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On the 1st May, following the murder of Bank Clerk, [http://crimehub.co.uk/index.php?title=Josephine_Whitaker_-_Yorkshire_Ripper_Victim Josephine Whitaker], an entry in the murder log approved the practice of eliminating suspects on the basis of the handwriting from the three "Sunderland" letters.
== 18th June 1979 ==
On the 18th June 1979 a further envelope addressed to [http://crimehub.co.uk/index.php?title=Assistant_Chief_Constable_Oldfield Mr. Oldfield] was posted in Sunderland.
When opened it was found to contain a cassette tape, recorded by a man with an accent which a voice expert said belonged to a man who had lived within 5 miles of Sunderland for much of his life. On the tape there was a personal message to Mr. Oldfield about his failure to detect the series of crimes.
The saliva on the envelope flap was quickly found to indicate a “B” secretor blood-group so linking it with the third letter and, as a result, with the Harrison murder. Senior officers in West Yorkshire now appeared to be fully convinced that the author of the letters and the tape recording was indeed the man responsible for the crimes which they were investigating and they decided to attach top priority to this aspect which, they felt, would be bound to lead to the detection of the Ripper crimes.
In addition to the major internal police effort it was decided to seek increasing assistance from members of the public in West Yorkshire and the North East of England in an attempt to identify the voice on the tape and the writing on the letters. Accordingly, a press conference was arranged, although the impact of it was slightly dulled by the publication earlier of some relevant aspects in the "Yorkshire Evening Post". Details of the letters and tape were given at the press conference, which was held on the 26th June 1979, and police inquiries thereafter concentrated on identifying a suspect who still lived in the North East of England or a suspect with origins in the North East who had subsequently moved to the West Yorkshire area. From this stage, existing lines of inquiry, some of which had already been suspended because of the demands of the Whitaker investigation, began to attract even lower priority.
