"Ripper Street" To Return For a Second Season

The BBC crime drama "Ripper Street" is returning for a season season next year. More here from The Guardian. The show airs on BBC America in the U.S.

A New Crime Drama From the BBC

From the Guardian, news that the BBC plans yet another crime drama, this time one inspired by Jack the Ripper. Ripper Street (for BBC One) takes place just after Jack the Ripper disappears from history and focuses on the detectives and public who try to recover from the effects of his crimes. More here in a press release issued by the BBC.

A Conference on Jack the Ripper

Paula Marantz Cohen discusses academic interest in Jack the Ripper here in the September 4, 2011 issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education. She and a colleague, Fred J. Abbate, have organized a conference on the issue, which will be held October 28-29 at Drexel University.

Another Jack the Ripper Candidate

Retired detective Trevor Marriott suggests a new candidate as the real "Jack the Ripper": a German seaman named Carl Feigenbaum, executed in 1896 in New York for murdering his landlady. Alan Boyle writes in an article for MSNBC.com that Mr. Marriott has lined up some old sailing records and has come to the conclusion that Feigenbaum could have been in London at the time of the Ripper killings. That, and the fact that he had the demonstrated capacity to carry out a brutal murder of a woman, makes him a likely suspect in Mr. Marriott's eyes.

Other Ripper experts are not convinced. Dr. Xanthe Mallett, a forensic anthropologist and "star" of television's History Cold Case team, considers Mr. Marriott's theory, as well as other evidence, in this article for the BBC online site. She thinks one person, perhaps Feigenbaum, could have committed one, some, or all of the killings. Jack the Ripper still holds his secrets.

Read more here from the online Metropolitan Police files and here, at Casebook: Jack the Ripper.