Families of Jack the Ripper’s Victims Back Call for New Inquest and Naming of Serial Killer

Relatives of some of the victims murdered by a serial killer known as Jack the Ripper have backed a call for the investigation to be reopened after new evidence emerged.

Jack the Ripper, whose identity has never been confirmed, was linked to 11 murders between 1888 and 1892 in east London. The moniker came from a letter written by someone claiming to be the killer that was sent to the local press at the time, according to U.K. newspaper The Times.

Per the outlet, police linked a single killer to five female victims. All five of the women were prostitutes and they were all mutilated, except for one, according to the BBC.

According to The Times and CBS News, evidence has since emerged suggesting that Catherine Eddowes, one of the five women, was killed by Aaron Kosminski, a Polish barber, who was a suspect in the original investigation but was never arrested.

The Times reports that in 2007, researcher Russell Edwards bought a shawl that was believed to have been found on Eddowes’ body at the murder scene in 1888, and Kosminski’s DNA was later found on it.

Mitre Square in London where Catherine Eddowes’ body was found. Credit: Hulton Archive/Getty

Per CBS News, Edwards sought the help of Doctor Jari Louhelainen, a senior lecturer at Liverpool John Moores University, who isolated small segments of DNA from blood stains on the shawl.

The DNA was matched with the DNA of Karen Miller, the great-great-great-granddaughter of Eddowes, while DNA from semen stains on the shawl were also matched with a descendant of Kosminski, leading Edwards to claim that Kosminski was the killer in 2014.

“On the testing, the first result showed a 99.2% match. Since the DNA has two complementary strands, we went on and tested the other DNA strand, which gave a perfect 100% match,” Louhelainen told U.K. newspaper the Liverpool Echo.

Edwards, who is the author of the book Naming Jack the Ripper, has now hired a legal team to push for an inquest into the murders, per The Times.

According to the outlet, Edwards’ call has received support from Miller, 53, along with descendants of the four other female victims.

“The name Jack the Ripper has become sensationalized; it has gone down in history as this famous character,” Miller said, per the outlet.

“What about the real name of the person who did this? Having the real person legally named in a court which can consider all the evidence would be a form of justice for the victims, Miller continued, adding, “We have got the proof, now we need this inquest to legally name the killer. It would mean a lot to me, to my family, to a lot of people to finally have this crime solved.”