JB's picture in the laundry room

[Userid]

Userid, I was confused about that floorplan as well but the first photo is of the door closest to the staircase. You can see it's next to the study, which kind of juts out of the house in a semi-circle. I believe the butler door is the one on the other side of the floorplan where it's labeled Lower Hall and there's just a flat wall, like in the second picture. God this house is a nightmare.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Thanks Droll and Kanzz -- yeah, I'm dumb -- even though it's clearly marked as "storage," I thought that was another door entry into the house, but it's just a storage area that's connected to the house, but that's only accessible from the outside.

 

[UKGuy]

:laughing:Stop it!

When you say maybe they got the green light for the staging....are you saying you think they rang their lawyers as soon as they found JBR's body?

Miz Adventure,
Nope, sometime after they did a cleanup and staging. They must have phoned someone for general advice. Ether they told it like it was, which I doubt, or something along the lines, we have some trouble here, what do we do?

JR and PR knew what to expect prior to doing the 911 call. They were ready to have their rights read and ask for legal representation if arrested, so while they might be sitting in a police station their lawyers would be out asking some up front questions, locking folks into their answers.

Was it Mike Bynum who popped out of nowhere to tell JR what to do, early on? Personally this sounds like ad hoc rationalization on JR's part, he knows his lawyering up early needs an explanation.


.

 

[DeDee]

Fernie parked in the alley and is the only one who parked around back on Dec 26. Yes, he claimed to have stood at the R door near the study and read the RN upside down. I'll always wonder if he was there earlier than announced b/c I simply don't buy his version. There is a thread for just Fernie in the forum.

 

[Miz Adventure]

Was it Mike Bynum who popped out of nowhere to tell JR what to do, early on? Personally this sounds like ad hoc rationalization on JR's part, he knows his lawyering up early needs an explanation.


.

I believe the R's had lawyered up at least by the following day. When criticized for this JR tried to make out that he was 'advised' by Mike Bynum to get separate lawyers for each member of the family.

Which is rather a strange thing for a grieving couple to do isn't it? I don't think I've ever heard of such a thing.

As I see things there can only be one reason JR wanted PR to have a separate lawyer. If she spilled the beans, and told the truth about what happened, maybe even implicating JR a lot more than he wanted to be, and the couple had to stand trial then there would be a conflict of interests and in that event would definitely need separate lawyers.

JR was basically looking after No. 1.

 

[DrollForeignFaction]

Yes, Mike Bynum is the one who swooped in immediately to give advice. Supposedly he was out skiing and only got to the Fernies house later that night, coincidentally bringing food from Pasta Jay's just as police were trying to set up an interview. He stepped in as their friend/lawyer and refused on their behalf. Nice and convenient.

It's been speculated that he was called early on. Peter Boyles has claimed a source told him that he was called before the police but who knows. I would lean towards him being aware of the situation before he should have because of how quickly the lawyering began. But the thing I don't get is that if they did call their lawyer friend before staging, would he really tell them to do that? They did a terrible job, it seems risky. Especially if BDI, wouldn't Bynum point out Burke can't be charged? If he can't be held responsible staging the scene would amount to committing a crime they could theoretically be charged for.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[AB1]

My memory may be faulty, but hadn't JR started arrangements for the ransom payment very early on? He could have made additional calls then. Also later on, JR had ample time to use his mobile phone when he went out of earshot and eyeline of LA. But like the landline, a warrant was never issued for the mobile phone records, nor is there any suggestion this data was volunteered by the Ramseys.

I still find it astonishing that the audience of friends was both invited to a crime scene and allowed to stay there.

Does anyone know who authorised BR going to stay with a friend? As the sibling of a kidnapped child, he should have been under police protection for fear of being a target. With the ransom note immediately implying knowledge of the family, the police should not have accepted any friendships on face value.
Or had the FBI judged the scenario "fake" from VERY early on?

N.B. I was confused by the doors as well. I'm sure that in an article somewhere the butler's pantry door is pictured accompanying the info about Fernie reading the note. But it can't be that door, because the note was on the floor outside the kitchen by the stairs. I really had a fully glazed door in my head, and a shorter distance between door and note. So he read it upside down from a distance? Hmm... And without recognising the handwriting?!

 

[singularity]

That was an excellent post, Meara. You should post more often. Not enough attention is paid to the odd dynamic between those two in their relationship.

Remember FW says mid afternoon on 12/26/1996 he had JR's legal representatives at his door. This takes forward planning, not least by the legal reps' themselves, so JR had it all sown up before the 911 call.

Good observation.

Especially if BDI, wouldn't Bynum point out Burke can't be charged? If he can't be held responsible staging the scene would amount to committing a crime they could theoretically be charged for.

Good point. I'd loved to have seen their faces if they heard such a thing AFTER doing all that staging.

Does anyone know who authorised BR going to stay with a friend? As the sibling of a kidnapped child, he should have been under police protection for fear of being a target. With the ransom note immediately implying knowledge of the family, the police should not have accepted any friendships on face value.

If memory serves me correctly, it was Fleet who suggested to John that Burke should be sent to his house. This was right after his first trip to the basement. I think this was mentioned in Kolar's book.

I completely agree. No one in their circle should've been trusted at that point by LE. For all they knew, the "foreign faction" was camped outside the Whites waiting for Burke's arrival to kidnap him. Burke should've been guarded the nanosecond LE arrived.

Its just one of many examples of how bungled the case was from the starting gun.

Yeah the FBI believed it was an inside job....... although so did John.

 

[Meara]

Thanks Droll and Kanzz -- yeah, I'm dumb -- even though it's clearly marked as "storage," I thought that was another door entry into the house, but it's just a storage area that's connected to the house, but that's only accessible from the outside.

Hi Userid,

Not dumb but maybe intuitive? There used to be a door to the outside in exactly that spot. In other words, the hall had doors on both the south and north ends. IIRC the Rams had to relocate the spiral staircase during remodeling and at that time put in the wall now seen behind the spiral stairs. They converted the remaining space to a storage area for an additional hot water heater and installed a vented door on the outside. Below is a link to a photo of the stairs to the old north entrance, now with the vented door.

http://jameson245_archive.tripod.com/JCn5RS.jpg

 

[Meara]

Sorry to respond to posts out of order, but I'm hoping to catch a number of your are thinking about who the Rams might have called in the middle of the night. There's a thread at Forums For Justice called "Lawyering JonBenet" that I believe you'll find quite intriguing.

 

[Meara]

Good point about the Whites and the Fernies, Meara - despite everything they saw that morning, they still wanted to believe their friends did not do such a heinous thing. But it didn't last past the funeral with the Whites, which makes sense - FW saw more than anyone that day. But even the Fernies didn't stick by them forever. Barb aired various concerns to police in January 1998 and according to Kolar, "the Fernies indicated that they severed their contact with the family following their observation of that [misleading ad about the "broken lock" the Rams put in the paper]." So: those closest to the action were not fooled.

And who DID stand by the Ramseys? Susan and Glen Stine, supposedly not at all close to the Ramseys prior to the murder. Susan aka "Patsy's Pitbull" seemed to be slavishly devoted - why? Because she looked up to Patsy? Pam Archuleta, who wrote a book about her experiences with the Ramseys as the wife of their pilot, certainly did. It comes through in every line. Patsy was the classy, rich, sophisticated woman Pam wanted to be and she clearly felt that she was blessed for a woman like Patsy to show friendship to a mere "pilot's wife" (as she repeatedly refers to herself in the book). Even Pam expresses some doubts about their innocence but keeps reminding herself - these are good, Christian people, they couldn't be involved!

Linda McLean, Patsy's old coach? What does she know? I mean she wrote a book about her great memories with Patsy but what does she really know about the murder? Nothing. What does Crazy Aunt Pam know? I'd guess nothing as well. I find all that pretty telling.

True enough, Droll. The Whites and Fernies caught on quickly that something was rotten in Ramseyland, and I suspect they did in part because they were true friends who meant to give the Rams all their support when they needed it most. But of course since the Rams weren't telling the truth, their friends' efforts to stay close and understanding must have caused tremendous stress.

It's not completely clear what happened with the Whites after the 26th. The way I interpret what's been written, the Whites saw John + Patsy in their native habitat among the Atlanta elite and were appalled by - once they saw it clearly -the atmosphere of self-admiring phoniness. With the Fernies there was that lie about the door lock and also Barbara's vexed observation, reported either in PMPT or ITRMI, that she felt like she was grieving JonBenet more than Patsy was. Again, we don't have all the details, but it's not hard to imagine the increasing strangeness of the conversations on their long walks together, with Barbara thinking they could share their sorrow or raise each other's spirits while Patsy had to keep a lid on things + secretly wished she'd shut up.

I haven't read Pam Archuleta's book and know only what I've read about it here. Susan Stine remains a mystery to me. What was the bond? God only knows.

 

[Meara]

I'm hoping to catch a number of your are thinking about who the Rams might have called

"you who are thinking"........bloody autocorrect....

 

[Meara]

N.B. I was confused by the doors as well. I'm sure that in an article somewhere the butler's pantry door is pictured accompanying the info about Fernie reading the note. But it can't be that door, because the note was on the floor outside the kitchen by the stairs. I really had a fully glazed door in my head, and a shorter distance between door and note. So he read it upside down from a distance? Hmm... And without recognising the handwriting?!

Hi AB1. You may very well have seen an article identifying the butler's pantry door as the John Fernie memorial door. It's a common enough mix up that gets passed along. Also, if you can't tell from photos which door is which, you're bound to choose the butler's pantry door because it makes more sense. It has a lower frame height at the bottom and thus more glass, and there's more ambient light from the glass panels on either side.

The hall door adjacent to the kitchen is recessed and more in shadow. However, it's not next to the stairs. If you entered by that door, you'd have to walk to the other end of the hall to get to the spiral stairs. Once there, you'd see the stairs to the butler's pantry descending a few feet away on your right.

 

[passionflower]

When one says that something is a family TRADITION, at our house NOTHING stands in the way of PREPARING for an ANNUAL TRADITION. The Ramsey tradition was began by JR's father as I recall, one that JR was proud of, how can a CEO forget to prepare?

Typically the mother does ALL of the busy preparations for a LARGE holiday, for a father to FORGET his part - that being to PREPARE for his family tradition, hmmm.

One does not FORGET that. To make is sound so SPECIAL by calling it a TRADITION.

I have some special news, EVERYONE does take pictures at special occasions BUT particularly at Christmas, but they donut call it a tradition, they just 'do it'.

I do believe with my entire mental structure that SOMETHING happened during the PRESENT opening EARLY that morning that was not wished by the Ramseys to be seen by anyone.

Wonder how large the collection of videos from past traditional Christmases was? Were there far fewer snapped pictures Christmas 1996 than in the PAST? IF IF the collection of 'snapped' pictures for Christmas of 1996 were fewer than those of previous Christmases, something would definitely be OUT OF ORDER here. IF IF that was the case, then you donut have to even wonder about the forgetting part.

Lets see IF IF that was the case, then we have a 'forgetting' of taking a video, and a 'forgetting' of taking the same quantity of pictures as in traditional Christmases before.

I am also wondering since so MANY MANY pictures had been taken of JonBenet, HOW were they organized, by year, by event er, did PR make the 'picture history books' for the recording of age progression of this dear little girl?

How many pictures of Burke ?, and how were they ORGANIZED, probably not put in JonBenets book.

Hmmm.

Wouldn't it be ironic IF Burke grows up to be a movie star, or a star performer of some type, scientific discovery OR?

The world is indeed a strange place.


.

.

I just found this thread and found this post very interesting.

 

[Miz Adventure]

So many posters have raised interesting points on this thread since I last read it.

The note:

JR stated that he got down to read the note on the wooden floor, which is the one where the spiral staircase is. So the note would not have been visible from the butler's pantry.

And another thing about the note - JR needed glasses for reading. There is no mention of him having his glasses with him when he crouched down to read that note. (In the video of his Deposition he puts his glasses on to read the greetings cards which were obviously written by Patsy - the one where he says "No I don't know who wrote those")

The Fernies. I would love to know their reasons for cutting themselves off from the R's. Patsy states she doesn't know why this happened, but I'm sure she does. It could be for the same reasons the Whites left the R's circle of friends. They knew more than they wanted to but didn't want to go to the police. They hoped the R's would 'fess up'.

 

[Userid]

Hi Userid,

Not dumb but maybe intuitive? There used to be a door to the outside in exactly that spot. In other words, the hall had doors on both the south and north ends. IIRC the Rams had to relocate the spiral staircase during remodeling and at that time put in the wall now seen behind the spiral stairs. They converted the remaining space to a storage area for an additional hot water heater and installed a vented door on the outside. Below is a link to a photo of the stairs to the old north entrance, now with the vented door.

http://jameson245_archive.tripod.com/JCn5RS.jpg

Haha, yes, intuitive works much better!! Great information Meara, like always.

 

[Miz Adventure]

If memory serves me correctly, it was Fleet who suggested to John that Burke should be sent to his house. This was right after his first trip to the basement. I think this was mentioned in Kolar's book.

I completely agree. No one in their circle should've been trusted at that point by LE. For all they knew, the "foreign faction" was camped outside the Whites waiting for Burke's arrival to kidnap him. Burke should've been guarded the nanosecond LE arrived.

Its just one of many examples of how bungled the case was from the starting gun.

Yeah the FBI believed it was an inside job....... although so did John.

Yes, I think you'd have to have been wearing blinkers not to see things looked very dodgy in that house on that morning. And then the R's wondered (or said they wondered) why in the world the BDI would suspect them...the parents? How dare they suggest such a thing!

Anyway, back to what I was going to say....

In the light of the fact that JR tells more lies than Pinocchio and we need to take EVERYTHING that comes out of his mouth with a large pinch of sodium chloride.....I would say that it is far more likely that it would have been JR who suggested that FW takes BR away from the house. In fact he probably insisted. It would have been part of the plan, to get BR out of way before the cops start asking questions.

And JR probably didn't want BR to be present when JBR's body was discovered.

 

[Tortoise]

I think more than likely JR and PR wanted to keep BR in his room and told him to stay there, in case he found JonBenet before the police looked.

 

[UKGuy]

I think more than likely JR and PR wanted to keep BR in his room and told him to stay there, in case he found JonBenet before the police looked.

Tortoise,
Kolar just phoned to ask but BR knows where JonBenet is because he put her there.


.

 

[Tortoise]

Tortoise,
Kolar just phoned to ask but BR knows where JonBenet is because he put her there.


.

I can understand Kolar being unsure.

 

[UKGuy]

I can understand Kolar being unsure.

Tortoise,
LOL, well he does think BDI All. So maybe JR does not want BR to do what he would do in the coming hours?

Anyway, why was BR not assisting in the search for JonBenet in the first place?

My sister is missing and nobody told me?

.