Jack The Stripper - Suspects

Suspects

Like the Jack the Ripper killings, the Stripper's reign of terror seemed to cease on its own, and there were few solid clues for police to investigate. Du Rose's favourite suspect was a Scottish security guard called Mungo Ireland, whom Du Rose first identified in a BBC television interview in 1970 as a respectable married man in his forties whom he codenamed Big John. Ireland had apparently been identified as a suspect shortly after Bridget O’Hara’s murder, when flecks of industrial paint were traced to the company where he worked as a security guard, Heron Trading Estate. Shortly after the trace was made, Ireland committed suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning, leaving a note for his wife that read: “I can’t stick it any longer”, and finished, “To save you and the police looking for me I’ll be in the garage”. Whilst seen by many as a strong suspect in the killings, recent research suggests that Ireland was in Scotland when O’Hara was murdered, and therefore could not have been the Stripper.

A recent book also named British light heavyweight boxing champion Freddie Mills as the killer, although this has not been substantiated.

In his book on the case, 'Jack of Jumps', David Seabrook says a former Metropolitan Police DC was the favourite suspect of several senior detectives investigating the case. This suspect was recently identified as DC Brian Cushway by the writer Stewart Home in a review of Seabrook's book (www.stewarthomesociety.org/seabrook.htm) but there is no evidence supporting the allegation, which is merely speculative.

Jimmy Evans and Martin Short in their book 'The Survivor' allege the culprit was Superintendent Tommy Butler of the Metropolitan Police's Flying Squad.

The Crime and Investigation channel's 'Fred Dinenage Murder Casebook' put forward the case that the killer could have been Harold Jones, a convicted murderer from Wales. Jones killed two girls in 1921 in the town of Abertillery. Because he was 15 at the time, he was not liable for the death penalty, instead receiving a life sentence. He was let out 20 years later for exemplary behaviour. In 1941, at the age of 35, after being released from prison, he is believed to have returned to his home town, Abertillery, and visited the graves of his early victims. In 1947, he surfaced in London. Moving to Fulham, he married and had a daughter. All the Stripper murders had similar features to his early murders. No sexual assault, but horrendous violence was inflicted on the victims. Due to poor record-keeping, he was never looked at by police. In 2011 Neil Milkins published 'Who was Jack the Stripper' in which he alleges the culprit was Harold Jones, but all the 'evidence' is based on coincidence. Milkins fails to establish whether Jones held a driving licence and/or owned a car or van, which the real culprit must have done, and no link between Jones and Mungo Ireland is established. Although Jones killed twice when he was 15 there is no evidence that he was a psychopath or a serial killer.