knows, maybe this method will unlock the secrets of this case once and for all. Steve.

I would rate the chances of closure at 15%. If this case is finally solved it would probably be the world record for time taken to solve a crime--hopefully the JFK case won't break that record.

Mark, while were here buddy, whats happened to your Mr Levy?

Better hurry, I hear Tim's about to break the case with his stunning thesis, JTR, Castro's grandad!!!!

Steve,

Er..Apologies about that. I couldn't find anything about him (except the stuff in Casebook)
so I dropped off it. I strongly suspect its a conspiracy by historians to prevent me from solving the case.

BTW Steve, has this apparent breakthrough technique in DNA research been mentioned in any of the Ripper publications? I recall reading about the use of DNA fingerprinting, but it was given little chance of solving the case because of it's apparent limitations.

Steve, your topics on JTR has inspired me to do a bit of dabbling in the case, nothing to contribute (I've mostly been fiddling with the letters to do image analysis, etc - a good source would be helpful), but to jump in before Tim!

Throwing all caution to the wind and not meaning to detract from the serious side of the topic but having fun with some coincidences:

The guy who supposedly vanished to the US>

At the time of the Great Exhibition in Chicago (Crystal palace:Ruby,White City:KKK) there was a club around people fascinated by the whitechapel murders. At the same time there was a Texan in town who appears to have been inspired by ole Jack (Jack, Jackie). He built a 3 story murder house where he, in secret chambers and passageways, disposed of ladies who came to Chicago seeking fortune. His assumed name? :: Harry D. Holmes!!!* ( connection to Post Office? he wrote letters

But serioulsly. The DNA thingy could prove most interesting.

(BTW I think one of the centuries old 'bogmen' in Denmark with a rope around his neck has been matched with a report of a taxman disappearing while visiting a village near where the body was found.)

EDIT:: * must have HD on the brain, I mean HH in the ripper instance.

John, Some of the letters.[attachmentid=3700][attachmentid=3701]

Also you can find all the ripper letters, and much more besides at www.casebook.org this site is a top class resource for all things "Ripperish" be interested to see what you come up with John, bearing inmind your sterling work with the JFK photo archive.

Mark, maybe just post what you have? he is an interesting candidate, and may well spark some debate.

Regards Steve.

John,

Welcome to the Jack the Ripper case. As you can see, Steve's an avid Ripperologist and can help you with any queries. Plenty of other experts here, too.

Steve,

I only have what's in Casebook but I can post it. Might just wait to see what Professor Findlay comes up with. It might make us all redundant.

Mark,Stephen et al , you'll have to put me right on this one. I couldn't find a ref. to anything like it on the net so here's for comment:

Take the 'ha' out of 'William H. Bury', add a bit of red stuff (the proper sort, in glass like, sparkling) : 'I'm will ruby'.

So : when billy boy gets upset, he rips.

[attachmentid=3706]

On another letter which shares a statistical similarity re letter use to the letter I based this on the signature is 'yours till death" : yours, will bury

The guys name was H.H. Holmes, aka D.W. Mudget. Try 'The Devil and the White City' for a great read about this extraordinary madman. Who was far too organized and ghoulish to be JTR. Holmes sold the skeletons of many of his victims to medical schools! The apartment building in Lawndale that he built was a death factory.

These methods are so different from JTW that I really doubt that it could be the same personality. Besides, Holmes earlier history is known.

Now that guy Tumblety (?) who ended up in St. Louis, he fits the profile for JTW real well.

Norman,

If and it's a big if, those DNA experts obtain a DNA fingerprint from the saliva on the envelopes, Tumblety's descendants will be among those contacted. He's my second pick after Jacob Levy.

Mark, any more news on this?

Steve,

Apologies for my tardy reply. No, I haven't come up with anything more about it--yet. I hope it doesn't just fizzle out. If they extracted a DNA fingerprint (they were confident) and it doesn't match any of the descendants of the known suspects, then I hope they publish the story. Either way, we may not be any closer to closure. It was always a longshot.

Hi all

Dr. Findlay himself admitted on "Casebook: Jack the Ripper" message boards that the hopes for what he would find through his investigation were overblown in the press. He hopes to advance knowledge in the field and has a chance to do so if he can extract DNA. However the chances are remote that Jack the Ripper will beidentified. The chances are slim of finding usable DNA on any crime scene artifacts, of which there virtually are none, or of being able to match a suspect's DNA to a Ripper letter, which most authorities think are hoaxes any way, despite what Patricia Cornwell claims in her investigation.

In any case, following is what I wrote up about Dr. Findlay's investigation for the latest (December) issue of Ripperologist.

Chris

****************

Australian DNA Investigation

Australian Pathologist Ian Findlay of Griffith University in Queensland, Australia (and formerly of Leeds University in northern England) is hoping to use DNA to further knowledge of the Jack the Ripper case. While admitting that such techniques might not identify the murderer, Findlay says that testing such artifacts as a rope of hair allegedly from victim Catherine Eddowes now in the possession of Stephen Ryder, owner of the ‘Casebook: Jack the Ripper’ website.

Findlay is reported to have developed 'a method, called Cell Track-ID, [that] is able to extract and compile a DNA fingerprint from a single cell or strand of hair up to 160 years old.'

On 6 November, Ryder on the ‘Casebook’ message boards stated: ‘About two weeks ago I happened to catch an Australian press piece which had an interview with Prof. Findlay. The article discussed his new method of extracting usable DNA samples from old strands of hair (160+ years old). Prof. Findlay happened to mention in the article that he would love to apply this new type of testing to historical cases such as that of Jack the Ripper. 'This was of interest to me, because I've recently acquired a plait of hair which was alleged to have been taken from the body of Catherine Eddowes. The hair and other artifacts which accompanied it are discussed in depth in the current Ripperologist, so I won't go into too much detail here, except to say that they all appear to me to have been modern (1960s/1970s) hoaxes. Regardless, I shared this information with Prof. Findlay, and he said he would be interested in testing the hair to conclusively state once and for all whether or not it was taken from the body of Catherine Eddowes. The hair will be tested against samples we hope to acquire from living Eddowes descendants.’

At this point, Prof. Findlay is trying to acquire other Ripper artifacts for possible DNA testing. Findlay stated on the ‘Casebook’ message boards on 6 November, ‘The Cell-Track DNA system is a significant advance over mitochondrial [DNA testing] (used by [Patricia] Cornwell) which as others have noted has significant limitations. STR profiling is the standard DNA fingerprinting used worldwide and has much increased specificity to genetically identify the source of small and/or old samples.’

Findlay continued, ‘If samples (such as stamps, letters) exist, they could be tested for DNA fingerprint. Of course the presence of the DNA fingerprint does not confirm the Ripper - just adds additional supportive info to the puzzle. The DNA fingerprint could be compared to living (or dead) relatives (just need some direct relatives certainly don't need ALL the relatives) of possible suspects to establish links. As the specificity of this DNA fingerprint system is so high (billions to one), then a close link could strengthen the case aganst that suspect.’ Anyone with possible Ripper artifacts that they are willing to have tested is encouraged to contact Prof. Findlay through Ryder’s ‘Casebook: Jack the Ripper’ website http://casebook.org/ or through his own website
http://www.gribblesmolecular.com/

Chris,

Thanks for the info and links. I guess there's still a glimmer of hope.

Hi Mark

Dr. Findlay might still come up with something useful to further knowledge of the case, depending what he is sent as a result of his appeal to receive artifacts from the case. However, the results to date, I understand, have been disappointing. The following is the way we reported the first results of his investigation in the January issue of Ripperologist (no. 63):

Findlay DNA Results Are Inconclusive

As we reported in December in Ripperologist 62, Prof Ian Findlay at Queensland’s Griffith University has developed a new DNA analysis which he hopes will help to increase knowledge of the Ripper case. On 24 January on the ‘Casebook: Jack the Ripper’ message boards, Prof Findlay reported that unfortunately his analysis of samples obtained from ‘Ripper letters’ and from a braid of hair alleged to be from victim Catherine Eddowes have up to this point been inconclusive.

Findlay stated, ‘We performed two types of forensic DNA analysis: nuclear and mitochondrial. As previously stated, nuclear is more powerful with specificity around the billion to 1 mark. Whereas mitochondrial can be approximately be 20 to 100 to 1. . . .’

‘We tested the hair braid and hairs from known descendants of Eddowes using mitochondrial sequencing. The descendants’ hairs were consistent with both descendant having a common maternal ancestor, in this case likely to be Eddowes. However, the hair braid consistently failed to provide a profile. This could be due to: 1. technique failing. Possible but unlikely as the technique worked well with other hair. 2. As the test looks for human DNA sequences, this could indicate that hair is not human. Nuclear testing on the hair provided several partial DNA profiles, including male, which may simply be from cellular contamination on the hair rather than from the hair. Conclusion: We cannot determine that the hair braid is from Eddowes or not. In fact, it is possible that the hair braid is not human and therefore not from Eddowes.’

Regarding the ‘Ripper letters,’ Findlay said, ‘The good news is that we obtained nuclear DNA forensic profiles from the Openshaw [letter] envelope seal samples (and hence possibly from the sender) and blood stains from two [other ‘Ripper’] letters. This demonstrates that nuclear DNA exists and that our techniques can detect it. I understand (though may be wrong) that [Patricia] Cornwell’s team failed to obtain nuclear DNA profiles but did obtain a mitochondrial profile from the envelope seal.’

He continued: ‘[The] bad news is that unfortunately all the profiles are partial and inconclusive and may originate from multiple persons. This isn’t very surprising considering that the letters etc would have been handled dozens to hundreds of times over the last 120 years – often without gloves etc. In conclusion – although DNA profiles from letters were obtained, they are inconclusive.’ Prof Findlay concluded: ‘Although our DNA techniques have worked, it appears that the notoriety of the Ripper case may have worked against us as the letters and hair braid have been handled multiple times thus contaminating the samples.’

For more on the DNA technique used by Prof Findlay see http://dsc.discovery.com/news/briefs/20051...ripper_tec.html

Chris,

Thanks for that. It's disappointing.

I had my hopes pinned on the saliva on the envelopes as I thought it could only be that of the sender. Of course, who knows how many others handled the envelope. It was also probably re-sealed quite a few times.

Hi Mark, Chris. I feel I have neglected these threads for sometime, (its that damn JFK stuff) I am putting together a long post on Mathew Packer, and the detectives, and another on Stephen White, hope you will both post comments/suggestions. Shame about the DNA tests, but the game is still afoot. Regards, Steve.