As always. Trouble is, those who SHOULD read it probably won't.
Ramsey Project Rebuttal (Non Intruder Posters Only)
- Thread starter Tricia
- Start date
As always. Trouble is, those who SHOULD read it probably won't.
- Aphrodite has chosen to perpetuate a very old myth: "Police also found a stun gun in Helgoth’s possession capable of inflicting the wounds found on JonBenet’s face and back."
The two most popular types of devices capable of administering an electrical shock are the type which administer a shock from a distance by firing two thin wires with barbed ends that pierce a victims skin (commonly sold under the brand name "Taser",) and stun guns which administer an electric shock by direct contact.
In the JonBenet case, Lou Smit pioneered the notion that a stun gun was used.
Despite many years of trying he was never able to find any device that was capable of leaving marks that matched the distance between two marks on JonBenet’s body.
The closest device that he was able to find was made by Air Taser, but it did not match.
He concedes the point on Larry King Live.
Meaning that the Air Taser stun gun is as close as we've been able to find to the marks on JonBenet.
Larry King Live, May 28, 2001
In the same interview, Smit makes the following comment:
Myself and Dr. Doberson, from Littleton, the coroner, have conducted experiments on pigs. We have replicated the marks on JonBenet by using it on pigs.
This is absolutely false, the marks on the pigs looked nothing like the marks on JonBenet.
The marks on the pigs were typical marks left by a stun gun, pink or reddish.
What type of mark is left by a stun gun?
Skin - All twenty subjects exhibited the typical "signature response", specifically a punctate reddening of the skin at 10 minutes post shock limited to a 3-5mm diameter circle directly under each probe. Five out of 20 showed small wheals at the stimulus site. All of these hive-like elevations had disappeared at 1 to 2 hours. Only one case, a man of mediterranean ancestry, showed residual markings at 24 hours and these were gone in 2 days. No burns or other permanent markings were ever noted.
http://www.paktronics.com/stun93.html
The marks on JonBenet were not the typical hive-like reddish color, they had a brown component which prompted the following description in the autopsy report.
(Unfortunately, other than describing the marks as abrasions, Meyer did not comment further with respect to what may have caused the abrasions and did not take tissue samples of the areas.)
Located just below the right ear at the right angle of the mandible, 1.5 inches below the right external auditory canal is a 3/8 x 1/4 inch area of rust colored abrasion.
On the left lateral aspect of the lower back, approximately sixteen and one-quarter inches and seventeen and one-half inches below the level of the top of the head are two dried rust colored to slightly purple abrasions. The more superior of the two measures one-eighth by one-sixteenth of an inch and the more inferior measures three-sixteenths by one-eighth
of an inch.
Undoubtedly Smit would have thought these were stun gun marks?
(KoldKase over at FFJ found this.)
[ame="http://www.forumsforjustice.org/forums/showpost.php?p=186955&postcount=19"]Forums For Justice - View Single Post - Autopsy photos: CAUTION GRAPHIC[/ame]
also
[ame="http://www.forumsforjustice.org/forums/showpost.php?p=186964&postcount=4"]Forums For Justice - View Single Post - Photos comparing marks on body[/ame]
Lou Smit’s chief ally in the stun gun theory seems to be speaking out of both sides of his mouth:
In the past, Dobersen had dealt with a crime involving a stun gun. His experience was first-hand and practical, and he should be able to offer some insight.
During Lou's talk with Doberson, the autopsy photos were studied from every possible angle. After a careful examination, Dr. Dobersen believed that the marks in the pictures did appear to have come from a stun gun. However, Doberson wasn't ready to make a definite public statement unless the body was exhumed. Because the exhumation didn't occur, Smit couldn't obtain the conclusive statement he was seeking. However, the evidence was mounting.”
Death of Innocence, page 194
"They came over and showed me some pictures from the (Ramsey) autopsy and asked for my opinion, whether they could be stun gun injuries," Doberson recalled. "I told them that they could be; that was a possibility. But there were a lot of things they could do to narrow down the possibilities of what it could be."
…the only definitive way to tell if electrocution was involved in JonBenet's death is to re-examine her body and look for "very characteristic" changes in skin tissue.
"You really can't tell from a photo," Doberson said.
Daily Camera, January 13, 1998
…he acknowledged that he had differed with Stratbucker on whether a stun gun was used in the case of JonBenet Ramsey, a 6-year-old girl whose 1996 murder in Boulder, Colo., remains unsolved. In that case, Stratbucker said a stun gun was not used, but Dobersen said, "I felt very strongly that these were stun gun wounds."
Newsday.com, Robin Topping, November 24, 2004
The Ramseys were clearly made aware that all the speculation that Smit was generating as he was peddling his stun gun theory could be put to rest by exhuming JonBenet, and yet the Ramseys refused to pursue that course of action.
This is in line with the reasoning behind hiring PI’s. They weren’t hired to help solve the case; they were hired to keep the Ramseys out of jail.
The Ramseys could have taken a major step in the investigation by exhuming JonBenet, but that would serve no purpose by way of self preservation. Doubt in the mind of prospective jurors who may be hearing about the possibility of a stun gun and an intruder, that’s what keeps you out of jail, you don’t want loose ends tied up, you want them to remain loose.
Q. Then what was, basically, your association with the private investigation of the potential suspects in the murder of JonBenet Ramsey?
A. The investigators were retained by our attorneys, and they stated to me that the principal purpose of those investigators was to prepare a defense in the case that the police might bring a charge against me. I hoped that they would also follow up on leads that came to us, but I was frequently reminded by our attorneys that their principal role was to prepare a defense should that be necessary.
Deposition of John Ramsey, December 12, 2001
BARBARA WALTERS: Why wasn't the body exhumed?
JOHN RAMSEY: (PAUSE) Don't know why the police didn't consider that. Uh, we were asked… when this theory first surfaced about a stun gun that if the body were exhumed… it could be proved conclusively but it had to be done fairly quickly. This was… within months of when we'd just buried JonBenet. And I, as her father, could not bring myself to do that. I had laid my child to rest. She was at peace. And that was, ah, that decision I couldn't make.
BARBARA WALTERS: Even though it might have cleared you?
JOHN RAMSEY: It wasn't… that was not the priority. The priority was my child was at rest.
20/20 (ABC) March 17, 2000:
Perhaps the most outrageous and inaccurate claim by Lou Smit regarding stun guns is the following:
Lou Smit: The stun gun that we came up with is this one and it’s the Air Taser stun gun. If a stun gun is used on a little girl I'm sure it would have knocked her flat and it would have allowed the killer to take her from her bed without her struggling
Court TV, The Elite, JonBenet “A Second Look,” November 7, 2002
The reality is this:
Air Taser representative Stephen Tuttle said he was contacted by an investigator early on in the case and provided Smit with the same model to conduct his experiments.
"I am bewildered. I don't know what to think about the theory," Tuttle said. "It defies the logic of what the weapon does."
Tuttle conceded that two marks are close to the width of the contacts of an Air Taser, but said that's where the similarities end.
"We have never seen those types of marks when you touch somebody with a stun gun," he said. "We are talking hundreds of people that have been touched with these devices. I can't replicate those marks."
Tuttle said it is uncommon for the stun gun to leave only two marks on the skin. The body moves away from the stun gun, causing multiple, erratic marks.
"How you can keep this thing perfectly still, not once, but twice on a squirming child? It doesn't make any sense," he said. "I hope that doesn't throw water on somebody's investigation."
He also said the Air Taser does not render people unconscious.
Daily Camera, May 2, 2001
Also:
Reporter: "... Taser International, the company that manufactured the stun gun Smit believes was used in this crime. Steven, thanks for being here. In fact, he says it was an AIR TASER 34,000. You've got one with you, show us how it works.
Steven Tuttle - Taser International: "Well, what you have is the stun gun version of the Air Taser. If I push back the safety here, (firing stun gun in air)I can activate the actual stun gun and that's what we... you have to apply to a person to keep them at bay, so to speak.
Reporter: Can you apply it to your arm?
ST: I can, ah, it's not fun, but (applies to arm held in air, the contact is brief and repeating as the arm jumps away) AH (he grunted) It's very disconcerting and makes you want to stay away from it. It's somewhat painful. To me that just felt like pins and needles hitting on my arm right now and I want to get away from that pain.
Reporter: Did it leave a mark?
ST: Not at all. (Showing arm)
Reporter: Let's take a look at a couple of ... we still-framed just a moment ago duting this package here... the front end of that Air taser, let's take a look at it right now. You can see, there you see, how far apart are the two sort of electrodes that come out there? Are they roughly 3.5 cm apart?
ST: That's fairly close, yes.
Reporter: And there's another look at it there. OK, the reason I ask that is that Lou Smit took your product, the 34000 Air Taser, he tested it on an anaestitized pig, hard to say, and produced the same marks that were discovered on JonBenét Ramsey - not in one place, but in two separate places. What do you make of that?
ST: Well, actually, we helped supply that Air Taser for the testing. We were as interested in this case as Lou Smit is. We've worked with him from the very beginning of the case. The one thing that's interesting is that the marks that the pigs have do look fairly similar to what's on JonBenét Ramsey. What's unusual is that, if you saw my arm, it was going off in many, many directions. It's extremely painful, uh, not even painful, just I wanted to get away from it. I don't know how you could leave this particular device in one solid spot, not once but twice
Reporter: Yeah, but your arm wasn't restricted against a bed. What if a child abut, oh say, 35-40 pounds, age 6, is in a bed, asleep, somebody comes over without her hearing and uses a stun gun, that taser you've got right there in your hand, and while holding her down uses it on her back and her neck and face area?
ST: Well, that's an interesting idea because if I do this to a child of say 6 years of age while they're in the middle of a very deep sleep, they're going to have fairly the same reaction I did. They're going to want to get instinctually away from the pain. It would be almost be like being hit with a hot iron while sleeping. It may take an extra second but you are going to wake up, kick, flail and scream....
Reporter: But didn't you tell our producer that if you do this to a hundred people you will get 100 different reactions? Right?
ST: You'll have about a hundred different reactions but most of them will be different screams, different yelps, different people kicking. You will certainly not see any incapacitation at all. That's the key to this issue is that you're NOT going to get incapacitation
Reporter: What are you gonna get?
ST: You're gonna get what I did just now and I'm still feeling it... I don't like the fact that I did that to myself... I would want to get away from that pain...
Reporter: No temporary paralysis?
ST: None whatsoever. There are a lot of places on the internet, if you look up stun guns. It's completely false as to what these things do as far as incapacitation rates. These are good devices to keep somebody at bay at best.
MSNBC Interview
The following is a compilation of three videos
The first is a “friend” administering a stun gun to the neck of his seemingly compliant buddy.
The second and third are victims of a taser rather than a stun gun.
You will notice how quickly the effects wear off and the plentiful yelling/screaming that occurs while the shock is being administered.
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDKUJqyozko[/ame]
What if a person was surprised in the middle of the night by someone armed with a stun gun and that outweighed them by at least 150 pounds? I’m sure Smit would’ve thought the “little guy” would’ve been incapacitated and have had no chance, well, he would have been wrong.
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JcI599B4ELY[/ame]
On Tuesday, a Superior Court judge in Beverly Hills offered David Spade some legal protection. Judge Elden Fox ordered Malloy, who weighs more than 300 pounds, to stay at least 100 yards from Spade, who can't weigh more than 125 pounds soaking wet. And, at the urging of Deputy Dist. Atty. Wendy Segall, the judge also ordered Malloy to refrain from any attempts to contact or communicate with the actor.
http://articles.latimes.com/2001/jan/24/news/cl-16050
David Spade's former personal assistant was sentenced to five years' probation Thursday after pleading guilty to attacking the Just Shoot Me star with a stun gun.
A Beverly Hills, Calif., judge also ordered David Warren "Skippy" Malloy, 30, to undergo counseling and to perform 480 hours of community service, Reuters notes. Malloy, who was facing up to six years in prison for zapping his actor pal, avoided jail time by entering into a plea agreement with prosecutors.
Burglary charges against Malloy were dropped. He was ordered to submit to periodic drug testing and not to own or use stun guns or other weapons.
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=106368&page=1
The BPD doesn’t buy the stun gun theory and neither do a number of other experts:
Fox interview with BPD Detective Sgt. Tom Wickman:
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1F3Ubv2cbds[/ame]
…the marks on her face which he (Tom Wickman) believes are bruises and not marks made by a stun gun, which has been out there and he thinks are a myth…
The DA’s investigators, Lou Smit and Steve Ainsworth, claimed that they could now place a stun gun in the hands of their unknown intruder. We would spend months proving to our satisfaction that it simply did not exist, but they wouldn’t give up on the idea.
Smit and Ainsworth concluded from studying photographs of the body that some of the abrasions were marks left by the prongs of a stun gun. When they asked the coroner about it, the answer was “Sure, anything is possible.” With that, they began to consider whether the child’s body should be disinterred so the skin around the marks could be tested.
Experts engaged by the police concluded there was no stun gun involved at all, but the DA’s team never relinquished their claim that such an exotic weapon was used to subdue JonBenét.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 176
We thought we had successfully knocked down the preposterous stun gun scenario but underestimated the tenacity of DA investigator Lou Smit. The idea, although demonstrably wrong, stuck to the case like glue, no matter how many times we thought we had proved it couldn’t have happened that way.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 221
Then Detective Jane Harmer gave the family overview, and Detective Trujillo explained the autopsy information. Trujillo carefully recited the conclusions of experts who effectively knocked down the stubborn issue of the stun gun, which the detectives believed never existed and which had become a cornerstone of the Intruder Theory.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 341
In December 1999, a few months after the grand jury came back and shortly before the third anniversary of the murder of JonBenét, Lou Smit was seen in Atlanta, praying at JonBenét’s graveside with John Ramsey. He had shown case photographs to medical examiners with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and was actively conducting an investigation, still asking stun gun questions. At this writing, he has never been challenged by the DA’s office for doing so. Smit had gone over to Team Ramsey, taking all his invaluable insider knowledge with him. Hunter bet on the wrong horse
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 396
Dr. Cyril Wecht: …the stun gun theory has been around for some time. I know for a fact that this was submitted to various experts in stun guns and manufacturers, criminalists, forensic pathologists, law enforcement people, they all rejected it. I also know for a fact that Mr. Smit, pursuant to his own request, presented this to one of the top-flight forensic scientists, who along with another top-flight forensic scientist of a different subspecialty, rejected it.
…
Darnay Hoffman: But what does invalidate Lou Smit's theory is the fact that as recently as this morning, a representative of the Air Taser company, which is the stun gun company that Lou Smit said made the weapon in question, they absolutely refute the fact that that weapon was used, or that object was used, simply because they have been unable to reproduce those markings on any kind of cadaver, or person, or anything else. They say that those injuries or those marks on her body are not consistent with anything that they've ever tried to show the police. They would certainly like to help solve this crime, but none of the representatives have been able to reproduce it themselves, so they don't think it's their...
Catherine Crier: Yes, I actually have that report here, and a conversation where the Taser representative, really, conducted the experiments on the Air Taser, and could not produce the kind of marks that we're talking about.
Darnay Hoffman: Yeah. It completely blows Lou Smit's theory out of the water.
Dr. Cyril Wecht:. That's right.
The Crier Report 05/01/01
Erin Moriarty: "How sure are you that it's not a stun gun?"
Dr. Werner Spitz: "Well I'm a hundred percent sure because stun gun injuries don't look that way."
Erin Moriarty: (Voice Over) "Dr. Werner Spitz, a nationally known pathologist who has worked on major cases including the assassination of J.F. Kennedy."
Dr. Werner Spitz: "Are you telling me that this looks to you like the other one, the one that JonBenet has? They don't look like that to me at all. A stun gun injury is an electrical burn, it's a burn essentially. And these don't look like burns."
Erin Moriarty: (Voice Over) "Instead, Spitz believes the large dark mark on JonBenet's face was left by a snap on a piece of clothing"
Dr. Werner Spitz: "You know like the snaps they have on blue jeans for instance. If you look at this one below the ear, this thing here. If you look at it closely with a magnify glass you will see within this brownish mark is a boat shaped structure which is missing with any of the other injuries."
48 Hours Investigates - Searching for a Killer, October 4, 2002
I forgot to add that SuperDave used a stun gun on himself and also found the typical hive-like reddish marks.
[ame="http://www.websleuths.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1149662&postcount=16"]Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community - View Single Post - What Happened to the Stun Gun?[/ame]
wonderllama
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Was this when he was away for a month? 
I believe he uses the stun gun to help him relax after reading IDI posts.Was this when he was away for a month?
Agatha_C
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I believe he uses the stun gun to help him relax after reading IDI posts.
Shock Therapy!!!! :woohoo:
Boy, does THAT bring back some painful memories!
Thank you so much for reminding everyone of that, cynic! Next time, why don't you give me a paper cut and pour a margarita onto it?!
Was this when he was away for a month?
No, this was a number of years ago. I did plenty of OTHER things in my recent absence, though. It helped me realize that I was being too nice.
I believe he uses the stun gun to help him relax after reading IDI posts.
Red-hot IRONS to my scalp would be relaxing after that!
Agatha_C
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LOL! News flash, some of us had never heard of this test...LOL... So it wasnt just a reminder it was schooling for the newbies.....
Agatha>>>>:floorlaugh:
For the record, thats dedication Dave and that I respect like heck!
Dedication. That should be my epitaph.
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WOW everyone. This is truly an amazing thread.
Haven't forgotten. Waiting to hear back from someone before we move forward.
Just wanted to say thanks for all your hard work. It will pay off.
Tricia
Haven't forgotten. Waiting to hear back from someone before we move forward.
Just wanted to say thanks for all your hard work. It will pay off.
Tricia
- Aphrodite Jones tells us:“From the very start of their investigation into the death of 6 year old JonBenet Ramsey, Boulder Colorado police were suspicious of her parents, John and Patsy Ramsey.”
It is standard investigative procedure to start at the center with family members who were in the home, had direct access, and were statistically the most likely to have been responsible for the death and move outward, unless there are very compelling reasons to act otherwise.
"Parents, other family members, and close friends or acquaintances of the family account for ninety percent of the homicides of young children. Investigations of these murders typically begin at center with the parents and move outward in concentric circles examining the other likely offenders."
John Philpin, Criminal Profiler
Here is a quote from Marc Klaas, and although he is speaking with regard to child abduction the same principle applies. A parent will be regarded as a suspect and must work diligently with the police to be cleared. (Instead, the Ramseys were evasive and hid behind a wall of attorneys.)
With approximately 77 abductions by family members for every kidnapping by a non-family member law enforcement will inevitably follow the statistics and concentrate on the child’s known universe. They will launch parallel investigations with a focus on the family and move outward. Like concentric ripples in a pond, they will look at family, friends and acquaintances, peripheral contacts, sex offenders registered in the community and finally the most frightening and daunting scenario of all: strangers.
As intrusive as it may become and as irrelevant as it may seem, fully cooperate with law enforcement and eliminate yourself as a suspect. They will ask questions that seem irrelevant and may even ask you to take a polygraph examination. It is not fair, but it is necessary. Remember, like you, law enforcement doesn’t know where your child is and the sooner they are able to gather and assimilate information and evidence, the sooner they are going to be able to direct their investigation toward the solution.
http://www.klaaskids.org/pg-mc-lawenforcement.htm
- The BPD investigated the Ramseys and many other suspects, but the evidence continued to lead them back to the Ramseys as primary suspects.The early work of the BPD is reflected in these interviews:
JOHN RAMSEY: You’re extremely thorough.
STEVE THOMAS: Well, take that as a compliment, but if you didn’t do this, I’ll go to bat as I did with John Andrew, I exhausted John Andrew and made sure that there was no way that have could have got a flight between Atlanta in the middle of the night and to the point I checked flight schedules and passenger list. I’ll do the same for you, so I’m not taking it personally, because I don’t think it’s directed at me as to . . .
JOHN RAMSEY: It’s directed into the direction that the effort has been made, in my, from my visibility, and all I see is a lot of effort and time and money being spent to try and categorize Patsy and I as child abusers and that can’t be further from the truth.
STEVE THOMAS: Well, John, I’ll tell you this. I’ve sat in a North Carolina jail cell with a suspected child serial killer, hoping that I could put him in Boulder on December 26. So there’s two sides to that, and it doesn’t sell papers when I’m chasing when it’s not John Ramsey.
JOHN RAMSEY: I know that.
STEVE THOMAS: But with that said John, let me say this. You said on CNN, we’re not a big department, these things don’t happen every day anywhere. So we defer to experience as well, and we go to the guys at the FBI and say help us, you know. You’re the experts in this thing. And just let me through my concern out and you don’t have to respond, and John, certainly I’m not pointing a finger at you. But the FBI, these guys who do it every day, say: Steve, there were clearly steps taken in this case to make this look like something it wasn’t. This is how it happens in the movies, it is not how it happens in real life. And they said all that was done, was done, and all that was made, was made to make this look like something that wasn’t there. And one theory, at least, is that something happened in the house that may have been accidental that turned to panic that turned to cover-up. And . . .
…
STEVE THOMAS: Well, let’s work on getting you out of the bucket, if that’s the right thing to do, and go the right direction.
JOHN RAMSEY: Well . . .
STEVE THOMAS: And I’m not saying there’s a sole direction in this, John, because I can tell you, more often than working the John Ramsey lead, I’m working the stranger, intruder leads.
JOHN RAMSEY: And I know, I know you guys have worked on some other things and that unfortunately been, we’ve become kind of story for the press to play with and we can live with that, but what I want to be sure of is that we’re spending our time finding who did this.
Tom Trujillo: And John, I can address that. I can assure you that we have so many people to look at. Unfortunately, the other people we look at don’t sell papers, and to be frank with you, and these papers don’t know what we’re doing. There’s a lot of speculation why we’re doing this, we’re doing that, this and that, and that’s pure speculation. I don’t sit down with newspapers and talk to them, I don’t have a reason to, and I can assure that the people that work on this investigative team don’t do that. So they don’t have any inside stories to, who we’re looking at, what we’re doing. In fact to be honest with you, nobody knew these guys were out in North Carolina, when we were out in North Carolina, they found out afterwards. That doesn’t sell the newspapers, unfortunately, you guys do. So there are two sides of the story here. We’re not just focused on you and Patsy, there’s a whole list of people; we’ve got to get people off the list, is solely what we’re doing.
JOHN RAMSEY: OK.
STEVE THOMAS: Everything as far as we’re concerned today John, has it been freely voluntarily offered and truthful?
JOHN RAMSEY: Yeah.
STEVE THOMAS: And do you anticipate, as I do, after when we can exclude you, to participate with us from our side of the table, to get the right thing done?
Boulder police interview of John Ramsey, April 1997
STEVE THOMAS: Patsy, will you continue to cooperate with us in the future as its appropriate, and certainly under the advice of your attorney, but at some point, if we could take you out of the bucket and of this list. This has been my life 100 hours a week, since December 28th, and come to the table and get on our side if we can positively and definitively eliminate you from involvement in this?
PATSY RAMSEY: Absolutely, I mean, I want to work with you. Every day and every minute if it will help.
STEVE THOMAS: Let me ask you one other thing Patsy. I’m no expert in handwriting, but I am concerned. And I’ll share with you quite frankly that I’m concerned and I’m having trouble moving away from you as being potentially involved, because the handwriting experts say, Steve, this means nothing to you because you’re not an expert, but we’re seeing some indications that you may have authored that note. Is there any reason at all that you can think of, why these experts would say that?
PATSY RAMSEY: I, I mean I don’t, I’m not a handwriting person. I’ve given handwriting after handwriting, after handwriting. You know, maybe it’s a female that wrote the note. I mean, I don’t know. I mean, I don’t know how to analyze handwriting, but I’m sure they’re doing the best they know how to do. But, I don’t know what else to do, you know. I write like I write.
Boulder police interview of Patsy Ramsey, April 1997
Even Lou Smit acknowledged that the BPD had been investigating many leads and potential suspects. Here is John attempting to cry on Smit’s shoulder:
…It started to occur to us that they're just blowing off the other inputs on this. You know, they're so focused on the Ramseys that nothing else is getting looked at. We said early on,
(Look, you're spending too much time on us. Look elsewhere as well and we'll be fine. But we never got comfortable that there was anything going on but a 100 percent focus on the Ramseys.
LOU SMIT: No, John, just from looking at the case report, and again, in respect of the police department, they have looked into other areas. I know that there's been a lot of focus on you, but I looked at every one of those reports. There's been a lot of work done in other ways. And I know from your perception it seems like that –
JOHN RAMSEY: Yeah.
LOU SMIT: -- but they have done a lot of work.
Interview of John Ramsey, 1998
- The BPD investigated many leads and suspects including those named by the Ramseys and their PI’s
Later that morning, the police would obtain copies of checks endorsed by Hoffmann-Pugh from the Ramseys’ bank for handwriting comparison. The Ramseys’ housekeeper would become the first suspect.
Perfect Murder, Perfect Town, Lawrence Schiller, page 12
Instead of focusing on the family, the police investigation was headed another way, toward Linda Hoffmann-Pugh, the Ramseys’ housekeeper. Despite being overcome with grief, she furnished the startling information that the little girl had a problem wetting her bed. That was of great interest to the police. Often the fouling of a bed is seen in cases of incest, as a child tries to appear undesirable to an offender.
…
Both were cooperative and gave fingerprints, and unaware that she had been the first person named as a murder suspect, the housekeeper scratched out a compassionate note of condolence to Patsy. It was only a first interview. Police would be back.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, pages 38-39
In-depth interviews were held with three important figures—former nanny Suzanne Savage, Ramsey’s personal pilot Mike Archuleta, and the housekeeper, Linda Hoffmann-Pugh.
Savage, a religious person who had spent eighteen months on a mission for her church, had no idea that she was among the first people the Ramseys had mentioned as a possible murder suspect.
…
Savage, Archuleta, Hoffmann-Pugh, and her husband had all been forthcoming and helpful when questioned. As a detective, that was what I would have expected when investigating the murder of a child.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, pages 49-51
A surprise speaker was Bill McReynolds, an eccentric old guy with a snow-white beard who looked like and played Santa Claus at the Ramseys’ Christmas parties. He offered a heartfelt tribute to the little girl who once gave him some “Stardust” to sprinkle in his beard. Patsy, in a black veil, stepped into the aisle to give Santa Bill a big hug. He would soon be on the suspect list.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 66
After the funeral Ramsey’s friend and financial adviser, Rod Westmoreland, took him aside for a private moment and expressed concern that the public was viewing John and Patsy more as uncooperative suspects than as grieving parents. People couldn’t understand why parents whose daughter had been killed would not talk to the cops.
The message would be repeated more strongly later that day by Fleet White in a tense meeting that became one of the most curious incidents of the case.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 74
Fleet and Priscilla White were both soon named by the Ramseys as possible murder suspects. Before the case was done, many other friends the Ramseys had in Boulder would join the Whites on the suspect list.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 76
For months to come we crawled all over Merrick, who finally walked into the police department one Saturday morning to answer still more questions, against the advice of his attorney but wanting to settle things once and for all.
“I’m here, on a murder case, without a lawyer, talking to two detectives, having been pointed out by John Ramsey as a suspect,” Merrick said to me. “Now, where is John Ramsey?”
He was eventually cleared.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 77
Joe and Betty Barnhill, the elderly neighbors so trusted by the Ramseys that JonBenét’s silver Christmas bicycle had been hidden with them, would also eventually be pointed at as possible murder suspects by the Ramseys. From the moment I saw them, I knew it was ridiculous that they should be considered and that we should be spending time investigating them.
Joe, a silver-haired man in his seventies, was taking care of his wife, who had Alzheimer’s disease, and Joe was crippled so badly with palsy himself that he needed both hands to sign a shaky signature allowing us to obtain their personal and medical records. He never asked for a lawyer, and shook our hands as we left, saying, “I’m confident that you will solve it.” That sort of cooperation was rare, and we certainly weren’t getting it from the Ramseys. We soon cleared the Barnhills.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, pages 77-78
Evidence was accumulating to indicate the involvement of a parent, but we could not ignore other leads, and there were dozens of them. That we kept clearing the other potential suspects, one after another, from Massachusetts to California, didn’t impress the DA’s office.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 159
It was extremely frustrating to chase the nonsense leads, and we seemed to be constantly heading down roads that led nowhere. Information evaporated before our eyes, suspects were cleared, tips were not what they seemed. The effort spent on such things was chewing up detective hours and not getting us close to the people on whom we should be concentrating.
Evidence at hand pointed to the Ramseys. But instead of the focus narrowing, as in normal investigations, this one widened like an inverted funnel. At some point we hoped common sense would take over; we wanted to stop chasing phantoms. There was no shortage of suspects, just a shortage of detectives.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 161
Actually, the detectives would have loved to have found some stranger whom we could wrap in a tight cloak of evidence, for there is no joy in looking at a parent for murder. We found no such person out there, although a recent letter from the Ramsey private investigator supplied a multitude of new “suspects” who had had “frequent and recent access” to the house—hundreds of unnamed guests at Christmas parties, nannies, friends, neighbors, people from the Historic Boulder tour, a battalion of cleaning women, street musicians, caterers, florists, friends, contractors, window cleaners, plumbers, and videotaping crews. When the case began, police were told that the only outsiders with keys were John Andrew Ramsey and the housekeeper, Linda Hoffmann-Pugh. Now a couple of dozen keys were said to be missing.
Who were all these people, where were those keys, and how the hell was a handful of detectives supposed to track them down? I felt their strategy, if not clear before, was crystal now. Team Ramsey was overwhelming us with useless leads while keeping Patsy and John safely beyond our reach.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, pages 171-172
The commander had reversed his pledge to allow us to stop chasing obvious dead-end leads, causing further resentment among his detectives. Tips were still flooding in from all over the country. A former Connecticut state senator told us that a serial child killer was involved with a nationwide bomb and extortion plan. A call from California alerted us that John Ramsey’s “abandoned son” worked as a restaurant short-order cook. The wackos were sucking up our investigative time. Detective Gosage demanded, “How long are we going to chase every freak and psychopath out there?”
“We’ve got to run these people down and clear their alibis,” the edgy Beckner replied.
The detectives were getting hot too. “Don’t you think we’re human?” asked an exasperated Detective Jane Harmer, who had come up empty after checking out all forty-seven registered pedophiles in Boulder County and had prowled the kiddy beauty pageant subculture, where parents knew each other and any pedophile would stand out like a sore thumb. “Don’t you think we’d love to find an intruder? To find that a parent didn’t commit this horrible crime? With suspect after suspect we hope to find that one link that would put some monster inside the house. But that’s not where the evidence is leading us.”
“If we had the same evidence against an intruder, his *advertiser censored** would be upside down in the county jail by now,” I said. “Why do we have no clear goal or clear mission or target?”
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 295
Ramsey Case Update #68
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 2, 1998
Boulder Police detectives today concluded their presentation of the Ramsey investigation to Boulder District Attorney Alex Hunter. The presentation was made by the seven detectives who have worked on the JonBenet Ramsey investigation: Case Supervisor, Sgt. Tom Wickman, Detective Tom Trujillo, Detective Steve Thomas, Detective Jane Harmer, Detective Ron Gosage, Detective Carey Weinheimer, and Detective Michael Everett.
At the conclusion of the presentation, Commander Beckner said, "This has been a very productive two days. After exhaustively reviewing the 30,000 pages of this investigation, we identified 24 investigative topics which were covered during the presentation. Some of the areas we covered included forensics information, analysis of evidence, what we learned from the ransom note and the hundreds of different items found in the house, what was not found in the house, and evidence supporting or not supporting an intruder. We discussed the interviews we’ve conducted and the people we’ve looked at as suspects. We covered a lot of ground in a very complex case."
Commander Beckner added, "We have made a very strong case for a grand jury and believe a grand jury will give us the best opportunity to find the final pieces needed in this case. We have been and will continue to be committed to working closely with the District Attorney’s office to complete this investigation."
"To give you some perspective of the enormity of this investigation and the effort that has been put forth in solving this case, let me give you some statistics. Since we began our investigation in December, 1996, we have formally interviewed 590 people, some more than once; we have utilized 64 outside experts and consultants; we have investigated 68 people as possible suspects, plus an additional 54 convicted sex offenders as possible suspects; we have logged 1,058 items of evidence into property; over 500 pieces of evidence have been tested through federal, state and private labs; we conducted the investigation in 17 states; we have received approximately 3,400 letters and 700 phone tips; and we have spent approximately 22,000 hours investigating the case. Through the 28th of May we have spent $282,180 to cover overtime, travel and investigative expenses on this case."
Since October 1997, the investigative team has identified 94 tasks of which 67 have been completed. Of the remaining 27 tasks, some will require the subpoena authority of a grand jury to complete.
Ramsey Case Update #81
CITY OF BOULDER NEWS RELEASE
April 30, 2001
Chief Mark Beckner responds to media questions about Lou Smit's television appearance
In response to questions about Lou Smit and his Ramsey case theories, the Boulder Police Department believes it would be improper to debate the merits of the evidence in the public arena.
Both Police and District Attorney investigators have been aware of Lou Smit's theories and interpretation of the evidence since 1997. Lou Smit left the investigation in the fall of 1998 and has not been involved for the last 2 ½ years of ongoing investigation. The case and development of evidence has changed significantly over that period of time.
"We certainly do not know what Mr. Smit hopes to accomplish, but we do not wish to have public debate about what evidence we do and do not have," Chief Mark Beckner said. "We will simply continue to do the work we've been doing."
Current facts and figures related to the investigation are as follows:
Number of people formally interviewed to date: More than 600. Note: Many have been interviewed more than one time.
Number of outside experts and consultants utilized to date: More than 60.
Number of persons investigated as possible suspects to date: About 140.
Number of items of evidence logged into property to date: About 1,400.
Approximate size of investigative case file to date: About 40,000 pages.
Number of phone tips: About 5,200
Number of letters received in reference to Ramsey case: More than 3,500.
Number of states investigation has taken Boulder Police to: 17
There will be no further comments by the Police Department.
A final editorial note: we asked officials from the Boulder Police Department to comment on Lou Smit's theories, and they referred us to a statement issued by Chief Mark Beckner on April 30.
He says, "The department believes it would be improper it to debate the merits of the Ramsey case evidence in the public arena."
The statement also says that Lou Smit has not been involved in the official investigation of JonBenet's killing for the past two and a half years. And adds -- quoting here, "The case and development of evidence has changed significantly over that period of time."
According to the Boulder police, they formerly interviewed more than 600 people in this case, investigated about 140 potential suspects, logged about 1400 items of evidence and built a file approximately 40,000 pages long.
LKL, May 28, 2001
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0105/28/lkl.00.html
Ramsey Update #84
Dec. 17, 2001
Police mark fifth anniversary of investigation As the fifth anniversary of the murder of JonBenet Ramsey approaches, Boulder Police have compiled updated statistical information related to the case.
Number of people formally interviewed to date: More than 650
Note: many have been interviewed more than one time
Number of outside experts and consultants utilized to date: More than 60
Number of persons investigated as possible suspects to date: About 140
Number of items of evidence logged into property to date: About 1,400
Approximate size of investigative case file to date: About 43,000 pages
Number of phone tips: About 5,300
Number of letters received in reference to Ramsey case: More than 4,800
Number of states investigation has taken PD to: 18
Total cost of investigation for Boulder PD: $1,705,251.21
The case remains an open, active investigation, with up to four detectives working on the case on an as-needed basis. The work includes following up on tips received, reviewing the case file, occasional laboratory analysis, and keeping current on new forensic technologies that may assist the case. "Any homicide, but particularly the death of a small child, has a tremendous impact on the community," Police Chief Mark Beckner said. "We know that there are some cases we will never bring to a resolution. We also know that there are some cases we solve many years after the crime. We will never give up hope for finding justice in this case."
http://www.bouldercolorado.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3625&Itemid=0
Ramsey Case Update #82
TO: Mark R. Beckner, Chief of Police
FROM: Joseph Pura, Director Financial Services
DATE: May 1, 2001
SUBJ: Expenses related to Ramsey Homicide
1996 expenditures related to Ramsey Homicide Investigation:
Overtime Expenses (604.75 Hrs.) $ 20,340.80
Travel Expenses $ 248.38
Investigative Expense $ 788.55
Total Expenditures for 1966 $ 21,377.73
1997 Expenditures related to Ramsey Homicide Investigation:
On-duty Salary Expense $308,630.81
Overtime Expense (3,929.5 Hours) $134,621.66
Travel Expenses through 12-31-97 $ 57,392.46
Investigative Expense through 12-31-97 $ 30,830.08
Total Expenditures for 1997 $531,475.01
1998 Expenditures related to Ramsey Homicide Investigation:
On-duty Salary Expense - P.P.#26 $562,149.72
Overtime Expense 954 Hours $ 37,541.46
Travel Expenses through 12-31-98 $ 11,319.01
Investigative Expense through 12-31-98 $ 19,946.74
Total Expenditures for 1998 $630,956.93
1999 Expenditures related to Ramsey Homicide Investigation:
On-duty Salary Expense - P.P.#25 $220,780.26
Overtime Expense (218.75 Hours) $ 10,554.11
Travel Expenses through 12-30-99 $ 3,842.91
Investigative Expense through 12-30-99 $ 3,010.70
Total Expenditures for 1999 $238,187.98
2000 Expenditures related to Ramsey Homicide Investigation:
On-duty Salary Expense - P.P.#26 $133,648.28
Overtime Expense $ 4,898.78
Travel Expenses through 12-31-2000 $ 3,157.00
Investigative Expense $ 4,369.25
Total Expenditures for 2000 $ 146,073.31
2001 Expenditures related to Ramsey Homicide Investigation:
On-duty Salary Expense (through 12/17/01) $133,624.66
Overtime Expense (through 12/17/01) $ 3,005.59
Investigative Expense $ 550.00
Total Expenditures for 2001 $ 137,180.25
Total expenditures related to Ramsey Homicide Investigation for 1996, 97,
98, 99, 2000, 2001: $1,705,251.21 (Does not include on duty costs of investigation for Management Exempt employees, such as Chief, Commander and Legal Advisor)http://www.bouldercolorado.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3627&Itemid=0
- When the BPD turned to the FBI for an evaluation of the focus of their investigation, they agreed with the direction that was being taken in the case.
We had been invited to Quantico, Virginia, to give a full presentation to the Child Abduction and Serial Killer Unit of the FBI, and we jumped at the opportunity. Having the CASKU experts hear and analyze your case was not an everyday thing for local cops.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, pages 239-240
In turn, the CASKU agents noted that of the more than seventeen hundred murdered children they had studied since the 1960s, there was only one case in which the victim was a female under the age of twelve, who had been murdered in her home by strangulation, with sexual assault and a ransom note present—and that was JonBenét Ramsey.
They told us that while it might be possible that someone broke into the house that night, it wasn’t very probable. The staging, evidence, and totality of the case pointed in one direction—that this was not the act of an intruder.
The crime, they said, did not fit an act of sex or revenge or one in which money was the motivation. Taken alone, they said, each piece of evidence might be argued, but together, enough pebbles become a block of evidentiary granite.
These conclusions by the FBI’s highly respected profilers were exactly what I hoped would provide a breakthrough in the case, but Hofstrom, DeMuth, and Smit seemed unimpressed. They ignored CASKU, just as they ignored us. It felt like we were on a train to nowhere.
…
The crime was an incredibly risky one for an outsider to undertake, the profilers said, and was committed by someone who had a high degree of comfort inside the home. The note was created to misdirect law enforcement and focus attention elsewhere and was a cathartic act that allowed the offender to “undo” the murder in one’s own mind.
Their bottom line was that there had never been a kidnapping attempt.
CASKU further said that placing JonBenét in the basement was consistent with a parent not wanting to put the body outside in the winter elements. The familiarity with and relocking of the peg on the white cellar door were noted. The ligatures, they said, indicated staging rather than control, and the garrote was used from behind so the killer could avoid eye contact, typical of someone who cares for the victim. They had the gut feeling that “no one intended to kill this child.”
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, pages 241-242
Newsflash for Aphrodite Jones, the BPD had good reason to narrow the focus of their investigation to the Ramseys as primary suspects; they had developed enough evidence for an arrest:
The police could now get an objective opinion about whether they had a case against the Ramseys or should move on. The FBI had told the detectives that they had enough evidence for probable cause, but now Eller, like Hunter, wanted to know if they had enough to convict beyond a reasonable doubt.
Perfect Murder, Perfect Town, Lawrence Schiller, page 475
The BPD has conducted a very extensive and expensive investigation into the death of JonBenet Ramsey.
Consultation with the FBI confirmed the direction of their investigative efforts.
We had interviewed 590 people, consulted 64 outside experts, investigated and cleared more than 100 possible suspects, collected 1,058 pieces of evidence, tested over 500 items at federal, state, and private laboratories, gathered handwriting and nontestimonial evidence from 215 people, built a case file that now bulged to 30,000 pages, reviewed more than 3,400 letters and 700 telephone tips, and contacted seventeen states and two foreign countries. And it all kept leading us in one direction. The detective team believed that John and Patsy Ramsey had knowledge of, and were involved in, the death of their daughter, JonBenét.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, page 333
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Reading this blood use to spurt from my eyes. Now it spurts through every pore of my being because I CAN'T TAKE THE LIES!!!
ATTENTION WEBSLEUTHS MEMBERS WHO ARE READING THIS THREAD!!!
Please list one outrageous lie that was in the documentary and then back it up with the facts.
Example: Jones said there was the Christmas tour a few days before Christmas 1996. We know this is a lie. Patsy's own words tell us that. Sorry, don't have it handy but you know what I mean.
Don't do a half *advertiser censored** job like I just did with the facts. I'll need details. The shorter the better.
Thanks,
Tricia
ATTENTION WEBSLEUTHS MEMBERS WHO ARE READING THIS THREAD!!!
Please list one outrageous lie that was in the documentary and then back it up with the facts.
Example: Jones said there was the Christmas tour a few days before Christmas 1996. We know this is a lie. Patsy's own words tell us that. Sorry, don't have it handy but you know what I mean.
Don't do a half *advertiser censored** job like I just did with the facts. I'll need details. The shorter the better.
Thanks,
Tricia
- Aphrodite Jones: “What people don’t know is that a few days before JonBenet Ramsey was killed, the Ramseys opened up their home and let people walk through it as part of a Christmas tour. (Video clip of Patsy Ramsey: “We had my goodness 1500 to 2000 people through our home…”
PATSY RAMSEY: No, because I had that whole downstairs painted, I mean cleaned.
TRIP DEMUTH: When was that?
PATSY RAMSEY: Well, 1994, before that home tour, Christmas home tour.
1998 Patsy Ramsey Interview
Also:
Historic Boulder's 11th annual Historic Homes for the Holidays Tour starts Saturday. Seven homes in the University Hill neighborhood will be featured. Once a cow pasture on an isolated hill above Boulder, development began here in the 1890s, with lots selling for $ 9.22 each. Today, the neighborhood features a variety of architectural styles and mature trees.
Three of the homes were designed by Boulder's first architect and master-builder, Glen Huntington. The earliest is a finely crafted Tudor Revival at 715 12th St., built in 1923, with cathedral ceilings in the living and dining rooms. Owner Emily Lowrance calls her place "a Christmas house" because she used shades of red and green.
Huntington's 1930 design is a Jacobean/Elizabethan residence at 1500 Baseline Road, with steeply pitched roofline, gables with half-timbering, and a spacious living room.
The last of this group, a Colonial Revival, was built in 1940 at 701 Seventh St., with gabled dormers and paneled windows. A large addition was built by Cindy and Charles Jones, the owners for 12 years.
A 1927 Tudor house at 755 15th St. is being restored to its original elegance by Patsy and John Ramsey, who also are opening it to light and air. A spacious master suite with dormers has gone into the unused attic, and a sun porch became a dining room.
A 1931 Jacobean/Elizabethan home at 1427 Cascade Ave. is enlivened with mementos from the career and travels of former U.S. State Department diplomat Robert Goold and his wife Libby. A sturdy Foursquare home at 845 12th St. was built in 1908, and has recently been given a window-filled addition by new owners Arnold Jacobson and Victoria Johns.
The 1935 Colonial Revival at 770 12th St. also has been given an addition - a large sun room and master bath by owners Carol Francipane and Donald Lococo. They also modernized the kitchen from the studs out.
The Denver Post, November 29, 1994
That anyone could look at this case and think an intruder did it..defies logic, even a disorganized schizophrenic would know better than write a three page ransom note while still in the house with the body and never the intent to take the body to start with.....
- Aphrodite Jones tells us: "At the same time, to clear their name and find their daughter’s killer, John and Patsy Ramsey hired their own investigative task force. Lou Smit, a renowned Colorado homicide detective headed the team."
While it’s true that Lou behaved as if he was employed by the Ramseys, he was in fact hired by Alex Hunter.
Alex Hunter had launched his own investigation, allegedly to identify holes in the case that might be exploited by a defense attorney. He brought over Steve Ainsworth, an investigator from the sheriff’s department, then hired Smit, a slight, balding sixty-one-year-old former lawman from Colorado Springs.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, pages 167-168
And BTW, the only “task force” assembled by the Ramseys was the “task force” whose task it was to keep them out of jail.
Q. Then what was, basically, your association with the private investigation of the potential suspects in the murder of JonBenet Ramsey?
A. The investigators were retained by our attorneys, and they stated to me that the principal purpose of those investigators was to prepare a defense in the case that the police might bring a charge against me. I hoped that they would also follow up on leads that came to us, but I was frequently reminded by our attorneys that their principal role was to prepare a defense should that be necessary.
Deposition of John Ramsey, December 12, 2001
joeskidbeck
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snipped by me:
Q. Then what was, basically, your association with the private investigation of the potential suspects in the murder of JonBenet Ramsey?
A. The investigators were retained by our attorneys, and they stated to me that the principal purpose of those investigators was to prepare a defense in the case that the police might bring a charge against me. I hoped that they would also follow up on leads that came to us, but I was frequently reminded by our attorneys that their principal role was to prepare a defense should that be necessary.
Deposition of John Ramsey, December 12, 2001
This question and the answer should be enough to convince any rational thinking adult exactly who killed JonBenet. If those two were really innocent, their "team" would have been totally unnecessary! Oh, one more thing. I'm thinking since they were hired to keep JR out of jail, they may have believed it was impossible to keep Patsy out!
Q. Then what was, basically, your association with the private investigation of the potential suspects in the murder of JonBenet Ramsey?
A. The investigators were retained by our attorneys, and they stated to me that the principal purpose of those investigators was to prepare a defense in the case that the police might bring a charge against me. I hoped that they would also follow up on leads that came to us, but I was frequently reminded by our attorneys that their principal role was to prepare a defense should that be necessary.
Deposition of John Ramsey, December 12, 2001
This question and the answer should be enough to convince any rational thinking adult exactly who killed JonBenet. If those two were really innocent, their "team" would have been totally unnecessary! Oh, one more thing. I'm thinking since they were hired to keep JR out of jail, they may have believed it was impossible to keep Patsy out!
- Aphrodite tells us: Published reports claimed that since there were no tracks in the snow outside the Ramsey’s home, the murder must have been committed by someone inside the house. But there’s a problem. Close examination of the crime scene photos today show plenty of snow in the front yard, but virtually none in the back of the house. No snow, no footprints. Why was evidence like this ignored?
There is no evidence, whatsoever, that any member of the BPD investigative team assigned to the case was ever under the impression that snow surrounded the house or regarded the snow conditions to be significant in any way with respect their view of the Ramseys.
The origin of the “no footprints in the snow” story is the following:
BOULDER -- Police who went to JonBenet Ramsey's home the morning she was reported missing found no footprints in the snow surrounding the house, sources said Monday.
That is one of the earliest details that caused investigators to focus their attention on the slain girl's family, police sources said.
Although there was no significant storm just before police went to the house the morning after Christmas, it had snowed lightly several times from Dec. 23 to 25, weather records show.
Rocky Mountain News, Charlie Brennan, March 11, 1997
If we assume that Charlie was honest in his reporting, then, obviously, his “sources” did not have access to, misread, or misunderstood police reports that stated that the walkways were clear (as is evident in crime scene photos.) There were no fresh footprints noticed in the snow and frost on grassy areas.
(The reason the snow was looked at was to determine whether there were fresh shoe impressions that should be photographed.)
Steve Thomas certainly was not misinformed with regard to the snow conditions.
The sergeant found no evidence of forced entry during a walk through the house, then went outside. A light dusting of snow and frost lay atop an earlier crusty snow in spotty patches on the grass. He saw no fresh shoe impressions, found no open doors or windows, nothing to indicate a break-in, but walking on the driveway and sidewalks left no visible prints. It was frigid, about nine degrees, and Reichenbach returned inside.
JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation, Steve Thomas, pages 19 - 20
Q. How about Officer Reichenbach, how do you pronounce his name?
A. Reichenbach.
Q. Do you ever recall hearing about what he said when he met with Dr. Henry Lee in terms of whether there was snow on the sidewalk of the house when he arrived that morning?
A. Yes.
Q. What did he say?
A. He said, and he also said this to me, that although there was due to what I think was an 11 degree temperature outside, there was a fresh frost and maybe a light dusting of snow on some of the lawn areas, but on the sidewalks and walkways around the house, as he put in his report, as I may have put in one of my reports, as we presented to the VIP conference, that you could not tell whether or not somebody may have walked on those walkways in question.
Steve Thomas Deposition, Wolf v. Ramsey, September 21, 2001
Sgt. Paul Reichenbach states in his report that he had arrived at the Ramsey home at approximately 0600 hours on December 26, and that he had examined the exterior of the Ramsey home as well as the yard. Sgt. Reichenbach noted that the air temperature was approximately 10 degrees fahrenheit. Sgt. Reichenbach noted in his report that there was a very light dusting of snow and frost on the exposed grass in the yard outside the Ramsey home. Some of the grass and yard was covered with snow from previous snowfalls and this snow was described as being crusty and measuring one to two inches deep. Sgt. Reichenbach states that he saw no fresh foot prints in any of the snow or in the frost on the grass. Sgt. Reichenbach also states in his report that he visually examined the exterior doors and windows of the Ramsey residence and found no signs of forced entry.
Search Affidavit
Just after 7:00, Detective Fred Patterson, one of Boulder’s most experienced officers, arrived at the Basemar Shopping Center, a mile from the Ramseys’ home. He had arranged to meet Detective Linda Arndt, who was driving in from her home in Louisville. Arndt and Patterson were briefed by Reichenbach, who had come from the Ramsey home for this meeting.
Reichenbach told the detectives that there was light, crusty snow and frost on the Ramseys’ lawn and he had seen no fresh footprints in the snow. The brick walkways were clear of snow. He had examined the exterior doors and windows and had seen no signs of forced entry. Other than that, all Reichenbach knew for sure was that there was a ransom note, the parents said the child was missing, and now they were praying. A short time later, when Arndt and Patterson arrived at the house, Fleet White and John Fernie had just returned from dropping Burke and the Fernies’ kids off at the Whites’ house.
Perfect Murder, Perfect Town, Lawrence Schiller, page 79