IMO BOTH McCrary and Douglas are actually saying the same thing.
It was someone who knew JB,knew the house&the family.No stranger.
I've been looking again at the house floor plans on
http://jonbenetramsey.pbworks.com/The House
Unfortunately, some of the points where evidence was found are not listed.
But, I think this is a very interesting house, especially the basement area. I've been trying to work out why it was designed as it was, but not having houses with basements here, I'm at a bit of a loss.
The window to the basement, with the window well I can now understand. However, there were other windows in the basement that opened into the space under the house, which seems odd. For example, there is a picture of the storeroom adjacent to the laundry. It had an open window with a chair underneath, as if someone had climbed out of it. This opens into the space beneath the area where the telephone was used by PR to dial 911, so this seems to fit with someone being able to spy on the R's, the "Speaking to anybody about your situation......" in the RN. The bathroom has a small window that is directly below another small window in the foyer on the 1st floor. There seems to have been some suspicion by the BPD about this, as the tank and lid of the toilet were taken away and there is a cloth of some kind on the floor circled in the crime scene photo. There is a window in the laundry and another in the other wall of that storeroom that open to what appears to be a void in the first floor area called the 'lower hall'. I could be wrong, but I think there might be access from this area via this void to the under house area (man hole?). There is an external door into the garage. There is an external door into a storage area beneath the spiral staircase, but it's not possible to see if there is access to the house through this (or in fact what it might have been used for). So, it seems there were at least six external doors allowing access to the first floor of the house. The basement window is the only one I can see that provides direct access to the basement, but there could be others not shown on the plan. For example there may have been other access points (man holes) in the exterior of the house not marked, which with the opening windows in the basement could provide several potential points of entry and exit (as well as hiding places) from the basement and therefore the entire house.
So, what you say Madeline about the person knowing the house well is a very good point. It's the sort of house where boys would love to explore and hide. It reminds me of a movie I saw many years ago, where the former owner's son comes back and starts living in the ceiling area without the new owners knowing. He comes out at night through a 'secret' entry in the closet under the stairs, steals from them, eats their food and spies on them during the day.