Why were the police unable to catch Jack The Ripper

Authors Avatar

                            Why where the police unable to catch Jack the Ripper?

         The police were unable to catch Jack the ripper due to a number of key reasons all linking with the limitation of police work at that time.  The first reason, was the focus of the police investigation, the police thought the murderer was local and wasted time on just one area.  A lot of attention was given to the suspect “leather apron” some newspapers published the leather apron story, this pressurised police to follow up this line of investigation, and this meant time was wasted.  The fact that the murderer was not local was based on the evidence that the murderer was not a butcher or an abattoir and could be someone of a higher class like a doctor; the police ignored this evidence and kept focusing on White chapel.  All these factors wasted time; it was mainly down to police work, as they only focused on one area when evidence suggested the murderer was not local.

         The police faced problems interpreting and using evidence, they dismissed possible leads and supporting evidence, but followed other leads with little supporting evidence.  Evidence suggested that the murderer had some medical knowledge, but the early investigations focused on abattoirs and slaughterhouses.  One description by a witness called William Hutchineson, was very detailed, which some suggested was to draw attention from himself, however he was never investigated.  This proved the police didn’t use evidence and dismissed possible leads.  Inspector Chandler came to the conclusion that Annie Chapman’s death at 5.30am was wrong as Elizabeth Long’s evidence conflicted with Dr Phillips, the police took seriously Elizabeth Long’s statement even though there was no evidence, but didn’t look into Dr Phillips statement. This meant the police just looked into one statement, but not all of them, this meant the police could not put to use all possible leads, and this also wasted time.  The press coverage influenced the direction of the investigation by publishing the “Leather apron” story which pressurised police to follow up this line of investigation, this also lead to concentration on foreigners.  This was not helped as Leather apron was Jewish, this encouraged many in White chapel to turn their suspicion and hostility to the Jewish community.  The police increased the number of patrols in the area, the night the two murders were committed, this meant they were carried out quickly, perhaps in 5 minutes, which caused trouble for the police, as there weren’t any witnesses, as the murderer didn’t linger around the bodies.  This suggested the murderer was quick and his work was efficient.

Join now!

         The methods the policed used were ineffective and proves hopeless.  The methods that they used included undercover work, where police used to dress as prostitutes hoping to trap the murderer, house to house inquiries, more than 2,000 lodgers were interviewed this wasted a lot of time as people could easily lie.  Slaughterhouses and abattoirs were investigated where seventy-six butchers were questioned and bloodhounds were used but also proved hopeless.  All these method proved hopeless and ineffective, as no further information or evidence was gained, this may have been because the police didn’t know what they ...

This is a preview of the whole essay