Ruth Ellis. What are your thoughts?

Yes, If there was a pregnancy two lives would be taken,

What I find particularly horrible is the scrupulous care extended to people under sentence of death with regard to their health, to ensure they don't die, or commit suicide, before the sentence can be carried out.
Women under sentence of death have always been checked to see if they were pregnant (Lady Jane Grey had to undergo a humiliating examination before her execution in the Tower to check she was not with child).

Why didn’t that doctor speak out, couldn’t have been patient
confidentiality, he told you? Also would she have sought confirmation of a pregnancy so soon ?

I think she became pregnant again after the miscarriage. All I know is what her Dr told me & apparently that pregnancy wasn’t widely known. I got the impression she was quite sound in mind but obviously being pregnant would have had an effect on her hormones.

My thoughts on this are that the death penalty is barbaric and I am glad that it has been abolished. Ruth Ellis should have served a prison sentence, been paroled and lived the rest of her life in peace.

Thank you eazybee she did receive medical attention

During her initial interview on the Monday afternoon, she again described the details of David’s killing. The Principal Medical Officer, Dr. Mervyn Ralph Penry Williams, examined her and interviewed her twice, finding no evidence of mental illness. Ruth consented to and undertook an electro-encephalograph examination on the 3rd of May. This also failed to find any evidence of brain abnormality. While on remand in Holloway, she was also examined by Dr. D. Whittaker, a psychiatrist for the defence, on June the 4th and by Dr. A. Dalzell on behalf of the Home Office, on the 9th of June. Neither man found any evidence of insanity. Ruth discussed her feelings on the days leading up to and including the murder, with Dr. Dalzell, and he reported to the Home Office that he found no evidence of delusions, hallucinations or other form of mental illness. These examinations were required by law to ensure that Ruth was legally sane and therefore fit to plead at her trial.

Ruth Ellis was arrested immediately after the killing of Blakely and transferred to the hospital wing of Holloway prison where she was under surveillance day and night. She was not pregnant at the time of the killing, but had suffered a miscarriage recently.

In her defence she testified that “He (David) only hit me with his fist or hands, “I bruise easily.” She also described her recent miscarriage of a two month old foetus: “A few weeks or days previously, I do not know which, David got very violent. I do not know whether that caused the miscarriage or not. He thumped me in the tummy.”

Her doctor wasn’t questioned re her miscarriage?

“ never forget “

I knew her Dr when I was in London, in my twenties, & he said she should never have been hanged & one major reason was that she was pregnant at the time of the murder & it had affected her mentally. I’ll ever forget our discussion about her - it left a lasting impression.

Although she pleaded 'Not guilty' because she wanted her side of the story to be heard, her evidence in court condemned her and there was no other verdict possible.
The only escape was a reprieve, and it would be interesting to know the reasons why Gwilym Lloyd George rejected it, as he had granted others.

She was judged as much for her appearance and life style choices as for the crime.

I am listening to The Ruth Ellis Files on BBCi Player, reading of witness statements, even the doctor spoke of her peroxide hair , she didn’t stand a chance

90%

In the 20th century 145 women were sentenced to death but only 14 hanged, a reprieve rate of just over 90. Given the trial judge urged for a reprieve it's astonishing one wasn't granted.

^ It has been stated by Nigel Havers (the actor and grandson of Mr. Justice Havers) that as trial judge, his grandfather had recommended a reprieve for Ruth in his post trial report to the Home Office but, unusually this recommendation was rejected.^

At the time the death penalty was in force. We cannot change the outcome. Murder is murder.

I remember watching a feature film about her in the 70's or early 80's. It was much less sympathetic & although it's ages ago I think it portrayed her as manipulative, and a callous mother.
As John Bickford said, she did threaten the status quo by her life choices, at a time when no-one could foresee the subsequent changing attitudes that would sweep the status quo away.
She was very proud & she had incredible courage if the story is real. She was certainly a victim but refused to see herself as one. At 28, she'd lost a boyfriend in the war, her best friend in a car smash, had several abortions, survived child sexual abuse and then domestic violence, before that cruel episode with her pregnancy with David & the whole abusive relationship.

Definitely an obsession, lost her apartment, gave up her daughter, she was free to break from him but couldn’t, different to women trapped in an abusive marriage/ relationship with no means of escape. Poor woman,

Ruth Ellis was obsessively in love with, and emotionally addicted to the love-and-abuse behaviours of the very handsome racing driver, David Blakely. (Her abuse addiction was formed by the childhood sexual abuse from her father.) It is said that Ruth, as a very damaged person, could be equally cruel to David. They were both deeply dysfunctional.

Ruth killed her lover David due to his ultimate rejection of her. He promised to marry her, then without telling her she heard from someone else that he was planning to marry another woman. She did not want anyone else to have him, if she couldn't.

In a way, Ruth killed David in cold blood. It would have been a crime of passion if she had shot him with a gun already in her possession, and in the heat of a terrible row - or very shortly afterwards while still in a heightened state of distress.

However, her aquisition of the gun was premeditated. She appeared shockingly cold and calm at the later date when she deliberately riddled David Blakely with 5 bullets. (There were several witnesses.) Apparently, she had planned the sixth bullet for herself, but as she held the gun to her own head - the barrel jammed. She most definitely wanted to die with him. She did not want anyone else to have David.

As Ruth was the generation brought up with much stronger Christian values than later generations, she totally accepted the Biblical Old and New Testament "An Eye for an Eye" theory. Furthermore, she may have also powerfully believed that she would be re-united with David in the afterlife - which is why she was genuinely happy to die with him. In her twisted logic, this was a way she could have David entirely to herself - and for eternity!!! In these particular circumstances, if there hadn't been a death penalty, I think there is a strong chance Ruth would have found another way to kill herself, so she could join her beloved David in the "afterlife".

It is absolutely right the death penalty was abolished shortly after that. There have been many cruelly abused women over the years who have ended up killing their partner either in self defence, or from a genuine crime of passion.

I don't know the intricacies of the law in 1955, I was a child, although I do remember the case.

Ruth Ellis pleaded guilty, did the law allow for not guilty after the jury found her guilty, the judge had no choice the Home Office did

I am against the death penalty but i question what of the many who were hanged ?

eazybee

Ruth Ellis was guilty of murder and condemned herself by her own words in response to the prosecuting counsel's question:
"It was obvious that when I shot him I intended to kill him." There was no other verdict to be found, and she consistently refused to use possible mitigating circumstances for a reprieve. It was her family and friends who were seeking an appeal.
And a defence is based on the defendant's information given to her counsel.

It was her family and friends who were seeking an appeal

The judge himself, Cecil Havers, sought a reprieve.

He obviously felt uneasy about the verdict and the sentence although he had no alternative but to deliver both.

Yes, armed with a gun she approached Blakely, it was the 50’s,
she was single, was free to leave him

This may be of interest

November 2004, with the judges saying that the cost and resources of quashing the conviction could not be justified, as there is no "tangible benefit" when "the convicted person has been executed and there are no other penalties ensuing", although they believe "Timothy Evans should indeed be regarded as having been innocent of the charge of which he was convicted."[31]