Why? Questions about JR and the basement

During an interview with JR months after the murder of his daughter, he revealed he had gone to the basement of his home at some point in the morning, discovered the window to the train room open, and shut it. He didn't bother to tell Linda Arndt about the window or his excursion to the basement at the time.

Based on his own words, then, why did he lead FW to this same room in the basement after Arndt made that fatal error of asking Ramsey and White to search for anything out of place in the house? If Ramsey had already been in that room, why did he need to go back there to point out the window to FW, since he already knew about it and never reported it to Arndt? Why didn't he tell Arndt about the window, if it was really opened?

Why would Ramsey leave the train room and immediately proceed to the closed off wine cellar? What did he think could have been disturbed in that secluded room? Why not look first at the open areas where there were other windows that could have provided access to an intruder?

I'm trying to think - if I had been asked to search for anything out of place, where would I have started, first? I would have gone directly to her bedroom - the place where I knew she was when I had last seen her (according to Ramseys' version). That would be the logical place to start looking for things out of place, not the basement. What would cause someone to start in the basement, if he thought his daughter had been kidnapped? Wouldn't it be logical to assume a kidnapper would have taken her out via the easiest method; i.e., one of the very accessible exits on the first floor? What would cause Ramsey to think anything would have occurred in the basement of his home? That has never made sense to me.

Why didn't he head for the second floor to check for things out of place? That would have been where she disappeared from, not the basement.

The fact that he headed directly to the basement, for no good reason that I can understand, has always spoken volumes to me.

 

Yes, and if anyone had been taking notes about John's behavior, that would have been noted - why did John NOT go upstairs first??? We all know he knew where JonBenet was lying that morning. I think he couldn't wait any longer for someone else to find the body, even while he "searched" the upper story. Just the fact that Detective Arndt let John and Fleet White go on this search mission ALONE is so unbelievable. What about asking, "Can I go into her room, Detective? Is it all right for me to walk here, walk there, or will I mess things up?" I would not want to muddy things up for detectives by putting myself into a room that might have held a kidnapper's evidence. I guess there was no real concept of "crime scene" or "suspects" at any point during that day. I feel sorry for Detective Arndt - she was terribly unqualified and shouldn't have been left alone like that. Did anyone ever discuss why everyone pulled out, was it an order from above? I wouldn't be surprised.

But you are right - John's immediate trip down into the basement was a HUGE red flag.

 

"During an interview with JR months after the murder of his daughter, he revealed he had gone to the basement of his home at some point in the morning, discovered the window to the train room open, and shut it. He didn't bother to tell Linda Arndt about the window or his excursion to the basement at the time.

Based on his own words, then, why did he lead FW to this same room in the basement after Arndt made that fatal error of asking Ramsey and White to search for anything out of place in the house? If Ramsey had already been in that room, why did he need to go back there to point out the window to FW, since he already knew about it and never reported it to Arndt? Why didn't he tell Arndt about the window, if it was really opened?"

Spot on!

 

obviously something is terribly wrong with this entire set of circumstances that transpired. Okay, say you realize you had entered through that window months before after being locked out......wouldn't you still think: hmmm, this is how the intruder could have gotten in here!! I don't understand John's course of actions concerning the window.

 

WY,

I think John Ramsey was making sure he had a witness in Fleet White, who would have to stand up at a later date, and state John Ramsey had told him the window was opened that morning of the 26 December, 1996.

I would need to check this out again, but I think Linda Arndt asked them to search the house from "top to bottom" and he made a beeline for the basement, because he knew where to go. Save all that time starting from the top.

Here's a recap from Steve's book:

 

If it wasn't such a tragedy John's actions would be funny.

Remember John stated in DOI and interviews he was LOOKING FOR CLUES. Anything that might help bring his daughter back.

But he ignored the OPENED window as a CLUE.

Later John goes upstairs and watches a STRANGE van in the alley, and comes to the conclusion the van couldn't possibly contain any monitoring kidnappers watching the Ramsey house!!! You know, the part where the kidnappers threatened to kill JonBenet if John so much as talked to a stray dog.

He spied on it for a few minutes and when nothing happened didn't even have the cops check it out!

Meanwhile John paces around the house thinking....clues, clues? Look for clues.

Dee, dee, deeeee.

 

"When you say that you found it

earlier that day and latched it, at what time?"

"I don't know, probably before ten."

I know this has probably been said over and over but....The kidnappers/potential murderers of his daughter say they will call between 8 and 10. The 'Ransom' note was specifically aimed at MR RAMSEY...the kidnapper spends three pages talking to and about JOHN RAMSEY...so who do you think the kidnapper is going to want to talk to? SO why is he wandering around the house between these times...wouldn't he be glued to that spot right next to the phone frantically, desperately willing it to ring? Surely? Where would YOU be...where would 99.9999% of the population be?

Secondly, if he had already been down there at this time as WY states...why did he go straight there again and why didn't he say to Arndt 'I searched the basement earlier so there is no need to go there again?

It's clear to me that JR moved the body on his 10 am trip...but where from? Was she in one of the corners of that room, so he moved her more towards the door so that she could more easily seen?

If that is the case it would explain FW's anger and determination. He saw nothing earlier at 6.00 ish....yet there she is at 1.00 ish...

And it's funny that before finding JBR, JR HAD to point out that window and his summer entry story..as if he was setting up the scene before finding the body.

 

Great point Amber! John moving the body while away from the phone which was the lifeline to his daughter's safety. Poor Fleet....he and Priscilla went thru so much crap from the RST when Fleet wanted John to talk to the police not CNN.

 

I'm not so sure that John's taking Fleet down to the cellar wasn't part of John's plan to someday set Fleet up.

 

Yes, I wouldn't put anything past that man. If and when Fleet ever talks about that morning, expect to see the nastiness just flow out of JR.

Heymom

 

stinks

Johns story stinks. When he was in the basement in the morning and looking around, wouldn't he look in the wine cellar? He should have been questioned about that aspect. He was gone for about 20 minutes - thats alot of looking around. I'll never believe he didn't already know where she was when he went down there with Fleet. Note that he says as soon as he opened the door "I knew what was up". To me that says it means he knew more than that he had just found her dead body - what father would describe the moment they found their dead daughter as knowing what was up. To me it describes knowing what happened, whether he is really talking about when he opened the door with Fleet present or if it was earlier.

 

ITA Texan, and I'll go you one further. John's account of what he did on Christmas day was full of smit as well. He got up, the kids opened presents, made pancakes with JonBenet at his elbow, they ate, then Patsy gets to spend the afternoon packing for the trip, cleaning up, and watching the kids while John goes over to the airport for several hours to get his plane ready for the trip the next day.

What?

It was Christmas day, why is he going to Jefferson County airport for a couple of hours? What does he have to do there that had to be done on Christmas, by himself, not bringing flying-nut Burke or his sweet little daughter with him?

I know a guy who owns his own plane, and is able to have affairs without wife finding out about it because he can go far away for the meetings (not a friend, just a guy I know about, don't ask.) It's not unusual for a rich guy to do that. Was John having an affair?

Probably not, but did he and the wife have a Christmas day tiff that got him thrown out of the house for a while, or he left to cool off? The airport was only 15 minutes away, not like he couldn't get there any other time.

Then he goes back home to get ready for the Whites' party. Still no private time with the missus there, it seems, and also not a homey family Christmas. The missus has been doing chores on Christmas, not so much fun, right? After the party, they have to trek around handing out gift baskets to their "friends". When they get home they put the kids to bed (in various ways depending on the version), and he takes a sleeping pill and goes to bed. No Christmas nookie.

(Did the cops ever inquire about their love life?)

 

Agreed, it's like the Scott Peterson thing where he goes fishing on Christmas day/eve? Not normal.

How much baggage could they be taking that necessitated 2 trips to the plane? From what I've read - they didn't need much because a lot of stuff was already there (or did I misread that?)

Melatonin is not really a sleeping pill - it's something to regulate sleep patterns after long haul flights...I always found it odd that JR mentions taking it as if it would render him unconscious and therefore unable to hear or react to any noise that night..surely that's nonsense and therefore suspicious?

 

It's more of his BS. He says the melatonin made him miss the intruder: "Unfortunately, I slept well." I've never taken it so I don't know what it does, but I've taken a Benadryl to sleep like PPR did (she used to take two) and it didn't knock me out.

They decided not to go to Charlevoix for all of Christmas because Santa couldn't get everything there. They just went there for the "big kids", which is also weird to me because why wouldn't they just come to Boulder to the house of 75 Christmas trees and 335 plastic reindeer?

Makes the "beginning of a Christmas tradition" at the Whites BS, too, if they really just wanted to go to Charlevoix. I think Patsy just didn't want to cook too, after a pretty crappy Xmas day. She lived for Christmas, but on the day itself she spent the afternoon alone with no adults...

...or maybe she wasn't alone?

 

John Ramsey Interrogation by Lou Smit and Mike Kane
Present also were Bryan Morgan, PI David Williams
June 23, 24, 25, 1998 - Boulder, Colorado
http://www.jonbenetindexguide.com/1998BPD-John-Interview-Complete.htm

John Ramsey apparently went into the basement the morning of December 26, 1996 between 7:00am and 9:00am. He moved a chair that was in front of the train room door and then went into the train room to the windows by the grate. He said the middle window was open maybe an inch or less.

But what about those boxes, that junk and THAT CHAIR ??????

0151
18 LOU SMIT: Okay. Let's back up just a little
19 bit?
20 JOHN RAMSEY: Okay.
21 LOU SMIT: You said that you went through
22 the house at another period of time?
23 JOHN RAMSEY: Um hmm.
24 LOU SMIT: I remember in your report. Did you
25 ever go down to the basement?
0152
1 JOHN RAMSEY: Um hmm. I went.
2 LOU SMIT: Who was with you at that time?
3 JOHN RAMSEY: I was by myself. I was. I had
4 gone down the basement. I went in the --
5 LOU SMIT: You're going to have to back up a
6 little so that the camera (INAUDIBLE)?
7 JOHN RAMSEY: I came down the stairs. I went
8 in this room here. This door was kind of blocked.
9 We had a bunch of junk down here and there was a
10 chair that was in front of the door. Some old
11 things. I moved the chair, went into this room,
12 went back in here. This window was open, maybe
13 that far.
14 LOU SMIT: Okay. You said -- or how far
15 were
16 you? An inch?
17 JOHN RAMSEY: An inch, maybe, or less. It
18 was cracked open.
19 LOU SMIT: Which window?
20 JOHN RAMSEY: I think it was the little one.
21 There's three windows across here, as I recall. I
22 think it was the middle one. It was that was
23 broken. There was pane class broken out of it,
24 which I attributed to breaking myself.
25 LOU SMIT: People go into that basement?
0153
1 JOHN RAMSEY: But it was open and there
2 was
3 a suitcase under it. This hard Samsonite suitcase.
4 LOU SMIT: Describe how the suitcase was
5 positioned?
6 JOHN RAMSEY: It was against the wall. I think
7 the handle was on top. It was directly under the
8 window, as I recall. And I closed the window, I
9 don't know why, but I closed it. And then --
10 LOU SMIT: When you closed it, did you lock
11 it or close it?
12 JOHN RAMSEY: I latched it. There's a little
13 latch on it.14 LOU SMIT: And you're sure of that?
15 JOHN RAMSEY: Pretty sure, yeah. Yeah, I am
16 sure. I don't think I looked anywhere else. I
17 think at that point I still was trying to figure
18 out how they'd get in the house.
19 LOU SMIT: Well wouldn't that trigger your
20 (INAUDIBLE).
21 JOHN RAMSEY: Yeah. Yeah.
22 LOU SMIT: Did you tell anybody about that?
23 JOHN RAMSEY: I don't really remember. I mean,
24 part of what is going on you're in such a state of
25 disbelief this can even happen. And the, you know,
0154
1 the window had been broken out. And you say hah,
2 that's it. But it was a window that I had used to
3 get into the house before. It was cracked and open
4 a little bit. It wasn't terribly unusual for me.
5 Sometimes it would get opened to let cool air in
6 because that basement could get real hot in
7 winter. So it was like, you know, after I thought
8 about it, I thought it was more of an alarming
9 situation how it struck me at the time. It was
10 still sort of explainable to me that it could have
11 been left open.
12 And the suitcase was unusual. That shouldn't have
13 been there. I took that suitcase downstairs, I
14 remember. But I sure wouldn't have taken it all
15 the way back there and put it against the window.
16 LOU SMIT: Okay. Let's talk about suitcases a
17 little bit as long as your talking about it now.
18 It was right up against the wall?
19 JOHN RAMSEY: Yeah.
20 LOU SMIT: And you said you had taken that
21 down. When did you?
22 JOHN RAMSEY: Months before, probably, months
23 before, two months before. It was one of these big
24 Samsonite suitcases that, I don't know, the kids
25 used it to bring some clothes home, the older
0155
1 kids. Sometimes it ended up at our house. I don't
2 think it was our suitcase. It seemed to belong to
3 Cindy Johnson, my ex-wife.
4 But it was here for a while. It was up in the
5 laundry room. I remember taking it downstairs to
6 clean up. And I think I just kind of sat it in
7 this room here.
8 LOU SMIT: That would be in that hall?
9 JOHN RAMSEY: Just in the landing in the hall
10 area.
11 LOU SMIT: Okay.
12 JOHN RAMSEY: But I'm 99.9 percent taken I
13 wouldn't have taken it all the way back and set it
14 against that wall.
15 LOU SMIT: When you noticed it, about what
16 time was that? That's kind of important. In terms
17 of time now.
18 JOHN RAMSEY: Well it would have been probably
19 before nine o'clock, I would say. It would have
20 been that time period: seven to nine. Cause I was
21 still, you know amidst all this other stuff,
22 trying to figure out what's going on here? How did
23 they get in the house? I know this is before Linda
24 told us to go through the house. It was well
25 before.
0156
1 LOU SMIT: And was there lighting down
2 there
3 or anything at that time?
4 JOHN RAMSEY: I don't specifically, I don't
5 remember that it was on. The lights were probably
6 off, which would have been normal.
7 LOU SMIT: How would you have been able to
8 basement with the lights off, or was it --
9 JOHN RAMSEY: With the lights off at night
10 it would have been hazardous because there's a lot
11 of junk piled in here. This door was kind of
12 blocked with boxes and a little chair. And you
13 could move the chair and then walk right in. But
14 it would have been pitch black; it would have been
15 tough.
16 LOU SMIT: Did you say you had to move that
17 chair to get in?
18 JOHN RAMSEY: Um hmm.
19 LOU SMIT: Any other areas you looked at?
20 You walked into that train room? Did you look in
21 any of the closets or in any other area?
22 JOHN RAMSEY: I don't remember doing that.
23 I
24 think my purpose in going down there was to see,
25 to figure how they got in. But I don't remember
0157
1 looking anywhere else on that trip in the
2 basement.
3 LOU SMIT: You didn't got to the wine cellar
4 at that time?
5 JOHN RAMSEY: No.
6 LOU SMIT: How long would you say you were
7 down there?
8 JOHN RAMSEY: Oh, a minute. Thirty seconds
9 to a minute.
10 MIKE KANE: When was this?
11 JOHN RAMSEY: I think it was, if you're trying
12 to put in blocks of time, it was probably some
13 time between seven and nine.
14 MIKE KANE: Okay.
15 JOHN RAMSEY: That's probably as close as
16 I can come. It was earlier in the day.
17 LOU SMIT: Did you notice if any police
18 officers had checked that before?
19 JOHN RAMSEY: No. I didn't. I don't know.
20 My impression was when they first came that
21 morning that one of them looked around.
22 LOU SMIT: Would that have been before you
23 went down there?
24 JOHN RAMSEY: Yeah. Yeah, it might.
25 LOU SMIT: Do you remember the crime scene
0158
1 techs coming with their equipment?
2 JOHN RAMSEY: Yeah.
3 LOU SMIT: Would you know if he went down
4 there before or after they were there?
5 JOHN RAMSEY: Before, I would say.
6 LOU SMIT: Okay.
7 JOHN RAMSEY: Yeah, I think before.
8 LOU SMIT: So after you checked the basement,
9 what did you do then? Do you remember?
10 JOHN RAMSEY: Not specifically. I came back up.
11 But I don't remember exactly what I after that
12 point. At one point I did go out to check this
13 door here because there was a bunch of boxes piled
14 in front of it. It was locked. Then I came out
15 here and went around and it was locked.

0170
18 MIKE KANE: Okay. And then I think you
19 said you did go in the basement to see how
20 (INAUDIBLE) Could you like just picture that scene
21 again and walk me through it?
22 JOHN RAMSEY: Well, when I came down, I
23 mean, one of the things I noticed, okay, that door
24 is still blocked?
25 MIKE KANE: What do you mean it was
0172
1 blocked?
2 JOHN RAMSEY: Well, there were some boxes
3 and there was like a barstool kind of thing
4 sitting there. It wasn't obvious to me that
5 anybody had gone through because I had to move the
6 chair to get in, which I did. And then I came back
7 in here and I noticed the window was broken, which
8 fits from when I did it. But the window was open
9 slightly.
10 MIKE KANE: It might have had a little
11 latch or something?
12 JOHN RAMSEY: Just this little latch. But
13 what I did specifically notice was the suitcase
14 sitting under the window. That was not -- that
15 didn't fit. I could explain why the window was
16 broken or why it might have been partly open, but
17 the suitcase just kind of jumped out at me.
18 MIKE KANE: And you said that you had
19 previously taken that down? I think you said you
20 took it down to the laundry room. Are you talking
21 about the second floor laundry room?
22 JOHN RAMSEY: No. I think it had been up
23 here for a while. The kids had gone in; they
24 unpacked or whatever. Maybe it was in this room.
25 It was somewhere up in this area.
0173
1 MIKE KANE: Okay. I thought you meant the
2 laundry area?
3 JOHN RAMSEY: No, no, the second floor.
4 Because I took it down to the basement, but I just
5 kind of sat it in this room. We weren't terribly
6 neat, so putting stuff away was kind of a
7 progression. So it got that far. But I absolutely
8 did not move that.
9 MIKE KANE: Now you said that that window
10 was open a bit, but that sometimes that had been
11 open before to let air --
12 JOHN RAMSEY: It was open for ventilation.
13 It was wide open, because with the heat all
14 winter, that room would really get hot. So if the
15 kids were down there and playing, you had to open
16 the window.
17 MIKE KANE: And that was a room where the kids
18 played in a lot with the train?
19 JOHN RAMSEY: The train was there. Burke
20 used to play with that. They didn't play there a
21 lot. Burke did, from time to time. But not so
22 much JonBenet. That was Burke's train room.
23 MIKE KANE: And so this was before or do
24 you remember if this was before or after the
25 Whites and Fernies (INAUDIBLE)?
0174
1 JOHN RAMSEY: I think it was after,
2 because they came fairly early.
3 MIKE KANE: Was it long after?
4 JOHN RAMSEY: I really don't remember
5 specifically. The best I can do is, it was, I
6 believe, after the police came. Because they had
7 gone through the house before I figured out what
8 I'm going to do. It was before ten o'clock. They
9 had already done some preparation before that. So
10 it would have been before. Probably before nine.
11 So then somewhere between seven and nine.
12 MIKE KANE: Okay. I think it's, and this
13 may put things into perspective. I think you were
14 saying that you were expecting a phone call
15 between ten and 12. The note said between eight
16 and ten.
17 JOHN RAMSEY: Oh, really?

18 MIKE KANE: So does that note, does
19 that put into context, between eight and ten,
20 where were you?
21 JOHN RAMSEY: (INAUDIBLE) yeah. Really it
22 does. When we were ready for the phone call and I
23 was prepped about what I was going to say and I
24 was getting the family ready. And so between that
25 period of time we were just waiting for the phone
0175
1 call and I was near the phone. And I was either in
2 the study or on the first floor. I just waiting
3 for it.
4 MIKE KANE: So it would have been before
5 that?
6 JOHN RAMSEY: It would have been before
7 that time period.
8 MIKE KANE: But would if have been before
9 the time that you said Linda prepped you? I
10 believe she arrived later on; she arrived around
11 eight o'clock or so?
12 JOHN RAMSEY: No, it was before that.
13 MIKE KANE: It was before that?
14 JOHN RAMSEY: (INAUDIBLE) my time --
15 MIKE KANE: No, I understand. That's why
16 trying to (INAUDIBLE).
17 JOHN RAMSEY: But if the note said, eight
18 to ten, which I don't remember.
19 MIKE KANE: Yes, it said that, eight.

=======================================

So I ask myself, self, I said, "If there was a bunch of boxes and stuff AND A CHAIR BLOCKING THE TRAIN ROOM DOOR then how did the intruder enter or exit using that door (the ONLY door to the ONLY window that one could enter or exit in the basement easily) and then put THAT CHAIR and boxes and junk back in front of the train room door AFTER IT WAS CLOSED for John Ramsey to find the next morning between seven and nine AM?"

And John Ramsey even says, "It wasn't obvious to me that anybody had gone through because I had to move the chair to get in, which I did"

And I am totally mind boggled that even in June 1998 that John Ramsey could not remember that the ransom note said they would call between 8 and 10.

If Fleet White or any of the cops had been to the basement BEFORE John Ramsey did that morning I don't think any of them would have put all the junk, the boxes and THAT CHAIR back in front of the train room door so in my opinion John Ramsey HAD to be the first one in the basement early that morning.

And then that begs the question that if John Ramsey closed that window and latched it then WHO OPENED IT again for it to be WIDE OPEN for those crime scene photos that Lou Smit flashes around claiming an intruder came in that window?

ACR

 

For an intelligent man, Show Me, he behaved very stupidly, don't you think?

 

I don't think it's odd

I don't think it odd to consider John might have been having an affair. Patsy told her housekeeper she had lost interest in sex. If John had an admitted affair once, what's gonna stop him from doing it again? Going to the airport on Christmas day may have been something he told his pilot he would do so his pilot wouldn't have to spend some of Christmas away from home but it would also give John an opportunity to do another activity too.

 

Somehow I think an affair would have come out in the investigation, but considering how many other things have been covered up, maybe not.

 

BJ,

So we have both Fleet White and John Ramsey making separate trips to the basement without either one of them knowing, they had both made a previous trip down there before 1:00 pm. If I remember correctly, Fleet stated he went down to take a look in the basement shortly after he arrived there at 6:00 am. Therefore, he must have seen the chair under the door, and yet this wasn't mentioned (?). I'm puzzled!

John Ramsey moved the chair, and this again is tampered evidence, but he is also putting his fingerprints on the chair. I don't remember reading anything about prints on this chair. Hard trying to put the pieces together, but of course, this is exactly the way the Ramseys wanted this investigation to go.
A psychological challenge for the investigators. They had the whole night to plan it out, and with Patsy's theatrics, she was a pro.

 

What did self tell you?

Oh, for a tough cop to have asked these questions, instead of poor ethically-bound Mike Kane. Cop could have said "BWAH!! That's such BS, you stupid babykiller!!! HOW COULD YOU NOT REMEMBER WHEN THE KIDNAPPER SAID HE WOULD CALL!!!"