Evidence Vs Pretense

Cherokee, Little, and Elle,

I am deeply touched by the appreciative words coming from you great posters who have researched the JonBenet Ramsey case for so much longer than I, and on whose encyclopedic case knowledge and creative thinking I keep resorting time and again during my own case study. Thanks so much again!

 

rashomon, you have earned the praise!

Little

 

Sure Has and Rash takes care of her own. She is wonderful!!

 

Thanks so much Solace for your nice words. Our common interest in both the MacDonald case and in this one has made us meet many times on the forums, and it is always a pleasure to see you posting. :hiya:

 

Could it be determined from the glass shards whether the basement window was freshly broken or whether the breaking dated back a while ? Can such a thing be technically established at all?

For if yes, then it would have been very easy for the investigators to verify or falsify John Ramsey's story about having broken the window the summer before.

 

Questions were asked of the Ramseys in either April of '97 or June '98 by LE investigators about this--sorry can't remember which, but you can do a search in the transcripts at ACR's and find out. Patsy went into GREAT DETAIL about vacuuming up the glass from the broken window. Over and over, she vacuumed. Had her maid vacuum. This, from a woman who doesn't even know if her small kids wash their hands before eating or when they bath.

But this vacuumed up glass must have been why John and Patsy had to fess up about the broken window being HIS work from that summer. Surely no INTRUDER would have VACUUMED, in spite of the comfort he felt in hanging out all night and murdering a child, writing a ransom note, and tucking in the body at his leisure while the Ramseys slept. And vacuuming is rather noisy...so maybe the Ramseys didn't think they'd be able to pass THAT off as intruder activity they missed. Plus, adding to the IMPLAUSIBILITY of so much that an INTRUDER did in this case--hunting down the VACUUM? And were the glass shards still IN the vacuum bag? If not, then we'd have to believe the INTRUDER ALSO EMPTIED THE VACUUM BAG into the garbate. No vacuum bag with glass shards in the garbage? THEN we'd have to believe THE INTRUDER MADE A RUN TO THE DUMP. Leaving the body behind, of course, and without anyone noticing.

Yeah, I'm sure the Ramsey lawyers drilled the Ramseys GOOD about the broken window:

Thanks for making me think about this one more time, rashomon. It has always puzzled me. I had recently written about it at topix, and had gotten as far as John decided to fess up about breaking the window because jams said someone was with him when he broke it. I was thinking John realized that person might spill the beans to LE and it would make John look bad for not telling them about something so crucial as key evidence of a "break-in"...by JOHN, NOT AN INTRUDER.

But now I see it was more than that: THE PHYSICAL EVIDENCE puts the lie to an intruder breaking the window BECAUSE OF THE CLEANED UP GLASS.

Silly, isn't it, how simple explanations are, but how long it takes us to catch up with the Ramsey games. They were SOOOOOOOOO far ahead of LE by the time they sat down with the BPD in April '97. THOMAS TOLD THE TRUTH: Hunter and his lawyers RUINED this case when they interferred in every way possible with the investigation, handing to the RST case police and lab reports, evidence, and refusing to get warrants for the basic investigation of this murder. I will always believe Hunter did this deliberately--you just DON'T refuse to get phone record warrants when a child is found murdered in the home. He was in on it, IMO, maybe not realizing the extent to which he was being conned early on, but by the time he saw the light, it was too late--they had him in their pocket because he would have been disbarred for what he did if they exposed him in the glare of the national publicity.

Oh well. La di da.

 

poor job

well despite claiming multiple vacuuming, there where still some pieces for Fleet to pick up and place on top of the suitcase. (this is what I recall reading somewhere) Unless there where still fragments of glass in the window and the stager pulled them out and put them on the floor as part of the staging.

 

ST, p. 20:

I don't believe for a second that someone like Patsy took the trouble to thoroughly vacuum broken glass off that cluttered basement floor.
I believe the R's originally wanted to stage a point of intruder entry/exit there, but then decided against it and got rid of the broken-out pieces of glass somehow (e.g. by crushing them and flushing them down the toilet), but forgot that one piece which FW later found on the floor. To account for the hole in the window, John told LE the story about the lost keys.

John's story about allegedly having climbed in through the basement window the summer before sounds more than odd:

When a suspect says "I don't remember" in interviews, this often indicates deception.
So John does not even remember how he broke the pane? I don't buy it. Also, in another part of the interview, he speculates about how he or "would have" let himself in. Hmm, he doesn't remember again how exactly he got in? How many alternatives are there? He seems to speculate whether he nose-dived into that basement or if he got down feet forward first?
I once climbed through a basement window of that type, and there's only one way to do it sensibly. John being so uncertain about how he did it leads me to believe that he has never climbed through any such basement window in his whole life.

Also, several other people in Boulder had keys to the Ramsey home. Why didn't John just call them instead of climbing down into that dirty well in his business suit?
When conducting experiments at the crime scene, Dr. Henry Lee said he was barely able to lift the grate and let himself down into the window well.

KK, on which Topix thread does Jameson say that? Could she back up her claim with the officially documented record? (I doubt it.)

jmo

 

Jams claimed that on her forum numerious times, said she KNOWS who was with John, but of course, she "can't tell" because it's a confidence. hahaha John has a WITNESS that he broke the window, this is HIS CHILD'S MURDER--NO LESS--and John's simply BREAKING THE WINDOW OF HIS OWN HOME AND CLIMBING IN is some BIG SECRET?

You're right, it won't wash, and it's absurd for John to make such claims, and for jams to back them up with yet ANOTHER story she WON'T source. The RST has this routine down PAT...or should I say PATSY?

Also, John's story about being on his hands and knees to go in that window is physically impossible. The basement floor is some 3-4 ft. below the window: watch Smit squeeze through on his butt and drop down, and Smit is TALL. Try positioning yourself on the side of your bed, as if it were the window ledge/well, and try to "drop down" from your hands and knees without putting a foot on the floor. I can't do it. No way. Now imagine bricks, hard wood of a window frame and sill.... John's lying.

This window story of John's finally convinced me John is in on this cover-up. The missing cell phone record convinced me he at least knew what was going on the night JonBenet died. JMO, of course, but I think he's ALSO good for it, in some capacity.

 

I never would have thought Ol' Louie would actualy try to reconstruct the so-called garrote but it seems he did:

Louie couldnt make it work either. Hardly surprising.

Smit couldn't make one because it can't be done. But not because it was elaborate and complicated (the knots are very simple knots, and a kindergartner can wrap cord around a stick). He couldn't do it because you can't really get a knot to lock with that kind of device. You don't need the wooden stick for that at all.
Bottom line: that handle was not needed for anything functional. It was not needed to create the knot, for this knot needs fingerwork. And when you want to get the knot tight, all you need is pull a little with your hands and the soft flat nylon cord will make the knot lock. Why bother to wrap remaining cord around a stick when all you need is pulling with your hands? Why make it complicated and unfunctional when you can get it simple and functional?

Therefore Smit got it right when reflecting that this stick was not needed to strangle the victim.

So why was the stick there? If it didn't work, what was to be achieved by constructing it? Smit theorized that the crime could have been staged simply by pulling cord around the neck. But I think the stager of the scene had the feeling it was not enough to stage it like that, since it does happen that children get strangled by their parents. So what does she do? She fashions
the 'garrote' so that everyone should think "No parent would strangle their children that way. A perverted sexual predator must have done this."

One doesn't have to be a physics major to try out that what was suggested with the 'garrrote scene' just doesn't work with that kind of knot and with that kind of handle. "Elaborate sexual device", Smit said. He obviously had some 'erotic asphyxiation' scenario in mind where the cord was alterantely tightened and loosened. But this wouldn't work at all with a fixed locked knot around the neck.

 

For my money, I don't think Patsy would have known what to do with the staging of the "garrotte," and that is how I come to the conclusion that John was involved. John would have known more about knots and other things like that - I can't believe Patsy would ever have come into contact with such a contraption, or known what something like that would have been used for.

Unless, of course, a garrotte was mentioned in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.

 

For the record, Patsy had done macrame. The hitch on the broken stick looks similar to some loops made at the start of certain macrame projects. Patsy had also helped sail John's boats. Anyone who has helped crew knows enough about basic knots to make a slip-shod, look-alike "garrote." The idea was to make it look like JonBenet was strangled in order to point away from the head wound which Patsy knew about. The ridiculous "garotte" may also have been concocted to cover any collateral choking done by Patsy trying to drag JonBenet's top off her with JonBenet still in it, or some tugging and pulling during the incident.

 

No, but a gibbet was.

 

I have done macrame, and I think that the hitch on the broken stick looks pretty much exactly like some loops made at the start of some macrame projects. I have made those loops myself...but I wasn't in Boulder on that night.....and Patsy was. I dont believe that Patsy was as stupid as some people thought she was. I am sure that she knew how to make a slip knot. And I too, believe that Patsy was trying to viciously jerk that turtleneck off of JB, therefore...IMO...slinging her around and into either the side of the tub, or toilet. I could imagine JB's head still being stuck in the collar, while Patsy tried to pull it off of her, (Pulling from the bottom up, and in the process turning the shirt inside out), and by pulling at the sleeves. Sort of like putting an egg in a sock and slinging it into something hard...(for example). I think that this is why she "broke down" when she was shown the picture of the red turtleneck. Haney asked her about it, and she said in one portion of the interview that she had a little tiff with JB over the red turtleneck because, Patsy wanted JB to wear it to the Whites, and JB refused. But, when Haney asks her how it ended up balled up on the bathroom counter, she says.."don't remember". Which IMO...is bull. If an intruder had of really killed JB, and not too many hours before she died, Patsy argued with JB over a stupid turtleneck...then, that argument would haunt her forever, and she would have remembered exactly how that red turtleneck ended up there. Because IT..the red turtleneck....was the cause of their last argument....and...IMO...she would have remembered every single thing about it.

 

Oh, I think Patsy Ramsey would have known just what to do, but I also think along these same lines heymom, that John Ramsey assisted with the staging of the garrote. Patsy knew macramé and could have helped with the knotting, but everyone knows they had a boat, and John Ramsey had to know something about knots, and if so, he still screwed up. The knot was locked and didn't slip, therefore would have been useless as a strangling tool.

It would have been easier for the Ramseys if they had used a straight piece of wire and two wooden handles and created the same gadget used to cut the large blocks of cheese in the grocery store, when I was a young girl. No slip knots or fancy knots needed for this tool, also known as a garrote. Real gory just talking about it.

I did macramé years ago, Ames, when it was in fashion. Wouldn't do it now if you paid me. I hate it!

 

Ames, at one point I wondered if Patsy "out of spite" put that red turtleneck on her when she was getting her ready for her bed (?). Linda Hoffman Pugh stated Jonbenét was rebelling quite often against wearing the same outfits as Patsy herself. Just the day before Christmas, she didn't want to put on the dress Patsy picked for her, and Patsy just may well have blown her stack that night(?).

 

I believe that John helped her too! And I ALSO hated Macramé...I think that I did a couple of projects...and that was IT for me. I had enough....

 

You could be right. Because now that I think about it, if she didn't want to wear it to the White's...she probably wouldn't have wanted to wear that binding thing to bed, either. I can't STAND them...they are so uncomfortable...I find myself tugging at the collar, the whole time that I am wearing it, that is why I don't own but two. Anyway, I do believe that JB wore that turtleneck to bed, I do believe that she wet the bed...and I do believe that the turtleneck got wet...and I do believe that Patsy, was probably already ticked off at her for not liking her "My TWINN" doll, and for not wanting to dress like HER twin for the White's party....all of these things combined, caused Patsy's rage attack...with the bedwetting being the straw that broke the camels back, if you know what I mean.

 

This is the way I see it could have happened, Ames! Patsy was plain harassed.

 

From PMPT, paperback, p. 753-754

How much time does it take to "make a noose"? A cord can be wrapped around a neck in seconds. What cut off JonBenet's oxygen supply was the cord tied around the neck with a fixed knot. How much time does it take to tie a simple knot? Very little.
Also, the autopsy report does not say that the cord was secured twice around JonBenet's neck. What is Schiller talking about?

Why does Schiller assume the cord was pulled [by the handle] at all and the noose was tighthened "little by little"? One almost gets the impression that he buys Lou Smit's 'garrote' scenario.

Another crucial question: did John or Patsy (or both Ramseys) think JonBenet was already dead when they tied the cord around the neck? Or did they (or one of them) want to make sure she would never talk again and murdered her by strangulation after the intial rage attack?