We Didn't Mean for This to Happen.

[Britt]

It's not being cerebral and philosophical, it's being numb. Poleaxed is the best word I can think of. Most people don't understand that reaction until something bad happens to them. Most people, given a hypothetical situation, say they would behave the way you say you would behave.

Besides the fact that you have no way of knowing what is "hypothetical" in my life or most people's lives, I'll just point out that, unlike most crime victims (or alleged crime victims), the spotlight-loving, PR-touring Ramseys have given us years of opportunities to observe them, which observation helps quite a lot in analyzing their behavior.

That the Ramseys seemed to be stunned and out-of-it is one of the things that lends credence to the belief they are innocent.

Yet they managed to snap out of it in time to pull it together for their PR appearance on CNN the day after the funeral of all days... and still they claimed not to be angry and only wanted to know "why." It's stunning alright... lol.

 

[vicktor]

Sounds to me like a small group of them asked to borrow JonBenet for a little while for something pleasant-sounding, and the parents are beating up on themselves for having trusted them.

They were left with not only the body of their child, but a coverup to concoct to hide the fact they trusted criminals with their child, just handed her over.

Anyone agree?

I going to have to disagree. Start with the obvious. The R's left the Whites, then stopped by a couple of places on the way home. They had a vacation planned and said there were still a few things to do, before getting up early the next day. Are they going to leave JB with some people outside of their circle of friends, after her bedtime, away from the parents, when they know they have to pick her up?

John's statement makes some sense in that he was sorry he couldn't prevent her death.

The problem with Patsy's statement is the we part. About the only way it really makes sense, is if the statement refers to the house's lack of security and broken window. Its an indirect way of saying 'we didn't mean for the lack of security in place plus an unfixed window to result in our daughter's death.'

 

[Britt]

Another reason they could have had for not tearing everyone apart and going into a rage is that they placed trust in the Boulder Police and thought that they would do a thorough job and follow the leads and take care of the business.

Then why were the Ramseys' own attorneys and investigators on the job questioning people on day one - the afternoon of December 26, 1996? Wow, they were awfully proactive for victims too upset to even talk to the cops.

And if they placed their trust in the police, then why oh why did they refuse to help them? How did they expect these trusted police to do their job without access to the two most important witnesses in the case?

In any event, how would the police taking care of business help the Ramseys not feel anger at the perp for what he did to their child?

But you're right about the cops screwing up the case. They should've taken the Ramseys down to the station, separated them, and got that investigation going in the right direction on the first day.

 

[Britt]

The problem with Patsy's statement is the we part. About the only way it really makes sense, is if the statement refers to the house's lack of security and broken window. Its an indirect way of saying 'we didn't mean for the lack of security in place plus an unfixed window to result in our daughter's death.'

Nah. "We" means John and I. Or it could mean Patsy and her other personalities. Or perhaps the Royal We.

Come on, Vicktor, an intruder breaks into your home in the middle of the night and commits a horrible crime, violates your life, invades your space, and you say you "didn't mean for that to happen"? Like, "oops"? I don't think so.

 

[Eagle1]

Are we, instead of trying to figure exactly what happened, getting off into the Rs' reaction again, which we discuss ALL the time, the past 7 yrs?

I know, we can't come up with much with so little to go on, but maybe something if we really wracked our brains to think of something new and different that could have happened.

Maybe it was normal to go toward the hills, or, on the other hand, maybe it meant they were sort of looking for something.

I'm sure we've all had something hit us so hard, we wondered if we'd be able to go through the motions of living, and if that would keep us alive.

With the possible international gossip among the jet set, I just have a feeling quite a few people may have been involved, maybe even unknowingly, just something they said or didn't correct, like the guys badmouthing John at Charlevoix, for just one example.

I keep thinking the hater in the tweed jacket must have heard something to make him come take a look.

 

[Britt]

Maybe it was normal to go toward the hills, or, on the other hand, maybe it meant they were sort of looking for something.

Or getting rid of something -- disposing of evidence.

Or soul-searching? Planning his strategy?

After John returned from his walk with Fernie and Beuf, he hired Attorney Bynum... but wait... Bynum was already on the job, having called to question witness Fleet White earlier that day. I guess John was making it official ? OR, more likely IMO, making a display of hiring his attorney in front of his audience so he could say Fernie and Beuf had talked him into it, when he had really hired Bynum earlier in the day, perhaps even before the 911 call (now where were those phone records again?)

Then John told his friends how sorry he was (sorry for what?). Sounds a lot like a guilty man, doesn't it? Hiring a lawyer, apologizing?

Anyhoo, then he went for his solo walk. I speculate that he used the time to strategize. If he himself weren't involved in the crime, he may have been deciding whether or not to keep covering for Patsy, or cut her loose and save himself.

 

[Eagle1]

"Judge not that ye be not judged. With whatever judgement you mete out, therewith shall you be judged." Or words to that effect. Not an exact quote, sorry folks. Good principle to remember though. Accentuate the positive and you reap what you sow, etc. Karma.

IF someone wanted some time with JonBenet, wouldn't it be just like Patsy to reason "Well, she'll sleep more on the plane tomorrow"? We didn't mean for this to happen sounds like we did mean for something to happen but not this.

Someone had molested JonBenet at the party on the 23rd, and I think she'd tried to call 911, since her parents were not protecting her. She probably figured she'd darned well do it herself. So they cut her off.

Tweed man could have been there? And if not foreign, could also have been one of the Whites' two male guests or a former student of McSanta, who probably would have had to be along if they took her w/out Patsy's knowledge, and/or Helgoth's friend "Mr. X". I don't think JonBenet would have gone down to eat pineapple with the one who molested her at the party, at least not unless McSanta was there. She had told Megan Kostelnik's mother that Santa promised to pay her an extra visit after Christmas and that it was a secret. Whoever that Santa was, he would have known this was his only chance before the family went to Charlevoix.

We used to hear the preachers mention "war on the American family", and someone may have been spreading something to all of them about the American family having too much pride, in their children or whatever....playing people against each other. Just a thought.

 

[Seeker]

Seeker, it just seems to me that reflection and introspection would more naturally come much later, and that in the hours and days immediately following a home invasion/murder of one's child - such a horrific violation - one would be consumed with rage at the intruder and obsessed with getting him. Where was their outrage?

And what odd questions to be asking: "I don't get it" ? "Why?" What about: "Who are you, you ? Where are you? I'm coming after you!" Instead of "I'm so sorry" to Fernie and Beuf, why not "Help me, guys, let's go find him! I'm gonna f***in' tear him apart!" and so on... especially since they supposedly had leads. If the Ramseys honestly suspected the people whose names they were offering up (in a real kidnapping/murder scenario), why weren't they confronting those people, asking questions? Both before and after the body was "found," why weren't they confronting, questioning, searching, demanding answers, insisting that their entourage and the police help them find their child and/or her kidnapper/killer?

I agree that their grief was clearly there. But their rage and their demand to know who did it so they could get their hands on him were conspicuously not. If there were really an intruder, IMO there's not enough valium and booze in the world to keep the Ramseys sitting around on the couch, doing nothing but crying and wondering "why." Quite the contrary: they would've been galvanized with fury.

Britt, you're talking about events that happened right after the murder. Remember, grief comes first and can last (literally) for years in some cases. Anger is the last step before acceptance and before any healing process can begin. Sorrow lasts a lifetime...

 

[Britt]

Britt, you're talking about events that happened right after the murder. Remember, grief comes first and can last (literally) for years in some cases. Anger is the last step before acceptance and before any healing process can begin. Sorrow lasts a lifetime...

Actually, if we're talking just about grief, anger comes second, the five classic stages being:

1. Denial
2. Anger
3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance

But I realize emotional reactions, and humans, are more complex than five simple stages.

The point I'm trying to make is that this situation allegedly wasn't simple grief (if there is such a thing), as if JonBenet died by accident or illness. This was allegedly an intrusive attack of the worst kind and IMO the complex emotions would include, along with the devastation, obvious rage against the intruder and drive to get him/strike back at him.

IMO the Ramseys appeared to be reacting as griefstricken parents of the former variety (child died), not the latter (child was murdered by intruder), which IMO is consistent with what happened -- there was no intrusive attack by an outsider.

Again, you're right that people are different. Emotions are complex. I, like all of us, base my perspective on personal experience. I'm not an expert, but there are things I just "know".. ya know? Yeah I know the Ramseys aren't me, but something is missing in their emotional reactions. I'll never be persuaded that their non-anger and lack of interest in the intruder (or how ever you want to describe the missing emotions) are consistent with a real intruder attack.

 

[Seeker]

Britt, I can only go by my own personal experience. I can only tell you the emotions I felt, and when I felt them.

Only before the part of my having to accept it I felt anger, real deap anger, at the Gods for allowing it to happen. I had to blame someone and I blamed the Gods...it's a natural reaction.
My first reaction was shock and disbelief, then complete devestation and grief at which time I did the barganing thing, then complete and utter hatred towards the Gods, then I finally accepted he was gone although there isn't a day that goes by that I don't still feel that hole in my heart and in my life.

 

[Eagle1]

So sorry that you lost someone!

"The Gods" instead of our usual plain "God" is an example of the longstanding WS principle that as long as we don't insult each other, we have a Constitutionally - protected right to believe/say whatever, reason we have "Statements" like "JMHO of the moment", mine.

Does everyone still hate Jameson, and by extension Lyn Wood, for violating their rights, trying to tell them what to think and say ? I used to wonder how so many could keep it up so long and hard but guess it was a worthy cause. It wasn't just River. It was the principle of the thing. I didn't say much at the time, wasn't needed.

Martha Stewart got sentenced to 5 mo. today, but can appeal, and don't you wonder if their making a big deal of her lying and nobody else's is "sexism"? If she were a whistleblower, she'd get labelled, we can all guess what. And there's a lone Christian woman in the Christians' Bible who's criticized and persecuted by "the Apocalypse Beast" heretic, who I guess eggs the sexists on with flattery. We are promised he will get caught, treason against his own nation, Isaiah 14, his followers getting death penalty, "and none shall help him", Daniel 7:26. After a long reign of terror, covert, during a series of eight heads of state. Lone women get attacked just because it's so easy, "because we can", for success or whistleblowing, whatever.

Again, sorry about your loss.

 

[DeDee]

Or getting rid of something -- disposing of evidence.

Or soul-searching? Planning his strategy?

After John returned from his walk with Fernie and Beuf, he hired Attorney Bynum... but wait... Bynum was already on the job, having called to question witness Fleet White earlier that day. I guess John was making it official ? OR, more likely IMO, making a display of hiring his attorney in front of his audience so he could say Fernie and Beuf had talked him into it, when he had really hired Bynum earlier in the day, perhaps even before the 911 call (now where were those phone records again?)

Then John told his friends how sorry he was (sorry for what?). Sounds a lot like a guilty man, doesn't it? Hiring a lawyer, apologizing?

Anyhoo, then he went for his solo walk. I speculate that he used the time to strategize. If he himself weren't involved in the crime, he may have been deciding whether or not to keep covering for Patsy, or cut her loose and save himself.

If JR called Bynum that morning before 911, then they knew they did not have to kill JonBenet with the garrote IF BDI. I think Bynum was called, immediately, once JR became involved.

That was before the bulldog Lin Wood jumped into the fray and became a multi-millionaire defending the Rs. BTW, LLW tweeted yesterday that he was John and Burke's lawyer.

"Judge not that ye be not judged. With whatever judgement you mete out, therewith shall you be judged." Or words to that effect. Not an exact quote, sorry folks. Good principle to remember though. Accentuate the positive and you reap what you sow, etc. Karma.

IF someone wanted some time with JonBenet, wouldn't it be just like Patsy to reason "Well, she'll sleep more on the plane tomorrow"? We didn't mean for this to happen sounds like we did mean for something to happen but not this.

Someone had molested JonBenet at the party on the 23rd, and I think she'd tried to call 911, since her parents were not protecting her. She probably figured she'd darned well do it herself. So they cut her off.

<snipped politely> She had told Megan Kostelnik's mother that Santa promised to pay her an extra visit after Christmas and that it was a secret. Whoever that Santa was, he would have known this was his only chance before the family went to Charlevoix.

<snipped politely>

The 2nd Santa visit after Christmas could be confusion on JBs pat due to their upcoming Christmas trip on the 26th to Charlevoix, a trip that PR did not want to make but John was adamant about celebrating Christmas with his older children.

We didn't mean for this to happen sounds like we did mean for something to happen but not this.

Always felt like this statement was a clue that unintentionally popped out while PR was under medication.

Someone had molested JonBenet at the party on the 23rd, and I think she'd tried to call 911, since her parents were not protecting her. She probably figured she'd darned well do it herself. So they cut her off.

I concur about the events on the 23rd. I believe every word of what you wrote that's included in the quote.

 

[johnjay]

I still don't see it. If she said "can you fix this for me?" doesn't mean anything. We need to know more of the context here. She could be asking her to fix something as minute as a seam. "We didn't mean for that to happen"- Well, what is the rest of the conversation. This tells me nothing.

And I would love to know how everyone thinks Burke really did this. The bashing in the skull makes no sense and then them trying to cover it up by tying the garotte and making it look like a strangulation. There is no way that is what happened. You cannot go on all these statements from books. We have no way of knowing what is true and what is not. I think if all of the things people are posting here about the guilt of the Ramsey's and their cover up were true, the Grand Jury would have seen things that way. I do not. I think that their behavior from the time they found the note up until now has been exactly what I would expect from some people in that situation. Some people, naturally would react differently. I deal with the dead and survivors and there is nothing at all unusual about anything I have read thus far regarding their behavior. I think the killer may still be out there (unless deceased since then) and it is just a matter of time before this happens again. JMO.

The people on the grand jury voted to indict John and Patsy for reckless endangerment of a minor and cover-up of a murder (my paraphrase, I'll get you the exact wording if you want).

What does that suggest to you that they thought happened?

 

[rob]

The people on the grand jury voted to indict John and Patsy for reckless endangerment of a minor and cover-up of a murder (my paraphrase, I'll get you the exact wording if you want).

What does that suggest to you that they thought happened?

That someone else killed her, and they covered it up. MOO (I'm thinking BR)

 

[Madeleine74]

Holy wayback machine, Batman.

Nothing like bringing back to life a 12 year old thread...

 

[Frigga]

^^^ Madeleine, you always manage to make me smile when I least expect it!

 

[Nehemiah]

Holy wayback machine, Batman.

Nothing like bringing back to life a 12 year old thread...

I love the resurrection of these old threads, esp. BlueCrab's. It's interesting to read his take on BDI from years ago, compared to where we are today.

 

[passionflower]

JMOO, as parents, they expected the siblings to fight but nothing like this...........we didn't mean for this to happen (jealousy, meltdowns)
JR holding BR........"I'm sorry", maybe for not getting BR the help he needed.
They never expected a fatal accident.......JMOO

 

[BOESP]

Was it just me or did Blue Crab's writing style sound a lot like Lou Smit's speaking style?

 

[fedfan4life]

I have to say that Britt was right on the money.