Walter Sicket

Question 1

Evidence;

Answer 1

Patricia Cornwell has claimed to have found DNA evidence linking Sickert to at least one “Ripper letter”.
He began having an obsession with painting prostitutes and begun to paint the murder scenes in accurate detail
His suspect status is boosted by claims he was impotent and had deformed genitalia which some experts point out could have been a driving factor in the brutality that the Ripper showed his victims. Studies have shown several serial killers suffer from sexual dysfunction and they use murder as a way of gaining satisfaction.

Question 2

Occupation

Answer 2

Painter

Question 3

His paintings

Answer 3

evidence: Walter Sickert littering his work with clues to his story is supposed to be evident in a couple of pieces of work which are titled Mrs. Barrett and Blackmail. Here we are on more interesting ground. Stephen Knight describes one of them, a painting of a woman in a large hat, (circa 1906): “Old Walter spoke about another picture, which he had given two names. This was a full face portrait of a square-chinned woman wearing a large hat. It was called Blackmail or Mrs Barrett. No one has been able to explain why it was given either of these titles. Sickert told his son it was a picture of Marie Kelly…. He called it alternatively Mrs Barrett because when she got to Dorset Street Kelly took up with a man called Barrett and was known as his wife. In this Sickert was mistaken, because Kelly’s common-law husband was called Joseph Barnett not Barrett. The painter’s intention was nevertheless as he described it. He called it Blackmail because Kelly was the centre of the blackmail involving the royal bastard.”

Question 4

Why was he thought to be the murderer

Answer 4

The reason for Sickert being suspected is that he was believed to have made sketches and paintings of the Ripper crimes…

Question 5

Childhood medical issues

Answer 5

impotent by a series of painful childhood operations for a fistula of the penis.

This impotency had scarred him emotionally and had left him with a pathological hatred of women which, in time, led him to carry out a series of murders in the East End of London which became known as the Jack the Ripper murder

Question 6

problem with him as a suspect

Answer 6

there is evidence to suggest that he may not even have been in England when the murders were committed.

A number of letters from several family members refer to him holidaying in France for a period that corresponds with most of the Ripper murders.

Although it has been suggested that he might have travelled to London in order to commit the murders and then returned to France, no evidence has been produced to suggest that he did so.