I've heard a lot of debate recently about whether Stride was a Ripper victim or not.
I am personally of the opinion that she is. What is different from this murder is that Stride did not only bear a lack of mutilations, but she had her throat cut but once instead of the Ripper's signature double silencing done with such ferocity that it went down to the spine and almost severed the head on some occasions. Not only this, but it seems like Stride was attacked from behind, and in a location untypical of Jack the Ripper, which leads some people to believe that this was done by a different killer.
Having said that, it is also important to note that JtR was a massive risk taker; an opportunist. Not only that, but rarely does a serial killer have each and every murder run hunky dory, and that combined with the fact that his location proved a greater chance of being stumbled upon makes for an interesting concoction of possible outcomes and events. Many people believe that it was the horse and cart that disturbed the Ripper, if this was in fact the killer, but I am of a much simpler and perhaps more sensible conclusion, that it was Schwartz who interrupted the murder by Jack the Ripper.
Now this makes for some rather radical decisions to be made by the killer - does he carry on how he planned and run the huge risk of Schwartz running after the police (which would have been running through his mind as I can imagine he would be quite paranoid), does he leave Stride and escape the area without any murder and leave an incredible witness to testify to great detail what he looked like, sounded like etc... and practically give himself away to the police, or does he kill her off quickly so that she cannot peach to the police and get the heck out of there so that Schwartz has no time to send the bobby after him? I know what I would do. So this leaves us with the scenario that he strangles her (her eyes were bulging, so this is probable), cuts her throat once to ensure that she's dead and walks away from the scene of the crime, obviously angry and frustrated that he couldn't carry out the mutilations so must fix another. This ties in with the story from a local, who heard who she thought was a bobby on the beat walk past her house shortly after the Schwartz incident. Which means that by the time Diemschutz drives by with his cart, JtR was long gone, back into the heart of Whitechapel and on the prowl for another easy victim.