Last week I was asked about the theory that Jack the Ripper was a woman. This comes from the supposition that a woman, or a man dressed as a woman, could have walked away from the crime scenes without attracting suspicion. Midwives were later suggested, based on the false idea that one of the victims was pregnant. There are eight accusations against specific women, all of whom are discussed in my book about 333 suspects.

One of these stabbed a man in the head, whilst drunk, and said she was Jack the Ripper. Another was accused by a small-town sheriff. None of the others were connected to the murder in their own lifetime. One was invented, one was an alleged victim of Jack the Ripper and another was the wife of a surgeon accused on false evidence. Aleister Crowley mentioned one in a phrase that did not indicate that he suspected her.

Three were convicted murderers, two notorious in England and one in America. Leaving aside gender there is absolutely no evidence connecting any of them to the Whitechapel murders. A Jill the Ripper cannot be disproved, unless the real killer is unmasked, but presently the theory, and the female suspects, sit in the vast category of unlikely possibilities.