Who will stand in the Ramseys' shoes?

Discussion in 'Justice for JonBenet Discussion - Public Forum' started by Scarifier, Aug 13, 2006.

  1. Scarifier

    Scarifier McHag The Third

    An interesting exercise, I hope. I'm not asking you to stand in JBR's shoes. I'm asking you to stand in John and Patsy's shoes. I'm looking for motives, not for murder, but for other behaviour that I find odd.

    Read through these questions. Then, for each one, give a realistic answer. Even if you don't think it's what happened, I want a good, logical answer to each of these questions. Please, really think about your answers. For example, question 2 - "I forgot about the gift" is not really an acceptable answer because it's highly, highly unlikely, since they received it only a day previously. I would particularly like us all to think about possible answers that don't fit our own personal theories of the case. You don't have to play if you don't want to, but I think it will be interesting. Feel free to add your own questions - in fact, I'd love it if you did. I know some of these questions have been looked at before, but I'd love to really brainstorm the possibilities.

    Have fun!

    1. Why would you hide your phone records?

    2. Why would you deny having ever seen the flashlight before when you had received an identical one as a gift the day before?

    3. Phoning the police I can understand, but why invite round half the neighbourhood when the ransom note clearly states that your daughter will die if you tell anyone?

    4. Why ask your sister-in-law to retrieve your golf clubs from the house (you could extend this question to any item on the list, but I find the golf clubs particularly intriguing. Bear in mind that it is December and your daughter has just been murdered)?

    5. Why refuse to go in for interview (realistic answers please!)?

    6. It's the middle of the night. You discover your daughter is missing (you may answer this question from two points of view - before seeing the ransom note and after seeing the ransom note, depending on which conflicting version of events you are using as a basis for your answer). Would you wake your son (reasons why/why not please)?

    7. Assuming your son woke up, whether you woke him or he just woke of his own accord, why would you lie about it later?

    8. Your house has been broken into and your daughter kidnapped. You are asked to search the house to see if anything is unusual or out of place. Where do you start? Why do you start there? (base this answer on the Ramsey house, not your own)

    9. You've locked yourself out of your house. What do you do and why do you do it that way? (again, base this on what you know of the layout of the Ramsey house)

    10. Assuming your answer to number 9 was "break a basement window, remove all my clothes and climb down through the grate and through the broken window", how long do you leave it before you repair/replace the window?

    11. You need to be at the airport at 6.30am. What time do you get up? What time do you rouse the rest of the family (husband particularly, since I can just about accept the 'bundle the kids into the car in their PJs' story)? Bear in mind that you have to do the following in the short time you have available:

    - Shower (because you don't remember until *after* you get up that your shower is broken - DOI, first page of chapter two, that's page 10 in my copy) - side question: why didn't you simply use another shower?
    - Dress
    - Makeup and hair
    - Get things together for the trip (same page of DOI) - side question: why haven't you already done this if you know you will be on an extremely tight schedule in the morning?
    - Hand wash some laundry - side question: why were you doing this when you were on a tight schedule, and you had a housekeeper?

    ...prior to waking hubby.

    And then you have to wake up the kids and drive to the airport, which is about 15 miles away. Come on, what time do you set the alarm?

    And as a tie-in to this question, if your alarm went off at 5.30, how do you manage to do all of those things (except for showering, although I assume you at least had a quick wash), go downstairs, find and skim-read a ransom note, and be on the phone to the emergency services at 5.52am?

    12. You haven't showered, but you go to the effort of doing your hair and makeup properly. Why do you put on yesterday's outfit? Especially when you want to make a good impression?

    I have plenty of other questions, but I also have a burning need for coffee, so I will post this now and perhaps add to it later. I will also add my own answers to each question.
     
  2. Scarifier

    Scarifier McHag The Third

    Some preliminary answers. I have lots more to say, but I think I might tackle each question individually after posting this summary.

    1. I was having an affair and didn't want it to have to come out OR I phoned someone in the middle of the night that night - either an attorney, or a friend or relative. There's always a chance that I really don't have those records, of course.

    2. I'm at a loss on this one.

    3. The only reason I can come up with here is that it hasn't occurred to me to follow the instructions. Reasons for this could be: I am in a state of sheer terror/panic OR I don't believe that the threats are for real. In which case, why? Why wouldn't I believe such heinous threats? Either I know for sure that they are not real, or something else is causing me to doubt that they would really harm my little girl. Perhaps I recognize the handwriting. Perhaps it is my own handwriting, or that of someone very close to me. If I am innocent, then I'm pretty self centered, placing my own emotional needs above my daughter's life.

    4. Golf helps me relax. That's about all I can come up with.

    5. Finding my daughter's killer is less important to me than protecting my reputation OR I am guilty and do not wish to be found out.

    6. Of course I would wake my son. I need to know that he is okay, and I need to check whether he heard or saw anything, or whether he knows where my daughter is.

    7. He is too young for me to want to involve him in this OR he saw/heard something I don't want made public.

    8. Her bedroom. If I'm looking for anything out of place, obviously that's going to be the first place to look for clues. I can't honestly think of any reason for starting downstairs when, by my own admission, I've already been down there.

    9. Call a locksmith. I might break a window if the price they quoted was too high. I would almost certainly call a friend or family member, and I might knock on a neighbour's door, apologizing for the lateness of the hour, but expecting they will understand given the circumstances. I might break a window as a last resort.

    10. I'd do it fairly soon afterwards, because if it was that easy for me, it'd be easy for anyone. Plus, I wouldn't want the window being broken all winter - not only would it be very cold but snow and rain would get in.

    11. I think it has to be 5am at the latest. I can't imagine trying to get everything done within an hour, including travel time. I'd certainly wake my husband up and get him to help me if I had so much to do before leaving. I must have used another shower in the house yesterday morning, so why not this morning? Someone help me out here, because I can't come up with a good answer for this one apart from running short of time, which isn't supported by my other actions that morning. I didn't organize things the night before because I am disorganized. This supports my story about forgetting the shower was broken. However, it doesn't support my story that I set the alarm for 5.30, because if I was that disorganized, I'd know I needed more than an hour to get everything done.

    12. I am disorganized.

    My only logical answers to the last couple of questions involve Patsy being very disorganized. Is this true, based on what we know of her?

    Another question: you see a van outside that looks suspicious. Your daughter has been kidnapped and you are waiting for communication from the kidnappers. The police are already in your house. What do you do?
     
  3. Jayelles

    Jayelles Alert Viewer in Scotland

    1. Why would you hide your phone records?

    I might hide my phone records if:-

    a) I'd run up an obscenely huge bill and didn't want my Hubby to know.
    b) I'd been phoning someone that I shouldn't have been phoning (a lover perhaps) and didn't want my Hubby to know.


    2. Why would you deny having ever seen the flashlight before when you had received an identical one as a gift the day before?

    Did I deny seeing such a flashlight before or was I unable to state for sure if it was mine? If someone showed my a photograph of a HV D1 sewing machine and ask me if it was mine, I wouldn't be able to say for sure. If they showed me a photo of it sitting on my sewing table in my sewing room, I'd say "probably it is mine".

    3. Phoning the police I can understand, but why invite round half the neighbourhood when the ransom note clearly states that your daughter will die if you tell anyone?

    That I would not do. I'd be so terrified of risking my daughter's life on the wrong move that I'd probably NOT phone the police straight away. Then when I did phone the police (I would probably phone the police), I'd be saying "They mustn't know we've contacted you - don't come here they're watching the house".


    4. Why ask your sister-in-law to retrieve your golf clubs from the house (you could extend this question to any item on the list, but I find the golf clubs particularly intriguing. Bear in mind that it is December and your daughter has just been murdered)?

    I don't play golf and have no interest in golf so this I cannot understand!

    5. Why refuse to go in for interview (realistic answers please!)?

    I wouldn't refuse to go in for interviews, but if I were an unbearable snob, I might think that it was beneath me to be treated like a common criminal - what would my friends at the golf club think? I might use my contacts to get som high ranking officer to pull a few strings for me


    6. It's the middle of the night. You discover your daughter is missing (you may answer this question from two points of view - before seeing the ransom note and after seeing the ransom note, depending on which conflicting version of events you are using as a basis for your answer). Would you wake your son (reasons why/why not please)?

    If one of my children were missing, I would certainly ask the other children if they knew anything. If I didn't aks them personally, I'd call for my Hubby to do so whilst I searched the house. I think the surreality of the situation wuld make me NOT believe the note until I'd searched the house - just in case it was some kind of sick prank.


    7. Assuming your son woke up, whether you woke him or he just woke of his own accord, why would you lie about it later?

    Well I wouldn't lie about it - I'd be too afraid of being caught out in a lie and I would want to assist the police in every way possible. I'd encourage my son to speak with police and to tell the truth. However, if I were a pompous snob who thought that the world revolved around me, I might decide that I didn't want my child being bothered by police when "I" knew that he didn't know anything.

    It's actually a common problem that police have in investigations - people who don't want to get involved simply say "I don't know nuffin about nuffin" or "I wasn't there, I was somehwere else", or "I was asleep, I didn't see anything".


    8. Your house has been broken into and your daughter kidnapped. You are asked to search the house to see if anything is unusual or out of place. Where do you start? Why do you start there? (base this answer on the Ramsey house, not your own)

    I honestly don't know - possibly in her bedroom if that was the last place I saw her. When I lose something - a set of keys for example, I always try to retrace my steps from the point at which I last remembered seeing them.

    9. You've locked yourself out of your house. What do you do and why do you do it that way? (again, base this on what you know of the layout of the Ramsey house)

    Why I'd strip naked and climb in a basement window of course ...... Seriously. I'd call one of our key holders and get a spare set. If it was an unearthly time of day, I'd be round the following day with a bottle of wine or a box of chocolates. Failing getting a keyholder, I'd probably phone a locksmith.

    10. Assuming your answer to number 9 was "break a basement window, remove all my clothes and climb down through the grate and through the broken window", how long do you leave it before you repair/replace the window?

    ROFL! I'd replace it asap. I'm very security conscious.

    11. You need to be at the airport at 6.30am. What time do you get up? What time do you rouse the rest of the family (husband particularly, since I can just about accept the 'bundle the kids into the car in their PJs' story)? Bear in mind that you have to do the following in the short time you have available:


    - Shower (because you don't remember until *after* you get up that your shower is broken - DOI, first page of chapter two, that's page 10 in my copy) - side question: why didn't you simply use another shower?
    - Dress
    - Makeup and hair
    - Get things together for the trip (same page of DOI) - side question: why haven't you already done this if you know you will be on an extremely tight schedule in the morning?
    - Hand wash some laundry - side question: why were you doing this when you were on a tight schedule, and you had a housekeeper?

    ...prior to waking hubby.

    And then you have to wake up the kids and drive to the airport, which is about 15 miles away. Come on, what time do you set the alarm?

    And as a tie-in to this question, if your alarm went off at 5.30, how do you manage to do all of those things (except for showering, although I assume you at least had a quick wash), go downstairs, find and skim-read a ransom note, and be on the phone to the emergency services at 5.52am?

    My husband will tell you that if I needed to be at the airport at 6.30am, I wouldn't go to bed. I'm obsessively early for appointments and flights and I build in time for a load of "what ifs". If my HUSBAND had to be at the airport for 6.30, he would calculate the journey time and add 5 minutes. He would allow 45 minutes for showering and coffee before he had to leave. So he'd probably be up at 5.15am

    12. You haven't showered, but you go to the effort of doing your hair and makeup properly. Why do you put on yesterday's outfit? Especially when you want to make a good impression?

    I would certainly wear a brand new outfit that I'd only worn for a few hours the previous day if the people that I was about to spend time with hadn't seen it. I don't see a problem with this. Especially not at Christmas if the outfit was "seasonal". I wouldn't like not to have had a shower though.

    I have plenty of other questions, but I also have a burning need for coffee, so I will post this now and perhaps add to it later. I will also add my own answers to each question.
     
  4. ravenmad

    ravenmad Member

    3. Phoning the police I can understand, but why invite round half the neighbourhood when the ransom note clearly states that your daughter will die if you tell anyone?

    I never play to an empty house. I also need other around to judge how I should act and react. Having others in the house fills my need to "put on a performance", like I said, never play to an empty house.
     
  5. Barbara

    Barbara FFJ Senior Member

     
  6. RiverRat

    RiverRat FFJ Sr. Member Extraordinaire (Pictured at Lef

    As John and Patsy......

    1. Because I had just ended my daughter's life.
    2. Ditto
    3. Ditto
    4. Ditto
    5. Ditto
    6. Ditto
    7. Ditto
    8. Ditto
    9. Ditto
    10 Ditto
    11 Ditto
    12 Ditto
    13. Ditto

    :verdict:
    RR
     
  7. Barbara

    Barbara FFJ Senior Member

    :clap:

    I like that. Right to the point, no other words really necessary :verdict:
     
  8. RiverRat

    RiverRat FFJ Sr. Member Extraordinaire (Pictured at Lef

    Well, I was told to pretend I was a Ramsey. How else could I have answered?

    RR
     
  9. icedtea4me

    icedtea4me Member

    That pretty well sums it up.


    -Tea
     
  10. tylin

    tylin Banned

    REMEMBER. I'm answering as a Ramsey. :yow:

    1. Why would you hide your phone records?

    Because they contained information that we didn't want ANYONE to see. Any and all phone records of calls made after returning home Dec. 25 and any phone calls made Dec. 26 are guarded. :snake:

    2. Why would you deny having ever seen the flashlight before when you had received an identical one as a gift the day before?

    We couldn't own up to a flashlight. It was the murder weapon. ::shocked2



    3. Phoning the police I can understand, but why invite round half the neighbourhood when the ransom note clearly states that your daughter will die if you tell anyone?
    Well, Duh! wink wink.
    The more people present at the house-- the more contaminated the crime scene.


    4. Why ask your sister-in-law to retrieve your golf clubs from the house (you could extend this question to any item on the list, but I find the golf clubs particularly intriguing. Bear in mind that it is December and your daughter has just been murdered)?

    The golf bag was the perfect place to hide the size 6 undies, the duct tape and the rope.

    5. Why refuse to go in for interview (realistic answers please!)?

    This was control pure and simple. The Ram's let BLE know right off the bat that they were in total control of the situation. Innocent parents would have gone in for an interview but the Ram's were guilty. Talking to LE was the last thing they wanted to do.

    6. It's the middle of the night. You discover your daughter is missing (you may answer this question from two points of view - before seeing the ransom note and after seeing the ransom note, depending on which conflicting version of events you are using as a basis for your answer). Would you wake your son (reasons why/why not please)?

    Easy, If I'm a Ramsey, no way I'd wake my son. I'd just killed my daughter and I knew my son was ok.

    Anyone other than the Ram's, it's absolutely, positively 100% I'd wake my son up. I'd want to make sure that he was first and foremost ok. Then I'd ask him if he saw or heard anything unusual that night.


    7. Assuming your son woke up, whether you woke him or he just woke of his own accord, why would you lie about it later?

    Not sure I understand your question...but a Ramsey would lie about it because they didn't want anyone to know Bruke was up. The Ram's didn't plan on Burke's voice being recorded on the 911 tape.

    8. Your house has been broken into and your daughter kidnapped. You are asked to search the house to see if anything is unusual or out of place. Where do you start? Why do you start there? (base this answer on the Ramsey house, not your own)

    I'd look in JBR's bedroom first,then I'd work my way through the rest of the house--top to bottom. Literally!

    9. You've locked yourself out of your house. What do you do and why do you do it that way? (again, base this on what you know of the layout of the Ramsey house)

    Call Patsy, the housekeeper or a neighbor and and ask for the spare key. :whiz:

    10. Assuming your answer to number 9 was "break a basement window, remove all my clothes and climb down through the grate and through the broken window", how long do you leave it before you repair/replace the window?

    11. You need to be at the airport at 6.30am. What time do you get up? What time do you rouse the rest of the family (husband particularly, since I can just about accept the 'bundle the kids into the car in their PJs' story)? Bear in mind that you have to do the following in the short time you have available:

    services at 5.52am?

    I'd be up at 4am. No later.

    12. You haven't showered, but you go to the effort of doing your hair and makeup properly. Why do you put on yesterday's outfit? Especially when you want to make a good impression?

    Because there was no time to shower and changed after I murdered my child.
     
  11. Scarifier

    Scarifier McHag The Third

    RR, I tend to agree with all your answers :(

    When I first wrote the post, I actually directed it to any RSTs who might be reading, but then I re-wrote it, because I figured few, if any, would be likely to answer (and I knew you guys would give me great answers).

    These are all things that have been explained away by the Rams, and since to my mind they're all rather suspicious, I would love for people to question them rather than blindly accept the Rams' version(s) of events - obviously not an issue on this forum but I know that it's widely read by members of other forums. Quite frankly I'd love to see Jameson respond, but I'm not going to go to the bother of registering on her forum just to ask this one thing, and then have the post deleted after ten minutes.

    I even wrote a disclaimer about how I'm not a lawyer, so objections to any questions would be unlikely to result in re-phrasing :D
     
  12. The Punisher

    The Punisher Member

    Nobody needs that aggravation!
     
  13. RiverRat

    RiverRat FFJ Sr. Member Extraordinaire (Pictured at Lef

    Scarifier -

    What is scary is that after all of these years - I could sit down and answer all of these questions how jameson would answer them, probably even pulloff a pretty good Patsy, too. But, that just feels like a scary line to cross over.

    You guys would have to have Laying Off Hand ceremony for me. You know, I have been wondering why there at the end, Patsy didn't just throw together another one of those miracle moments that soo victoriously helped her go into remission in the past.

    RR
     
  14. shannon1233

    shannon1233 Member

    Please Don't Flame Me, I'm just trying

    Since I've been out of the case for so long, maybe I can do this objectively expecially since I'm not up to date on what the responses to these questions were, if they ever were answered by the Rams. Lets see, what happens, okay, I'm Patsy and proclaiming my innocense please don't flame me guys, remember I've been out of the loop for a long time and I'll try to answer in Patsy's shoes as though she's claiming being innocent of the murder) it's not what I believe or the way "I" think as myself) Playing Devils Advocate here.

    Well, now I feel sick, :) Did any of it make sense to you?

    EDITED TO ADD: Sorry, I did something wrong, it's all apearing as OP quote, the bold parts are mine!
     
    Last edited: Aug 15, 2006
  15. The Punisher

    The Punisher Member

    Sick doesn't cover it.
     
  16. Vic

    Vic Active Member

    Oh, I think Patsy called everyone and their dog to protect herself from John. She knew John was going to be suspicious/p!ssed/unbelieving. He had to act concerned with other people around.
    The friends made a nice buffer for Patsy to scope out what John and the police were thinking.
     
  17. Ginja

    Ginja Member

    All of your "questions" are actual actions by the Ramseys. All of these actions, taken into the context that their child was found murdered in their home, indicate knowledge and guilt of the crime.

    As to motive (for murder or accidental death), one need only refer to the coroner's report. JonBenet was sexually abused, and although I don't believe she was killed because of that, she did receive a fatal injury and thus the coverup. Whichever Ramsey accidentally hit her would have easily gotten off, e.g., little jail time. However, it's the coverup, and what was being covered up, that would have caused the Ramseys the most misery and significant sanctions.

    I think the fatal blow came first and was accidental, although the power of the blow indicates rage. So something happened that night that enraged either Burke or the parents to strike out with everything they had. And it's quite possible that JonBenet wasn't even the intended victim; she could have simply gotten in the way of the other's rage.

    However, the coverup is what's important here. Why coverup? Because there was something serious to hide. Not the rage or the swinging of the bat. The parents knew of the sexual abuse; whether they were involved in it or not is irrelevant; they had, at the very least, knowledge and that knowledge was the reason for the coverup.

    I believe they either thought JonBenet was dead from the blow or was about to die. My personal belief is that it was John who staged the body in the basement while Patsy sat upstairs and wrote the ransom note.

    JonBenet died from asphyxiation, which means the ligature killed her before the headblow.

    Interestingly, I think John was downstairs staging the crimescene in such a way as to "frame" Patsy while Patsy was upstairs writing a ransom note in such a way as to "frame" John. By this time, both were totally enraged, such rage running from the initial rage that got them into trouble to begin with.
     
  18. shannon1233

    shannon1233 Member

    Ginja

    "Interestingly, I think John was downstairs staging the crimescene in such a way as to "frame" Patsy while Patsy was upstairs writing a ransom note in such a way as to "frame" John. By this time, both were totally enraged, such rage running from the initial rage that got them into trouble to begin with."

    Wow, that's interesting and an angle I had never thought of but I have the following problem with it: it beckons the question as to why, if each of them were trying to frame the other, why didn't one turn on the other during the investigation thus having the other party imprisoned? It would be a "he said, she said" type scenerio if one had turned I guess? Can you tell me why you think one of them didn't "get rid" of the other that way?
     
  19. Watching You

    Watching You Superior Bee Admin

    I know this isn't what you asked for, Scarifier, but I'm going to do this another way. If there is one problem I know I have, it's that I am TOO honest sometimes, so I have a hard time thinking from a criminal's point of view. So, I am going to answer these from my own point of view rather than from the Ramseys' point of view, because I can't pretend to know why they did what they did.


     
  20. Ginja

    Ginja Member

    Shannon

    I don't think they were actually trying to "frame" each other (although that's what I said). It's more that they were enraged at each other and that anger came out in their actions (see what I'm saying?). Neither could actually come out and out the other because both were complicit. So to out the other, one would be confessing to their own complicity. Their purpose was to stage the crimescene and thwart police -- neither wanted to get caught.
     
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