Are the Ramseys involved or not?

New here, sorry if this is old. But, @ 30:50

[video=youtube;7YROdRPPP48]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YROdRPPP48[/video]

That flippant attitude just rubs me the wrong way.

meade said:

New here, sorry if this is old. But, @ 30:50

[video=youtube;7YROdRPPP48]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YROdRPPP48[/video]

That flippant attitude just rubs me the wrong way.

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Agree, attitude isn't evidence but everything about her is confrontational and defensive. When my teens acted this way my husband and I heard alarms in our head and knew something was wrong. Patsy behavior is just wrong for a mom of a murdered child.

Cranberry said:

yes qft, or maybe gloves? thermometer?! from PR interview 6/98

20 PATSY RAMSEY: Not on a day-to-day
21 basis, not really. I don't know why the drawers
22 would have been out, but...
23 THOMAS HANEY: What's normally
24 stored in those?
25 PATSY RAMSEY: Well, that's usually
0285
1 where I kept my supplies for my -- when I was
2 taking chemo, when I had my shots and my little
3 alcohol wipes, thermometers, and all that kind
4 of stuff. And I could have been looking
5 through, looking for a thermometer to take on
6 vacation.

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Thank you Cranberry for the above SNIP from PR's interview. It helped me take a mental snapshot, step back away from the case for a moment... here is my insight(which I doubt is any new idea, but worth mentioning ok):

This case is painful to think about, then and now. Back when the murder occurred, many people could not emotionally fathom a mother doing the killing. Since then, speculation about the father still confounds many. And perhaps hardest to accept is the theory of the young brother.

BUT... seeing this snippet from PR interview now, my first thought/question is: did the children gravitate toward the JR bathroom drawers precisely because they contained "PLAYING DOCTOR" supplies???????

think about it

CorallaroC said:

Thank you Cranberry for the above SNIP from PR's interview. It helped me take a mental snapshot, step back away from the case for a moment... here is my insight(which I doubt is any new idea, but worth mentioning ok):

This case is painful to think about, then and now. Back when the murder occurred, many people could not emotionally fathom a mother doing the killing. Since then, speculation about the father still confounds many. And perhaps hardest to accept is the theory of the young brother.

BUT... seeing this snippet from PR interview now, my first thought/question is: did the children gravitate toward the JR bathroom drawers precisely because they contained "PLAYING DOCTOR" supplies???????

think about it

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Hi CorallaroC, When I look at the photo, in one word, I see "haste" rather than "sneak", which would put it post-murder IMO. Or possibly a packing frenzy as PR pretty much admits, which eliminates an intruder, so that narrows it down.

UKGuy said:

Priscilla White might have been referring to JonBenet being sexually assaulted at sleepovers, and her acting out inappropriately?

.

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So, why in the feckin' hell would Priscilla wait to tell Patsy about such an occurrance instead of telling her earlier?

icedtea4me said:

So, why in the feckin' hell would Priscilla wait to tell Patsy about such an occurrance instead of telling her earlier?

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And why wouldn't Patsy badger Priscilla to tell her everything she claims to know, rather than shut her down?? Why does Patsy even tell this story? it doesn't make her look like a parent desperate to know who killed her daughter.

TD

icedtea4me said:

So, why in the feckin' hell would Priscilla wait to tell Patsy about such an occurrance instead of telling her earlier?

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Patsy said a lot of negative things about Priscilla and Fleet's behaviour at the funeral in Atlanta. She spins stories of Fleet acting like a madman, her family wanting to arm themselves in defence, and a yelling match between John and Fleet, followed by the Whites storming off and exiting Atlanta ahead of schedule. In a subsequent police interview John said that none of that happened.

We know that the White's have always been cooperative with LE and tight lipped with the press, so if Priscilla knew anything, I'm positive that she told LE all about it.

TinaD said:

And why wouldn't Patsy badger Priscilla to tell her everything she claims to know, rather than shut her down?? Why does Patsy even tell this story? it doesn't make her look like a parent desperate to know who killed her daughter.

TD

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At that point in time the Ramsey's were subtly pointing fingers at the Whites and others. This was Patsy's way of telling LE that Priscilla knows more than she should wink wink.

Teresa said:

Agree, attitude isn't evidence but everything about her is confrontational and defensive. When my teens acted this way my husband and I heard alarms in our head and knew something was wrong. Patsy behavior is just wrong for a mom of a murdered child.

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That's a problem I've had, too. Not just here; her interview with Haney was loaded with snark.

singularity said:

And I said, "I am the mother of this child. And I know nothing."

TOM HANEY: What was she referring to?

PATSY RAMSEY: I don't have a clue.

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It may be nothing, but I find I find it odd in the 911 call and interviews she says "I'm the mother." To me this use of the definite article is distancing. I would use it to describe playing a part in a play or something.

I don't know if it's relevant to the crime, but I find the language very odd, distant language I would never use to describe my relationship to my kids.

singularity said:

I also believe there was something sinister about that 911 call on the 23rd. The chances of an accidental/hangup 911 call in a home where two days later a real 911 call takes place are probably a trillion to one.

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I agree it's suspicious. The odds of someone calling 911 by accident two days before a real emergency are low. But we have to look at the odds of all suspicious-looking things happening in the days prior to a crime. I suspect if you looked at many crimes, you could go back and find something anomalous but unrelated in the days before. The chances of any one anomaly occurring are low but the chances of something anomalous occurring are high.

Fleet was a crucial key to the puzzle. Only two men went down into that basement multiple times throughout the day and also wound up being the two down there when her body is found. Fleet saw the basement at different moments and I assume would have noticed different items being moved around. When seeing this, how many people not named John would he suspect as the person doing this? Patsy's movements in the house that morning/afternoon can be accounted for. John goes off the grid at several moments that day.

singularity said:

I'd also like to know why after Fleet's first trip to the basement he immediately suggests Burke be taken out of the house.

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I do not understand why they didn't want to get him out of the house immediately. If the Ramsey's story happened to me and I woke up to find a ransom note and my daughter gone, I would be freaked out. If the perpetrators could sneak in and spirit her off while everyone was asleep, might one be hiding in the closet, have planted a bug, or might be monitoring from a nearby location, esp if the note said I would be monitored closely and mentioned electronic devices. I'd want to get everyone outside immediately.

It just blows my mind that they, their friends, and the police did not do a security check of the house. I do a check if I hear a strange but almost certainly benign noise in the house. Imagine if I came home and saw signs of a robbery. The first logical thought is the perpetrators might still be in the house or nearby.

Instead of a home invasion, they act as if she were kidnapped from a public place and their home is a place of safety.

AndHence said:

If they reported their daughter missing without a note or any evidence of a break-in and then her body is found dead in the house LE would have made an arrest immediately. The note pointed away from the Ramseys, explained JonBenet's 'missing' body, and give them time to contaminate the crime scene.

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It seems to me if they did it they would be better off trashing part of the house a bit and claim a few hundred dollars was missing. That would leave open the possibility that it was a robbery with an opportunistic kidnapping or the other way around. The foreign faction story doesn't make any sense. I don't see how it helped them unless it just gave police something to spin on. I don't think anyone literally thought it was a foreign faction or whatever, but rather maybe the note made them spin on who would write such a bizarre note. I would not expect the note to make it less likely for the police to arrest them.

OliviaG1996 said:

Yes. Here's part of the National Enquirer article:

'He heard us screaming. He heard Patsy ...a woman in terror,' John confessed. 'We thought he was asleep but he wasn't. Burke was awake.'

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They have an odd way of talking that reminds me of describing a play. She's "the mom", "a woman in terror."

It doesn't prove anything, but a lot of their language has a theatrical feel to it.

UKGuy said:

Staged or hidden away in the train-room? Fleet White's observation was first hand, ours is biased depending on whatever theory we hold. Whenever a theory relies on ad-hoc adjustments, i.e. Fleet White could not see JonBenet because she was further in, or far to the left, etc, then I prefer Fleet White's version, since if others can offer ad-hoc reasons for Fleet White missing JonBenet then I can suggest similar ad-hoc reasons for her being elsewhere, except I have Fleet White as corroboration.

Moving from the train-room to the wine-cellar is not that risky. Fleet White's initial observation, i.e. that the wine-cellar was empty, suggests JonBenet was located elsewhere in the basement. There is no staging in the wine-cellar, other than JonBenet being moved there, her associated artifacts could simply be remnants from a prior staging? Certainly her pink pajama bottoms, worn the previous night are missing, never to be recorded. The pink bloodstained barbie nightgown was dumped in the wine-cellar and finally JonBenet was wearing white long johns, thats three items of lower torso clothing! I reckon the wine-cellar crime-scene is the outcome of penning the ransom note, JonBenet had to vanish, out of sight, so the R's could make the 911 call.

.

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That would be possible but I was referring to a location such as their bedroom, garage, car,etc. Unlikely I know but something about that whole basement "sequence" has always been off. Even if you take Fleet opening the wine cellar out of the equation, the scene down in the basement is evolving throughout the day. John even admits things have been moved around and its mind boggling that Smit would sit there with him while he's saying that and neither man realize that the mover of these items can only be one person and its the man Smit is questioning. Only reason John admits this is because photographic evidence was staring him in the face.

I consider what little we know about the wine cellar as staging. If not technically staging, a dumping ground for lack of a better term. Dolls, cigar boxes, possibly photographs, the nightgown, that "cotton" Patsy comments on when viewing a photograph,etc. I do agree that this is likely remnants of one or even two prior staging events. I don't think anyone, including BPD on the scene ever saw the 'authentic' crime scene, if such a thing even existed. It was continually evolving.

UKGuy said:

Priscilla White might have been referring to JonBenet being sexually assaulted at sleepovers, and her acting out inappropriately?

.

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If so, she better have reported this to BPD. To hell with telling Patsy. I don't think she gave a rat's patootie.

UKGuy said:

ours is biased depending on whatever theory we hold.

.

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This is certainly true. I was a fence straddler for eons. Never liked to box myself in to a specific theory. Earlier this year I took a refresher on this case by reading most of the books again and Kolar's as well. Also read the transcripts which were brutal and needless to say...frustrating. After this huge crash course there's just no way I can buy them not having any involvement in the murder and/or coverup. Even if involved on a minor level, they're guilty. Period. You don't write ransom notes for strange intruders. I gave them the benefit of the doubt for years. I cant do it anymore. They were neck deep in the events that night and all the way up to the discovery of her body.

I wish I had read those full transcripts years ago. I feel like a fool.

When I look at the photo, in one word, I see "haste" rather than "sneak", which would put it post-murder IMO

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I agree. It screams "time is of the essence". Gotta get that freak show a rollin'....

which eliminates an intruder, so that narrows it down.

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It certainly does.

So, why in the feckin' hell would Priscilla wait to tell Patsy about such an occurrance instead of telling her earlier?

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Good question.

I was reading FFJ recently(old discussions) and I assume you're the same poster with the Steve Martin avatar. Some great discussions. Wish I had posted there back then(2007-08). I had already fled the forums due to the lunatic fringe dominating them. Couldn't handle it. Too disturbing. These communities might be less active than they were back in the old days but at least most of that element appears to be gone.

It may be nothing, but I find I find it odd in the 911 call and interviews she says "I'm the mother." To me this use of the definite article is distancing. I would use it to describe playing a part in a play or something.

I don't know if it's relevant to the crime, but I find the language very odd, distant language I would never use to describe my relationship to my kids.

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The whole 911 call is disturbing. On a certain level it also feels scripted and I thought it interesting in the transcripts Patsy made a sacrastic remark about not having time to write out a script.

PATSY RAMSEY: Yeah well, at that moment in time, nobody was in any kind of control. When you wake up at the crack of dawn and your child is not in the bed that you put them in the night before, you are not in control. Okay?

TOM HANEY: Okay.

PATSY RAMSEY: Now, I don't know who is more or less in or out of control. But you do what you feel like you need to do at the time, and whoever -- you know, it's not the time to sit down and write out the script. I will read, you call. You know. You just do it.

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The distancing is creepy...even more so taking into account they had supposedly just found the note. I also thought it odd that she mentions Jonbenet is blonde. Technically she wasn't and even if she is, you wont mention her name but tell 911 her hair color?

Here's the part that really feels scripted...

PR: We have a kidnapping...Hurry, please

911: Explain to me what is going on, ok?

PR: We have a ...There’s a note left and our daughter is gone

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The whole thing lacks authenticity and you gave the best example....I am "the" mother and not I am "her" mother. Distancing, depersonalizing, and she already knows she is dead.

"We have a kidnapping" isn't a genuine, instant reaction either.

This part gave me chills in its level of cunning...

911: Do you know how long she’s been gone?

PR: No, I don’t, please, we just got up

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She is already establishing the fact that they just woke up even though we know that isn't true.



We...The....Her.....She....

Let's not dare say her name. Might remind them she's an actual person and that might complicate the task at hand.

I do not understand why they didn't want to get him out of the house immediately.

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On the other hand, once cops arrive it is the safest place in town. Only danger would be Barney Fife pulling out his gun.

It just blows my mind that they, their friends, and the police did not do a security check of the house. I do a check if I hear a strange but almost certainly benign noise in the house. Imagine if I came home and saw signs of a robbery. The first logical thought is the perpetrators might still be in the house or nearby.

Instead of a home invasion, they act as if she were kidnapped from a public place and their home is a place of safety.

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Had this been a kosher kidnapping gone wrong, they would have found her long before calling 911. You would have checked every room in that house multiple times. There would have been a chance of the kids pulling a prank. Burke would have been woken up immediately, demanded to know what was going on and if he knew where she was, then they would have run through that house screaming her name. Once realizing she really IS gone, panic sets in and you call 911. Patsy never would have let her son out of her sight after finding an authentic ransom note.

They did none of this. It's because they knew she was dead and had written the note themselves. You don't go looking for kidnapping victims that have been murdered in your home. You know where they are. You also know your other child isn't at risk.

It is referred to by many as a perfect crime....in many ways it is....but they made mistakes. First mistake being how they wouldn't touch that ransom note under any circumstances. John turns into a contortionist just so he can read it on the stairs. They overthought this aspect. That note could have been ANYTHING. A note from the housekeeper....Jonbenet's scribblings.....an old Burke homework assignment tossed there....

but they wouldn't pick it up immediately and read it. Its because they both already knew what the note said.

I don't believe they found it there but that's beside the point.

It seems to me if they did it they would be better off trashing part of the house a bit and claim a few hundred dollars was missing. That would leave open the possibility that it was a robbery with an opportunistic kidnapping or the other way around. The foreign faction story doesn't make any sense.

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This is an excellent point. It was also what I initially leaned towards happening back then when first hearing about it. She woke up for a snack or to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and had walked right into a robbery in progress. They didn't know what to do with her so they killed her. Its not unprecedented. Its such a big house I can easily picture such a scenario. On its face it makes some sense but then there's the bizarre nature of the note, the suspicious activities that day, and last but not least the personal nature of the crime.

I think you're right...flush that note down the toilet and burn some cash, couple credit cards, and a checkbook in the fireplace. Maybe swallow a few rings. Instant robbery...instant get out of jail free card.

Having said that, the note achieved its mission. It stumps people to this very day and this crime will be studied for centuries.

I don't think anyone literally thought it was a foreign faction or whatever, but rather maybe the note made them spin on who would write such a bizarre note. I would not expect the note to make it less likely for the police to arrest them.

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Yeah no one but a couple loons ever believed it was a "foreign faction". That's a red herring. Even if it was an intruder they would have added such a term just to create confusion.

I'm sorry to say, but you have to be really, really ignorant of the facts and basic logic if you for one second think the Ramseys had absolutely NOTHING to do with a cover up in this case.

singularity said:

Had this been a kosher kidnapping gone wrong, they would have found her long before calling 911. You would have checked every room in that house multiple times. There would have been a chance of the kids pulling a prank. Burke would have been woken up immediately, demanded to know what was going on and if he knew where she was, then they would have run through that house screaming her name. Once realizing she really IS gone, panic sets in and you call 911. Patsy never would have let her son out of her sight after finding an authentic ransom note.

They did none of this. It's because they knew she was dead and had written the note themselves. You don't go looking for kidnapping victims that have been murdered in your home. You know where they are. You also know your other child isn't at risk.

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This is my view exactly. The post it came from is a great summary is a great break-down of the Ramsey's initial response doesn't make sense. Thank you.

singularity said:

The distancing is creepy...even more so taking into account they had supposedly just found the note. I also thought it odd that she mentions Jonbenet is blonde. Technically she wasn't and even if she is, you wont mention her name but tell 911 her hair color?

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Maybe PR was used to seeing her presented at pageant that way. Her name is... hair color is... the mom is... I've never been to a pageant, so have no idea, but that's how I imagine it.

It sounds like she's either distancing herself from JBR or always thought of JBR as pretty prop and PR played the role of "the mom". I have no evidence PR exhibited this show-pony behavior, but it sounds like it.

UKGuy said:

Moving from the train-room to the wine-cellar is not that risky. Fleet White's initial observation, i.e. that the wine-cellar was empty, suggests JonBenet was located elsewhere in the basement. There is no staging in the wine-cellar, other than JonBenet being moved there, her associated artifacts could simply be remnants from a prior staging? Certainly her pink pajama bottoms, worn the previous night are missing, never to be recorded. The pink bloodstained barbie nightgown was dumped in the wine-cellar and finally JonBenet was wearing white long johns, thats three items of lower torso clothing! I reckon the wine-cellar crime-scene is the outcome of penning the ransom note, JonBenet had to vanish, out of sight, so the R's could make the 911 call.

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singularity said:

That would be possible but I was referring to a location such as their bedroom, garage, car,etc. Unlikely I know but something about that whole basement "sequence" has always been off. Even if you take Fleet opening the wine cellar out of the equation, the scene down in the basement is evolving throughout the day. John even admits things have been moved around and its mind boggling that Smit would sit there with him while he's saying that and neither man realize that the mover of these items can only be one person and its the man Smit is questioning. Only reason John admits this is because photographic evidence was staring him in the face.

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Is UKGuy saying they went to the trouble to stage a crime scene but changed their mind and moved it? Or are you and UKGuy saying maybe the Ramsey's reworked some aspects of the body in one location with the intention of dumping the body in the wine cellar before calling the police?

If the body was being moved and/or other elements of staging were being completed after the police arrived, the Ramsey's are incredibly lucky. A logical criminal would get everything together before calling the police. The only scenario I can think of is with John remembering something incriminating and then scrambling to fix it while the police were there. I could see him panicking in Tell-Tail Heart fashion. But Arndt said he was cordial.

singularity said:

I consider what little we know about the wine cellar as staging. If not technically staging, a dumping ground for lack of a better term. Dolls, cigar boxes, possibly photographs, the nightgown, that "cotton" Patsy comments on when viewing a photograph,etc. I do agree that this is likely remnants of one or even two prior staging events. I don't think anyone, including BPD on the scene ever saw the 'authentic' crime scene, if such a thing even existed. It was continually evolving.

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Why dump things used in the staging in the same place as the body?

CircuitGuy,

Is UKGuy saying they went to the trouble to stage a crime scene but changed their mind and moved it? Or are you and UKGuy saying maybe the Ramsey's reworked some aspects of the body in one location with the intention of dumping the body in the wine cellar before calling the police?

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What I'm suggesting is that the primary crime-scene was located upstairs, someone relocated JonBenet and forensic evidence to the basement, this became a movable feast, with ad-hoc elements being added and removed, hence JR's stories about the broken window, the chair and suitcase, i.e. he moved the suitcase, who cares?

So the secondary crime-scene might have been located in the train-room, with JR moving JonBenet later that morning, also James Kolar thinks JonBenet was whacked in the breakfast bar, then relocated to the basement, something that BR could have done, dragging her body so explaining all the abrasions on her body?

.

CircuitGuy said:

Maybe PR was used to seeing her presented at pageant that way. Her name is... hair color is... the mom is... I've never been to a pageant, so have no idea, but that's how I imagine it.

It sounds like she's either distancing herself from JBR or always thought of JBR as pretty prop and PR played the role of "the mom". I have no evidence PR exhibited this show-pony behavior, but it sounds like it.

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Indeed! I always thought PR's description of JBR as "a blonde" VERY weird in the 911 call. Is it possible she only thought of JBR as what she was presented as at pageants?