JonBenet Ramsey Case

[Wickerman]

Patsy Ramsey is the only person who's handwriting could not be excluded as the author of the ransom note.

Ransom note?


Does that seriously look like anyones handwriting?

With the quivering on each letter it looks more like a right-handed person trying to write left-handed, or vice-versa.

Regards, Jon S.

[tji]

Hi

An analysis of the ransom note, see what you all think

http://www.statementanalysis.com/ramseynote/

Tracy

[jason_c]

Hi

An analysis of the ransom note, see what you all think

http://www.statementanalysis.com/ramseynote/

Tracy

Thanks for the link, tji.

I had visited the link before but had forgotten all about it. Fairly damning stuff.

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Rob. Those aren't police photos. And I was speaking only of the snow outside the alleged entry window. And the snow is the very least important of the evidence presented that precludes an intruder.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Errata]

I always figured it was a neighbor kid wo had been in and out of the house pretty regularly. Like a babysitter, or a babysitter's boyfriend.

And that note totally looks like my handwriting, and I've been told I have the handwriting of a 10 year old doctor.

[jason_c]

To me the telling evidence was the fact that Patsy was wearing the same dress that morning as she had worn the previous night to the party they attended. According to police testimony this was unusual for her(especially as they were due to fly on holiday that morning). Once Patsy held Jonbenet's body in her arms that morning much of any fibre evidence against her disappeared.

[tji]

Hi Jason

No problems, I have done that before also, you know what you are looking for is out there but just can't find it, so annoying!

Hi Errata

The analysis concluded what was written in the letter and how it was worded and not just the writing of the letter, if you read the link you would see what I mean.

If the analysis is proven correct then I think we have to conclude that Patsy either was the perp as Tom hypothesis's or that she knew who was and was helping to cover up and I don't think there are a lot of people you would cover up the murder of your daughter for.


Tracy

[Errata]

Hi Errata

The analysis concluded what was written in the letter and how it was worded and not just the writing of the letter, if you read the link you would see what I mean.

If the analysis is proven correct then I think we have to conclude that Patsy either was the perp as Tom hypothesis's or that she knew who was and was helping to cover up and I don't think there are a lot of people you would cover up the murder of your daughter for.


Tracy

I read the link. I just disagree that it HAD to Be Patsy Ramsey. It had to be someone who knew the family, who had access to the house, who was intelligent, well read, and did not have a solid grasp on how to hide their intelligence in a note. Certainly I could have done it at 16 or 17, and my sister, a few of my friends.

I'm also well aware of the activity of the average babysitter, which is after the kids are in bed, they read the mail, they go through drawers, look through computers... The average babysitter is an above average snoop. The reason I always thought it was a kid was the inherent drama of the note, a few lines that I'm almost positive are movie and book quotes, and the notion that 118,000 dollars is a reasonable ransom demand. It's an idiotic ransom demand. 1 million dollars is a reasonable ransom demand. 118,000 dollars either says that you are a moron, or that you are hoping to actually get some money out of this, and so you pick a number that you know they have on hand.

I have no idea who actually did it. I choose babysitter. It works for me.

[ChainzCooper]

Hi Rob. There was a small window in the basement that was broken, but John Ramsey told police he had broken the window by accident some weeks before. This window has been pointed out by investigators hired by the Ramsey's as the only likely point of entry for an intruder. However, this poses serious problems for an intruder theory. For instance, it had been snowing and no foot prints were noticed leading up to the grate outside. In order to access the window, a grate would have to first be removed, and the next morning a large spider web was noticed going across the latch of the gate, which means the gate had not been moved since the spider formed this web. While it's possible that the spider did so after the intruder left through the window and grate, this would mean accepting that in this less than 24 hour period, in very cold and snowy weather, a spider came out and created this web. Also, there's the problem of the light in the basement, which was off when investigators arrived. John Ramsey said that's how he found it. The basement of the Ramsey house was alone the size of an average house. The little room in which Jon Benet's body was found was so off the beaten track that the Ramsey maid didn't even know it existed. Yet, this is where Patsy stored Christmas decorations and she had been accessing this little room in the weeks before the murder. If an intruder came in through the little window he must have used a flashlight to navigate his way to the stairs leading into the house. Problem is, he left this flashlight behind in the kitchen and didn't think to turn on the basement light when leaving. It would be near impossible for someone to navigate the basement in the dark. Then there's the matter of the window itself. If he left through the window he came in, not only was he very agile, but he did so without disturbing the broken glass left on the window sill from when John broke it. This is all extremely suspicious. All the evidence points to there not having been an intruder.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

Good post, Well stated
Jordan

[Tom_Wescott]

Thanks, Chainz.

Hi Errata. What babysitter? Patsy was a stay at home mom and they had a maid, who was an older woman and had an alibi.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[Errata]

Well, I assume that someone watched the children when the couple went out at night either for professional functions or for dinner as a couple. The typical suburban choice is female, early teens, hopefully too young to entertain sexual partners at your house and old enough to pose a dire threat to a phone bill. Usually pulled from a pool of three or four responsible teenagers used by friends and neighbors.

I don't know that there was in fact a babysitter, but it is the norm for middle and upper class couples who do not have an elderly parent living in the house, or a substantially older sibling to look after the younger one.

I have to admit that I have not intensively looked into the case, mostly because it happened right as I came of an age to watch the news regularly and remember all of the increasingly shrill broadcasts. But it seems too locationally specific to have been done by a stranger. I think you would have to know the house. And while it could have been the parents, I never saw any reason why it would be them. And the son thing makes very little sense.

So it has to have been someone who had been in and out of the house, and be ruled out as a suspect without consideration. Because if it had been considered, they would have been plastered all over the news. So really, the only people who could not have done this, or we cannot conceive of doing it, is a kid, or an unattached female. We might consider an unattached female for a lot of good reasons, but we would eventually dismiss it because of the semen traces. A woman alone can't do that. And we can't fathom a younger child committing this crime. 17, sure we could see that. But we balk at 12, even 14. But while say, 9 years old cannot have left the semen traces or be able to whip up a crude garotte, but 12 can. 14 can. But the only way a child of that age would have access to the house (being too old to be a friend of either child) would be by being the child of someone who does have access to the house, or have access to the house by virtue of necessity. Like being the babysitter. Or the kid who mows the lawn. Personally, the Ramseys seemed like a yard service kind of people to me, so I picked babysitter.

It's not a theory based on available evidence. It's a theory based on the idea that if "the usual suspects" aren't the answer, then what would be so unusual that the cops would never even entertain the notion that this person might be the killer? It's more of a sociological theory than a theory based on a specific crime.

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Errata,

The Boulder DA, who blocked the police at every turn, were convinced the Ramseys were innocent, as were some investigators with very impressive credentials (such as John Douglas). They looked long and hard for an alternate suspect, i.e. someone who could get in and out of the house with a key, who Jon Benet would trust, etc. There was no such person. As the murder happened on Christmas, people were for the most part able to provide excellent alibis, because they were either out of town or visiting with relatives.

Unfortunately, the evidence does not allow for the intruder theory at all. The 'outsider' who would need to fit all the available evidence simply doesn't exist, so we're left with the three people inside the house. Based on the evidence, I personally feel we can exclude John Ramsey from being involved (although I can't say he didn't figure it out at some point after the fact). This pretty much leaves two possible conclusions.

1) Burke (Jon Benet's 10 yo brother) accidentally or intentionally killed Jon Benet with a blow to the head and everything else (garrot, paint brush insertion, ransom not) was 'staged' by Patsy in order to protect Burke.

2) Patsy murdered Jon Benet with a blow to the head and everything else was staged to divert suspicion.

As attractive as #1 is, there's really no strong reason to suspect Burke had anything to do with it, so #2 is the most likely scenario.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

[robhouse]

Hi Rob. There was a small window in the basement that was broken, but John Ramsey told police he had broken the window by accident some weeks before. This window has been pointed out by investigators hired by the Ramsey's as the only likely point of entry for an intruder. However, this poses serious problems for an intruder theory. For instance, it had been snowing and no foot prints were noticed leading up to the grate outside. In order to access the window, a grate would have to first be removed, and the next morning a large spider web was noticed going across the latch of the gate, which means the gate had not been moved since the spider formed this web. While it's possible that the spider did so after the intruder left through the window and grate, this would mean accepting that in this less than 24 hour period, in very cold and snowy weather, a spider came out and created this web. Also, there's the problem of the light in the basement, which was off when investigators arrived. John Ramsey said that's how he found it. The basement of the Ramsey house was alone the size of an average house. The little room in which Jon Benet's body was found was so off the beaten track that the Ramsey maid didn't even know it existed. Yet, this is where Patsy stored Christmas decorations and she had been accessing this little room in the weeks before the murder. If an intruder came in through the little window he must have used a flashlight to navigate his way to the stairs leading into the house. Problem is, he left this flashlight behind in the kitchen and didn't think to turn on the basement light when leaving. It would be near impossible for someone to navigate the basement in the dark. Then there's the matter of the window itself. If he left through the window he came in, not only was he very agile, but he did so without disturbing the broken glass left on the window sill from when John broke it. This is all extremely suspicious. All the evidence points to there not having been an intruder.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

Hi Tom,

I am still not convinced about all this. From what I have read, there is some debate as to whether the spiderweb actually was going across the latch of the gate, and as I mentioned before, the "snow" situation is not at all clear. Likewise, I am not too clear on the light in the basement point you are making. Is it not possible an intruder brought a flashlight and then took it with him when he left?

Also, I could be wrong, but wasn't there an unlocked "butler door" or something?

The DNA evidence, from what I have read, comes from 2 separate samples... one was on the band on the longjohns, and the other from a spot of blood on the underpants. And I think it seems that this also is consistent with dna collected from under her fingernails. Am I wrong here or what?

Rob H

[Errata]

Hi Errata,

1) Burke (Jon Benet's 10 yo brother) accidentally or intentionally killed Jon Benet with a blow to the head and everything else (garrot, paint brush insertion, ransom not) was 'staged' by Patsy in order to protect Burke.

2) Patsy murdered Jon Benet with a blow to the head and everything else was staged to divert suspicion.

As attractive as #1 is, there's really no strong reason to suspect Burke had anything to do with it, so #2 is the most likely scenario.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott

To the best of my admittedly limited knowledge, Jonbenet was still alive when garotted. Which would mean that it wouldn't so much be staged to divert suspicion as much as it would be finishing her off to divert suspicion. I mean, little kids hurt themselves all the time in a myriad of odd ways. I would think it would seem easier to take her to the hospital and lie about how the injury occurred than to take her downstairs and garotte her to death. Especially as there had been no record of any previous abuse.

In the end, the head injury would have been fatal, but it takes awhile. Especially as she was still breathing on her own when she was strangled. And she died so shortly after receiving the head wound that it barely had time to bleed and swell. So while the head injury would have killed her, it didn't have time to. So if it take a couple of minutes for someone to die from strangulation, If she had received the head injury first there would have been significant bleeding and swelling in the brain. Which there wasn't. Ergo she received the head injury during the garotting. Which means the garroting came first, or came within seconds of the head injury. Tragically, her body also had time to react to the sexual assault before she died, which means that she was unfortunately still alive when something was inserted into her vagina.

It isn't staged. It isn't a cover up of an accident. She was deliberately murdered. And probably after a sexual assault. Her mother could not leave semen samples. Her brother most likely couldn't either (being younger than the average age that men produce sperm) and I have no idea where he would learn about a garotte at 9 years old. But lets leave aside the semen. If Patsy Ramsey did this, She took her still perfectly whole daughter downstairs, placed a garotte around her throat, inserted something in her vagina, bashed her in the head, possibly twice, and then choked the life out of her which takes about two minutes.

And of course she could have. There are any numbers of cases in which incredibly sadistic mothers have killed their children in even more ghastly ways than this. Was Patsy Ramsey one of them? It would be surprising if she were, there being no evidence of previous abuse. But not impossible. But it wasn't an accident. And it wasn't covering up an accident. And most theories I have ever heard about A family member having done this revolve around the idea that this was some tragic accident that they were covering up, or it was a covering up a split second moment of rage. But neither is true. Whatever evidence was or was not at the scene, the child's body tells the tale. She was alive when sexually assaulted, she was alive when strangled. And the head injury came so close to the time her heart stopped that she barely had time to even bleed.

I think if the only way people can reconcile Patsy Ramsey having done this is to blame it on a fit of rage or an accident, then they need to dismiss her as a suspect in their minds. Because that's just not what happened to this child. Personally I have no problem with her being a monstrous child molester whose sadism or jealousy caused her to murder her own child in such a horrid fashion. Really nothing surprises me anymore. I just think that there would have been evidence before the murder.

[Tom_Wescott]

Hi Errata,

You're correct in that your knowledge of the case is very limited. It seems though you have a sincere interest and there's a couple of good books I could recommend (and a few you should stay away from). John Ramsey has a new book coming out soon, by the way. I agree that when you study Patsy Ramsey, it seems impossible she'd kill her daughter. In fact, there is much to admire in her life. But she was definitely involved in the cover-up of the murder and therefore likely responsible for the death itself.

Rob,

It sounds like you're reading online discussions about the case. If so, I'm sure you'll stay confused. There was no unlocked butler door, no debate over the spider, and the flashlight circumstance is hilarious in it's own right. A very large, expensive flashlight was left in the Ramsey home, and the Ramsey's claimed it was not theirs (though, suspiciously, they owned one just like it) and was therefore the intruder. However, that would mean the intruder maneuvered his way through the labyrinthine basement without the aid of any light. None of that makes a lick of sense.

The bottom line is, the only possible point of entry for an intruder was the tiny basement window. The glass from when the window was broken was undisturbed on the sill. Obviously, a body squeezing through the tight space twice should have knocked it all off. When you read all there is about this window you'll see there's no evidence of an intruder. In fact, there's no solid evidence of an intruder anywhere in the house.

As for the DNA evidence, I didn't pay all that much attention to it as it's in no way reliable. But it certainly doesn't exonerate anybody.

Yours truly,

Tom Wescott