VA - Joseph Ryan shot, Christine Banfield stabbed, both deceased, in home - Herndon 24 Feb 2023

[Lawnguylander1964]

When I was on my double murder trial a couple of months ago, we had a 3 day break and I was glad that my work was still waiting for me to do, so I was able to keep busy and easily keep my mind off thinking about the trial. It's hard not to think about it as it creeps in unexpectedly. But you have to be vigilant and chase it away.

I remember panicking at one point during the break, thinking that there was so much evidence, and how was I going to be able to deliberate and how was I going to put all these little pieces of data together.

After the break, we lost 2 jurors. We had many more alternates than usual, so we were okay, but I think that long break broke people because they had time to think.

 

[Luna20]

I've read through the telegram messages. There are some snippets from the messages below that "Anna" typed. To me there are some clues that whoever is communicating as Anna, English may not be their first language. I know that texting is a language all to itself, and that often phrases are abbreviated and there are misspellings. But some of the examples below sound a lot like how JM talks and not typical errors an English speaker might make:
"Never, but I look through some pictures where the......"
"I probably will be a bit panicked"
"are my hand going to be free that I can snap?"
"the is a digital clock next to the bed"
"Oh I forgot to tell you. I do have a dog. She is very nice. But she will be in the
basement"
"Call me what you want from the start until 10:30"

The last two remind me of how JM testified in the courtroom .. i.e. short phrases, unclear meanings, etc Perhaps I am just reading too much into these!

Do you mean Juliana? She is Brazilian and has a steep language barrier. That’s another reason why it would have been harder for her to set this all up.

 

[Tortoise]

I think there are parts of the plan for which Brendan purposely didn't clue-in Juliana. She testified that she didn't understand why he was saying the code to the gun safe, or why he sent her to the gun safe after she'd shot Joe, because he'd already given her a gun to carry in her pocket that morning, and she also testified that she was telling Brendan that Joe was still moving and Brendan didn't react to it.

I've also been confused as to why Brendan only shot Joe one time and left him alive, and then didn't use his own gun to kill him, and didn't have Juliana stay in the basement with his daughter, and lock the internal door to the basement, which would be the natural thing to do and to look more realistic that he was concerned there was an intruder in the home. In fact he should have had them stay outside in Juliana's car.

I think he set Juliana up to have to use her gun and kill Joe, as his insurance that she wouldn't turn him in straight afterwards. They both murdered in his plan. That's why he took her to the shooting range, and that's why he had her go to the gun safe, to cover for already having a gun on her that morning. But she didn't understand those things because he never told her.

MOO

 

[Tortoise]

https://twitter.com/x/status/2016245090008600797

 

[Tortoise]

https://twitter.com/x/status/2016254099680075904

 

[Lawnguylander1964]

The closings are coming in now. Everything that wasn't shoveled is solid ice. I paid 4 young boys to move the ice from just in front of my car and it was a workout for them.

 

[Luna20]

I think there are parts of the plan for which Brendan purposely didn't clue-in Juliana. She testified that she didn't understand why he was saying the code to the gun safe, or why he sent her to the gun safe after she'd shot Joe, because he'd already given her a gun to carry in her pocket that morning, and she also testified that she was telling Brendan that Joe was still moving and Brendan didn't react to it.

I've also been confused as to why Brendan only shot Joe one time and left him alive, and then didn't use his own gun to kill him, and didn't have Juliana stay in the basement with his daughter, and lock the internal door to the basement, which would be the natural thing to do and to look more realistic that he was concerned there was an intruder in the home. In fact he should have had them stay outside in Juliana's car.

I think he set Juliana up to have to use her gun and kill Joe, as his insurance that she wouldn't turn him in straight afterwards. They both murdered in his plan. That's why he took her to the shooting range, and that's why he had her go to the gun safe, to cover for already having a gun on her that morning. But she didn't understand those things because he never told her.

MOO

Agree. It would have been much simpler for her not to be there at all and I’ve wondered why. As you said, it was part of his overall plan. It was a good one but he didn’t think that she would turn against him. I think he underestimated her desperation. He thought that she was too dumb to figure it out.

 

[jeff2034]

Do you mean Juliana? She is Brazilian and has a steep language barrier. That’s another reason why it would have been harder for her to set this all up.

Yes I meant Juliana likely was texting Joe with BB of course looking over her shoulder coaching her. But even with the coaching and probably telling her what to say, there are still some things, in my view at least, that slipped through indicating it was more likely JM texting JR than it was CB. Certainly not definitive proof just an impression. It would've been interesting to compare these texts from Telegram with an exemplar of known CB texts to see how similar or dissimilar they were. Everybody has their own somewhat unique phrases and grammar when they text.

 

[Luna20]

Yes I meant Juliana likely was texting Joe with BB of course looking over her shoulder coaching her. But even with the coaching and probably telling her what to say, there are still some things, in my view at least, that slipped through indicating it was more likely JM texting JR than it was CB. Certainly not definitive proof just an impression. It would've been interesting to compare these texts from Telegram with an exemplar of known CB texts to see how similar or dissimilar they were. Everybody has their own somewhat unique phrases and grammar when they text.

He probably closely coached her through every detail. I feel like the state didn’t go into enough detail to make that clear. To my knowledge I don’t know if they spoke enough about how BB set JK up.

As @Tortoise mentioned above and I agree with, is that BB strategically had JK involved, thinking that she wouldn’t flip on him. He underestimated the fact that prisoners flip when it comes down to getting out of jail.