Saturday, February 2, 2013

Failure to find killer in Ramsey case more "baffling" than it should be?



On the day after Christmas 1996, in the basement wine cellar of a large, elegant home on 15th Street in Boulder, Colorado there was discovered wrapped in a white blanket the body of a six-year-old girl. Her hands were tied, and duct tape was placed over her mouth, and a nylon cord was around her neck. An autopsy revealed that girl had suffered “severe blunt trauma” to the head, but officially she died of strangulation. And so began the supposedly unsolved murder of JonBenet Ramsey, a case which to some observers was deliberately bungled by police and prosecutors from the very beginning, and still has the taint of something not quite “right.” The revelation in the past week that a grand jury had voted to indict John and Patsy Ramsey for her murder—but prosecutors refused to move forward with the case, claiming there wasn’t sufficient evidence for a conviction—merely makes the whole thing even more unpalatable. 

There is much that makes little sense in this case. Take, for instance, the “ransom note” found by Patsy Ramsey in a stairway, which stated that JonBenet was allegedly kidnapped. The note claimed that the kidnappers were members of a “small foreign faction” called the “S.B.T.C.”.  No one has ever been able to determine what exactly the initials stand for. Judging from the various threats in the note, this “small” faction seemed have its entire membership in Boulder, with the movement of the Ramseys, their family members, their friends, the police department and even bank employees under constant surveillance to insure that their every instructions were followed, or else the girl would be killed. Even if this was false bluster to force cooperation, it didn’t seem to dissuade the Ramseys’ from disregarding almost every warning in the note within hours of finding it, particularly if the girl’s life was under threat; it was as if they knew the letter was a hoax. The note further warned that the kidnappers were quite willing to kill the girl, because there were other “fat cats” to skin in town. Curiously, this mystery group was never heard from again, and none of its members were discovered, despite the fact that eventually 160 “suspects” were investigated by police. 

The alleged ransom note demanded a payment of $118,000. This was an odd amount; it was noted that this suggested “inside information,” since it reflected an amount that coincided with one or two aspects of the family finances (such as a recent bonus). There had been a Christmas party the day before, during which supposedly anyone could have just “dropped in” and snooped around the house to find such information just laying around. This had to be so, according to the story, because the evidence of a break-in was rather weak and could have been explained in any number ways given how many people attended the party. Since the girl apparently never left the house, in order for that narrative to make any sense, the kidnapper or kidnappers would  have stayed hidden with the girl in the house and then killed her for no apparent reason—and then got away without being seen. 

It just doesn’t add-up. The police didn’t initially investigate the house because they “assumed” the child was not in the house, but not investigating and conducting a proper collection of forensic evidence of the crime scene could also point to the fact that there was a suspicion by some that this was a “domestic” crime; John Ramsey was a former high-ranking naval officer and now respected businessman, and there was little appetite to suspect him or his wife of the crime. The case has had an evil aroma about it from the start; many people thought that the killer or killers were right under investigators’ noses, but they refused to sense it. They went off on wild goose chases for public consumption, while the Ramseys’ public appeal to find the “real” killers seemed self-serving if not completely suspicious. Nor did media hype help advance the case; a University of Colorado professor named Michael Tracey claimed to know who the real “killer” was, but his theories were regarded crackpot by investigators, and such concocted “suspects” like John Mark Karr proved to be publicity stunts and without merit. 

What could have spurred the original grand jury to indict? Was it merely that the crime was so heinous, someone had to be charged, and nothing else made any sense?  Was the revelation that Patsy Ramsey was jealous of her daughter and “over-reacted” to the girl’s bedwetting accepted as “evidence” of a motive?  Did they believe it was suspicious that Patsy Ramsey—a stickler for appearance—wore the same red outfit the day after she was photographed in it at the Christmas party? Was she in fact up all night—and doing what? Did her 911 call to police sound like she was “faking” being emotional, as some contend? This is but circumstantial, but what can’t be as easily explained away is that six handwriting experts testified that it was Patsy Ramsey who wrote the ransom note.  This certainly does suggest an attempt to deceive investigators and draw suspicion elsewhere.

The testimony of Linda Hoffmann-Pugh, the housekeeper, was also important in the vote to indict. She claimed that JonBenet had been killed by her mother. One reason for this assertion was in regard to a knife found at the scene; Hoffman-Pugh told reporters that "Only Patsy could have put that knife there. I took it away from Burke (JonBenet's brother) and hid it in a linen closet near JonBenet's bedroom. An intruder never would have found it. Patsy would have found it getting out clean sheets." She also reported that the blanket found at the scene had recently been in a dryer, because the static was so fresh that it had left a Barbie Doll nightgown clinging to it. Hoffman-Pugh again claimed only Patsy Ramsey would have known the blanket was in the dryer. She went on to say that only someone familiar with the house could have found the door to the “wine cellar.” The fact that the level of digestion of  pineapple found in JonBenet's stomach suggested that she was killed less than two hours after she had eaten it also seems to be suspicious.

None of this is ironclad evidence of murder, and it is perhaps understandable why prosecutors did not move forward based on such. But one cannot escape the feeling that this case is still “stumping” investigators because they are looking for a killer who doesn’t exist. The third party DNA could have belonged to who processed the evidence, not the killer. Former Denver homicide lieutenant Jon Priest told the Denver Post the DNA could simply be “contamination” after years after the fact. He also told the paper that it never made sense to him that if this was an alleged kidnapping for ransom, why investigators like Boulder detective Lou Smit insisted on looking at the case as one of a “sexual sadist killer.” Isn’t that an admission that they don’t believe that part of the Ramsey story, and if they knew that was a lie, why are they also assuming that the rest of it is true? Priest noted that no DNA from a third-party was found inside the JonBenet; while this does not rule out the theory of a pedophile crime, it does mean that it does not quite reach the credulity standard. Priest is also convinced that the crime scene appeared to be “staged” to hide the fact that this was a domestic crime; “evidence” was scattered about in a way that didn’t make logical sense.   

The deceased Patsy Ramsey is now beyond the law. John Ramsey continues to deny all and claims all speculation regarding family involvement (including son Burke, who was 12 at the time) a “circus.” But one thing remains true out of all of this: Someone did commit this crime, and the most “baffling” aspect of it is that it seems to have happened right underneath the noses of everyone who was in the best position to know, and yet plead complete ignorance. Just because there are two standards of justice in the country—one for those with money, and those without—doesn’t mean we have to believe it.

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