??/??/?? - "I'm Jack...
Real-Life Crimes

The "I'm Jack" hoax letters and tape caused a great deal of confusion and time-wasting on the investigation. The tape that taunted and haunted the Ripper squad arrived in the post at the West Yorkshire police HQ on 18 June 1979.

It was immediately linked with three letters that had come in during the previous 15 months. Assistant Chief Constable George Oldfield and his boss Ronald Gregory weighed the evidence - and decided it was genuine.

The tape and letters gave them what they thought was a host of clues: voice, handwriting, even a blood group from the saliva used to seal the envelopes. They hoped that by broadcasting the tape it would be only days before the Ripper was pinpointed.

Linguistic experts said the voice on the tape was a Sunderland accent, and Oldfield sent a team to the Wearside town to stand by. But as soon as the tape was played on TV and radio they were swamped with thousands of calls claiming to know whose voice it was. All had to be checked out.

Officially the senior officers kept a firm front, sticking to the story that they believed the messages were real. In private they were having their doubts, especially when Detective Chief Inspector David Zackrisson of Northumbria police gave them a report which showed that 10 phrases in the letters were very similar to phrases used in letters sent to police in London by Jack the Ripper in 1888.

Zackrisson warned that the whole affair could be an elaborate hoax. The Geordie voice could simply be someone who had studied the original Ripper case from the 1880s.