John Ramsey Fabricated Open Basement Window "Evidence"

BlueCrab

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Lou Smit proudly poses beside the wide open basement window; and he demonstrates how he could slide through the open window, "just as the intruder did".

A federal judge relies on the open basement window "evidence" to support the intruder theory.

The media and the public accept the open basement window as a hard fact.

One problem: THERE WAS NO OPEN BASEMENT WINDOW. It's a story John Ramsey made up four months after JonBenet was murdered.

John casually revealed his open basement window story for the first time during the police interviews on April 30, 1997:

JOHN RAMSEY: "And actually I'd gone down there earlier that morning, into that room, and the window was broken, but I didn't see any glass around, so I assumed it was broken last summer. I used that window to get into the house when I didn't have a key. But the window was open, about an eighth of an inch, and I just kind of latched it."

- - - - - - later in interview - - - - - -

STEVE THOMAS: "And Fleet had talked earlier about being down there, I think alone at one point, and discovering that window. When you say that you found it earlier that day and latched it, at what time of the day was that?"

JOHN RAMSEY: "I don't know. I mean it would have been probably, probably before 10 o'clock. "

STEVE THOMAS: "Was that prior to Fleet's first trip down?"

JOHN RAMSEY: "I didn't know he was in the basement. I didn't know that. I mean other than that trip with me."

STEVE THOMAS: "And on that trip that you latched the window, were you alone when you went down and latched the window?"

JOHN RAMSEY: "Yep."


So John Ramsey reveals for the first time that he had snuck away from the group upstairs, gone to the basement alone, found the basement window open about 1/8 of an inch, closed it, latched it, and then went back upstairs and told no one about it.

John said he did this at about 10 o'clock or sooner, but, as we all know, he had been manning the telephone between 8 and 10 o'clock waiting for the "kidnapper" to call, in accodance with the instructions in the ransom note. So, if he had been in the basement at all it would had to have been before 8 o'clock or after 10 o'clock.

But Officer Rick French had searched the basement at about 6:05 AM looking for a point of entry and making sure an intruder wasn't hiding down there. He found neither. French did not report anything about an open basement window, even though that's the very thing he was looking for, and there are only three windows in the basement.

Then, around 6:20 AM Fleet White searched the basement looking for JonBenet and calling out her name as he searched. Fleet found the broken basement window and inspected it, but did not report anything about the window being open.

IOW, Rick French and Fleet White had both inspected the window prior to John Ramsey and neither reported the window open. In fact, it seemed to have surprised John to find out that Fleet had also been in the basement early that morning -- thus putting Fleet in a position to refute John's open basement window story.

Therefore, it appears that John was lying about finding the window open at 10 AM (or at any other time) and had fabricated a fictional open window to accomodate a fictional intruder.

BlueCrab
 
IOW must mean: jump to conclusion, bypassing logic.
 
BlueCrab said:
But Officer Rick French had searched the basement at about 6:05 AM looking for a point of entry and making sure an intruder wasn't hiding down there. He found neither. French did not report anything about an open basement window, even though that's the very thing he was looking for, and there are only three windows in the basement.
BC, do you know if French or Reichenbach or any of the other cops noticed that the window was broken? Was the break mentioned anywhere?
 
Good point B. Obviously John lied about the window being broken and had broken it himself to implicate an intruder to save Burke.
 
BlueCrab said:
Lou Smit proudly poses beside the wide open basement window; and he demonstrates how he could slide through the open window, "just as the intruder did".
I don't believe anyone came in through that window. I think the killers (plural) had a key. I feel it is possible that one or more left through that window.


BlueCrab said:
One problem: THERE WAS NO OPEN BASEMENT WINDOW. It's a story John Ramsey made up four months after JonBenet was murdered.
Be fair, BC. FW said he was down there in the basement early that morning. FW said he found the window closed and unlatched. JR said that he went down there later, he found it open only 1/8 inch, and he closed it and latched it. The stories are not inconsistent.

You are right that the window was not open when FW first observed it, but they are both in agreement that it was unlatched, but I don't see it as being unlikely that an unlatched window can open and close in a breeze, so neither of them are necessarily lying on this point, and we're only talking about 1/8 of an inch. It could have been open that far when FW observed it, and he still could have perceived it as being "closed."

If it were a part of staging on JR's part, why didn't he open the window all the way and have more broken glass around? He says himself that it was open only 1/8 of an inch.


BlueCrab said:
John casually revealed his open basement window story for the first time during the police interviews on April 30, 1997:

JOHN RAMSEY: "And actually I'd gone down there earlier that morning, into that room, and the window was broken, but I didn't see any glass around, so I assumed it was broken last summer. I used that window to get into the house when I didn't have a key. But the window was open, about an eighth of an inch, and I just kind of latched it."
If he was lying, what was the point of his telling this story? He would have kept it quiet to make it look as if an intruder had broken the window. This indicates to me that he is telling the truth.


BlueCrab said:
- - - - - - later in interview - - - - - -

STEVE THOMAS: "And Fleet had talked earlier about being down there, I think alone at one point, and discovering that window. When you say that you found it earlier that day and latched it, at what time of the day was that?"

JOHN RAMSEY: "I don't know. I mean it would have been probably, probably before 10 o'clock. "

STEVE THOMAS: "Was that prior to Fleet's first trip down?"

JOHN RAMSEY: "I didn't know he was in the basement. I didn't know that. I mean other than that trip with me."

STEVE THOMAS: "And on that trip that you latched the window, were you alone when you went down and latched the window?"

JOHN RAMSEY: "Yep."

So John Ramsey reveals for the first time that he had snuck away from the group upstairs, gone to the basement alone, found the basement window open about 1/8 of an inch, closed it, latched it, and then went back upstairs and told no one about it.
As far as JR's sneaking away, it was his house, and he was free to go into any room he wanted to, just as you are now. This does not necessarily indicate guilt, and it is not the Ramseys fault that the police did not follow the correct procedure.


BlueCrab said:
But Officer Rick French had searched the basement at about 6:05 AM looking for a point of entry and making sure an intruder wasn't hiding down there. He found neither. French did not report anything about an open basement window, even though that's the very thing he was looking for, and there are only three windows in the basement.
Someone refresh my memory here -- I wasn't able to find this in a cursory search of PMPT. Who was down in the basement with Officer French that morning? Was it JR? Someone had told him that there wasn't an exit from the wine cellar, so neither of them bothered to look. Book and page # would be helpful.


Paradox said:
Good point B. Obviously John lied about the window being broken and had broken it himself to implicate an intruder to save Burke.
Paradox, I disagree. John didn't lie about the broken window. He told the truth. He said he broke it the previous summer. If he were lying, he wouldn't have brought that up at all, and if someone else did, he would have denied it. That would have been lying. He told the truth about the window.
 
I saw a special on TV years ago and it included a look-see at that window. Yu probably all saw it too, but there was a reason why this man said no one came through that window. Spider web or perfect snow on the outside ledge {?}.


Scandi
 
Britt said:
BC, do you know if French or Reichenbach or any of the other cops noticed that the window was broken? Was the break mentioned anywhere?


Britt,

I don't know for sure. It should be in the cops' reports if they saw the window was broken but, unfortunately, we don't have access to those reports. However, Fleet found the window broken during his 6:20 AM search of the basement, so it was broken prior to the 5:52 AM 911 call, if that's what you were thinking about. But Fleet did not report the window as being open.

Frankly, I don't believe John visited the basement at all after the cops got there, as he claimed. It appears he made up that story to give credence to his intruder theory. Why would he wait four months before telling anyone about this obviously extremely important piece of information?

However, I do think John was in the basement hours BEFORE the cops arrived. The evidence supporting this is the chair that John says was blocking the trainroom doorway, and hence blocking the way to the window in the trainroom. He said he had to move the chair, and some boxes, to get into the room. But Rick French and Fleet White had entered the trainroom BEFORE John Ramsey claims he had entered it, at 6:05 and 6:20 respectively, and they didn't report any chair, or boxes, blocking the door.

Therefore, John had inadvertently mis-spoke during the interview when he revealed that he had to move the chair. He was obviously in the trainroom prior to the 911 call, even though he denies it.

John Ramsey had lied again.

BlueCrab
 
Bluecrab,

Is this what you are suggesting? John entered the train room in the middle of the night, during the "staging" period, and had to move a chair and boxes at that time. So when Fleet White checks out the basement at 6:20am and enters the train room there was no chair or boxes in the way. If there had been, he certainly would not have replaced them on his way out as there was a missing child and such things could wait. Four months later, when John makes up a story of finding the open window around 10am, he tells how he had to move the chair and boxes to get into the room, remembering this from his midnight activity but forgetting that Fleet White was in there at 6:20am and so there would not have been anything blocking the door at 10am.

It makes sense to me. Good observation!
 
Bluecrab: WOW. This is an amazing find. Have you ever posted this theory before? Has it been posted elsewhere?

I've never heard it, but it makes ALOT of sense. Does this seems as rock solid to everyone else as it seems to me?
 
Good find! If JR thought JBR had been kidnapped and found a window open why would he latch it and mess up evidence of an intruder? Wouldn't he have automatically alerted the police in the house?
 
BlueCrab said:
Therefore, it appears that John was lying about finding the window open at 10 AM (or at any other time) and had fabricated a fictional open window to accomodate a fictional intruder.
BlueCrab


BlueCrab,

I agree that John was lying about something here, not only does Fleet White contest this aspect , but also that JonBenet's corpse was in the wine-cellar, so somebody is not being consistent here.


.
 
Cypros said:
Bluecrab,

Is this what you are suggesting? John entered the train room in the middle of the night, during the "staging" period, and had to move a chair and boxes at that time. So when Fleet White checks out the basement at 6:20am and enters the train room there was no chair or boxes in the way. If there had been, he certainly would not have replaced them on his way out as there was a missing child and such things could wait. Four months later, when John makes up a story of finding the open window around 10am, he tells how he had to move the chair and boxes to get into the room, remembering this from his midnight activity but forgetting that Fleet White was in there at 6:20am and so there would not have been anything blocking the door at 10am.

It makes sense to me. Good observation!


Cypros,

Good recap of what I had posted. It is EXACTLY what I was saying, except for just one little change: John didn't forget about Fleet's visit to the basement; he didn't even know that Fleet had been in the basement at 6:20 AM looking for JonBenet and had inspected the window. Steve Thomas informed him for the first time during the 1997 interviews.

BlueCrab.
 
http://jfjbr.tripod.com/truth/johndepo.html

Q. Did you ever have occasion prior to, say, 1:00 in the afternoon to go down to the basement?

A. Yes.

Q. How many times?

A. Twice.

Q. Prior to 1:00?

A. I don't know what time it was. I wasn't paying attention.

Q. Prior to the time that I believe it was Linda Arndt had asked people to begin looking around the house?

A. Linda Arndt asked me to look around the house, yes.

Q. Did she ask anybody else to do it?

A. I don't remember her specific instruction, no.

Q. Prior to Linda Arndt asking you to look around the house, how many times did you go to the basement?

A. Once.
:liar:
 
Q. Do you remember what you saw in the basement when you went down there?

A. I saw a partially opened window with broken glass and a suitcase beneath the window.

Q. When you would - did you see anything else there?

A. Not that looked out of the ordinary.

Q. May I ask why you went to the basement at that time?

A. I was trying to determine how someone could have gotten into our house.

Q. Did anyone ask you to go to the basement at that time?

A. No.

Q. Do you know if anybody saw you go to the basement at that time?

A. I have no idea.

Q. When you saw that the basement was in the condition that it was in, as you have just described it, and you came back upstairs, did you inform anybody of what you found in the basement?

A. I don't recall specifically if I did or not. I have a vague recollection of telling Linda Arndt that I found an open window with broken glass, but that I perhaps had broken that glass myself months earlier.

Q. Do you think you might have mentioned that to any other law enforcement officer beside Linda Arndt?

A. Not that I recall

Q. When Linda Arndt asked you to go down to the basement, I think that was sometime in the early afternoon -

A. I don't remember the time. I really don't.

Q. When she asked you to go down to the basement, could you explain why you chose going to the basement since you had already been there earlier?

A. She told me to go through the house and look for anything - go through the house thoroughly, as I recall, and look for anything that seems out of place. And so my intent was to do it thoroughly.

Q. Did you ask Fleet White to join you?

A. I think I did, as I recall.

Q. Do you remember exactly the sequence of events when you went down to the basement the second time?

A. Uh-huh (affirmative).

Q. Can you tell me where you looked?

A. I went back into the train room, showed Fleet the broken window, explained to him that I might have broken it myself months ago. I showed him the suitcase that I saw under the window, which I felt was very out of place. We looked for any large pieces of broken glass. And then I got up and went to the cellar room, opened the door, and found JonBenet.


http://jfjbr.tripod.com/truth/johndepo.html

Please remember that John had absolutely no clue that Fleet had earlier checked the basement out......saw the window closed and saw no body in the spot that John eventually did.

Great thread BlueCrab - as always!
RR
 
I'm so confused! Could someone do a time line of the window? I thought the first time it was inspected, Fleet and John were together and John told him he broke it the summer prior, and I've always wondered why he didn't say that must have been the point of entry for the perp. Would have been a good opportunity if he was trying to cover something up.
 
Becba said:
Good find! If JR thought JBR had been kidnapped and found a window open why would he latch it and mess up evidence of an intruder? Wouldn't he have automatically alerted the police in the house?
That's exactly what throws suspicion on John Ramsey: that he found the window partly open and did not tell this the police at once. There is just no plausible reason for behaving like that.
The fact that John may have broken the window months before has nothing to do with its being open on Dec 26.
Not only didn't he say anything about the window, he even closed it, thereby destroying possible crucial evidence.
The normal reaction should have been to alert Det. Arndt at once because he had just found an open window in the basemeet.
 
Becba said:
Good find! If JR thought JBR had been kidnapped and found a window open why would he latch it and mess up evidence of an intruder? Wouldn't he have automatically alerted the police in the house?
One would think so.I know I would
 
Becba said:
Good find! If JR thought JBR had been kidnapped and found a window open why would he latch it and mess up evidence of an intruder? Wouldn't he have automatically alerted the police in the house?
I've asked these same questions myself!

If it had been me searching for clues as to what happened to my missing six year old daughter, I would have been yelling for the detective to come down and see the open window without touching it the second I noticed it! You don't shut it and then think "wow that's weird" and then not mention it for four months!!!

They knew she was dead and there was no intruder. All of their actions and comments are those of someone with something to hide who knows more than they are letting on.
 
both times Ramsey had been asked what time he found the body, he said it was in the morning. First he told his future son-in-law, when asked what time the body was found he said either "this morning around 11am" or he said "around 11"*. The next time he was asked by Larry King what time he found the body, he said "that morning."

*No, I don't have the exact words.

This is absolutely speculation, but I've always been curious about this - I saw several pictures of that window well, with a garden hose laying on part of the window grate, and the gas grill partially "parked" on it. (that's not the spec part, that part is fact) I wonder if he was getting antsy when the body wasn't found - whether he did it or Patsy did it, he had to know the body was in that basement, and decided to open that window - he looked out and up the window well, and thought that maybe it didn't seem to be such a good idea to make it look like a point of entry or exit, because of the stuff on the grate, (besides which he couldn't be sure what French had seen) and then closed it again. He couldn't have known whether someone had been looking outside from upstairs and had seen him open/close the window, so he made up a story if he was asked, and decided not to try to bull Arndt when he went back upstairs. There is just something so incredibly dumb about him entering the house that summer through that window when he claimed he lost his keys. Why didn't he get the one from the neighbor or use his garage door opener, after all, didn't he use the garage xmas night? I just have a hard time picturing a guy in a business suit, a dress shirt, tie and wingtips climbing down and through that dirty window well. - the window story didn't make sense to begin with - and another thing, how many guys keep their house key on another ring beside their carkey ring?
 
ssiegmund said:
I'm so confused! Could someone do a time line of the window?


ssiegmund,

BASEMENT WINDOW TIMELINE

6:05 AM: Officer Rick French, the first police officer to arrive at the house, goes into the basement by himself to look for a possible point of entry for the kidnapper and to make sure the kidnapper wasn't in the basement. He found neither. However, we don't know what French's written police report says about the broken window, if anything.

6:20 AM: Fleet White, the first civilian to arrive at the house, goes into the basement by himself to search for JonBenet, calling out her name as he searches. He notices and inspects the broken window glass but notes nothing about the window being open. However, he believes the window may not have been latched. Fleet continues his search and opens the white door to wine cellar, looks into the darkened room, but sees nothing.

10:00 AM: John Ramsey allegedly sneaks downstairs by himself without being seen (everyone had been told to stay in the sun room) and finds the window open by about 1/8 inch, closes and latches it, and goes back upstairs without telling anyone. Contradictorily, John's own stated purpose for going into the basement at that time was to try to find a point of entry for an intruder, yet he stayed quiet after allegedly finding one.

1:05 PM: John Ramsey and Fleet White, upon the suggestion of Detective Linda Arndt, go into the basement together to look for anything that seems to be out of place. They were told to not touch anything. They checked the broken basement window and continued their search until they got to the white door to the wine cellar. John opened the door, found JonBenet on the floor only a few feet from the door, picked her up and carried her upstairs.

4/30/97: John Ramsey, during the police interviews, for the first time reveals that he had been in the basement at about 10:00 on the morning of the murder and had found the basement window open, and had closed it, and latched it. John is the only person who had seen the window open.

John's story contradicts what both Officer Rick French and Fleet White saw in that neither of them reported anything about the window being open. An open window would have been blockbuster information and they would have immediately reported it.

John's story is also contradicted by his assertion that he had to remove a chair and some boxes away from the trainroom door before being able to enter. French and White had been into the trainroom prior to Ramsey's alleged entry into the room, and they weren't blocked by a chair and boxes. It strongly suggests that Ramsey had been in the basement BEFORE the 911 call was made, even though he denies it.

BlueCrab
 

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