The cross-fingerpointing defense

SD,after JR passes on,can one or either parent be declared the killer,and the case closed?? (based on what evidence LE has now, irregardless of whether anymore is discovered or not).

Probably. Will they is another story.

barring that,would confessions from one or more of those with inside knowledge be enough to close it,after JR passes on??

I think it would depend on how accurate the story was.
 
Maybe.

Slightly less ambiguous than RDI's pocket-guide to probable cause, LE and judges are probably looking for stuff like this:

PR files for divorce, weeks prior to the murder, or
JBR's pediatrician notes suspicious injury prior to the murder, or
a hundred other things prior to the murder that would establish any kind of motive, or
sharpie ink stain, blood stain, or paintbrush shard anywhere on R skin or clothing, or
scratch injury to JR or PR face, arm, or hands.

See what I mean?

I do but it can't just be relatively hard evidential stuff like that - I thought that behaviours (including post-offence) could be part of probable cause (e.g. refusing to answer questions, evasion etc)?

They can. HOTYH is talking about the kinds of things that HE would look for, not what can be actually used. If Hunter's (and HOTYH's) standards were uniform in this country, we'd have to scrap the justice system altogether, because no one would ever be arrested, much less convicted!

I mean, there was some fibre evidence etc and the RN was known to be written on Patsy's paper and with her pen. Add this to their behaviours post-offence, and it seems to me that you have pretty much got your probable cause.

Probable cause is the easiest thing to prove, Sophie. Did you know that the cops wanted to plant listening devices in the Ramsey home? They needed cause to do that. The only reason they backed out is because Beckner was worried that someone would open his big mouth about it, not because of cause issues.
 
Here is an explanation in ONE sentence of why the Rs were not arrested or prosecuted:

Ready?

Hunter was a coward and afraid to lose such a high-profile case publicly.
 
Sorry it took so long to get back to this one, folks. It's SO hard to find a good helmet/breathing mask polishing service these days.

A few highlights:

SuperDave said:
If Hunter's (and HOTYH's) standards were uniform in this country, we'd have to scrap the justice system altogether, because no one would ever be arrested, much less convicted!

Yup, I still stand by that one!

Sophie said:
Would a judge be that amenable to signing a warrant if the DA didn't support the police's request? In fact, I'm pretty sure the BPD discussed this possibility with their own legal people who doubted that a judge would agree. Having said that, there's at least one judge mentioned in PMPT who claims to have routinely taken an anti-Hunter stance so maybe they could have pursued this possibility more aggressively. In any event, neither Koby nor later Beckner seem to have had any appetite for rocking the boat and you can't really expect a detective to go to a judge without even his own boss's support?

Generally, it looks to me as though AH was paralysed by fear. I seem to recall that one of his first actions was to call prosecutors in the Jeffrey Dahmer case to discuss managing a high profile case. I'm also pretty sure that people close to him have commented on his fear of being involved in another 'OJ.' This fear was compounded by his own department's lack of trial experience. Equally, can you imagine the controversy had this case gone to trial? His own faith in, and history of, plea bargains would have been at total odds with the public pressure to prosecute this case to the utmost. How would he and De Muth and Hofstrom have reconciled this conflict? Indeed, the defence could probably have made an issue out of his traditional laxity had he tried a hardler line in any JBR trial. Much easier to twabble on about one's utter belief in the presumption of innocence and to suggest that it's this precept that is informing your inactivity. With any luck, the case will never get to trial and the BPD's early errors will pre-dispose a critical public to blame them rather than the DA's office.

If you read any true crime book, you will see prosecutors getting on detectives' nerves and demanding more and more evidence but they normally facilitate the acquisition of this evidence by supporting requests for warrants etc and normally accept that, once the police have established probable cause, it's the job of prosecutors to establish guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. AH wanted the police to establish guilt beyond any doubt - or at least wait until he was no longer around to have to prosecute the case.

Separately, going by what I understand probable cause to be, the BPD had more than established that. In fact, that the BPD had got probable cause is one of the few undisputed aspects of this case - I don't think even AH seriously contested this. Certainly, LE all over the US seems to have agreed that they had probable cause.

Another :clap:, just to show that SOME of us value what you have to say, Sophie! You really hit it out of the park.

Holdontoyourhat said:
You've claimed all along that BPD had probable cause but the DA squelched the idea out of some corrupt or misguided authority.

I STILL stand by it!

And just to put us back where I wanted to go, let me remind our friends who bring up Leopold and Loeb that what what I describe is exactly what happened when they were arrested: they each tried to pin it on each other.
 
And that is exactly what would have happened if they had arrested and questioned PR and JR SEPARATELY.
 
If BPD knew without any doubt that PR and/or JR murdered their daughter, they would have probable cause and can therefore make arrests. They don't need DA permission. They simply need to convince a judge to sign an arrest warrant. Thats how it works.

How are you going to find probable cause when things like the phone records go missing? Really! I read the phone records went missing. Is that true? Did that happen to everyone on that street or was it just them?

You can't find probable cause because maybe the evidence went out the door with the Ramsey's.

Now, I don't blame anyone for not doing there job because this case is Abby Normal.

I have not voted on "who done it" yet.
 
How are you going to find probable cause when things like the phone records go missing? Really! I read the phone records went missing. Is that true? Did that happen to everyone on that street or was it just them?

You can't find probable cause because maybe the evidence went out the door with the Ramsey's.

Now, I don't blame anyone for not doing there job because this case is Abby Normal.

I have not voted on "who done it" yet.

I believe there were computers in 1996, and the phone company used them. Its not like phone records for one number just vanish. Maybe consider the source, or take it with a grain of salt?
 
How are you going to find probable cause when things like the phone records go missing? Really! I read the phone records went missing. Is that true? Did that happen to everyone on that street or was it just them?

You can't find probable cause because maybe the evidence went out the door with the Ramsey's.

Now, I don't blame anyone for not doing there job because this case is Abby Normal.

I have not voted on "who done it" yet.

Yes, in a manner of speaking. At first, DA Hunter refused to issue a warrant for the phone records, saying LE should simply "ask for them". Right...
Much later, when they were finally produced, all records for December 1996 were missing. It was said that NO calls were made that month. Right.
Then a tabloid tried to obtain them fraudulently and a judge subsequently sealed them forever.
 
Yes, in a manner of speaking. At first, DA Hunter refused to issue a warrant for the phone records, saying LE should simply "ask for them". Right...
Much later, when they were finally produced, all records for December 1996 were missing. It was said that NO calls were made that month. Right.
Then a tabloid tried to obtain them fraudulently and a judge subsequently sealed them forever.

Thanks. I think the phone records would have helped this case.

I have to admit I'm having a hard time figuring out what happened because nothing makes sense. It's like "How can that be"?
 
Thanks. I think the phone records would have helped this case.

I have to admit I'm having a hard time figuring out what happened because nothing makes sense. It's like "How can that be"?

Well...it "can be" because the Rs had a powerful and politically connected defense team. The defense lawyers had both personal and professional relationships with DA Hunter and ties to the Governor's office. As soon as LE was involved, the DA got the word to "treat these people like victims, not as suspects". And so they did...
 
Well...it "can be" because the Rs had a powerful and politically connected defense team. The defense lawyers had both personal and professional relationships with DA Hunter and ties to the Governor's office. As soon as LE was involved, the DA got the word to "treat these people like victims, not as suspects". And so they did...

Yes, I'm reading about that now. You have really helped me along. Thanks so much for helping this newbie!
 
Recent events have shown me that it may be time to re-examine this.
 
So the phone records are there, just sealed? This is crazy. I hope the new cold case squad can work on this with no bias and no political influence on how they can perform their job. Sealed records can be opened if the ruling is overturned right?
 
So the phone records are there, just sealed? This is crazy. I hope the new cold case squad can work on this with no bias and no political influence on how they can perform their job. Sealed records can be opened if the ruling is overturned right?

The phone records were sealed for misuse in related case, weren't they? I seem to recall they were obtained illegally by the media and for that reason a judge sealed them permanently. Hmmm....How conveeeenient. Anything "improper" here?
 
For our friends who haven't seen it yet:

Well, I promised I'd start this thread, so here we go!

When people ask me "why were the Rs never charged," whether rhetorically or not, I answer "the cross-fingerpointing defense." I get some pretty odd responses to that. Because most people don't know what I'm talking about. They've never heard of it.

Simply put, with no legal-beagle mumbo-jumbo, the cross-fingerpointing defense is where two people are involved in a crime, one as the leader and one as the accomplice, but the evidence is structured in a way that LE can't be sure which one was in the driver's seat and which one was along for the ride. Under the law as it is in America today, a prosecutor cannot--CANNOT--go before a jury and say "one of these people killed such and such, the other helped cover it up. You make up your mind as to which is which." No way! A prosecutor MUST, MUST bring specific charges against each person.

In other words, 2 suspects equals NO suspects.

I'm not just pulling this stuff out of my nether regions. Three prosecutors, speaking about this case specifically, have said the exact same thing.

One was ADA Pete Hofstrom: "So what if [Patsy] wrote the note. It doesn't prove she killed her kid."

Vincent Bugliosi: "A prosecutor can't argue to a jury, 'Ladies and gentlemen, the evidence is very clear here that either Mr. or Mrs. Ramsey committed this murder and the other one covered it up...' There's no case to take to the jury. Even if you could prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Patsy Ramsey wrote the ransom note, that doesn't mean she committed the murder."

And Wendy Murphy: "It‘s why the JonBenet Ramsey parents are both free, because you can‘t try the father, he‘ll blame the mother. You can‘t try the mother, she‘ll—so they both walk." She went a great deal further in her book, And Justice For Some.

You can't charge JR, because there's too much evidence against PR. You can't charge PR, because there's too much evidence against JR. The only way to break that stalemate is for one of them to confess and give the other one up in exchange for immunity. And even then, accomplice testimony without further corroboration is inadmissable. Not to mention how that person would be ripped to pieces by the defense atty. as a "rat" trying to save their own skin, and as such a very likely suspect themself.

And make no mistake: PR's death changes NOTHING about this. In fact, it makes it stronger. If JR were to be charged now, there's nothing to stop him from laying it all on her. She can't defend herself from the grave.

Any questions?
 
"You can't charge JR, because there's too much "evidence against PR. You can't charge PR, because there's too much evidence against JR.

Thats got to be tabloid junk. Nobody's complaining about excess evidence against either PR or JR. I'm surprised you fall in for this tabloid faire, usually thats for older women.
 

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