Legacy of the Ripper (31 page)

"I see, and if you were asked to make a diagnosis, purely hypothetically, of course, on the man whom the police believe to be the real killer of those poor unfortunate women in Brighton based on what you know of him from the information they've supplied you with, what would that diagnosis be?"

"Well, if the man was Mark Cavendish as has been suggested by the police I would say this. If we begin with emotional immaturity, perhaps that showed in a small way in the fact that he ran a company which produced video and computer games, toys in fact, though highly technological, but toys nonetheless. He had no roots as such, no wife, no close friends and shunned the limelight throughout his life, classic antisocial behaviour. He was very much a reclusive type of man from what I've learned from his family and certainly disappeared further into his shell after the death of his brother. Speaking hypothetically, I suspect that Robert Cavendish, being a psychiatrist himself, knew of his brother's condition and was perhaps the only man who helped Mark stay on the straight and narrow for as long as he did. Once Robert was gone, Mark was 'released' and felt free to do as he wished. I've already mentioned the lack of guilt that would be experienced in implicating his nephew, so I would say that, yes, Mark Cavendish, or at least the man who killed those women in Brighton, almost definitely suffered from the disorder."

"I see. Thank you, Doctor."

The judge turned to his fellow learned colleagues and the three appeal judges sat in close whispered consultation with his colleagues for a minute before turning back to me.

"One last question, Doctor. In your time spent in the treatment of Jack Reid, do you believe that he, too, suffers from this, ah, Sociopathy?"

"Jack Reid is a disturbed young man, your honour, of that I have no doubt. As to whether he is a sociopath, I would have to be honest and say no, not at this stage, though it is possible he might develop those tendencies in the next year or two. He certainly suffers from a psychopathic personality disorder and exhibits great confusion at times, and is easily open to suggestion. Those are not, however, the symptoms of Sociopathy, so my answer to your question, I repeat is no. I would, however, like to caution your honours against releasing him from my care at this stage as he is without doubt..."

Judge Hume interrupted me before I could finish my sentence.

"Yes, yes, thank you, Doctor Truman. We have your complete written report on Reid's condition here," Hume held it up so that I could see he was indeed holding the fourteen page report on Jack that I'd written in response to request from the court. "We have taken advice from a number of leading psychiatrists in this case, your good self amongst them and we will now retire to consider our verdict on the appeal of Jack Reid."

I was shocked to be so summarily dismissed from the witness box, but short of exposing myself to a charge of contempt of court by protesting to the appeal court judges, there was little I could do. Together with the police officers and other witnesses I could only leave the court and await the trio of learned judges' decision. Quite often the results of appeals are not revealed for some time after the court sits, but in this case, the three appeal judges arrived at their decision that very day.

As everyone will know, back in 1888 Jack the Ripper carried out his murderous spree with apparent impunity, never, so it seems, coming close to being either named or apprehended. In a judgement that certainly surprised those who'd been involved in the case of Jack Reid and I must admit, almost took my breath away the three judges of the Court of appeal decided thus:

"In the case of the appeal in the case of The Crown versus Jack Thomas Reid, we find as following: There being sufficient evidence as to cast reasonable doubt on the conviction and subsequent sentencing of detention at Her Majesty's Pleasure in a secure psychiatric unit, we hereby overturn the original sentence, and find that the aforementioned Jack Thomas Reid is, in point of law innocent of the crimes for which he was originally tried. There being insufficient evidence to establish the identity of the man who perpetrated the crimes, despite overwhelming physical evidence having been found to establish that someone other than Reid
did
in fact commit the murders in Brighton on the given dates, we find no reason to name a potentially innocent man in connection with the crimes. Had the police been able to establish the identity of the man in Poland by either fingerprint, DNA, or visual identification this decision may have been different but the law will not permit us to name and vilify a man who has not been positively identified and we instruct that the case be placed on the 'open' file once more and the police are at liberty to re-open their investigations into the murders in the hope that they will establish and perhaps eventually positively identify the perpetrator of these heinous crimes. The fragments of the journal that the police uncovered go a long way towards establishing the innocence of Jack Reid as do the knife that was used in the killings, but they alone neither identify the writer of the journal nor the man who carried it with him at the time of his death. We accept, as is included in Doctor Truman's report that the killer, in his deranged state of mind assumed himself to be a descendant of Jack the Ripper, and for that reason embarked upon his crime spree using Reid as a dupe to throw the police authorities off his own trail, but again, no evidence actually exists to prove the identity of the man concerned.

"As for Jack Thomas Reid, it is the finding of this court that he be immediately released from the secure unit at the Ravenswood Psychiatric facility and placed in the out-patient care of his local Area Health Authority with instructions that he be regularly examined and interviewed by a consultant psychiatrist from said Health Authority, who will have responsibility for his well-being under the Care in the Community Programme."

I couldn't believe it. They were not only refusing to name the killer even though everyone, which I'm sure included the three appeal judges knew to be Mark Cavendish, but they were simply going to release my patient into the community out of some sense of responsibility to the political correctness that has all but taken over the establishment in the UK in every one of its many facets. Jack Reid was potentially dangerous. I knew it, they knew it, everyone in the court knew it, but because he'd been cleared of the murders and hadn't harmed anyone so far as any of us was aware, he was to be released despite my professional recommendations and simply trusted to appear on a regular basis for consultations with a psychiatrist at his local hospital.

As I left the court that day, I was caught up as I walked down the steps towards the road by Inspector Holland, Sergeant Wright, and Alice Nickels.

"You all right, Doc?" asked Inspector Holland as he saw the look on my face, one of shock and worry I'm sure, as they were the two emotions I was feeling most strongly at that time.

"I can't believe it," I replied "Any of it. First they let Jack go, just like that, and then they fail to even name Cavendish as the killer. It's as though he's got away with it. It's just like Jack the Ripper. No-one will ever know who really killed those women, but this time it's due to a legal technicality, the lack of a positive ID of the man you almost caught up with in Poland."

"I know, Doctor," Holland replied. "I was shocked myself at that part of the judgement, but I never really expected them to keep Jack in Ravenswood once it was established that he was innocent of the crimes he was convicted of."

"It's terrible," Alice Nickels said. "We went through all of that to clear Jack, and now we can't even tell anyone who really did it."

"Maybe one day we will be able to," Carl Wright added. "We won't give up, and there's a chance that the Polish police might yet turn something up."

"Do you really thing that's going to happen?" I asked with a note of cynicism in my voice.

Neither policeman answered.

"No, neither do I. As for Jack the Ripper, you even managed to establish the existence of his journal, but that was so badly damaged and almost destroyed in the car crash in Lublin that we still can't even establish who the Whitechapel Murderer was, can we?"

In the silence that followed we reached the last of the steps that led to the wide pavement. As we stepped onto the broad expanse of flagstone I turned and looked back at the towering court building behind us, the statue of Justice atop the domed roof, her eyes firmly blindfolded and her scales held aloft, glinting in the afternoon sunshine.

"It's not right you know, " I said, looking into the eyes of the man who had first arrested and then finally been instrumental in helping to clear the name of my patient, who would be released from his incarceration in Ravenswood upon my return.

"Jack may not have killed those women but that's not to say he's safe to be allowed to roam the streets as though he's the same as the rest of us, because he isn't."

"I know what you mean, Doc, but after all, and despite what you may think of him, Jack Reid is an innocent man."

"Yes, he is," I replied, "but for how long&?"

Epilogue

From the Pen of Jack Thomas Reid

I suppose by now you've all spoken to Doctor Ruth. She'll have told you the whole sorry tale of how I came to be in that awful place. I have to say though, that she was always as nice as she could be in the times we spent in her office or in the consulting rooms at Ravenswood. I tried to be as polite and as courteous in return as I was brought up that way. She's a nice person, Doctor Ruth.

I must admit that she was sad to see me go. When she came back to Ravenswood that day after the appeal and told me the news of my impending release I was so happy I could have cried. Well, in fact, I did cry, just a little. Doctor Ruth did tell me that she was a little unhappy at me being released so soon and without what she called 'proper' safeguards for my future being put in place. I wasn't sure what she meant until the next day when my barrister Mr. Allingham arrived at Ravenswood with my parents. Mr. Allingham and the doctor had a bit of an argument when she told him that she was worried that I wouldn't receive the constant care she thought I needed once I was released. Mr. Allingham told her that I was no longer her responsibility and that she should be pleased that an innocent man would no longer be unjustly locked up in a psychiatric hospital without due cause. Doctor Ruth told him that there was plenty of due cause for me to be in Ravenswood but that she had been overruled by the courts. I wasn't angry with her for her attitude towards me. After all, in her own way she was concerned for me, even if I felt such concern was no longer warranted. After all, I
was
innocent, wasn't I?

I soon settled into life back home with Mum and Dad. Finding work wasn't easy because of my notoriety and the fact that everyone in town seemed to know who I was and where I'd been. One man who didn't care about my past was Dave Longbridge, the owner of the small car repair shop a few streets from home. It was well-known that he'd done time in prison for assault and battery in his younger days so perhaps he took pity on me. He offered me a job valetting cars, and though it was quite menial and boring, it was a job after all and I accepted it with good grace and in time I've grown to enjoy the work.

I attend the local hospital once very two weeks where I have a consultation with Doctor Bill Redman, a nice psychiatrist who encourages me to talk about my past and my hopes for the future. He thinks I'm doing okay. He assures me that any connection my family had with Jack the Ripper is all in my mind, that the journal may have been real but there's no reason to suppose I'm a descendant of the Ripper or that his murderous genes could possibly be inherited by me, or by any member of my family. Doctor Ruth used to say that, before she became a believer. But then, what do the so-called experts know of genetics, heredity and such? They think themselves so superior and knowledgeable, but they know so little when all is said and done. Only those of us who have the gift know the real truth.

So, as for Doctor Redman, I haven't told him about the dreams of course. Why should I? They're my dreams and they're private, aren't they? He wouldn't understand anyway and if he did he'd try to have me put away again. They always start the same way, with the pages of the journal of Jack the Ripper swimming before my eyes, the words unclear but the voice that follows the pages being as clear as day. It's odd really. I remember reading the journal when Uncle Robert first left it to me, but don't really recall the details that were contained in the pages, not word for word anyway, though I do recall much of the meaning of what the Ripper said in them. That voice keeps me awake much of the night. At least, I think I'm awake, especially when I see the shape of the man who almost ghosts his way through my bedroom window and stands before my bed, waiting, just waiting. It's as if he knows exactly what I'm thinking and what I'm going to do with my life, as though he is a part of that life, which, of course, he is.

Tomorrow is the first day of August, and there's just under a week to go. The seventh is an important anniversary and I have new work to begin, work that only I can do! You know, all the time I was under the influence of my Uncle Mark and of Michael, and through the trial and everything else, none of them knew that I'd left one page of the journal at home when I left. I didn't know either until I was released from Ravenswood and I came home to live with my parents. I found it one day, lodged under the wardrobe where it must have floated down and found itself alone, there in that dark place when I left home in such haste. Mum would never have thought to move the wardrobe to look for it. Why should she? No-one knew of its existence did they, least of all the police? They denied that the journal even existed until the end. Would you like to read it? Here it is, for this is my destiny, my legacy, my future.

Blood, beautiful, thick, rich, red, venous blood.

Its' colour fills my eyes, its' scent assaults my nostrils,

Its' taste hangs sweetly on my lips.

Last night once more the voices called to me,