(96) Jack the Ripper - Psychopath

Added: 2026-05-11

[00:00:08]It's often wondered what motivated the serial killer known to history as Jack the Ripper. It's human to try to understand. So, it's only natural that people interested in the Jack the Ripper murders want to try to understand the motivation behind them. They weren't carried out for gain or for jealousy.

[00:00:26]They weren't crimes of passion or revenge. They were not part of a political, royal or masonic conspiracy.

[00:00:33]They were not crimes of hatred against women or prostitutes. These murders were committed largely for their own sake.

[00:00:42]Murder was the motive. And the reason for this was that the culprit would have been a psychopath. The reason why women or often children are the victims of psychopathic serial killers isn't out of hatred for women as such. is because they were the easiest targets for a male psychopath to overpower and kill.

[00:01:04]Understanding psychopathy is intrinsic to the study of serial killing in general and Jack the Ripper in particular. If you have no understanding of psychopathy, you have no chance of understanding the phenomenon of Jack the Ripper. The word psychopath comes from the classical Greek words psycho meaning your mind and pathos meaning suffering.

[00:01:25]So it kind of literally means a diseased mind. Although psychopaths have been living undiagnosed within every human population since the origin of the species. The word was first coined as psychopatic by Baron Erns von Fertton's Lebanon an Austrian doctor in 1845 in le book art lickton senkunda which was translated into English in 1847 as the principles of medical psychology which is a lot easier to say at this time the term was used to refer to a wide variety of mental illnesses or what were then perceived to be mental illnesses for example I've mentioned in several different films on this channel.

[00:02:06]An influential book published in 1886 again in German by Richard Friedlin Yseph Fraier Kathon Festenberg Al Thronberg Ananton Ebbing called psychopathia sexualis which diagnosed sexual insanity as being pretty much identical as homosexuality. The meaning was narrowed down to the term as we use it today in 1941 with the publication of the mask of sanity by Hervey M. Kley in the United States. It was subtitled an attempt to clarify some issues about the so-called psychopathic personality which pretty much tells you what it's about.

[00:02:47]This is the seinal work which informs all subsequent study of psychopathy and it went through multiple editions and was continuously updated up to Kley's death in 1984. The book contains a series of case studies from which 16 characteristics were identified which defined psychopathy in individuals. The mask is one of normality which conceals the disorganization, ammorality and lack of conscience and disorder of the psychopathic personality which can lead to antisocial, emotionless and criminal behavior. collectly felt that the condition might affect up to one in eight people which is obviously a huge proportion of the population although there are degrees but only about one in a 100 psychopaths becomes a criminal and an even smaller proportion becomes murderous. There are 16 characteristics not all of which are present in a psychopath and some are no longer regarded as being valid. The first is superficial charm and good intelligence.

[00:03:53]The intelligent aspect is no longer thought to be valid with psychopaths being no more or less intelligent than the normal population. The second aspect is absence of delusions and other signs of irrational thinking. This might seem counterintuitive. You might assume that psychopaths are deluded and think irrationally but actually they don't.

[00:04:15]The third aspect is a lack of nervousness or psychonurotic manifestations.

[00:04:21]The fourth is unreliability.

[00:04:24]The fifth untruthfulness and insincerity.

[00:04:27]The sixth is lack of remorse and shame.

[00:04:30]The seventh is inadequately motivated antisocial behavior. The eighth is poor judgment and a failure to learn by experience. The lack of learning aspect is is dubious. Again, the ninth is pathological egocentricity and an incapacity for love. The 10th is a general poverty in major effective reactions. The 11th is specific loss of insight. The 12th is unresponsiveness to general interpersonal relations. The 13th is fantastic and uninviting behavior with drink and sometimes without. The 14th is unalithing threats, but they're rarely carried out. The 15th is an impersonal sex life with trivial and poorly integrated relationships. And the 16th is the failure to follow any life plan. The presence of any of these characteristics can be regarded as a red flag, as an indicator of possible psychopathy. Believe it or not, the mere mention of a red flag sends some critics of the Lechmere theory into a fit of apoplelexy. And as a curative, I can only recommend that you view the five film series on this channel entitled Jack the Ripper, the evidence for guilt.

[00:05:49]But a red flag is an indicator. It is not in itself cast iron proof. But the more red flags that attach to somebody, obviously, the more likely it is. Robert Hair, a Canadian doctor, drafted a checklist in 1980 based on Kley's work called the hair psychopathy checklist, which has also gone through a series of revisions, the last one being in 2003.

[00:06:17]Initially, there were 22 questions, but two were eliminated in the revised checklist, which is called the PCLR.

[00:06:25]A score of four is regarded as normal.

[00:06:28]The maximum score is 40. This is a strange thing. In the United States, a score of 30 would mean that you're a psychopath. Although, strangely, in in Britain, with the same checklist, the threshold is lower at 25. I'll put a link to the original checklist, the psychopathy checklist 22 or the PCL22 in the description below, as it's the only one I could find online with a self- testing tick box, which automatically gives you a score. But that's out of 44 and not 40. I'll also provide a link to the revised one. So you can at least see what the questions are so you can test yourselves although commonly people underscore themselves as they don't want to think that they're psychopaths and that they are much nicer than they really are. The brains of known psychopaths have been tested and it is found that they tend to show low activity of the monomine oxidase a enzyme which is encoded in the ma gene which is found in the X chromosome. This regulates empathy and aggression. It's also known as the warrior gene. In the evolution of our species, it would have been a useful characteristic within a tribal group that was fighting for its survival against its neighbors. The circle of empathy for those high on the psychopathic scale narrows towards their kindred group. Someone high on the psychopathic scale would be naturally hostile and ruthless towards people from an out group with whom they had no shared experience or family bond. They would kill intruders in the fight for resources. There are also observable neurological differences with people who score highly on the psychopathic scale.

[00:08:13]They tend to show a loss of function in the orbital frontal cortex. This is the front part of the brain behind the forehead. This affects the ability to judge what is socially acceptable and could be a genetic condition from birth or it can be caused by a head injury.

[00:08:32]For example, Henry's personality is thought by some to have undergone a change after a jousting injury sustained in 1536.

[00:08:42]6 months later, he executed Amber Berlin. Another possible example of this involves the serial killer Fred West who may have sustained a head injury as a child when he fell off a bike. As psychopathy is the result of a genetic condition, it is built into the DNA of a psychopath. It is not treatable. You cannot cure a psychopath. The following are regarded as common behavioral traits found in psychopaths, but they're not always present. So, they should be treated with a degree of caution. In instances where they relate to childhood experiences of the subject, the information tends to come from interviews and statements made by the psychopaths and as such have to be treated with caution. This is because they're manipulative liars and they're also prone to telling interviewers what they think they want to hear or they'll make statements which they think will benefit them. I'll give you one example of this. Peter Satcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper, claimed that he heard voices coming from a grave telling him to murder prostitutes. This implied that he murdered while he was in a schizophrenic state and so killed while under diminished responsibility, which would mean that he'd be sent to a secure hospital such as Broadmore rather than being incarcerated within the general prison system in a category a jail, for example, with the worst offenders in the country. The judge at his trial was not fooled, but subsequently some psychiatrists were and Suckliffe spent some time in Broadmore, although he ended his days in the normal prison system. Anyway, these are some of those traits. It's commonly stated that as children, psychopaths are often chronic bed wetters and engage in animal cruelty and fire starting. They may perform petty acts of theft such as sweets from a corner shop or stationery from their school. But these sorts of behaviors are likely to pass unnoticed. So it's difficult to make a real judgment as to how commonplace these are with psychopaths. They all relate to a lack of emotional control and boundaries.

[00:10:54]Psychopaths lack empathy. They have no sorrow for their behavior. They lack a conscience. They tend to indulge in unrealistic fantasies and obsessions.

[00:11:04]This often leads to numerous failed relationships and a fascination with law enforcement. But notice the Yorkshire Ripper didn't have a failed relationship. Neither did the Long Island serial killer Rex Human, nor the Moors murderer Ian Brady. The list could go on and on. Psychopaths tend to be pathological liars. They often reflexively lie when they don't even have to. They are glib and don't have to think up their lies in advance. They're used to lying and being believed from an early age, so they are very good liars.

[00:11:37]They stay calm when they lie. Their heartbeat doesn't go up, and they can pass lie detector tests. They're good at triangulation. They can simultaneously tell different lies to different people and keep track of these lies. They have a superficial charm that's only given away by micro expressions which you have to be very vigilant to notice. And most people don't look out for them as they're not expected. They mirror the behavior of the person they're interacting with. And people are conditioned to regard this as being reassuring and empathetic, which in the case of a psychopath is the exact opposite. Due to this superficial charm and believability, their lies are usually not corroborated, even improbable ones. They're just taken at face value. They motivate the other person to believe them, which is why interviewing a psychopath can produce misleading results. Narcissism is one of the overlapping personality traits that make up the so-called dark triad with psychopathy and machavelianism and is closely connected to another key trait of the psychopath, grandiosity. They elevate their own status way beyond which is realistic for their standing in society or their intelligence. The average IQ for the general population is 100, but for psychopathic killers, it's just under that, around 95. So contrary to popular myths, most psychopathic killers are not overintelligent. But the average IQ for normal criminals is even lower at about 85, which is one reason why criminals turn to crime and get caught. So, psychopaths are on average clever than the average criminal, but less intelligent than the average person in society. Yet, their narcissism gives them a feeling of grandiosity, an unrealistic superiority complex. This feeds into other characteristics.

[00:13:39]They're risktakers, as they believe in their own infallibility and don't think they're going to get caught. And because they imagine they're superior to everyone else, they have the need for control. Psychopaths who are successful in one sphere or another, business or politics for example, usually achieve psychopathic supply by exerting power and control over people who they interact with, their subordinates and their colleagues. If they don't have this outlet in their real life and they have little or no control, then this would never be their fault. To them, it would just be due to some other unfair factor. And this provides the self-justification for their actions.

[00:14:24]They project blame. And these are the types who are likely to become serial killers as the killing is the ultimate act of exerting control. Control over life and death. The traits I've described apply to psychopathic criminals, serial killers, and noncriminal psychopaths. And most psychopaths are not criminals, although they may engage in dubious behavior.

[00:14:52]Psychopathy is found to be four times higher with successful people compared to unsuccessful people as they are ruthless and unencumbered by empathy and guilt. Psychopaths tend to excel in business, sports, the military, and politics. Although obviously they're a minority in all of these activities.

[00:15:16]With serial killers, it's commonly said that genetics loads the gun, personality aims the gun, and life experiences pulls the trigger. genetics. That's the part I've been discussing so far with psychopaths being born that way, but not all psychopaths become serial killers.

[00:15:35]Although all serial killers pretty much are psychopaths. The other points are the nature and nurture dichotomy. The last factor is nurture, life experiences. The middle one, which I put in italics, is a bit of a mixture of the two and is often admitted from this catchy little saying. What life experiences or environmental factors can trigger a pre-existing psychopath to becoming a murderer? Often they come from what might be called broken homes where there's no dominant father figure that sets moral boundaries. They're usually unsuccessful which breeds resentment and the need to fuel their grandiosity in some way by exerting dominance and control. Even a psychopath who's relatively successful, such as Rex Hume, who is topical as he pleaded guilty to eight murders in April 2026, probably felt that he should have been more successful or he was dissatisfied perhaps with his home life. The term serial killer was first coined as recently as the 1970s.

[00:16:40]It refers to someone who has killed at least three people with a gap between each killing, not a spree or a mass killing. In other words, it's often mistakenly said that Jack the Ripper was the first serial killer, but this isn't true. The Rackcliffe Highway murders took place in the same general area in 1811 when seven people were murdered in two incidents 12 days apart. And that wasn't even the first serial killing.

[00:17:08]Serial killing is closely associated with urbanization. When most humans lived in kindred groups, tribes, clans, and in villages, a lot of people were interrelated by blood and were very familiar with each other. This acted as a break to aborant behavior for two reasons. Because the risk of getting caught was so much greater in that sort of society where everyone knew each other's business. And psychopaths, contrary to that earlier point, are not totally risk averse. But more importantly, the psychopath would have to be at the very highest end of the scale, approaching the top score of 40 to have no empathy or sense of shared interest with his closest kin group.

[00:17:53]Some serial killers are like that. For example, I go back to Fred West. He murdered his own daughter, but that's quite rare. I know someone who actually knew Fred West and talking to them I would score him at 38 out of 40 on the checklist. With the rise of urbanization as the 19th century progressed with people moving from close-knit rural village communities to sprawling anonymous cities, an environment was created in which a psychopath could thrive and become a serial killer. In a very real sense, Jack the Ripper heralded the creation of the modern world. One reason why there are so many serial killers in the United States compared to the rest of the developed world is possibly because it's a society based on migration from around the world, not just from rural areas to the city. So a psychopath would have a double dislocation.

[00:18:51]Less than 1% of murders are serial killings. So the focus of police murder squads is on solving normal murders.

[00:19:00]This lack of experience leads to an expectation that the same factors will be in play with serial murder as they are for normal murders. That there would be a clear or understandable motive, for example, and that the killer's behavior would be easily understandable. That he would not take unnecessary risks. So, it's hardly surprising that the police in all countries are not very good at solving serial killing cases. Also, if a murder is not recognized as being at least potentially part of a series early on, then it makes solving the crime all the more difficult as the biggest barrier to solving crime is if the initial crime scene investigation is bungled. Serial killer behavior at the crime scene, their modus operandi, is often what groups these crimes together.

[00:19:49]Although in serial murders you often see an escalation in violence and that pattern has also got to be identified.

[00:19:57]This has obvious implications with the Jack the Ripper case where the police were totally inexperienced with what they were dealing with. There's a drive for law enforcement in the United States to try to understand serial killings better and it's obviously a bigger priority for them as a majority of identified serial killers live in the United States. Interestingly, the so-called Long Island serial killer, Lisk, they like to give their serial killers catchy titles, perhaps as a some sort of homage to Jack the Ripper. He's really called Rex Herman. And he's promised to help the FBI's behavioral science unit to give them insights into serial killer behavior as part of the terms of the acceptance of his guilty plea. But once he's put in presumably a cushier jail, he could easily tell them a load of lies. As I've said, psychopathic serial killers are selfserving, habitual liars, often painting themselves in the light they think will be most advantageous for them. They have no remorse, and they'll say what they think their captors want to hear. I've already done two detailed films on the Long Island serial killer, and as the case has now been concluded, I'll do a follow-up in the near future.

[00:21:11]Huerman contradicts some of the stereotypes about serial killers. He was married with children and had a successful and stable career as an architect. He was clearly way above average intelligence. Some of the better known serial killers have been of high intelligence. Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dharma, and Ian Brady, for example. Well, while most such as Fred West for example or Eene Warnerus had a much lower than average IQ, coming next in this episode, I'm going to apply the characteristics of a psychopath to the Jack the Ripper case. So, keep watching to the very end.

[00:21:46]But quickly, if you like my content, you want to support this channel, then please take a look at the House of Lechmre Patreon page. If you join, you'll get extra information and an opportunity to go on a unique tour or many tours. So, check it out. Details will be in the description below and here somewhere. Also, please don't forget to ring the notification bell, hype, and what else? Yes, subscribe, share, like, and comment. There are so many things to mention. But back to psychopathy and the Jack the Ripper case. So, now that I've sketched out some of the factors around psychopathy and serial killing, how can this be applied to the Jack the Ripper case? I said that if a murder is not recognized as being part of a series and if the initial crime scene investigation is bungled, then this makes solving the crime so much more difficult. This has an obvious implication with the Jack Ripper case where the police were in total ignorance of what they were dealing with. They thought initially it might be gang attacks or if not the work of an obvious monster in human form such as Leather Apron. The man they should have questioned at the first crime scene, Charles Lechmere, passed through unchecked and recorded as Charles Cross.

[00:22:58]I've noted that psychopaths have superficial charm that's only given away by micro expressions which you have to be very vigilant to notice and most people are not primed to look out for them. This has two implications for the White Chapel murders. Firstly, it's often wondered why the victim would go off with the murderer to a secluded spot when the whole of the district was on high alert. And don't forget, at the time, it wasn't thought that there were just five victims. Mary Kelly was widely regarded as being the seventh. Emma Smith and Martha Tabram were commonly added to the total, especially in the eyes of the press. And it was that popular image that would have entrenched itself within popular opinion. This has led some to believe that the culprit must have been known to the victim, perhaps as a regular customer. That's the logical or normal conclusion. But we're dealing with a psychopath who can mimic behavior. They're good at mirroring, reflecting back the same temperament as the person they're targeting, and that creates trust. They are believable. So it is by no means certain that the victim would have known the culprit at all. His superficial charm would have been enough to reassure the victim to set aside caution even at the height of the Jack the Ripper hysteria. Secondly, if the culprit were to interact with the police or perhaps appear at the inquest or speak to other people at the crime scene or afterwards at work, then they would be able to convince the people they interacted with of their harmlessness, their innocence.

[00:24:37]They would radiate believability, not me. Gov. This obviously would have applied to Charles Lechmere. He would not have been phased or nervous during his interactions with Robert Paul at Bucks Row with PC Meisen on Baker's Row or when he gave his statement to the police and when he testified at the inquest into the death of Maryanne Nicholls. It is the answer to that question which hangs over Charles Lechmere's potential guilt, his behavior at Bucks Row when he heard Robert Paul approaching from behind. If guilty, he was interrupted while in the process of engaging in his overkill ritual, which I'll come on to shortly. I'll sketch out the scenario. Paul was between 30 and 40 yards away when he saw Lechmmere standing alone near the body. Lechmre went towards Paul. Paul thought he was about to be mugged and swerved out of the way. Then Lechre told him there was a woman laying on the pavement. They went up to the body and touched her, but were unsure whether or not she was dead.

[00:25:41]They then both left together, saying they were late for work and would tell a policeman on the way. If guilty, why didn't Lechmere walk quickly off in the opposite direction? Surely, he can't have been certain whether or not he had blood on him. And if he interacted with Paul, he would afterwards be recognized by him. This is the should I stay or should I go dichotomy clearly expressed in these terms. Should I stay or should I go? Now if I go there will be trouble.

[00:26:13]If I stay there will be double. But there were risks involved in fleeing.

[00:26:18]When Paul reached the body he may well have called out murder and could have alerted PC81 ger who was based some 60 yards further on at the gate house of a goodsyard. And there may have been anyone behind the dead ground of the board school. But if Lechmere was guilty, then he was a psychopath, someone who was used to telling glib lies and being believed because he could show fake empathy and had superficial charm. His grandiosity would have made him totally confident that he could easily fool this interloper. He would have been used to doing this since childhood. And psychopaths are hardwired to face a threat head on rather than flee. When faced with the option of fight or flight, the psychopath usually chooses to figuratively fight. That is why Lechmmere, if guilty, effectively had no choice. He had to turn and bluff it out. He was being proactive, taking control by going up to Paul, by doing the talking with me. He was again exerting control by attending the inquest on the Monday. He again exerted control. He was setting the narrative.

[00:27:34]He didn't want to wait for events to take their course. And if he was responsible for the graffiti above the bloody apron at Goulston Street on the night of the double event, which famously read, "The Jews are the men that will not be blamed for nothing." He was deflecting blame, which is another typical psychopathic trait associated with control. Blaming Jews in this case almost certainly for his committing two murders in the one night after he'd been interrupted in Burner Street by Louis Dimshutz next to the Jewish Anarchist Club. As I've pointed out, psychopaths lack empathy. They lack a conscience.

[00:28:14]They have no sorrow for their behavior.

[00:28:16]So with the Jack the Ripper murders, the culprit will not have unalived himself at shock at the his behavior and after the carnage he indulged in with Mary Kelly at Miller's court. Suggestions of this sort exemplified by Melville McNorton, a very senior Scotland Yard detective are very wide of the mark. A much more rational theory is that the murderer's brain gave way altogether after his awful glut in Miller's court and that he immediately unalived himself. This perfectly illustrates the degree to which the police were totally out of their depth in understanding what lay behind these murders and was one of the factors that led McNorton to favor Montigu drew it as the killer. drew it unal alived himself about a month after the Mary Kelly's murder and McNorton thought this was the last Jack the Ripper murder. It's commonly proposed that Mary Kelly was the last victim because the desecration of her body would have been something the killer couldn't top. This is another misunderstanding of how psychopaths operate. You would look long and hard to find a serial killer who was appalled by his own behavior, nor one who quit because they felt they couldn't top the barbaric perfection of their last kill.

[00:29:37]They need supply, which is why they're serial killers, not one-off killers.

[00:29:43]They do stop, but that's usually due to old age, such as with Rex Herman or the Golden State Killer. There's another catchy little title, Joseph to Angelo, or because they achieved supply through other means, through business. For example, Lechre opened up a shop while continuing to work as a carman between 1895 and 1898, a period when there was a gap in any Jack the Ripper like or Tim's torso cases. And when he eventually stopped, it would have been due to old age. The culprit would not have been flustered after killing any of these murders as to them the taking of a life was not mentally troubling. They would have seemed calm afterwards and would not show signs of tension which a normal person would expect to see if on someone who had just murdered somebody else.

[00:30:35]This explains why Robert Paul, although frightened when Lechmmere approached him on Buck's Row, didn't think he'd just murdered Polly Nicholls. As I've said, narcissism is closely associated with psychopathy. The killings provided narcissistic supply in two ways. Murder represents the ultimate control of life over death, and the notoriety that came with these killings, which dominated the national discourse, would have fed his grandiosity.

[00:31:05]Whether or not he coined the term Jack the Ripper himself, it added to the notoriety and would have fed his ego.

[00:31:12]This would probably not have been the case for the previous name that was most closely associated with the White Chapel murders, Leather Apron. The description that went along with the name Leather Apron was very unflattering and was closely based on an alternative real person, John Piser. Writing letters and the attention they received would also provide narcissistic supply. But if he didn't write them, the whole did he or didn't he discussion would have also been satisfying to him. With the torsos, the common assumption is that the body parts were thrown into the river as the most convenient and discrete means of disposal. However, multiple body parts from the various cases were not deposited in the river but were found in land. Furthermore, after the first torso, whether you count it as being the Bassie torso of 1873 or the Rainom case of 1887, it would have been obvious to the perpetrator that the body parts would be discovered and cause a growing sensation. The next installment of the story with the parts being dripfed over a week or more, bit by bit, adding to the media frenzy and providing narcissistic supply.

[00:32:25]There's a clear concurrence here between the torsos and the Jack the Ripper murders. Overkill is generally described as violence demonstrably exceeding the force required to cause death, often involving a disproportionate number of injuries. Of the White Chapel murders, Liz Stride, Rose Milelet, and Francis Coohl's show no signs of overkill, but it seems likely that in these instances the killer was interrupted. You do see it with Emma Smith, arguably Martha Tabram, definitely she was stabbed 39 times. Polly Nichols partially, but there indications that the killer was interrupted after he had started the overkill aspects of his ritual. and definitely with Annie Chapman, Katherine Edto's Mary Kelly, and partially with Aris McKenzie, although like Paulie Nichols, the killer seems to have stopped before he'd completed what he'd wanted to do. That the killer was interrupted on multiple occasions, is hardly to be wondered at as the East End was very densely populated. It can be argued that the Temp's torso victims were also subjected to overkill. I mentioned that the disposal of the body parts was probably not an act of concealment because after the first torso case, the perpetrator would have been well aware that the discovery of each part caused a growing sensation.

[00:33:54]That being the case, the act of dismemberment itself can be regarded as overkill.

[00:34:00]So, this is another commonality between the torso cases and the Jack the Ripper murders. With certain of the Jack the Rif murders, overkill is sometimes suggested as another indicator to signify that the victim was killed by someone familiar to them and that the overkill was a response to rage or jealousy, for example. This is an example of a normal person trying to make sense of or rationalize an abnormal act. You don't really see this proposed for Annie Chapman or Katherine Edtos as there's no obvious culprit for this act of rage. You do see it proposed with Martha Tabroom mainly as an example of her being stabbed instead slashed with this suggestion to some uh being that she was a one-off and not part of the series. Although no credible rage killer has been identified for her, it's also sometimes suggested for Mary Kelly with her ex-boyfriend Joseph Barnett as the culprit despite the fact that he was interrogated for hours and found and was found to have an alibi or George Hutchinson who said he'd known Mary Kelly for several years despite him also being interrogated and evidently cleared by Inspector Abaline. However, overkill is a common feature of serial murders where there's no relationship to rage, jealousy, or hatred. With Martha Tabum, the overkill took the form of peakerism.

[00:35:31]She was stabbed 39 times. This is not an indication of a rage attack, but of a sexual motive. The overkill was also associated with the posing of bodies which were left on display. a common feature of such attacks designed to cause shock and awe with the first finder and is an expression of narcissism and control over the body of the victim. Again, it doesn't fit with the attack being the result of a jealous rage impulse. I'll summarize some of the environmental aspects which could have a bearing on Lechmir transitioning from being a psychopath to a psychopathic serial killer. His father left home when he was a baby and his mother moved to London with young Charles and his sister where after a few years she bigamously married a young policeman called Thomas Cross who was more than 10 years her junior. The policeman came from a village a few miles from where she had lived in rural Heraffordshire which tends to suggest that they moved to London together to get away from local social disapproval over their liaison.

[00:36:43]This bigamous marriage seems to have led to various lies being told to mask what was going on. As if the true circumstances became known, it's probable that PC Cross would have been dismissed from the Metropolitan Police.

[00:36:56]PC Thomas Cross would likely have seemed to have been an interloping authority figure as a replacement father and a policeman, but one not old enough to be Charles Lechmere's real father. They lived in one of the worst areas of London known as Tiger Bay, which was the haunt of what were regarded as being the most vicious and lawless prostitutes in London. It's also the most densely populated district in London. It was a marked contrast to their rural Herafordshire background. In Heraffordshire, the Lechmmere came from a wellto-do gentry family, and Charles Lechmere's aunts lived a comfortable middle-class existence in the West End of London. This contrast would be likely to fuel resentment and offend against feelings of grandiosity, which would have been satisfied by serial murder. The area in which they lived was also associated with two particularly violent incidents which would have been formative experiences for Charles Lechmere while he was at school. The brutal Ratcliffe Highway murders took place a few hundred yards from where Charles Lechmir is brought up, albeit some 50 years before, but the story would have entered local folklore.

[00:38:20]The culprit for these murders was accidentally dug up in 1886, which revived interest in these early murders.

[00:38:28]Then there's the Gemrex tiger incident when a school boy the same age as Charles Lechman, who lived very close to him, was almost eaten by a tiger that had escaped from a wild animal emporium and caused a local sensation in 1857.

[00:38:44]You can apply the same sort of thinking to your preferred suspect if for some obscure reason you don't think it was Charles Lechmere. Remember with serial killers it's a mistake to try and imagine what you might rationally do if you found yourself in an extreme situation. If you base it on these terms, you're misunderstanding this whole area of study from the outset. You must learn how a psychopath would react.

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[00:39:48]>> Stone, but his name comes through the phone.