Andrew couch detail

[Lorcan]

I think I see a striped blanket laid over the arm of the couch, and the overcoat rolled up in a big ball and stuffed under, with maybe the coat arm sticking out. I think if that is his overcoat the is no way he rolled and stuffed it like that. There is a pillow with a crocheted doily, I think.

Can anyone make any other finds? I pulled the original from the wikipedia article, so I don't know if that was overly processed before I got to it. No AI, just histogram and other contrast and denoising.

[camgarsky4]

Preliminary Hearing Page 89
Dr. Dolan, Medical Examiner describing the sofa when Dolan first saw Andrew 
 At the head of the sofa, which was to the west, there was a Prince Albert coat folded up, that was placed on top of, I think an Afghan, some knit cover, and on that was placed a small sofa cushion with a piece of the tidy on it; on that rested Mr. Borden's head. His two feet were on the floor; and he lay in the position as if he had been asleep.

[Lorcan]

That all fits - except "Prince Albert coat folded up" - doesn't quite completely describe what was actually done to the coat. It looks to me like the length of the coat was folded from the sides into the center and then doubled or tripled up rolled almost into a ball. The part sticking out might not be sleeves, but maybe the split tail, but what strikes me most is the way it's shoved in under the top of the pillow. You can see the difference of the color of the afghan and the coat, someone shoved that part of the coat deep under the pillow.

I don't see personality-wise Andrew balling his coat up like that, nor logistically shoving that part of the coat so deep under the pillow. I know it's just a guess, but I'd put very high odds that the killer did that to the coat, which I would also conclude means the coat was likely involved in the crime as many have speculated.

My speculation is something like this: "Let me help you with your coat. I'll hang it up for you." Once Andrew doses off, the coat is used as a shield, removed and balled up with the sleeve/tail perhaps used to fix the final relative positions of the pillow and his head.

Using the coat for final positioning seems like a valid reason for shoving that particular part of the coat so deep under the pillow - I don't think it was purely to disguise blood spatter analysis, since the majority of the coat is above the head, but more of a general let's make sure plenty of blood soaks into this already blood splattered coat.

All that's needed after that is to throw the sleeping bonnet / dust bonnet into the fire, wash any splatters from hands and face, and hide the hatchet.

[Inspector]

Andrew’s left pants leg, below the knee shows some distinctive staining. Not sure what to make of it. Possibly something was wiped there. Of course it could be from a previous soil of some sort.

[Inspector]

Additionally, his shoes do seem narrow.

[camgarsky4]

How the Prince Albert Coat fits into the story is something that feels pretty clear for me.

Bridget testified that the coat was kept in the dining room closet, which was about 2 feet (or less) from where the assassin probably stood when he/she killed Andrew.

Upon arriving home from his August 4 walk, Andrew initially went to the dining room. Bridget relates that is where Lizzie approached Andrew, asked about mail and she told AJB about Abby's note. After the brief chat with Lizzie, Andrew went up to his room and came back down to the sitting room to read. He did not go back into the dining room, so it was just a transitional location upon his return.

Why in the world would he go to the dining room first instead going directly to his bedroom or the sitting room? For me the answer is loud and clear. He went to the dining room to take off and hang up the coat. The sequence of events fit like a glove.

So if he hung the coat up in the dining room closet around 10:40 (and at almost the exact spot his murderer would have stood) and it is found under his head at 11:15 and the coat was folded under his head.....that tells me the killer used the coat when committing the murder. Most likely to shield his/her body.

One last tidbit....Bridget testified that the last time she saw Lizzie, Lizzie was going into the dining room after mentioning the sale at Sargent's. Hmmm.

That is a goodly number of factual 'dots' that one can connect without getting creative or fantastical.

It was gross incompetence that law enforcement apparently lost the item. Knowlton realized the potential significance of the coat because he mentioned it in his closing. Even with it missing, why he didn't push more emphatically the very reasoning I mention above is beyond me. The photograph could have passed around to the jury to make up for the lack of the item itself.

I wish we had the 'shrug' emoji!!

[TeenaBee]

I do love the speculation game, and I also wish we had a shrug emoji to make the point that its all a guess on our part. I am also intrigued by the Prince Albert Coat and very frustrated the police gave no attention to it at the time. I don't think it even came up in trial until Knowlton's throwaway line in his closing (after he suggested maybe Lizzie covered herself in paper!) but maybe I am wrong. But the lack of interest in the coat by police at the time seems in itself seems a bit of a clue. Today we look at that coat in that photo and it seems glaringly out of place, but why? Because we have been told so many times that fastidious Andrew Borden would NEVER have folded up his coat and lay on it for a nap? Okay, but says who? Victoria Lincoln? What I want to know if there is anyone who actually knew Andrew who made a point of saying it. It would seem on the day of the murders a lot of people saw that coat and seemed to think nothing of it, people who actually knew Andrew. So why didn't it jump out at them? Maybe brains numbed with shock (I'd put a shrug here ha). I think its a reasonable inference that Lizzie could have used the coat, IF she was guilty. Like you said, fits like a glove. My problem comes when people talk about that folded up coat as if its some kind of proof of Lizzie's guilt, when it's not. We really have no idea if Andrew sometimes folded up his coat beneath his head or not. If you know of a source from the 1890s for such information I'd love to know! Of course I also realize Lizzie could be stone cold guilty and yet never thought to use the coat abd figured out some other way to protect her clothing. Maybe paper hahaha

[camgarsky4]

Teenabee,
Sounds like we have differing definitions of speculation. I view speculation as a theory built upon flimsy facts or a nonexistent basis. For me, what I laid out in my earlier post is not speculation, but a deduction. It could be a wrong deduction, but the foundational facts are there. The distinction is important in this case because of the extreme number of purely speculative myths this case has generated.

I intentionally made a point of stating 'he/she' because anyone could have used the coat for whatever purpose it was used. Someone killed Andrew and someone didn't get noticed with signs of blood on their person.

If not to take off and hang up his coat, what might be other reasons on why Andrew went to the dining room first?
Besides talking to Lizzie, Bridget tells us she saw him looking at pieces of paper. It would seem logical that he removed the papers from his coat before taking it off. That is what I do and probably others do when they get home from work and remove their suit jacket or, in this case, 'going out' coat.

We have no indication that he used the dining room as anything other than a place to eat and a place to keep the coat he used on a daily basis. We have multiple sources which tell us he did use the sitting room for relaxing and reading. We know he had a safe and desk in his dressing room for paperwork. To think he went to the dining room to study papers doesn't match up with what we do know about his use of the various room in his home. I also think we are safe to scratch eating off the list of reasons he went to the dining room.

I intentionally did not suggest that Andrew would never fold up his coat and use as a pillow for same reason you note, that is an assumption that modern day sleuths have made, but is not a documented fact. That said, based on Dolan's testimony, the sofa did have a little pillow. The dining room also had a sofa/lounge. I would speculate that the dining room lounge would also have a decorative pillow and, if Andrew had a need to prop his head up better, he would use an actual pillow vs a piece of clothing.

As it pertains to Lizzie, it is telling that the last time anyone saw her prior to AJB's murder she was walking directly into the area from which he would be killed sometime in the coming minutes. Interestingly enough, that same location is where Andrew's coat was kept.

[Lorcan]

Teenabee,

Please keep posting in support of the possibility of Lizzie being innocent. I try over and over to find a way and I always get stuck here:

1. I am 6ft tall and it took me 7 steps to go from the doorway to a position to make the first strike on Abby on the other side of the bed. No scream. If it were a stranger there would have been a scream and defensive wounds. First strike was from the cheek going back to the ear, so she was facing her killer on the first strike.

2. I can get someone into the house only if overnight either Bridget or John let them in. However, if they hid on the 3rd floor that can't get past the sight or hearing of Bridget and Lizzie. If they hid in the guest room, that is still very improbable because the only hiding spot is behind the opened door and that is even more than 7 steps to get to Abby and they would have to move the door. No way. Clothes closet is locked. Lizzie's door is likely locked.

3. There are over 30 windows overlooking the front and side doors. Chagnon has someone on the porch and is an active doctor's office and they have a dog. An intruder smelling like blood hopping the fence in front of that dog would almost certainly result in some barking. The workers at the masonry place are numerous. There is a lot of street traffic. Andrew arrives home and is witnessed. Bridget leaves and is witnessed. Lizzie is even seen standing inside the screen door. It is extremely implausible that a murderer left that side door into the driveway without being seen. Every other person was seen.

Bridget seems like the only other person who could have done it, but nothing, not a single thing she testified to points to her lying. She had nothing to gain and everything to lose and she, by all accounts, was actually friends with Abby. I don't think Bridget did it. My list of Lizzie's contradictory and implausible statements grows every time I study the transcripts. It keeps getting worse, not better, the more I try to actually map out in reality what she is saying using floor plan maps and timelines.

We need people to keep an open mind and maybe someday we will find a plausible culprit other than Lizzie. I'll keep trying, but so far, I am not able to do it.

[TeenaBee]

Hi! I like your distinction between deduction and speculation camgarsky, helps me understand where you're coming from. You are right, my definition is a little different I would say there are degrees of speculation, some on the more reasonable end of the spectrum (where I like to think I hang out) and some on the more unreasonable end (Victoria Lincoln and the like). Deductions I consider more mathetmatical, a deduction should lead to the correct answer, and if you can't possibly know if its correct or not, then for me its speculation to one degree or another.

I enjoyed what you call your deduction about the dining room, I would call that very reasonable speculation. My thought on that (speculative thought) has always been that Andrew went into the dining room because Bridget was in the sitting room washing windows.(I don't hang out in rooms where my cleaning person is working.) Removing the papers he looked at from his coat? As I recall, Mrs. Kelly next door saw him with papers in his hand when she saw him at his front door. I guess it could have been the lock he supposedly wrapped in paper and not papers to read but... As far as I know, it was not established whether Andrew actually wore his Prince Albert coat that day on his trip downtwon or not. I know people say he wore it every day, even if it was hot, but I don't know the source of that, and if it's not in any source documents (I think I've read them all) or at least a newspaper account or two (I have yet to read them all), then I do not accept it as given fact. I'd guess its probable he wore that coat.... but I still don't know that it has any bearing on whether he folded up the coat for himself or not.

And Lorcan, I am glad to hear of your support for open mind!. Although I think its too late to ideintify a plausible culprit other then Lizzie, the police let any potential trail freeze over, but I do think there's a lot of reasonable speculation to be made there, maybe even a deduction or two. I hear what you are saying about Abby must have known her attacker, or else why didn't she scream, I would agree on that. But I don't think an "intruder" would have necessarily been a stranger; in fact, I would assume that anyone who came there to kill Andrew Borden had to have known him well enough in order to have been enraged at him enough to want to get in that house and kill him/them. I think Governer Robinson, who clearly believed in an intruder, suggested in his closing that Abby might have known her attacker. Andrew was said to have conducted business meetings in his sitting room regularly, and sometimes Abby let them in the front door. So this intruder might have known the house, known Abby. Even Knowlton admitted it was known that Andrew had "quarrels" with disgruntled tenants.

What I wonder about it whether or not the police ever really interviewed people other than tenants to look for a possible enemies of Andrew; for example, some of the rich and powerful men he served on different boards with. It seems not, they seemed not to have generated any leads of their own, just went on wild goose chases after whatever "tip" was given them. But if there was a rich and powerful someone who Andrew was thwarting in some plan they wanted to see happen, and that person wanted Andrew out of the way, maybe hired someone to get him out of the way.... (shrug emoji here)

Oh and I completely disagree that someone slipping out the side screen door would necessarily have been seen. That side door was just a few feet away from the corner of the house, where the jog is, someone could have slipped out the screen door and disappeared behind that corner in mere seconds, and be unable to be seen from the street. Get under the shady pear tree and over the back fence and drop into the Chagnon orchard on the other side and be practically invisible under the shadows of those trees in about 30 seconds more. No one was keeping their eyes steadily on that door all morning and even if they were trying to, in the time it would take to turn one's head to sneeze an intruder could have been out and gone. All speculation oon my part of course. Still, I think it was purposeful exaggeration by the prosecution to make it SEEM like no one could get in or out without being seen; that was their job, they did it well, but even so, the jury didn't buy it, and I don't either

[Lorcan]

Teenabee, your last paragraph gives us a usable set of constraints to investigate. Lizzie spent the first half of her 20 minutes in the barn loft looking out the window directly in the line of sight overlooking the driveway and side door, eating her 2nd, 3rd, and 4th pear within a 20 minute timespan, having already eaten the 1st pear in the kitchen when her father came home.

So that leaves about a 10 minute window where she was at the workbench away from the window. It takes no more than 20 seconds to kill Mr. Borden. If the killer waited for Lizzie to leave the house, and struck immediately, then they are cleaning up and waiting around for 8 minutes before exiting. If they waited several minutes after Lizzie left the house, why? They had no idea how long she would be gone. They had no idea when Bridget would descend the stairs to prepare the noon meal or perform other duties, or use the toilet in the basement, or get food or drink from the kitchen. They couldn't have exited the house before Lizzie was looking out the window because she would have seen the screen door wide open and she said she did when she came back into the house.

The killer would have had to not be observed exiting into the driveway - I'd have to weigh that against Lizzie being seen just standing inside the screen door and every other person who left that doorway in the relevant timeframe being seen. As for the shadows, this was 11AM on a sunny day. The leaves could provide cover from the upper floor windows, but I don't think the shadows would be deep enough to be solid cover from ground level observation. Now we come to the Silver Blaze Sherlock Holmes quote:

Gregory (Scotland Yard detective): "Is there any other point to which you would wish to draw my attention?"
Holmes: "To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time."
Gregory: "The dog did nothing in the night-time."
Holmes: "That was the curious incident".

A man smelling of blood (even if he rinsed himself, a dog would smell it on the clothes and as invisible residue) climbs the wood pile, hops the fence, and drops at least 5 feet to the ground. The dog does not bark. Almost every dog I know barks at anyone even approaching the property line.

Don't do this for real, but consider it as a thought experiment. The next time you are walking around your neighborhood, find a house with a fence and a dog. Imagine what that dog would do if you hopped their fence. I bet 100% of the dogs bark if you even walk up the their fence and knock on it. Again, don't do this, but I think we can all do the thought experiment - or have actually experienced this when actually approaching fences with dogs inside, even dogs that know us.

We also have to account for the lady assigned to sit outside waiting for clients to inform them that Dr., Chagon was unavailable. We have to account for the many workmen next door, and we have to account for emerging onto 3rd Street or Borden St. cutting through someone else's property.

[Lorcan]

I messed up - the window is tighter - I believe Lizzie's testimony is that she spent the first 5 minutes under the pear tree in the back yard looking at the birds and birdhouse. Then she either washed the pears or not, went up to the barn loft, walked over to the window overlooking the driveway and ate 3 pears. So, that takes up about the first 15 minutes with only the time it took her to enter the barn and proceed up the stairs to the loft when Lizzie is not in a position to observe the screen door. However, this might be a moot point since the killer supposedly left the screen door wide open and Lizzie did not see that for the entire first 15 minutes after leaving the house.

I think we have a fairly strong case that the killer either struck Andrew immediately and then waited until 15 minutes or more had elapsed after Lizzie left the house or the killer struck later, waiting longer before beginning the attack, taking a chance of either Lizzie or Bridget coming down near the kitchen.

Bridget's window has a commanding view of the back yard and barn, I've seen it myself. The entire yard except the few feet directly up against the back of the house is visible. Bridget was most likely laying down, but the killer couldn't have been sure of that.

Perhaps we can tighten this up a bit or find gaps in what I have laid out. I may be missing some important points.

Then we have to consider how the discovery was made. Lizzie said she was in the back yard and heard a groan. She told another person she was in the back yard and heard a scraping sound. She told other people she heard a peculiar sound and went inside. So, in this version of events Lizzie hears a concerning sound and decides to go inside to investigate. She sees the door wide open and goes in and sees her father. There is another version of the story Lizzie gave. She goes into the house, enters the kitchen, then goes into the dining room to lay down her hat. Then she opens the sitting room door and sees her father. Can we merge all of Lizzie's versions - was she simultaneously concerned enough by the peculiar noise to immediately go into the house to investigate, not call out to anyone upon entering the house, take time out to lay her hat down in the dining room, then check on her father? It's one of the many areas that were not fully explored.

[TeenaBee]

Hi Lorcan, I do love it when someone asks a question that did not occur to me before, doesn't happen too often after all these years of studying this case, but you just asked a good one. I have thought about Lucy Collett on the Chagnon porch, but I have also read her testimony that she wouldn't have looked over to the Chagnon orchard and noticed anyone passing through it unless he heard a noise to attract her attention and she didn't hear a noise. I have thought about the men stonecutting in the Crowe yard, and know they were on the other side of the Crowe barn making a bunch of noise, so why would they notice someone walking quietly through the orchard they could not even see. (They didn't notice Deputy Wixon dropping into the Crowe yard itself until he walked up to them.). What I have not thought about is how would an intruder know it was clear to exit, did he kill Andrew right after Lizzie stepoed out (because she stepped out), and then purposely wait 'til Lizzie had entered the barn, and how would he know without stepping outside, etc. Very good questions.

Off the top of my head, I would guess he waited awhile after she left the house for the sound of silence to convince him it was time to come out.... but that isn't very satisfying, none of the "he got lucky" stuff is satisfying or believeable. I think that is why so many reject the intruder theory, they presume he would have just wandered in off the street and happened by some great stroke of luck to get in and out without anyone seeing. I don't think that's how an intruder would pull it off. IF there was an intruder that is. If there was, I'd suppose it was well planned by someone who had been in the house before or was hired by someone who had been in the house before. I am sure he had been casing the joint (which is why Lizzie felt that spooky sense of danger), and maybe he even had a lookout, as Robinson suggested in his closing. I don't think he just bumbled through, I think it was all stategically planned, and things didn't go according to plan exactly -- which is why Abby was killed -- but he was going to be very careful. I think all he needed was to make sure Andrew got in the house and fall asleep and be left vulnerable and once he was dead, he would have killed Lizzie and Bridget or anyone else who may have witnessed him. IF there was an intruder.

I know most people like to come up with lists of hard-to-navigate obstacles for an intruder and say well that shows Lizzie must be guilty. People's theoretical obstacles are not evidence. I was very struck by Robinson's words in the closing about the problem of :deciding on a guilty verdict against Lizzie “simply for the reason that you do not see how anybody else could do it. That is very dangerous ground.” The judges also stressed to the jury that Lizzie enjoyed the presumption of innocence, so that's how I've been approaching it lately after a few decades of being pretty sure she was guilty. It's been a very eye-opening exercise. What if she was actually and truly innocent, how would an intruder have pulled it off? It would have been damned difficult yes, but not impossible. At least no more impossible in my mind than it would have been for Lizzie to stand before witnesses thirteen or however many minutes after he was killed without a drop of blood and no weapon to be found. But a potential intruder is such an unknown -- unknown history, unknown motive, unknown skillset, unknown everything. Lizzie was a sitting duck, so much easier to pick apart. And I have been enjoying giving her the benefit of the doubt. It makes it a whole new case in my eyes -- But I see now I will have to ponder those non-barking dogs ha

[Lorcan]

I'm temporarily interrupting the primary topic of the thread - something I will try not to do in the future, but it looks like it's just the 4 of us, so I think it might help keep the conversation fun with no misunderstandings. This is my current theory, based on what I've learned from Cara Robertson, Dr. Koorey, Rebecca Pittman, and others, and a bit about my methodology.

I'm in the process of putting all the testimony into a data format called a neo4j knowledge graph (I'm a software developer and do data analytics as my day job). I plan to go line by line through the testimony and create as many real world timespans and logical dependencies as I can. For instance, when Abby went upstairs to make the bed, that took much longer in 1892, when the layered feathers had to be literally beaten back into place and smoothed out with a stick. So, instead of 5 minutes to make a bed, it might be closer to 15 minutes to fully make a bed in 1892. Lizzie would have heard Abby slamming the stick into the mattress. I want to map these timespans visually and see if I can make sense of everyone's testimony and narrow down the gaps and conflicts as much as possible. At all times I try to picture myself in the house with all my senses and try to see in my mind what they are describing and see if it follows the laws of physics and the actual activities of the era.

Here's my working theory and my internal justification for approaching the case the way I do:

I blame Andrew for not spending less than 1% of his money on upstairs bathrooms, valuing his Yankee Puritan ego over his daughters' comfort and dignity. I blame Andrew for not buying a house like Maplecroft and leaving it in his name, if ego needs be, (just 4% of his money - a simple real estate investment and he could have let 2 middle-aged women live there without a man of the house. I do not buy the social convention argument - there were many widows of the civil war and wealthy unmarried women in that neighborhood at that time, including Emma and Lizzie just months after the crime). Andrew chose to live by his rules. Andrew chose to dole out a $4 per week allowance. Andrew chose to never let Lizzie have the dignity of a private door. Andrew chose to not tell his daughters what he had done when he bought the half-share of the house for Abby's half-sister.

I blame Abby for advocating for Sarah to get a house when Lizzie's bedroom was the size of Abby's closet. I blame Abby and Andrew for the humiliation, betrayal, and loss of influence Lizzie felt when an outsider told her that her parents bought half the house for Sarah, a woman 2 years younger than Lizzie.

I think a second event happened that triggered the murders out of fear, loss, betrayal, grief, rage - if Andrew decided to make a Will or put the Swansea farm in Abby's name without telling Lizzie and Emma - KNOWING FULL WELL - how much that specific type of lying by omission hurt Lizzie in the past, then I completely understand why Lizzie lashed out.

She already lost her youth, her chance for a house of her own, a life of her own, to marry and be a mother (maybe she didn't want that, but she lost even the reasonable possibility of finding a suitable husband of her social expectations), and if now it was doubly confirmed that Abby had that level of influence over Andrew for the specific betrayal to be repeated? What would Andrew put in the Will? He made it perfectly clear that disapproved of Lizzie's desired lifestyle. Would he put conditions on her inheritance? Would Abby be in control? Rage, fear, loss, betrayal - that's what I think happened.

Although almost all my evidence points to Lizzie being guilty of a brutal and unjustified crime, I'm still trying my hardest to see if I can find a way to see if there is a possibility she can be innocent, because of what she chose NOT to do to Bridget. Bridget was inside the house washing windows for part of the time. Her alibi for Abby was only partial. If Lizzie killed Andrew and then simply cleaned up and left, when Bridget came downstairs to a double murder in an empty house, at that point it would be a well-connected, wealthy Sunday School and charity matron Lizzie’s word against an Irish maid who almost certainly was complaining to Dr. Kelly's maid about Abby making her wash the windows after puking her guts out that morning. I think Lizzie knew if she did that, Bridget would almost certainly hang.

I think Lizzie was a murderer, but that she also risked her own life in a commendable act of integrity and mercy. I could be giving her too much credit, but investigating this case if I truly believed Lizzie was just a monster is too much for me, so I choose to give her the benefit of the doubt.

If you think Lizzie is actually innocent, a good test would be to try to answer the most pressing of questions that make many of us think she is guilty, such as this:

After Andrew was found and Dr. Bowen, Alice, Adelaide, and Bridget were all in the kitchen and dining room, Lizzie was still telling people she thought Abby was out of the house - that fits with her actions upon discovering Andrew. She didn't call out for Abby because she thought Abby was not home. Fine. I've been in that kitchen and dining room. It is 15 of my paces from the triple-locked front door to the back of the kitchen with a clean line of sight right over the top of the sofa Andrew is laying on. Lizzie says she thought she heard Abby come home.

1. Which door did she hear Abby come in?
2. When did she hear it?
3. Why did no one else hear it?
4. Why wouldn't Abby greet Andrew, Bridget, or Lizzie upon her arrival or if after Andrew's murder, how didn't she realize she walked into a crime scene?

It is literally impossible for Abby to enter that house unseen and unaware of the crime from either door after Andrew's body was discovered. Is Lizzie going to argue she just remembered she heard Abby come home before she went to the barn? HOW?! Andrew asked where she was and even went up to the bedroom and Lizzie specifically said she got a note and was out. Is she saying Andrew came home and didn't greet Andrew? Is she saying Abby didn't hear the murder take place from inside the house when she heard the groan and scraping from the back yard? Is she saying Bridget didn't hear Abby and stayed in her room and didn't greet Abby? When exactly did Lizzie hear Abby come home?

If you really, truly think through all of that - along with the other questions in my Let's Play Lawyer thread - really honestly and practically think through these questions envisioning yourself inside the house seeing and listening to everything described - it becomes extremely difficult to believe Lizzie's version of events.

[Inspector]

When I think of the intruder theory, I have to believe there was corroboration . For instance , say David Anthony was involved and was the killer. How would he know how to get Abby up to the spot she fell, where no one would easily spot her without coming upstairs, and this to buy time for Andrew’s return without Lizzie’s help?
Additionally, Lizzie had just spoken to Bridget at the side door right before Abby was killed, so there’s the partnership of two involved and seems improbable without Lizzie’s help, because the intruder would have been spotted by Lizzie in my opinion.

Obviously not considering Bridget as being involved.

I don’t think Lizzie believed the time gap between the murders would be found out and is in part why she was tripping over herself to have Abby discovered quickly.
As much as the time gap incriminates Lizzie, it also hurts a story similar to the David Anthony theory, which says he lost his temper and killed in a rage.
Though I want Lizzie to be innocent, her proximity to both murders, without being killed herself, or seeing anyone is hard to explain, unless she herself was working in tandem with the intruder/partner.

[Lorcan]

The layout of the guest room is very tough for an intruder. It took me seven steps to get inside, around the bed, and square up to be in a position to strike Abby. Way too long to not have a scream or a defensive wound. I am absolutely convinced Abby felt comfortable being face to face with her killer alone in a bedroom.

I posted this before and I couldn't find it on a search, so maybe it violates the terms, so I won't post it again, but if you are comfortable with seeing a hatchet test with a forensic dummy from the History channel show Forged in Fire. It makes it absolutely clear a grown man of reasonable upper body strength did not swing the hatchet. The skull would be utterly destroyed and mostly emptied of the brain by the 4th full strength strike. If you want to see it search youtube for exactly this phrase "J Axes! ballisticdummylab" - it is just ballistic plastic and food coloring, but the background music has a minor swear word - the video itself aired on the History channel, so although graphic, it's TV safe.

[Inspector]

I would be a bit queasy at the sight, however I would tend to agree with your views here.
I’ve never bought into the narrative that a woman couldn’t swing hard enough to inflict the damage done to the Bordens.
The wounds are what I’d expect, nothing more or less.

[TeenaBee]

I agree with Inspector that if Lizzie was guilty, she never would have never guessed the time gap between murders would be so easily established. I would guess she expected everyone would assume they were killed about the same time. And I do agree with a lot of the speculation on what might have driven her to it --- IF she was guilty. I know its possible she was, and some days I come across something on this forum, or in a book that makes me think it's probable she was. Still, I try not to start from the premise of guilt. It becomes a self-reinforcing loop, in which everything she says and does seen through the lens of guilt seems terribly suspicious and then becomes yet another sign of guilt, so one becomes more convinced of her guilt, and so on...

So I was glad to read what you said Lorcan, that you try to look beyond that loop, that you're willing to give Lizzie the benefit the doubt, at least on some things. It is challenging though, because there is so much she did that seems irreconciliable with innocence. But if one starts with the presumption of innocence, then it sort of reverses a bit, the loop goes back the other way.... For me, the most enlightening thing that George Robinson said in his closing was "Look at these things in a natural and easy way, a common sense way, assuming her innocence and not assuming her guilt. That's the way you will meet these things and these facts."

I have pretty much taken his advice, and the case feels different to me now. Way less fraught and heavy, I don't try to figure out what Andrew or Abby might have done to have caused Lizzie to suddenly rise up and kill them. The movies about Lizzie always villainize Andrew and Abby, make them awful people who practically deserved to die. And then there are writers like Victoria Lincoln, who came up with the idea that Andrew planned to give the Swansea property to Abby (which I don't believe). The things she wrote about Abby, just so over-the-top bad, reprehensible really. Lincoln never met the woman, and from most everyone who had anything to say about Abby -- not counting Emma and Lizzie -- they all said nice things about her.

So I read Knowlton's closing argument, and he seems so full of exaggeration and hot air, I don't buy half of what he says. Then I read Robinson's closing, and he seems to have his head on straight, a calm and reasonable man who clearly believed Lizzie innocent, and I admit he sways me. So now, I try to look at the evidence beginning with the presumption of innocence, and it's interesting how a lot of the case against Lizzie, at least as it was presented by Knowlton, becomes hollow to me, insubstantial. Not all of it though. There are a few substantial reasons that remain in my mind to consider her guiilty. The time gap being one of them. And that story about the note, can't say that isn't damning....

[camgarsky4]

Teenabee, Inspector & Lorcan -- sitting aside the possibility that Lizzie acted alone, do you think it more plausible that Lizzie was NOT involved in anyway or that she had fellow conspirator (s).

If she acted in tandem with other (s), do you think an insider (ex. Morse, Bridget or Emma), a known outsider (ex. Dr. Bowen) or an unknown party?

If she was not involved, did the perpetrator stay inside the house hidden between murders? Ideas on where?

I know these are general questions, but your thoughts will help spark some fun convo to dissect various possibilities.

By the way, I do think it is a possibility that she had a co-conspirator (not Bridget) who might have helped with killing Andrew.

[Lorcan]

I think if Lizzie had an accomplice, they would have come up with and stuck to a logically reasonable, self-consistent alibi. Lizzie's inquest testimony was the opposite of that.

If Lizzie conspired to have someone else kill her parents, why not have it done when she was far away from the crime scene?

If Lizzie swung the hatchets, the only accomplice she would need, if any, was Bridget.

It seems unlikely Bridget was an accomplice, because they could have both left the house with a window open or the basement door open, evidence of a robbery, maybe set a fire that would still give them time to leave before it was detected, etc.

Teenabee - as for Robinson, I have an entirely different view of his ethics.
1. He outright lied about Bridget having firsthand knowledge of the note in his closing argument.
2. Why did he not recuse himself or the judge he had appointed to the bench recuse himself? Consider the jury instructions that judge gave and whether that is evidence of a conflict of interest.
3. He pushed to the very edge of an outright lie in describing the accuracy of the blows and the level of damage caused by the hatchets. That was his lawyerly duty, so I don't hold it against him, legally, but ethically it doesn't sit well with me.

I tried every variation of the intruder theory I could think of and it works for a bit then falls apart no matter where I try to position them. Having been in the house and having heard sound travel so easily among all 3 floors, I just can't find a way for an intruder to pull off both crimes unseen and unheard by anyone inside and outside the house, which was surrounded by over 20 windows and relatively busy street.

The closet under the front staircase is easily large enough for a person to hide in, but I don't know what it was filled with. The closet (clothes press) was locked - Lizzie had to unlock it for the police. Lizzie's bedroom was locked. The front door was triple locked from the night before. The basement door was locked with cobwebs built up from a few days. The north side door wasn't unlocked until Bridget got the milk, then the screen door was locked until she started on the windows. Lizzie was in the kitchen, dining room, and sitting room according to her own testimony except for using the toilet in the morning and basting a piece of tape to a dress in her room for a few minutes. It is very, very, very hard to come up with a viable route and timing and hiding and silence for an intruder, but I am looking forward to what people come up with.

[Inspector]

I enjoy this broad style speculation for its “to the point” brand of discussion, and also the occasional suspicious characters that lurk around the fringes. (possible suspects.)
I feel that Lizzie is literally right on top of each murder in a way that compels her involvement,
So obviously she would know her helper if there was one.
I don’t think it was a family member, but neither do I know who it was. David Anthony didn’t pan out for me, and William Borden doesn’t make much sense, but I have some general ideas of how easily Lizzie could hide someone upstairs, possibly Emma’s room, and stay up there until Andrew came home,
This would keep blood off Lizzie and hide her helpers appearance.
The cellar door would be another entry point, but riskier during the night, than the front door .
The most obvious helper would be Bridget, but she testified about the bloody rags, and Lizzie laughing among other things, which seems to show her innocence, or is she saying “Lizzie, don’t mess with me? “
From watching lots of interrogations, I often notice that people close by tend to know more than they say.

[camgarsky4]

Lorcan -- something Kat and I have been noodling on that might help you think of some alternative scenarios.

What if the crime plan went off script for some reason and much of what occurred in the house that day was crisis management and ad hoc decision making? What if the original plan intended for a quality alibi that included being away from the house? But something throws the plan off and much of how the final 30-45 minutes happened was Lizzie (and possibly her accomplice) 'winging it'?

Maybe the barn had no original role in the plan? Perhaps the same applies to the silly note story...if she didn't expect Andrew home, she made up something on the spot to explain Abby's absence. Once out of her mouth, she was stuck with it.

As a thought starter...what if the plan assumed Andrew would arrive home 30 minutes later? What if they didn't know Morse was coming to dinner and only found out from AJB? Could the original plan and timeline have been abandoned. What other events might have disturbed the original gameplan?

I think you'll find that this critical thinking approach opens up many possibilities to consider.

[TeenaBee]

Funny camgarasky how I have never seriously considered an accomplice before, probably because I am so driven to find reasons to believe Lizzie innocent and an accomplice won't help me get there, ha. I have had the thought the reason people might lean toward an accomplice is because they have that nagging feeling that something about Lizzie acting alone just doesn't add up. Say Lizzie really did dream of having help to kill her parents, our very private closed mouthed Lizzie, who would be safe enough to tell? Who would equally hate Andrew and Abby enough to want them dead, too? Emma? Well she didn't swing the axe. Uncle John? He apparently liked Andrew a bunch, was not close to Lizzie. If I can stretch my mind to believe in an unknown secret intruder, I suppose I could stretch it far enough to believe in an unknown secret co-conspirator, but if I am going to imagine someone else swinging the axe, I might as well imagine it someone not connected to Lizzie. I'm not sure why Lizzie would have to be involved, unless it is to let someone into the house. But I can imagine an intruder getting in there withought being noticed just fine. I'm not saying it would have been a piece of cake for that intruder, but all it would require would be for Lizzie to float around the house clueless for a few hours. It seems to me would be much less challenging a proposition than Lizzie finding someone to agree to help her commit murder?

And Lorcan your questions about what if some pre-hatched murder plan went awry because Andrew did something unexpected or Morse came back earlier than planned, all of those things -- those questions are always brought up about why it would be so hard for an intruder to pull it off. But those same questions apply to Lizzie, a lack of foreknowledge about who would be where and when, that would make it equally hard for her to pull it off..... well except for the getting in and out of the house part. But she had different challenges,like having a bunch of people watching her within minutes of the murders and picking her behavior apart, like being a sitting duck for suspicious police officers desperate to make an arrest. All an intruder would have had to do was get through a tense few minutes getting out of the house and then he'd be home free.

As for Robinson's ethics, well the note thing he stuck to Bridget, yeah not great, I think it was the one thing he was openly criticized for afterward, but I am willing to accept it as an honest mistake, he had maybe read Mrs. Churchill's statement where it really did sound like Bridget had said she saw Abby rush off, and maybe Robinson didn't register Bridget's denial, or it slipped his mind while he got rolling on his mission to protect Lizzie.... I don't know, I only know when I compare him to Knowlton and Knowlton's many flights of fancy and exaggerations and pure inventions, and Knowlton's willingness to call literally everyone who took the stand in defense of Lizzie a liar -- well in comparison to THAT, Robinson strikes me as a paragon of honesty.

[Lorcan]

Camgarsky - I like your and Kat's idea - I opened a new personal casebook file for it, titled A Hatchet at the Improv, and I'll try to think through the possibilities.

TeenaBee - I'll try to look at Hosea through your eyes as I'm reading the testimony. I don't see any of it yet - if you can think of specific questions, start a thread and we can examine the ethics of the lawyers and their techniques. I don't have any law background, but Cara Robertson would be outstanding, if someone could get her to chime in on it.

[camgarsky4]

Teenabee -- I think an accomplice is possible, but it has nothing to do with the strength of the case against Lizzie. I just find a few non-Lizzie related issues provocative enough that Lizzie having help is a plausible scenario....for me.

If I had to give odds, I would say Lizzie did it solo 55%, Lizzie is fully innocent 1% and Lizzie had help 44%.

There must be a couple of specific headline issues which are driving your strong belief in Lizzie innocence....I'd love to hear what they are?

[Inspector]

I see you’ve changed from 60/40.

[camgarsky4]

[TeenaBee]

I am at about 75 % innocent, and 24 % percent guilty, and 1 percent co-conspirator, haha. Until this past year, it was the opposite for me, I was 25 innocent, 75 guilty. I think the turning point for me was re-reading the closing arguments for each side. I decided to really take to heart the "innocent until presumed guiilty" idea. Then so much of what is taken as "evidence" for guilt starts to just look like an interpretation that can be interpreted in another way. She burned a dress. Aha! Must have been destroying evidence! The timing is too suspicious! Well yeah, if you presume her guilty. But if she starts off innocent, then its a big fat maybe. Maybe she just had nothing else to do trapped in that house, and wanted to do something "normal" and she had probably burned dozens of dresses in her life and she knows she's not guilty and didn't think anything of it. Who's to say for certain? It's not evidence. It's conjecture.

Most of the so-called evidence against her in my mind is conjecture. Put it together, string it into a narrative, and it looks like a lot. I know the power of the narrative. I see how Knowlton works his story, fills in the gaps of the evidence with story. But when I pick up one piece at a time and look at it closely, most of those pieces are hollow to me, open to interpretation. I think they had a few big solid pieces early on -- Bence primarily. That made them feel sure they had the right person. Lizzie helped them feel they had the right person with her performance at the inquest. But they couldn't dig up much more, so they created a story, interpreted things in a way that would suit their case.

But for headlines -- besides the obvious: no blood evidence, no weapon found, the short time between Andrew murdered and the call of alarm. Lack of real motive is huge for me, her few sour comments about Abby do not a motive for murder make. That was Knowlton's greatest story invention, the seething hatred... Also she never showed signs of a lack of conscience, or narcissistic selfishness, or predilication for violence or a bad temper. She seemed kinda... boring. Became a nice old lady. Or that's my story anyway ha. But another big one is the rush to judgment, the police just not considering it could be anyone else, ruling out an intruder so quickly, not investigating Andrew's life, his business partnerships, business projects, looked for situations in which he might have made a powerful enemy. Of if they did, I've seen no evidence of it.

The things that keep me stuck in possible guilt? The Note story. Hard to intepret that differetnly. Bence, even though I think it's highly possible it was mistaken identity, I know that's me telling myself a story there, too. Three eyewitnesses who agree... but maybe they got caught up in their own exciting story about bringing down a killer themselves...

[Inspector]

TeenaBee, I have to hand it to you for sticking to your feelings on the case. I also want Lizzie to be innocent, but like most, I don’t see the evidence as you, probably the opposite, though I’ll never claim that she’s guilty because life is stranger than fiction as this case demonstrates.
A couple of opposing views to yours,
1) Several if not more friends and family members mentioned relations at the Borden house as unpleasant, negative comments of Lizzie towards Abby , (the type who never die), and I believe Abby’s step mother said she wouldn’t trade places with her for all the money in the world.
Then there’s Hiram Harrington to name a few.
Early witness statements get right to the mood at the house, even though Abby was not a talker.
Bestcome Case also stated that Abby was closed mouth, but mentioned the robbery that took place at the Bordens, and would tell her all about it later, however later never came..too bad.

2) I think money and hatred can possibly be a strong motive, and looks to be a big part of the case.

I do appreciate the opposing views, it keeps our eyes open for viewpoints that could strangely offer clues in the right direction.

[Lorcan]

There was blood evidence. The bloody rags in a pail that Bridget did not see prior to the murders. She said it was her job to clean that type of laundry for the women and I guarantee she knew their schedules.

Women wore sleeping bonnets over their hair back then, so getting blood in her hair is not a problem. She owned leather gloves, winter scarfs, a waterproof raincoat, she bought unaccounted for dress material in New Bedford a few days before, etc. There is no reason she would not be completely blood free - she had many options to cover all but her eyes.

Lizzie hadn't used her fishing lines in 5 years, yet she picked those 30 minutes to look for scrap lead to custom make sinkers? Her father is a carpenter, yet she fails to ask him for help fixing the screen a couple of minutes before she decides to look for tin or iron to fix a screen?

Do you really think she ate 4 pears in 30 minutes? Try it for yourself.

Do you really think Emma wasn't lying under oath about it being her idea to burn the dress? If so, why did she ask Lizzie what she was doing and more importantly, why did Lizzie say I am burning this dress because it has paint on it. Wasn't that Emma's own suggested reason to burn the dress? That dress had paint on it for over 100 days - why burn it mere hours after being told you are the murder suspect. Why step backwards to further hide yourself from the police outside when confronted about the dress burning?

The implausibilities accumulate. Each isolated explanation has to survive contact with the others. What are the odds of each unreasonable thing Lizzie says she did all occurring in that sequence in that order on those days? A judge pointed that out in one of the books Spencer covers.

Lizzie gave two materially different reasons for going back into the house. In one case, she heard a groan or a scraping sound and went in to investigate. In another, she went in, checked on the kitchen fire for ironing, set her hat down in the dining room and then happened across the crime scene when she decided to go sit upstairs in her room.

My objection is not that every individual point proves guilt by itself. It does not. The issue is that any proposed innocent explanation has to fit the whole case. You cannot create reasonable doubt by explaining one fact in isolation if that explanation makes the surrounding facts harder to account for.

A defense lawyer can point to a gap and exploit it. But if we are trying to reconstruct what actually happened, the explanation used to fill that gap has to be able to exist in the same reality as all the other facts.

[camgarsky4]

In my opinion, the only way to reasonably create doubt about Lizzie's guilt is to develop a plausible, fact based alternative solution that exonerates Lizzie.

For us in 2026, we don't need to prove Lizzie guilty or not guilty in a court of law, handcuffed by courtroom rules and regulations. We can view suggestive evidence to the same degree as proven evidence and weigh all of it accordingly. We have freedom to form perspectives of Lizzie's mental state at the time of the murders by factoring events that happened post-trial. Things like a permanent estrangement from her only close living relative, remaining in Fall River and therefore embracing being ostracized, and living a lifestyle built on relationships she could control or dominate, like employees, pets and children.

I do find her friendship with Grace Howe fascinating and incongruent with the need to control. My pet theory is that Grace got some degree of emotional satisfaction by being the friend and confidant of the infamous Lizzie Borden, and therefore was supplicant to Lizzie in their interactions.

It is indisputable that the Fall River police force, and likely most law enforcement groups in 1892, was in over its head with the Borden investigation. That said, all of us that toy around with 'true crime' know the murder statistics. The majority of murders are committed by family or loved ones, with motives involving greed (and lust) and by the person last known to be with the victims.
Lizzie matches up with those statistical truths 100%. No one else does. The caveat is that Bridget might have been last w/ Abby...so 50/50 on that stat.

The police were correct to focus on Lizzie as the primary suspect. But they did not ignore other leads. We know they followed up on the Lubinsky lady sighting because they interviewed Ellen Eagan (which was the genesis of Arnold Brown's theory and book) and they put substantial effort into finding Dr. Handy's 'wild eyed man'. The witness statements and newspaper articles are full of other leads they followed.

Based on all this, my Lizzie case focus has been on whether Lizzie might have had an accomplice, not whether she had no role in the crimes. These efforts are not because the case against Lizzie is weak, its because we have no reason to think she was stupid, so it seems practical to me that any master murder plan would have included her having a legitimate alibi and, perhaps, to allow her to avoid having to personally slay her father.

To be clear, it is most likely that the situation that morning may have just gotten out of Lizzie's control, so she may have needed to improvise and do things like fabricate the note story, choreograph Abby's finding, iteratively invent the barn alibi and so on. If she acted alone that is what I think happened.

Hopefully that helps explain my 55%-44%-1% opinion.

[Inspector]

Cam, you reminded me of something I’ve always felt , and that is , Lizzie never went to the barn at all on Thursday. This made me never really believe Hyman Lubinsky, or the Brownie and me story among other things.
I feel certain she wasn’t up in the loft, and always felt the officers would have noticed evidence of her being up there of true.
I had wondered where the pear centers would have been left if Lizzie ate so many, but none were found in the loft where she was eating.
It has always struck me about like the note story, as something to explain things off the cuff.
I will say that Lizzie was quick witted, no question, but she said too much in her inquest, and her defense must have picked up on her shortcomings and kept her quiet as they could.

Do you know when the defense team got a copy of her inquest?

[Lorcan]

Inspector - I should point out why I posted this, it was in response to your theory Lizzie never went to the barn loft the morning of the murders. If she did not, then her knowledge of the contents of the loft was 3 months old, or older, I believe. That may or may not have been safe for her. What I want to get at is if she did not go up there just to give herself at least some time out of the house and some opportunity for an eye witness to see her out of the house, why did she describe the box, workbench, and board placement is such a bizarre way? See below:

If this is an accurate view, at least proportionally of the barn loft, Lizzie's testimony is bizarre and the fact that it might be truly how the Bordens stored items is bizarre as well.

Why would you pile boards on top of a basket you keep hardware in, so you have to move boards to put anything in or take anything out when you have wood piled on the floor elsewhere in the loft and tons of empty floor space?

I can see piling wood on a workbench if you wanted it off the floor, but balancing it on top of a box of hardware?! The whole story makes no sense.

However, in this case, I have to believe what Lizzie described is close enough to the truth that Knowlton couldn't find a direct contradiction - or more likely the police were so incompetent as to not have taken notes, a drawing, or photo - I cut them slack on the photo because you'd need a tripod and the lighting was terrible - but notes - I cut them zero slack on not taking notes. Thoughts / answers / guesses anyone?

I propose we all do a junk drawer challenge. How many seconds (in Lizzie's case 10 minutes +) did it take you to look through your junk drawer? It took me 25 seconds. I know Knowlton probably was too much of a Victorian gentleman to do it and it would have gotten objected to, but I would have brought in a box of the same dimensions as Lizzie described filled to the brim with junk hardware and slowly take every single item out and put it back in several times while a timer ran for 10 minutes. I'd have my assistant eat four pears in a row while I did it.

[Lorcan]

Hosea Knowlton How long since have you seen it there?
Lizzie Borden I have not been out there since that day.

Hosea Knowlton Had you been in the barn before?
Lizzie Borden That day, no sir.

Hosea Knowlton How long since you had been in the barn before?
Lizzie Borden I don't think I had been into it, I don't know as I had in three months.

[camgarsky4]

Lorcan -- sorry, I'm not sure what you are probing? I think you are suggesting that Lizzie might have gone up there as she testified because she was able to describe loft contents well enough that Knowlton couldn't catch her being wrong?

I would think no member of the family went up in the loft very often. The workers from the farm probably brought tools with them and took back when they returned. The horse was sold the prior year (if my recollection holds). I would think Lizzie was safe describing what was up there the last time she had visited the loft.

When you read her testimony regarding the basket and work bench contents......she mentions that her dad had told her nails were kept up there. Can you think of another event that involved a nail and Lizzie? That event is when I think Lizzie became acquainted with the random contents of the basket and workbench.

Inspector - Knowlton Papers tells us the answer to when the defense got a copy of Lizzie's testimony, but I don't recall off hand. My sense is they had a copy early on....unlike Bridget's, which I don't think they got a copy until the trial, almost a year after the inquest. If you don't have Knowlton Papers and really want to know the answer, let me know and I'll look tomorrow.

[Lorcan]

Camgarsky - yes, that is what I was getting at. I was waiting for Knowlton to point out that what she was describing was not what was on that workbench in that box. It never happened. As painful as her descriptions of that box and its search was, she made it through unscathed.

Also, yes, if she was 11 and told the police that story about picking a lock with a full-sized nail that would be understandable, but at her age with her father's love of locks, she should have known better.

Her instinct to try to stage direct and point out "evidence" showed up a few times, such as solving the murder with a single sentence while calling up to Bridget, redirecting Bridget not to go to Mrs. Whitehead to ask about Abby, trying to tell the police which rooms weren't worth searching, because they were locked and she had the keys.

I think she really did live in books and was a bit naive about some of the mechanics of the workaday world and she may have underestimated the mostly Irish police. I could be misreading her - not sure. One person pointed out that when Lizzie said to Knowlton, I don't even know your name, it wasn't frantic frustration reaching the surface but contempt. The woman (can't remember who) said we should read her exclamation as "Who are you to think you can talk to me in such a rude manner? I don't know of your family name but you certainly know mine."

[Inspector]

Lorcan, Lizzie said about 3 months since she’d been up there in the loft, we can take that as fact or fiction, but certainly that’s enough time for dust to settle, which I believe was the case.
Also, as much as we can question the police, I believe the detail testimony of peering across the floor and wiping the dust and documenting no one had been up there in a while, certainly not Thursday morning.
However the fact that no pear centers were found up in the loft where teeth prints could be matched is hard to overlook.
In addition, I can name a bunch of things that are in old 5 gallon buckets in the shed, and I haven’t really used for many months.
It’s kinda like unorganized, but I know what’s in there.
I’m not saying Lizzie didn’t go outside, or even possibly to the lower barn, of course there’s a chance she did.
I just didn’t feel there’s enough to convince me and use it in my analysis of the case.

Cam, If you feel the defense had her inquest early on, that’s enough for me. Thanks for the search offer though.
I would consider it to be one of the reasons she wasn’t allowed to testify at the trial, coupled with private consultations with her defense team.