Patsy Ramsey

[Tawny]

Except we know that this transfer was not that way as there is no RAMSEY DNA and the DNA in her panties matches the Touch DNA found on the pants.

Just because people want to believe it does not exist does not mean it will go away. That DNA is science and the answer to who hurt her that night. IMO

Someday you'll pull that wool away from your eyeballs and remember that there is an IF qualifier in that DNA report.

But keep hammering away at that DNA. Maybe if you wish it hard enough it will make it relevant.

 

[Hexe]

I find this comment amusing. Everyone who read the ransom note realized it was a fake ransom note. It was dramatic and over the top with lines taken straight from movies and the amount of money not being anything that indicated a real ransom note.

But apparently John and Patsy were supposed to buy it hook line and sinker and freak out like they were in a movie, playing along.

Yes, they were supposed to buy it because the life of their daughter was at the stake. As overly dramatic and fake the RN might sound, Ramseys (if they were totally innocent, that is) had no way to tell if the perps were serious, or not.

Instead what the parents did was call every single person at their disposal to try to get their daughter back. The note doesn't read REAL. It reads fake from beginning to end and indicates that the person who did this knew John in an intimate way. So it makes sense to me that they would call everyone they felt they could trust.

...risking the Jon Benet's life. How could they know the kidnappers would not punish Jon Benet for their disobedience?

 

[chlban]

I find this comment amusing. Everyone who read the ransom note realized it was a fake ransom note. It was dramatic and over the top with lines taken straight from movies and the amount of money not being anything that indicated a real ransom note.

But apparently John and Patsy were supposed to buy it hook line and sinker and freak out like they were in a movie, playing along.

Instead what the parents did was call every single person at their disposal to try to get their daughter back. The note doesn't read REAL. It reads fake from beginning to end and indicates that the person who did this knew John in an intimate way. So it makes sense to me that they would call everyone they felt they could trust.

That's one of the most ludicrous things I have ever read here. So the Ramsey's immediately deternined that the RN was "off" and were so certain that they were completely comfortable risking their daughters life with that certainty?

Oh, but of course, they never mentioned their absolute certainty about the fake RN to LE that morning. Kinda slipped their mind I guess.

I guess they were also completely certain that this person who knew John so intimately, and clearly must have hated him, would kill JB just out of spite for defying the instructions in the fake, over the top RN?

That is an amazing amount of certainty even for arrogant creeps like the Ramseys. Particularly when your daughters life is at stake.

 

[Cailin Rua]

They were so savvy that they realized right away that they could disregard the note, but not savvy enough to realize that having every friend in Boulder in the house would only create confusion and distraction and possibly destroy evidence that could help safely recover their daughter.

Makes sense.

 

[lawstudent]

Yeah, the way they didn't react to the ransom note/calls to me is the most damning of all, because I can't come up with alternative explanations for that other than complete mental collapse from the stress. Although, if I were trying to cover up a crime, I also don't think I'd want to invite so many people over who might pick up on something being off.

 

[chlban]

Yeah, the way they didn't react to the ransom note/calls to me is the most damning of all, because I can't come up with alternative explanations for that other than complete mental collapse from the stress. Although, if I were trying to cover up a crime, I also don't think I'd want to invite so many people over who might pick up on something being off.

Except Patsy fancied herself as an actress of sorts, enough that her "talent" was dramatic reading in her pageant days, so I doubt she was worried.

 

[Cailin Rua]

Yeah, the way they didn't react to the ransom note/calls to me is the most damning of all, because I can't come up with alternative explanations for that other than complete mental collapse from the stress. Although, if I were trying to cover up a crime, I also don't think I'd want to invite so many people over who might pick up on something being off.

Unless they are people who love and support you and will run interference with the police if there are "too many questions."

Dragging more people into a potential conflict is a well-known avoidance tactic. Therapists call it "triangulation" though with all the people there it was more like octagonation.

 

[lawstudent]

Unless they are people who love and support you and will run interference with the police if there are "too many questions."

Dragging more people into a potential conflict is a well-known avoidance tactic. Therapists call it "triangulation" though with all the people there it was more like octagonation.

It's hard for me to place myself in the situation both because of the strangeness of it and because I always think 500 steps ahead and way overanalyze/worry about things, but trying to take on the mindset of John and Patsy:

I might call someone to cling to to break up the awkwardness and focus, but I would not want to have to keep explaining a false story to that many people and have them watching my reaction. Plus, if I had written the note with the threats, presumably I'd know not to then make it so obvious there was a problem. Maybe they just weren't thinking, but I don't know. I just don't know. It wasn't very well planned out, but this was in a time pre-crime show craze, and I could see them making such mistakes. But I still am baffled as to what actually happened that led to the need to cover up, and that's why I'm hesitant to formulate such detailed theories as to what they did.

ETA: I also hate people around me in a crisis situation so I just can't relate. I'd be self-conscious because I tend to be unemotional and wouldn't want to be judged and have to feel like I was putting on enough of a show. I'd just be focused on finding my child, and also I feel like I'd know that ransom note made no sense, and then really start panicking. I'd tell the cops to come quietly, and then be rambling on about who could have done it. And if I'd staged the scene, i wouldn't have written that ridiculous note, so I can't say what I'd do.

 

[Cailin Rua]

I don't like a ton of people a around in a crisis either, but I think that's just a matter of personality type. I think the "collapsed, can't answer questions " act probably goes down better with a sympathetic audience to back it up.

Plus she didn't die in prison so it seems like it worked.

 

[Cailin Rua]

As an aside, I think getting away with murder is mostly sheer dumb luck. And money helps.

 

[lawstudent]

Plus she didn't die in prison so it seems like it worked.

I think what worked is not talking. Without cooperation, I think the investigators were baffled, and while in today's society they may have felt they had to prosecute anyway, back then they did not. Plus, nowadays it would be easier for more info to leak out and you'd have more electronic records, etc., and more suspicion on parents in general. Back then, it would have been hard to establish whether the killing was intentional or an accident and who did it. I really just don't know - clearly the investigation did not proceed as one would expect, but I think that was largely luck. By framing it as a kidnapping, they ended up with a lot more time to avoid tough questions. I wonder if nowadays an Amber Alert would have gone out or if that would have been considered too risky given the note, even though I'm sure the police would realize it was at least partly made up.

 

[Anti-K]

The Ramseys called the police FIRST. That means that the police could (they did!) have arrived before anyone else and the police could have (should have!) prevented anyone else from entering the home. If the Ramseys had wanted friends, etc present to confuse or muddle the crime scene or to act as some sort of buttress between them and the police than they would have called the friends, etc. first and allowed time for them to arrive before calling the police.

While it seems strange that the Ramseys would call people over (did they ASK people to come over, or did people just come over because they were called?) I know that there are many people who claim that they would have done the same thing. I don’t know what I would have done.

The reaction to the note seems genuine – they panicked and called the police before reading the second page (there are no threats on the first page). Calling others is just a way of dealing with the shock – it’s doing something when something must be done but one doesn’t know what to do.

No offence to lawstudent, but this notion that faking a kidnapping would somehow provide the Ramseys with time to avoid tough questions is hard to defend. Reporting a kidnapping with the body still in the house, telling the police that the house was secure, unnecessarily using and creating self-incriminating evidence, etc...? creating a situation in which the police are going to occupy your home waiting for a kidnapper to call, etc... ? no, this is not the way to go about avoiding questions; this is a way to create questions and the opportunity to be observed (and questions).
...

AK

 

[BOESP]

Unless the Ramsey phone records are revealed we commoners don't know who the Ramseys called first.

 

[pukasonqo2]

well, for the sake of argument let's say they knew the note was fake, after all this silent intruder (s) came so unprepared they had to source pen and paper from the R's, at the same time they were so clever that they could fake PR's handwriting almost perfectly.

if the note is fake and the Rs know it they also know that they have to, at least, go through the motions: call the cops, panic, gather friends for support and as witnesses

as far as i know the Rs asked people to come over, they called the whites and the others

at this point everyone thinks JB is gone, out of the house. the cops are treating the Rs as victims of a kidnapping, the house hasn't been secured as a CS and the cops and everyone else not involved w the staging thinks JB is in a place unknown.

i think they took a gamble and it paid off. maybe (and this is my MOO, i feel like a cow when i see those letters) the idea was to "discover" JB outside the house but FW taking into his own to search for her forced their hand to "discover" JB's body

there are so many maybes...the police should have never allowed FW to go searching as he could have contaminated the CS, at that point nobody (except those involved) knew where the kidnappers had been hiding or how they entered the house. allowing people to come and go at will did nothing but complicate matters more

AK, how do you explain the RN that was written all w materials found in the R's house and with almost identical handwriting to PR? i am not being demanding i just would like to have another perspective on the RN


lupus est homini , non , non quom qualis sit novit

 

[lawstudent]

if the note is fake and the Rs know it they also know that they have to, at least, go through the motions: call the cops, panic, gather friends for support and as witnesses

. . .

i think they took a gamble and it paid off. maybe (and this is my MOO, i feel like a cow when i see those letters) the idea was to "discover" JB outside the house but FW taking into his own to search for her forced their hand to "discover" JB's body
. . .
AK, how do you explain the RN that was written all w materials found in the R's house and with almost identical handwriting to PR? i am not being demanding i just would like to have another perspective on the RN

Again, I think this depends on the person, but my idea of "going through the motions" would never include calling other people to come over. It's just strange to me. I could see calling a friend or family member who is a police officer, or someone you think might know more about what happened if JonBenet had been old enough to, for example, have school friends who might know if she'd been having problems, or her grandparents so they don't hear on the news, maybe even a pastor, but several family friends? I mean I guess it depends on the types of relationships you have, but it's just a weird reaction to me in the initial hours. It's just speculation, though.

If it was intended that her body be found outside, I think that changes a whole lot in terms of how everything fits together. But because we can't know, I feel like it's really hard to decide what actually happened. Those are the details I'm talking about - the ones we can't know. The whole thing makes more sense from a RDI perspective if she was to be found outside. But then why call people over? Call the police and then hope they go on a chase and you can sneak her away. I don't know that the Ramseys viewed the house as a crime scene, whether they were involved or not, and I'm pretty sure they didn't. Everyone thought she was gone or was supposed to be gone and that's why no one took proper security measures. Only in hindsight does the house appear to be the crime scene, and there's not much to contaminate if there are no signs of a struggle and at that point no one assumes she was injured yet.

I don't think the RN was identical to Patsy's handwriting. She couldn't be ruled out, and there are similarities for sure. But identical is a stretch.

The Ramseys called the police FIRST. That means that the police could (they did!) have arrived before anyone else and the police could have (should have!) prevented anyone else from entering the home. If the Ramseys had wanted friends, etc present to confuse or muddle the crime scene or to act as some sort of buttress between them and the police than they would have called the friends, etc. first and allowed time for them to arrive before calling the police.

. . .

No offence to lawstudent, but this notion that faking a kidnapping would somehow provide the Ramseys with time to avoid tough questions is hard to defend. Reporting a kidnapping with the body still in the house, telling the police that the house was secure, unnecessarily using and creating self-incriminating evidence, etc...? creating a situation in which the police are going to occupy your home waiting for a kidnapper to call, etc... ? no, this is not the way to go about avoiding questions; this is a way to create questions and the opportunity to be observed (and questions).
...

AK

Your first point is a very good point that I had not considered. However, if they thought the police would be out on a hunt and a while had gone by before other investigators arrived, the friends could have been invited over to alleviate the awkwardness and restlessness in the meantime, whether they were involved or not. I mean, they were just waiting around, right? I don't believe it was a calculated plan way in advance, but it just could have seemed like a good way to keep conversation from going places they didn't want or to take the focus off of them due to either guilt or grief.

I'm not 100% Ramsey did it, so I was posing that more as a hypothetical, but you make good points regarding the delay in questioning. It definitely was not a perfect plan if that's what happened, but if you find a dead body in the house, you are going to get immediate questions and a lockdown of the house, and maybe even arrests. There's no real way to report that to 911 and really give any good explanation that's remotely plausible. A kidnapping may send police away (not in reality, but I could see people thinking this), giving you time to get rid of the body or at least make it look more like a kidnapping. It also at the very least makes your initial reaction easier to come up with because you don't have to offer an explanation of what happened, and it paints you in a sympathetic, panicked light that is harder to read. The house being secured makes no sense - I agree on that point. That's one of the things that makes me doubt RDI.

 

[pukasonqo2]

the only reasoning i find to call their army of friends and supporters is that they knew there was no danger to JB as she was already dead. they had to call the cops first even if RDI, it would look totally out of place if they didn't and very weird that your first reaction in finding your daughter gone was to call friends but not LE, they had no option but to call the police first.

PR could not be ruled out as the physical author of the RN, please correct me if i am wrong


lupus est homini , non , non quom qualis sit novit

 

[bettybaby00]

Nearly all LE people connected with the crime concluded this was a staged crime scene. Here, obviously, there is a difference of opinion on who staged the scene.

To me I feel this was a situation that spiraled out of control--meaning not premeditated--and the Rs acted under extreme duress and used staging to not only confuse the situation but to also buy them time.

Emphasis mine

Staging is a conscious criminal action on the part of an offender to thwart an investigation.

Equivocal Death Investigations

Equivocal death investigations are those inquiries that are open to interpretation. There may be two or more meanings and the case may present as either a homicide or a suicide depending upon the circumstances. The facts are purposefully vague or misleading as in the case of a "staged crime scene." Or, the death is suspicious or questionable based upon what is presented to the authorities. The deaths may resemble homicides or suicides; accidents or naturals. They are open to interpretation pending further information of the facts, the victimology and the circumstances of the event.

TYPES OF CRIME SCENE STAGING

1. The most common type of staging occurs when the perpetrator changes elements of the scene to make the death appear to be a suicide or accident in order to cover up a murder.
2. The second most common type of staging is when the perpetrator attempts to redirect the investigation by making the crime appear to be a sex-related homicide.
​

http://www.practicalhomicide.com/articles/staging.htm

"Pending further information."

As I said, to me, the RN bought them time. Time to be viewed and treated as victims, which then ultimately allowed them to walk out the front door into the "protective custody" of their lawyers. Not a single LE official at the scene that morning considered/treated them as suspects of a crime, and the fact that it took so long to find JRB actually worked to their benifit. They had hours to present as victims while conveying the kidnapping for ransom narrative.

"Pending further information," meant once JRB was found, LE were forced to quickly change gears, and by the time they could fully appreciate that fact, the Rs were out the door.

As soon as they were safely away from LE, they and their team were free to subvert all normal investigative protocols. All they had to do was hang tight until they were out of that house and then anything was possible. They loose nothing by standing firm in their lie. If the the plan succeeds then they're home free.

Sure they had no way of knowing whether or not it would work, but they did know there was a chance.

And it worked.

MOO, MOO, MOO & all that jazz.

 

[lawstudent]

In some ways I feel like the issues in this case are illustrated by a comparison to the Casey Anthony case.

In that case, she has few supporters who argue her innocence, but there's certainly disagreement about what exactly happened to Caylee. It would be tough to agree on a charge, as it was for those jurors, even if the evidence is quite clear she was involved.

Then we have cases like the Amy Bishop one back when she first committed murder by shooting her brother - the further you go back, the more likely it was that intrafamily violence would not be suspected or at least not be acted on. I can only imagine how many people used to murder family members without being discovered - look at how many have been revealed in the last few decades. It just wasn't considered likely, and the media was different, and police had different sorts of agendas. It's hard to compare cases from even the 90s to the details of a modern case.

Going back to Casey Anthony, in that case, I feel like the evidence about her as a person and her behavior point more towards someone who would plan to kill her child, but yet the actual incident seems more like the act of someone who totally panicked and had no plan. Plus we have no real evidence of how she died so it doesn't seem like an attack so much as either a negligent accident or a quiet smothering. In the Ramsey case, their general behavior and presentation would lead more people to think this was an accident that spiraled out of control, but the way she was found and the molestation aspect indicate more intent, and you have the very violent manner of death. It would be a tricky case to prosecute.

 

[Chewy]

Yes, they were supposed to buy it because the life of their daughter was at the stake. As overly dramatic and fake the RN might sound, Ramseys (if they were totally innocent, that is) had no way to tell if the perps were serious, or not.



...risking the Jon Benet's life. How could they know the kidnappers would not punish Jon Benet for their disobedience?

If I read the ransom note I would think my daughter's life was at stake because she was missing. I wouldn't at all think they were "really" watching to see if the cops were called at all. I'd be focused on getting as much attention and help as possible.

Consider the way Amber Alerts work, they get as much attention on that kid as possible. They don't hide in the shadows and think the crazy psychopaths that took their kids can be taken at their word.

 

[Chewy]

In some ways I feel like the issues in this case are illustrated by a comparison to the Casey Anthony case.

In that case, she has few supporters who argue her innocence, but there's certainly disagreement about what exactly happened to Caylee. It would be tough to agree on a charge, as it was for those jurors, even if the evidence is quite clear she was involved.

Then we have cases like the Amy Bishop one back when she first committed murder by shooting her brother - the further you go back, the more likely it was that intrafamily violence would not be suspected or at least not be acted on. I can only imagine how many people used to murder family members without being discovered - look at how many have been revealed in the last few decades. It just wasn't considered likely, and the media was different, and police had different sorts of agendas. It's hard to compare cases from even the 90s to the details of a modern case.

Going back to Casey Anthony, in that case, I feel like the evidence about her as a person and her behavior point more towards someone who would plan to kill her child, but yet the actual incident seems more like the act of someone who totally panicked and had no plan. Plus we have no real evidence of how she died so it doesn't seem like an attack so much as either a negligent accident or a quiet smothering. In the Ramsey case, their general behavior and presentation would lead more people to think this was an accident that spiraled out of control, but the way she was found and the molestation aspect indicate more intent, and you have the very violent manner of death. It would be a tricky case to prosecute.

This is something that is very telling in the theories presented by the RDIs I've presented my own theory on here how it could have happened. But most of the posts I see are talking about things that have nothing to do with the actual crime. It's all gossip and hearsay and rumor and "hinky meter" theories.

I'm still waiting for a clear theory to be spelled out that explains how it went down.

Bottom line for me, the parents saying that there was no sign that someone had been in the house was something they wouldn't say if they wanted to pretend someone had come into the house. Even a flipped over rug would have been "something"