[ SECRET POST #3014 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #3014 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 06 pages, 130 secrets from Secret Submission Post #431.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

17. http://i.imgur.com/sSQa2ZG.jpg

[(Anonymous)]

Destroyed valuable art... how?

DA

[(Anonymous)]

I don't know about art. But she had a piece of "Ripper" evidence destroyed in order to get a DNA hit from it so generalized that it is useless as evidence and served only to "prove" that the person behind it was of Indo-European background. Basically all she did was rule out the possibility of the Ripper, if he even sent the letter in question (most genuine experts say "no"), being American First Nations, East Asian, Oceanic, or Sub-Saharan African. So, really narrowed down the suspects there then.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, I wanna hear that story now. Details, OP!

[(Anonymous)]

Ah, spoke too late. Thank you, other anon!

[(Anonymous)]

The argument in the book was that an artist called Walter Sickert was Jack the Ripper. So in an attempt to find some of Sickert's fingerprints/DNA, she got her hands on one of his paintings and ripped it apart.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QFSeMLccOY (starting at 4:42).

[(Anonymous)]

She purchased some paintings by Walter Sickert (her suspect for Jack the Ripper), which were quite valuable in their own right, and then took them apart to test for fingerprints and DNA.

http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2001/dec/08/art.artsfeatures

It was pretty dumb, tbh. It's been over 125 years, everything that could possibly be related to the murders or Jack the Ripper has not been preserved properly and has been handled by countless people. The DNA contamination has probably rendered any evidence worthless, so there isn't much point in destroying anything just to test for DNA.

[(Anonymous)]

It's the CSI effect: nobody believes anything now unless they have DNA evidence and apparently that evidence is everywhere and easy to test!

[(Anonymous)]

Haha, I know, right? In that video someone else linked to, they actually dusted the frame of one of the paintings for fingerprints. When you think of how many people may have handled that over the decades, it's like jesus, why bother?

[diet_poison]

That's pretty sad, tbh. :/

[(Anonymous)]

Cornwell was roundly mocked and criticized for that Ripper shit and the Scarpetta books have gone way downhill according to fans. i don't think you're alone with losing respect for her.

[(Anonymous)]

I own the Ripper book, haven't even gotten past one-fourth of it yet so I'll draw my own conclusions.
As for the Scarpetta books, I'm not even a minor fan and even I could tell the quality was BLECCCHHH.

[starzki]

I lost respect for her as a writer after reading Hornet's Nest. It was just really, really bad.

[(Anonymous)]

Ohmyjesusyes. I was appalled by that one. Just awful on so many levels.

[(Anonymous)]

Wow, I hadn't realised this was supposed to be a nonfiction book.

[(Anonymous)]

Oh, yes. As I recall, she was/is obsessed with the subject and in the book she claims to have the definitive answer. She doesn't, of course, and there's very little evidence that Walter Sickert was the Ripper. He's just one of many disturbed individuals who happened to be in London during the time of the murders.

[(Anonymous)]

Kind of off topic, but I really wanted to read Post Mortem. Is it worth reading?

[(Anonymous)]

I only read this one. It's pretty okay, but it's dated as fuck, being written in the early 90s. Explanations of hacking, telephone services and genetic evidence are especially tedious, there's also a young 90s hacker child.
Some positive things... female protag who deals with sexism during the serial rape and murder case, with women solidarity winning out in the end. more or less.

[(Anonymous)]

Cool. Thanks for replying.

[(Anonymous)]

I had long since given up on her fiction when she published this, but I was still put off by the arrogant tone. I did enjoy her statement that she would "stake her reputation" on the rightness of her conclusions. "You mean your reputation as a *writer of fiction*? "

[(Anonymous)]

LOL, yes, exactly. Her "proof" was so weak I wouldn't have staked five bucks on it, quite frankly.

[(Anonymous)]

To be fair, she did stake her reputation on it even if it was just her reputation as a writer of semi-decent fiction. Now we are mocking her, and her stories. She lost exactly what she said she was prepared to lose.

[(Anonymous)]

Yes, I suppose. I think it was foolish to stake her reputation on it in the first place, though. Barring some miraculous new discovery of evidence, we'll never know for sure who Jack the Ripper was. All the evidence and theories have been discussed to death for over a century by everyone from amateur scholars to the FBI, and since the answer will likely be permanently elusive, there'll never be a vindication for anyone.

In other words, there's nothing to stake upon, because we'll never know. Claiming otherwise is pointless.

[(Anonymous)]

"In other words, there's nothing to stake upon, because we'll never know. Claiming otherwise is pointless."

Yeah, I remember thinking that, too. It was kind of ridiculous.

Transcript

[(Anonymous)]

Image: cover of Patricia Cornwell’s Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper Case Closed

Text: This was so poorly researched and full of unfounded speculation that I lost all respect for her as a writing. She destroyed valuable pieces of art becaue she wanted to prove her daft theory that she doesn’t deserve to be taken seriously.

S!B I know people don’t like the “I judge you” secrets, but I do judge people if they claim to be amateur Ripperologists and this is the only book they’ve read.