In which room do you think the head blow occurred?

It is a possible scenario that makes sense. The stairs to and from the basement connected right into the kitchen area as shown on the following graphic. I overlayed the first floor of the Ramsey house (in dark blue) over the basement blueprint (shown in purple). Next, I circled the stairs in red.

 

IMO, I think that the reasoning behind Kolar’s belief that it happened in the kitchen has to do with the following, and is not necessarily founded on information that the public is not privy to:
He is impressed with, and believes, the conclusion reached by Werner Spitz regarding the viability of the flashlight producing the injury to JonBenet’s skull.
A number of evidentiary items including the flashlight were found in close proximity to each other in the kitchen area. (Point #6 from Steve Thomas’ (Coors Event Center) 12 point presentation of reasons why the BPD suspected the Ramseys.)
The flashlight was apparently wiped clean both externally and internally (batteries.)
John and Patsy were evasive and distanced themselves from the flashlight when questioned about it during interviews.
The flashlight as the weapon and the kitchen as the location had long been considered as a high probability combination by BPD investigators.

From FOREIGN FACTION, Who Really Kidnapped JonBenét:
Dr. Werner Spitz, forensic medical examiner for Wayne County, Michigan, had conducted extensive studies on the wounds caused by the application of force and was considered a leading expert on the topic.
[SNIP]
Released from the grasp of the perpetrator, JonBenét turned and was struck in the upper right side of her head with a blunt object. Dr. Spitz would subsequently offer the opinion that the barrel of the Maglite brand flashlight found on the kitchen counter of the Ramsey home was consistent with the rectangular shape of the skull fracture. JonBenét’s head injury continued to bleed internally until her strangulation.
Pages 65 - 66
[SNIP]
Dr. Spitz offered some additional expert opinions on the injuries sustained by JonBenét that are referenced in Chapter Six of this book.
Page 246
[SNIP]
Dr. Werner Spitz РForensics Expert, outlined sequence of injuries sustained by JonBen̩t
Page 459

Very early on in the case the focus seemed to be on the flashlight, presumably well before the experiment by Spitz
On November 5, Detective Weinheimer arrived in St. Clair Shores, Michigan, to meet Dr. Werner Spitz, one of the world’s foremost forensic pathologists.
Perfect Murder, Perfect Town, Lawrence Schiller, page 557

The flashlight found on the kitchen counter on December 26, which was normally kept near the kitchen, could have been used either as a light or as a weapon—in the kitchen or in another room. By now the CBI had determined that both the outside of the flashlight and the batteries inside held no fingerprints. Most likely they had been wiped clean. This was highly unusual.
Perfect Murder, Perfect Town, Lawrence Schiller, page 452
Just before midnight, Frank Coffman joined Shapiro. They stood on a wooden fence in the backyard and watched as lights in the house were turned on and off. They saw Detective Gosage, with a flashlight in his hand, performing a pantomime in which someone found John or Patsy and JonBenét, attacked one or the other, but ended up fracturing JonBenét’s skull instead. With the flashlight still in hand, Gosage recreated a slightly different scenario in the kitchen. It looked as if the detectives thought the flashlight was the murder weapon.
Perfect Murder, Perfect Town, Lawrence Schiller, page 455

Sound familiar?
The conjecture that the blow to JonBenét’s head took place first fit the scenario that the police considered most likely: that JonBenét had been struck on the head with the heavy flashlight in or near the kitchen. The police had found it on a kitchen counter.
Perfect Murder, Perfect Town, Lawrence Schiller, page 559

The flashlight, the writing pad, and the Sharpie pen were all found in the kitchen area. The flashlight—which may have caused the head injury—was left on the kitchen counter.
Perfect Murder, Perfect Town, Lawrence Schiller, page 669

LOU SMIT: Where does that flashlight appear to be here?
JOHN RAMSEY: Well, it's on the kitchen counter.
LOU SMIT: Can you point on the diagram where that is?
JOHN RAMSEY: It's right here. (INAUDIBLE) is right there.
LOU SMIT: Do you have any idea how it got there?
JOHN RAMSEY: No.
LOU SMIT: Did you put it there?
JOHN RAMSEY: No. Not that I recall.
LOU SMIT: Did you use a flashlight at all that morning to look for JonBenet?
JOHN RAMSEY: I don't think so. There was no reason to turn the lights on. I wouldn't even bet that our flashlight worked. If I were to bet, I'll bet it wouldn't work. We just didn't keep up with that.
LOU SMIT: When you had that flashlight, did you ever put batteries in it? Do you remember?
JOHN RAMSEY: I might have once. Certainly probably initially.
[SNIP]
LOU SMIT: Okay. We will just go on to the next photograph. I am going to show you a photograph, this will -- you had described your flashlight before. The one that you had. And we had a photograph on the counter of a flashlight and we discussed that before. I am going to show you another photograph and have you take a look at that, see if that looks familiar to you, that's a photograph of a flashlight, and I don't have a number associated with that.
JOHN RAMSEY: Well, it's dirty. Mine was hardly used. You know, it was completely black. I don't know what the scale is here. Is that 3 feet do you suppose or maybe that's -- (handing a magnifying glass).
(MULTIPLE SPEAKERS.)
JOHN RAMSEY: It's dirty. Mine was not dirty.
LOU SMIT: Is that a similar type flashlight as to what you –
JOHN RAMSEY: It is similar if that's a metal case, and it looks similar. The end looks a lot different, the end where the battery is in. It looks -- looks similar, but it's very dirty. Mine was, I don't think mine ever got used; it was just in the drawer.
[SNIP]
LOU SMIT: What kind of flashlight do you have?
JOHN RAMSEY: Well we've got several, I guess. One that, I believe, came up as an item was this MAG light flashlight. If it's the one I think it is, my son gave me that for a Christmas present a year or two ago. And that was probably in the bar. The bar drawer was typically where it was kept.
LOU SMIT: You don't remember getting that?
JOHN RAMSEY: No. I know I did not get it.
LOU SMIT: Anyone else get it?
JOHN RAMSEY: Not that I recall. I don't even know it worked. Typically our flashlights didn't work because we needed new batteries (INAUDIBLE).We might have a few blown flashlights around.
1998 Interview of John Ramsey


TRIP DeMUTH: And I think last time when you were here on last April –
PATSY RAMSEY: Uh-huh (yes).
TRIP DeMUTH: -- you said where that was stored.
PATSY RAMSEY: Uh-huh (yes).
TRIP DeMUTH: And I wanted to clarify that a little bit. Do you remember where it was stored?
PATSY RAMSEY: Well, the best I recall it was in like one of those junk drawers there in the bar area.
TRIP DeMUTH: Okay. And I wanted to flip back to photo 380, right there.
PATSY RAMSEY: Right, yeah, one of those drawers.
TRIP DeMUTH: One of the drawers that's depicted in 380?
PATSY RAMSEY: Yeah.
TRIP DeMUTH: Do you remember which drawer?
PATSY RAMSEY: Well, I, I most recently remember it being, you know, right in this drawer.
TRIP DeMUTH: The drawer that is open?
PATSY RAMSEY: That's open there, yeah.
TRIP DeMUTH: And that's the wet bar that's by the spiral staircase, right?
PATSY RAMSEY: Right.
TRIP DeMUTH: Okay. Okay. And now looking at photo 380, you don't see a flashlight in there, right?
PATSY RAMSEY: Correct.
TRIP DeMUTH: Okay.
PATSY RAMSEY: Where was this flashlight found?
TRIP DeMUTH: Well, do you remember when you came in on, in April, they showed you a picture of the flashlight? Do you recall that? You may not.
PATSY RAMSEY: No, not exactly.
TRIP DeMUTH: Okay. This was on the kitchen counter?
PATSY RAMSEY: Oh.
[SNIP]
TRIP DeMUTH: And if you're looking towards that nook area, it would be sort of on the left island area, kind of in that area.
PATSY RAMSEY: Okay.
TRIP DeMUTH: Does that make sense to you?
PATSY RAMSEY: It doesn't make sense to me. I mean, like I said, usually it was kept in that drawer in there.
TRIP DeMUTH: Uh-huh (yes).
PATSY RAMSEY: No, I don't know.
TRIP DeMUTH: Why would that be out?
PATSY RAMSEY: I don't know.
1998 Interview of Patsy Ramsey

 

Thanks for that information, Cynic. Where do you think the head blow occurred?

 

That is quite plausible, although I believe Kolar's speculation regarding the kitchen area is based on the flashlight as the weapon.

 

Well, if the Maglite location is all the "evidence" there is for the head blow occuring in the kitchen, then I'm back to the basement!

 

If PDI, the second floor, if BDI, the basement. For whatever reason, I just can't see it happening in the kitchen other than in a scenario such as you proposed.

 

I agree.

 

Years ago, I read the reason they came to that conclusion, a stain was
found on the floor in the kitchen/dining room that was vomit.

I hate I can't show proof. But, as i've said before, those things
among others have disappeared.

There are so many things that have been removed. I would love to tell more
but I can't because I have no way to back it up.
So, sometimes I have to sit on my hands.

brenk

 

Agree, and I think the LE fell for the red herring that surely JR placed neatly onto the kitchen counter as though the intruder had just left it there! It HAD to be a red herring because it was carefully WIPED CLEAN of any fingerprints and then LEFT OUT in the open! "HERE! Look over HERE! WEAPON ALERT!!!" Meanwhile the real weapon was either put back into the golf bag or perhaps thrown out onto the lawn.

 

That's exactly how I see the maglite. Regarding the golf club, I can see Burke thinking no one would find it if he slung it outside. In fact, he may have even had the idea of his parents not finding it before he realized he wasn't going to be able to rouse JonBenet and, therefore, needed to get Mom in on what was going on.

John being so insistent to get that golf bag makes me wonder if the golf club makes me think he knew what the real weapon was and wanted it out of the house. Which means one of two things: he assumed the weapon was back in the golf bag or he put it there himself - or at the very least, made sure either Burke or Patsy did.

 

I agree about the red herring. But I don't think even Boulder LE would've fallen for that. There had to be more evidence.

Now this rings a bell. Didn't Patsy vomit or pretend to that morning and some speculated that it was to camouflage evidence of JBR having vomited? Also, didn't the Ramseys later claim that JBR had been sick on Christmas Day even though she was out riding her bike and playing? Or something like that.

Well I'm fascinated and would love to hear more. Where were these things removed from? Were they articles or interviews, or was it just speculation on the forums?

 

ITA Britt! I still think it happened in the kitchen.

 

Never said that the BPD did fall for it, only that the Ramseys were trying to direct the investigation toward the flashlight, pretending it wasn't theirs, that they had not seen it, that theirs was clean while that one on the counter was dirty, etc.

I had never heard any of those other statements. Too bad the dog was across the street or they could have blamed him for the vomit.

 

I've never heard anything about vomit in the kitchen area either. I know JR said, I think in DOI, that Patsy was vomiting in the bathroom that morning.

 

Were you thinking of this, perhaps?
The kitchen, with a restaurant-sized walk-in refrigerator, gas stove-top, convection and microwave ovens, was arranged in an efficient work-flow pattern. Lou Smit wanted to examine a place where photographs indicated an unexplained spot of blood, but Detective Gosage pointed out, “It wasn’t blood, Lou, just some spilled juice.â€
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 214

 

This is probably what you're thinking of:
Very soon after Patterson’s departure, Arndt began to have trouble keeping everybody confined to the designated area. John Ramsey wandered out of sight. Arndt had to find him and lead him back into the study, leaving the others unsupervised. Meanwhile, Priscilla White was trying to keep her friend Patsy from fainting. She seemed to be in shock; she was vomiting and hyperventilating. Arndt was supposed to keep her eye on everyone and at the same time monitor the phone for a possible call from the kidnapper.
Perfect Murder, Perfect Town, Lawrence Schiller, page 14

 

Maybe she was just gagging or retching, not actually vomiting. That seems pretty extreme, even for Patsy.

 

Q. (By Mr. Levin) It was brought to my attention fairly recently that a woman I believe named Jean Fortier, F-o-r-t-i-e-r, for the reporter, who are the parents of some children who were over your house on Christmas, and they, they, she, excuse me, said that her children reported to her at Christmas day when they went over to play, they played with Burke but that JonBenet did not play because she was sick. I hadn't heard that before. Is that nonsense?
A. Absolutely. I don't know who that is, but we had a whole parcel of kids there all day.
John Ramsey Interview, Atlanta, 2000

 

It does, LOL. She was a very talented lady, though.

 

cynic - Thanks so much for the quotes and info!