The Purpose Of the Ransom Note

Discussion in 'Justice for JonBenet Discussion - Public Forum' started by Learnin, Apr 5, 2010.

  1. DeeDee

    DeeDee Member

    It wasn't even that outlandish a conspiracy, actually. All it took was a call from JR to MB, and that set the ball in motion for the other calls. The defense firm had strong ties to the governor's office, as well as personal and professional relationships with the DA- in any other jurisdiction, a DA in this position would have to recuse himself because of those relationships. Not AH, though.
    So it was more like a cascade of deceit from the get-go, and like a runaway train, once started, couldn't be stopped.
     
  2. koldkase

    koldkase FFJ Senior Member

    Good thread, learnin, and I'm not trying to derail the topic...really! :blush:

    I have had a long day, so I'm going to come back tomorrow and keep reading. I'm about half way through now. Your thoughts about the ransom note are at least close, I believe. Whatever specifically the writer/author meant for LE to believe happened, it's clear it involved kidnapping gone wrong. John Ramsey said that himself many times.

    I'll say that I believe John Ramsey was in on it, myself. What specific part he played, whether in the abuse and/or murder or just in the cover up, I can't say. But the story of him on the floor on his hands and knees in his underwear doesn't fly with me. Nor do I believe for one minute that John would tell Patsy to call 911 when they clearly could have called the very powerful defense company John worked for, considering his child was supposed to be kidnapped by a foreign faction who named the company as the impetus.

    Also I don't believe for half a second that John and Pasty would have answered the door all groomed and smiling--cordial, I think was the word used. No way they'd have invited over friends, and if Patsy had done something that dumb and John heard it, he'd have called them back pronto and said do not come over--if that wasn't part of a "plan" as you point out.

    No way would it never occur to John Ramsey that the kidnappers might still be in the house, with his child, and a threat to himself, his wife and son, as well. Never once have I ever heard either Ramsey mention it ever crossed their minds. Sheer instinct should have given them that thought first and foremost. When someone breaks into your sanctuary and does harm, every nerve in your body starts screaming. They have your child? Its fight or flight.

    But John and Patsy had a kidnap party instead.

    So your breakdown of the ransom note is very interesting, learnin, and might be very close to the truth of what the writer was planning. But I believe John was right there with her.

    I'll go back over your analysis tomorrow. I had some thoughts as I was reading it, but wanted to finish the thread and see what everyone else said before I said much. Now I'm just pooped.

    Thanks for starting this discussion. You are such a good addition to the FFJ family. I am so glad you joined.
     
  3. koldkase

    koldkase FFJ Senior Member

    I agree, DeeDee, but for one issue that was once such a laughed at concept by the RST, it was hard to discuss it: the blank phone record being tampered with by Team Ramsey.

    Now that we have seen exposed, time and again, the corruption of our government, it's not so hard to contemplate. It wasn't so obvious to everyone in 1996, when the Internet was just becoming financially feasible for many of us.

    A long list of conspiracies involving the very rich and powerful in the last decade has lifted that curtain, however, and all Team Ramsey can do is ignore the subject.

    The poster Spade, who brought us a lot of inside info, including "The Bonita Papers," has said the subpoena block went all the way to the White House. Of course, he never gave his source for that, but I can't think of a time when any info he provided turned out not to be what he said it was. With Access Graphics being owned by Lockheed, it's not that much of a stretch, if you know something about the level of power that company has. They can bury the bodies without so much as a sniff from LE. The world over. Their business is war, after all. REAL war. At the highest level.

    Why would they do that for John Ramsey, who was over such a small company they owned in Colorado? It's the club, of course. One CEO with a molested and dead daughter can be a PR problem, after all. Have you seen their commercials? They don't advertise collateral damage and death. It would have been a small problem for them to handle. Easier than seeing the headlines: LOCKHEED MARTIN CEO AND WIFE CONVICTED OF CHILD ABUSE AND MURDER.

    Lockheed Martin has been in the news in scandals involving corruption, as well, in the past. I posted the articles here, I think, but I am drawing a blank right now. It was along these lines, though: powerful company breaking the law and a cover up.

    The Ramseys had but to do what their powerful lawyers told them and hope for a little luck, because it was not foolproof, of course. I don't think on that night, or that morning, anyone involved dreamed it would become a national scandal, major unsolved crime, and live in infamy forever.

    But you never see anyone in the media ever mention Lockheed Martin as a player in this crime, do you? And you never will.

    P.S. If I die unexpectedly soon, or disappear, it was nice knowing all of ya'! :shadow:
     
  4. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    Fleet White told Steve Thomas that he'd talked to a Ramsey investigator--or investigators. (Don't remember that detail.) When Thomas asked when, White looked at his notes and said that it was the afternoon of the 26th, the same afternoon that JonBenet's body was discovered.

    That's quick work. Somebody got these guys on the job in a big hurry. I've always assumed it was Mike Bynum.
     
    Last edited: Oct 14, 2010
  5. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    Rushing in where angels fear to tread, I was thinking again about the alliteration in the ransom note. I'm not sure that this literary tic was below the level of the author's consciousness. It occurs to me that the author might have been well aware of this particular trait and loved it very much.

    "Adequate size attache" always struck me as awkward, to say the least. Then I realized that if you take out "size," that it's another, subtler, example of alliteration.

    What's an "adequate size attache"? Is that like a basic briefcase? Looking around the internet I found that some briefcase websites rate their wares on whether or not they have "adequate capacity." Perhaps the ransom note writer had been doing some attache shopping before the murder.

    Anyway, I'm not sure our ransom note writer was panicked by the time he or she got around to the 11th page of rewrites. Perhaps by then a kind of exhilaration had taken hold, to the extent that our ransom note writer realized that John was in the shower and it was almost too late.
     
    Last edited: Oct 14, 2010
  6. Cherokee

    Cherokee FFJ Senior Member

    I believe you have assumed correctly. Mike Bynum and John Ramsey have been thick as thieves for years. And Bynum is STILL fixing things for John Ramsey.

    John has refused to take a regular job ever since he was let go from Access Graphics/Lockheed Martin because he felt it was beneath him to be anything but a CEO (or some other big dog) in a corporation. Because of this, John had to severely downsize his extravagant lifestyle and was having to sell off his expensive toys. Once again, Mike Bynum has come to John's rescue by getting him an executive post with a company Mike recently joined.

    http://www.forumsforjustice.org/forums/showthread.php?p=184851&highlight=john+ramsey#post184851
     
  7. koldkase

    koldkase FFJ Senior Member

    There have been many analyses of the ransom note, but it's always interesting to see another POV. So yes, I'd like to see that site, if you have it handy. Don't spend a lot of time on it, though, if you can't find it quick.

    Thanks for pointing this language out. Patsy was all over that ransom note. Every way it could be analyzed, from handwriting to linguistics, from inside knowledge of the family to motive, Patsy wrote the note. Anyone who won't even acknowledge the obvious associations with Patsy has another agenda than knowing who actually wrote it, IMO.
     
  8. koldkase

    koldkase FFJ Senior Member

    Well, I think I've caught up now.

    I do think that Patsy was coming up with a scenario that she beileved would quickly divert LE from the family and allow Burke, Patsy, and John time to get out of the house after the body was quickly found.

    I believe they were looking to get to Bynum as quickly as they could, so he could become their legal shield before LE had a chance to pick up that there was no kidnapping.

    In the meantime, I believe the many friends called over were for that purpose: a shield between the Ramseys and LE that morning. Like squirrels, the Ramseys were working to scatter "predatory" LE's attention by keeping them busy, IMO.

    I have said this before, but I'll repeat it for this discussion: I once saw one of those "former" FBI profilers talking about this ransom note on TV, and he said someone who writes a fake ransom note inherently includes "fear" that is relevent to him/her. So whoever wrote the note probably had entertained some kind of fear about his/her child being kidnapped.

    We know that Ransom was playing in Boulder, a movie which JAR mentioned to LE himself in an interview and said was a story about a family JUST LIKE THE RAMSEYS. It really is. I watched it recently and the story is astonishing when you consider that the ransom note writer so perfectly mimics what happened in that movie:

    • The ransom note threats and language are similar to the kidnappers' phone calls to to the parents in the movie: lots of high tech stuff used, etc.
    • The instructions of how TO DELIVER the money involves a lot of long, complicated directions to keep LE from following the father when he tries TO DELIVER the money.
    • The mother collapses at one point and almost vomits--John mentioned several times that Patsy was throwing up that morning...sort of.
    • The child in the movie had his hands restrained and cuffed to the bed and his mouth and eyes duct taped.
      • The kidnappers intended all along to kill the child.

    I also believe it's very possible, in fact probable, that Patsy knew all about the kidnapping of members of a rich family because of John's employer, Lockheed Martin. As I said above, John traveled for the company overseas and it would be a surprise if he never attended any Lockheed Martin training or had any info about safety protocol and security in a world where kidnapping is literally an industry in some countries.

    I've also written about this, but let me repeat it because it illustrates to me how improbable it is that John was never given any info on company policy and protocol regarding the safety of its executives:

    Here's the context:

    Years before the Ramsey kidnapping, the only thing I knew about Lockheed Martin was it had a large operation near Atlanta where they built planes and was a major defense contractor, and only knew that because it's such a large American corporation and manufactures part of our military defense equipment, who hadn't heard of it. But I had no special or even conscious interest in the company. Just knew it existed and loosely what I have said above.

    So I had a social friend whose music hobby intersected with mine in that we belonged to a local booster club of sorts. He was married, and me, too. I met his wife and she was a nice woman. He was a nice guy, as well, and we participated in various projects with that club that brought us to working together from time to time on them. I'll call him Bob--not his name, though.

    In that context, we became friends, as well, enough so that we talked about personal stuff at times, when we had time. Nothing too personal, but just the kind of conversation that you get into while waiting for this or that to happen or equipment or personnel to arrive, etc.

    So one evening, waiting for something or other, Bob started talking about his wife. I can't remember the lead in, but he surprised me by telling me her father was rich and had a large business, etc. I was surprised because Bob and his wife were in no way wealthy on the surface that you'd notice. They looked and seemed just like...us--had average jobs, education, etc.

    The story Bob told me was fascinating because I had no idea about this kind of international business operation and experience--I'm a sucker for a good story, too. And it was interesting:

    Bob said he once went as a guest to South America with his father-in-law during a business trip. Having never traveled with that kind of private jet, limo's, etc., Bob was having a good time. But he said that it was scary, as well, because they traveled with security guards and the limo's were bullet-proof, every hotel had security gates, big time armed protection. While Bob wouldn't even tell me what his father-in-law's business was, apparently it was a private business that did work for various gov'ts. And the security was because of the potential for kidnapping.

    Some time after the Ramsey murder, I think, I read a long article in Vanity Fair about kidnapping as an industry in many countries like those in South America. Even today, so-called rebel factions kidnap executives of rich companies to collect the ransom. It's literally a business deal, one in which the victim will always be returned if the ransom is paid, because if the kidnappers keep that faith, they will always get paid. In such companies, exec's who travel in those areas often actually have insurance in the event of being kidnapped. I am not making this up.

    Consider that back in the 70's, John Paul Getty's grandson was kidnapped in Italy, his ear sent to his grandfather when he first refused to pay, and then once paid, the grandson was released--can't say unharmed, either. This was a well publicized kidnapping, as well. There are entire neighborhoods in Italy known to have been built with the monies collected from kidnap victims. Insane, isn't it? But that's the reality of being rich, successful, and traveling in FOREIGN countries.

    So your premise about the writer of the ransom note trying to build a story about a kidnapping gone wrong is very plausible to me, learnin. I believe Patsy had access to such information and probably had seen Ransom. I think it came immediately to mind when she needed to divert LE in such a way as to be able to get the family out of the house without being arrested. She didn't do too badly.

    But I still believe that it only worked because the Ramseys had help working at some other level. I find it highly suspicious that even Boulder PD allowed what happened that day to transpire so carelessly. If they believed a child's safety was at issue, forget that her parents were rich and employed by LM, there is no reason on earth the FBI shouldn't have been called immediately and given jurisdiction.

    Why did the FBI not take over jurisdiction? There was no question they had it. Someone had to tell them to stand down, IMO.

    What LE agency would leave a single officer in the home alone with 8 or 9 civilians at a crime scene when kidnappers were supposed to be calling? I don't believe it for one minute.

    And once the body was found, who has a child's body found in the basement and walks away like the Ramseys did that day?

    So I think the ransom note was really propaganda and a PR missive, written with the expectation that the body would be found and the Ramseys would be out of there before many questions could be asked at all. Blame the foreign faction, absolve AG/LM, too. (Always something that I have thought is a telling detail--why would a foreign faction or kidnapper of any kind like John Ramsey and his business but kidnap and kill his child?) Stick to the script--Ransom--for family and friends and business associates and life would go on though the "handful" would be missed.

    Okay, too much writing, I know, but I can't help it, obviously. This is a complicated case and I use everything I know to figure out what I can. I may be totally off, I am aware of that. But this crime was not committed by someone who wasn't thinking hard, using elements from life to construct a getaway and cover up. It has logic to the person or people who committed the various deeds. Thinking through it backwards is hard, and it requires climbing over innumerable obstacles left by Team Ramsey, a professional group of WORLD-CLASS defense experts and shills who have kept us busy for 14 years with lies, evasions, red herrings, an unending supply of "intruder" suspects, fake clues, and legal threats and deterents, as well.

    Well, that's what I think, anyhow.
     
  9. rashomon

    rashomon Member

    Also, the foreign faction members (or at least one of them) still had to have remained in the house as well, in order to "kill" JonBenet immediately after the police call). Aside from the absurdity of this, the stage of the body's rigor mortis contradicts such a scenario anyway. But still, it may well have played a role in the stager's panicked mind frantically trying to put a story together for LE to swallow.
    I believe it was more the fear of being seen which stopped them. Parents cruel enough to tie a cord around their child's neck and inflict the genital wound (even if they believed she was already dead, it still is a cruel act) are capable of anything imo.
    Imo the Ramseys intially wanted to dump the body outside without a ransom note, having a "child abducted from her bed, tortured and killed by a sexual predator" scenario in mind.
    But when removing the body from the home was regarded as too risky after all, they switched to a "political kidnapping for ransom" scene instead. This switch would explain why the body was wiped clean of blood and redressed in underwear, covering the previously staged sexual assault.
    Imo the blanket was used for the staged scene to suggest JonBenet had been quickly grabbed from her bed together with the blanket covering her.
     
  10. Learnin

    Learnin Member


    kk,
    When I read your post here, I wanted to swing at someone, I really did. I don't think there's any question of a conspiracy, just a question of how many were covering and for whom?
     
  11. Learnin

    Learnin Member

    Thanks for the kind words, kk. When I began studying this case, this was one of the first forums I came to and am glad I did...such great case history and discussion.

    The ransom note author had a distinct motive for writing this letter and the motive, if established, goes a long way in apprehending the perp(s). For instance, I remember one poster or two, on another forum, state that the motive was to buy time for the perp to get out of the country, etc. I think they were way off base(if the perp was a stranger, it would have taken months for BPD to decipher this), but at least these posters knew the author had a motive.

    If the author's motive was to make LE think it was a kidnapping, and the kidnappers killed JBR when Ramseys contacted police and friends, then, it is clear a Ramsey(s) were the authors as they did exactly what the ransom note said would get their daughter killed.
     
  12. koldkase

    koldkase FFJ Senior Member


    I know. I'm kind of making myself sick. It's hard to learn the lesson the Ramseys have taught: our whole justice system is a two--faced fraud. If you're poor or working class, it'll grind you up like hamburger. If you're rich and a member of the elite 5% of the population, no worries if you break a few laws here and there.

    Hard lessons for an American who once drank the kool-aide with both hands.
     
  13. Karen

    Karen Member

    Or of not seeing 1997?
     
  14. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    Here's the site: http://alinguistic.blogspot.com/2007/10/becker-barbara-j.html

    ("Familiar" isn't actually spelled with an "e" in the note. It's just one of Patsy's funny "a's.")

    People say that the writer was someone who knew Patsy well enough to mimic her handwriting and phrasing, but it would have to be someone who was beyond intimate. It would have to be someone who could predict with confidence that she would write "C.B.I." after the murder. How could you predict that beforehand? It's not like it comes up. I have no idea if anybody in my family would put periods in that.

    Yet this same linguist genius friend of Patsy's thought, according to Lou Smit, that it would be a good idea to study Ruthless People for advice on how to conduct a successful kidnapping.
     
    Last edited: Oct 15, 2010
  15. Cherokee

    Cherokee FFJ Senior Member

    This excellent analysis was done by a brilliant linguist who used to go by the hat of "Twilight" at Websleuths many years ago. I don't know if she still posts at WS now or not. She and I agreed about the linguistic composition of the Ransom Note publicly (when I still posted at WS) and discussed linguistic theory behind the scenes.
     
  16. DeeDee

    DeeDee Member

    The phrase "adequate size attache" always made me suspicious. If this was a real kidnapping, the kidnappers wouldn't give a rat's patoot how the victim's family packed the money. Brown paper bag (this is the "movie version" usually seen), backpack, lunchbox, or Louis Vuitton. Doesn't matter. All they want is the money. And they sure as he** don't care if you are "well-rested".

    This note SCREAMS Patsy.
     
  17. Learnin

    Learnin Member

    Extremely interesting, kk. I agree with you. I've never thought about the help going as high as you indicate, but, I've always thought local political power was working for the Ramseys. You've really got me thinking now that the help may really have come from even higher up

    Although I believe the ransom note author(s) had a particular motive in mind, like you, I believe there were secondary motives which served the author's purpose. You mentioned several; it served as a way of the R's getting people to the scene for distance and chaos, etc. It was a way of having the police find the body instead of the R's calling to report a body. I, also, believe that, if BR was involved in the first assault, the ransom note was a way of letting him off the hook in his own mind; to make him think some one else was responsible for the actual death. In that way, he wouldn't see his "secret" as really being a lie, etc.

    As I think about the note and the crime scene, however, I believe the author really intended to stage a kidnapping, with kidnappers holding the girl in the basement, and killing her when the police were called. I read, somewhere, (and maybe it was in several different works in regards to the ransom note) that someone, who is lying, will use more words than necessary to convince the one listening that what they are saying is true.

    If there is one thing, in this ransom note, that is overkill, it is the warnings directed toward John about what will happen if he doesn't carry out the instructions to a T. "Listen carefully!" "Don't grow a brain, John!" "You must follow the instructions." "We are monitoring.." "The two men watching over your daughter don't particularly like you." "You can try to deceive us but be warned...." You stand a 99% chance of killing your daughter if you try to outsmart us." "You and your family are under constant scrutiny." "Don't think that killing will be difficult!" "Don't underestimate us John." "It is up to you now, John."

    The greatest percentage of this long letter is to let John know what will happen if he.....what? what?....calls the police.....

    Since this is a lie, the author overkills the subject trying to convince police that this was a kidnapping gone bad.

    If police would have walked into that cellar room first thing in the morning, what would they have seen on the surface, before the autopsy was performed? They would have seen a lifeless little girl who looked like she had been held against her will, bound, gagged. No signs of head trauma. No signs of a brutal struggle. The only obvious lethal assault being the ligature tightened around her neck. They would have seen her covered with a blanket. The blood, I believe, had been wiped clean, and she was redressed to make it look exactly like a kidnapping. This is exactly what a person would have seen on first observation. A little girl who had been killed with a rope tightened around her neck.

    Of course, it wasn't a well thought out plan, LE saw right through the staging but a panicked perp would not think so clearly, no?
     
  18. Learnin

    Learnin Member

    Yes. I believe the body was wiped clean to stage the kidnapping for ransom scene. I'm beginning to think that the jab was not done as a staging. I'm beginning to think the little girl was penetrated on purpose and then the head blow came. Then she was wiped clean for staging purposes. I guess what I'm beginning to believe is that there was no quick jab in order to stage a sexual assault or cover one. I'm beginning to believe the vag. penetration started the whole thing in motion.
     
  19. fr brown

    fr brown Member

    It's true that women often throw up in movies--usually when they find out their husbands are cheating on them. Maybe we can blame An Unmarried Woman for that. I don't think it happens in real life. (I do think Patsy had ample reason to throw up, though.)

    An FBI agent did go to the crime scene. I read this just the other day in Perfect Murder, Perfect Town. Ron Walker was his name. According to Schiller, John Eller dismissed the FBI from the case. Some law enforcement agencies don't have that much respect for the FBI.

    As far as Arndt being by herself, they were operating with a reduced crew and maybe they figured she could handle a bunch of tame yuppies. They had a trap set up on the phone so they probably assumed she wouldn't have much to do.

    I agree about the Ramseys walking away. I find that beyond odd. I'd probably sit outside the morgue all night.
     
    Last edited: Oct 15, 2010
  20. Elle

    Elle Member

    Courtesy of Little: John Andrew Ramsey mentions the movie "Ransom"
    from Steve Thomas "JonBenét":

    <o:p></o:p>
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 15, 2010
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