The ransom note
- Thread starter terralee
- Start date
sorry @Lavinia
RST, Ramsey Spin Team = Public Relations Team
CNN.com - Anderson Cooper 360° Blog
"Another man, Michael Helgoth, was also a prime suspect. He was a Colorado native who died shortly after the murder. But his death left more questions than answers.
It appeared to be a suicide. And what about the stun gun discovered next to his body? Investigators believe a stun gun had been used on JonBenet.
Prosecutor DeMuth told me this about Helgoth: "I remember that he had footwear that was consistent with the footprint evidence, he had a stun gun, he had reportedly made statements to a friend, very similar to the types of statements that we're hearing about today in the press with the arrest of John Karr. "
Even more strange, a baseball cap with the letters s-b-t-c was found near Helgoth's body. Those are the same letters found in the ransom note at the Ramsey home. DeMuth says he believes Helgoth's DNA was tested and didn't match up.
Posted By Randi Kaye, CNN Correspondent "
RST, Ramsey Spin Team = Public Relations Team
CNN.com - Anderson Cooper 360° Blog
"Another man, Michael Helgoth, was also a prime suspect. He was a Colorado native who died shortly after the murder. But his death left more questions than answers.
It appeared to be a suicide. And what about the stun gun discovered next to his body? Investigators believe a stun gun had been used on JonBenet.
Prosecutor DeMuth told me this about Helgoth: "I remember that he had footwear that was consistent with the footprint evidence, he had a stun gun, he had reportedly made statements to a friend, very similar to the types of statements that we're hearing about today in the press with the arrest of John Karr. "
Even more strange, a baseball cap with the letters s-b-t-c was found near Helgoth's body. Those are the same letters found in the ransom note at the Ramsey home. DeMuth says he believes Helgoth's DNA was tested and didn't match up.
Posted By Randi Kaye, CNN Correspondent "
Maybe she thought "SBTC" sounded more like a foreign faction; maybe it reminded her of "saved by the cross" (though I have to say that when I searched for "saved by the cross" in a database of texts from books, magazines and television, I didn't come up with anything). According to Paula Woodward "saved by the cross" turned up in a police report in some context. Maybe the letters just caught Patsy's eye that way.
Psalm acrostics do sometimes reverse letters of the Hebrew alphabet, but I have no reason to think that Patsy was aware of that. (Psalm 34 is an irregular acrostic psalm: one Hebrew letter is missing. The commentary doesn't say anything about letter reversal.)
I don't want to overthink this.
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John had an engineering degree from a good engineering school. The engineers I've known have been rather smart. Patsy was no intellectual slouch.
I'm not sure why you think anything needed to be "decoded." This has nothing to do with Bible codes which look for hidden words in the Bible. I'm not sure why you think Patsy was sending John a message. We do know that she dropped him in the soup with the police when that Bible was mentioned in an interview. She could have said that the Bible might have been left open. Problem solved.
My question is: why did she mention Psalm 57 in Death of Innocence? (In the version in that book, she's alone when she stabs her finger at random into a Gideon Bible and lands on the verse about being safe in the shadow of God's wings.) Since Death of Innocence was published before Steve Thomas's JonBenet, she might not have been aware of Foster's discovery of "SBTC." According to Thomas, the DA's and Smit were dismissive of Foster so they might not have relayed the information about Psalm 35 to the Ramseys or their lawyers. But you can gauge the dismay of the Ramsey side when they found out because, even though they love taking the mickey out of Foster, they never, ever mention it.
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You might not subscribe to this notion, but many believe that PR was trying to "point the finger" at JR with the ransom note. The movie references, the "SBTC," were all designed to send him a message and/or to pin the crime on him. So, that is what would need to be decoded (by JR). For the record, I've never subscribed to this theory. But, if SBTC does stand for something (in general; and regardless of who it was intended for), it would serve to be decoded, would it not?
JR was an engineer -- which takes intellect, granted -- but that's a different type of intellect. PR was an English major (if I remember correctly) -- which again, takes intellect -- but that's also a different type of intellect.
To be clear, it isn't "SBTC" or any verses in Psalm 35 that point to John. It's this exchange from '98:
"TOM HANEY: Now we are up to 326, it is just one photo on that page.
PATSY RAMSEY: This is on John's desk, a picture of Linda and John -- looks like his bible.
TOM HANEY: Do you have any -- do you have different bibles.
PATSY RAMSEY: Well, we have a lot of bibles.
TOM HANEY: Okay.
PATSY RAMSEY: I don't know if they are different.
TOM HANEY: You said it is his as opposed to being ours or yours.
PATSY RAMSEY: I see what you mean. Well, yeah. I think it was his on his desk.
TOM HANEY: Kept on his desk?
PATSY RAMSEY: Yeah.
TOM HANEY: Is that where he normally had it or where it was normally kept.
PATSY RAMSEY: Yeah. He would read it there."
Linda Wilcox (I think) said that she could tell that that particular Bible was always being read because it moved around the bedroom and it never needed dusting. Patsy here is telling us that it was only John who read it. The police never mention Psalm 35 and since they didn't have the Bible in their possession, Patsy might not have twigged that they had discovered "SBTC" in Psalm 35. But if they have, they're going to connect it to John because she's forging that link before our eyes.
Part of the beauty of "SBTC" is that it really stands out on the page. "SmT" not so much.
It just seems like she would have been going way too much out of her way to use "SBTC" if she simply wanted to connect the bible to JR. From what I gather, the only reason she reversed the order was because it looked better on the page, which I don't necessarily believe in that, "CTBS" would have sufficed just as well on the page (but perhaps that's just me) and would have connected JR more easily to the bible.
I think he probably did recognize some phrases from the ransom note. Arndt said that he was quiet while his group of friends were having a lively discussion of the note.
I don't see why "SBTC" has to stand for anything. Maybe those letters meant signified something to her; maybe they didn't.
John doesn't give any indication that he's aware of where "SBTC" comes from. But unlike Patsy he admits to searching through the Bible looking for clues to its origin. We know he eventually clued in because in The Other Side of Suffering he tells us that he read the psalm on the same page as "SBTC," Psalm 34, to Patsy on her deathbed. If you wanted to live a long life, you shouldn't have told so many lies? Thanks, honey.
Yeah, that takes a lot of work, reversing those letters. LOL
That's not my argument (that reversing the letters "takes a lot of work").
My argument is, it would have been completely and utterly unnecessary to do so.
Your explanation, is that it "looks better on the page." <modsnip - demeaning another poster>
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You think it's a reverse order of a stanza in the bible, but you also say it doesn't stand for anything? Which is it?
For sincere people: Whoever pulled "SBTC" from Psalm 35 went from the bottom up rather than top down. It could have been an intruder; it could have been Patsy. We don't know why because that person hasn't told us, but no mind reading is necessary. We know that's what happened because those letters don't exist next to each other in contiguous words or contiguous lines anywhere else in that Bible. Donald Foster established that. If it weren't true, the Ramsey side would be shouting it from the rooftops.
<modsnip>
And I don't understand why anyone would attribute the phrase (via quotation marks) "looks better on the page" to me as the reason for "SBTC." The reasons I suggested as possibilities were that it might have sounded more like a foreign faction to Patsy, that it reminded her of "saved by the cross," or that the letters just caught her eye that way. But of course, I'm not a mind reader and I don't talk to the dead so I have no way of knowing.
And I don't understand why anyone would attribute the phrase (via quotation marks) "looks better on the page" to me as the reason for "SBTC." The reasons I suggested as possibilities were that it might have sounded more like a foreign faction to Patsy, that it reminded her of "saved by the cross," or that the letters just caught her eye that way. But of course, I'm not a mind reader and I don't talk to the dead so I have no way of knowing.
"SBTC engraved gun" maybe part of the serial number?
fr brown,
It has to stand for something, its not padding as in an essay, the author only gets one shot at communicating, so "SBTC" must mean something to either the reader or the author?
Lets assume Patsy wrote it, so why did she not attribute it to the "KKK" or some whacko religious outfit, e.g. Branch Davidian, an End Of Days sect.
Jeff Shapiro suggested "SBTC" was a reference to John Ramsey's naval training at the Subic Bay Training Center in the Philippines. Yet that is not really a Foreign Faction is it, its not an other terrorist outfit?
If it was a deliberate insertion by Patsy then maybe "SBTC" refers to Southern Baptists of Texas Convention? Not quite a Foreign Faction, but maybe Patsy thought John would get it?
The last sentence of the Ransom Note reads:
So Patsy might be alluding to a Christian Fundamentalist Sect, one that follows scripture in line with "SBTC"?
So why the claim for "Victory" which is surely a miltary allusion, and apparently on John's behalf?
How does Patsy know the RN will be read as intended, why bother with all the cryptic references, especially if they are ambiguous?
If Patsy wants to frame JR why not save a sample of his semen then leave it on JonBenet, job done?
Shades of Boris Becker allegedly saying he had his semen purloined during a tryst he had with Angela Ermakowa in a cupboard in a restaraunt, which only lasted minutes?
So if you know enough about the case and John has a tale to tell then maybe its all just Smoke and Mirrors.
That is, "SBTC" is a stand in for whatever anyone reckons the Foreign Faction is, be that Terror Outfit, Christian Sect, or a false lead because it is meant for John's eyes only?
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Dragognosis
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"SBTC" must mean something to either the reader or the author?"
The reader AND the author. They are the same person. Alters at play.
The reader AND the author. They are the same person. Alters at play.
fr brown,
Yeah, the same guy who loves the case because its made him loadsa money !
Anyone wanna disagree with a millionare?
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Dragognosis,
LOL, but the reader is not supposed to know about the author, they are psychologically siloed.
If there is ever anything wrong with your theory you can just invent a new alter and say it is responsible.
It makes Patsy look like Medusa with all these alters popping out of her head.
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Dragognosis
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The r n was not meant for anyone outside Patsy's mind. Imo.
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