The Mindhunter Connection

Nom de plume

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After recently reading Mindhunter I find there are several "coincidences" to the murder of JonBenet. Since this book was found on John's nightstand, and John Douglas was later brought (bought) into the RST, it's too much for me to ignore.

In chapeter 7, The Heart of Darkness, Douglas discusses four serial killers in the following order:

Son of Sam
BTK
Trailside Killer
Carmine Calabro

In the same chapter he mentions a case that Bob Ressler had been "terrified and intrigued by" while growing up in Chicago. It was the case of Suzanne Degnan. She was a 6 year old girl, taken from her bedroom in the middle of the night, on January 7, 1946. A ransom note was left, but Suzanne was strangled, and dismembered in a basement laundry room. Her body parts were dumped into various storm drains.

[ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Heirens"]William Heirens - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]

Is Mindhunter the source of SBTC? There was the sound of metal scraping concrete heard that night. Was someone thinking of dumping JB in the storm sewer? What are the odds that the murder of a 6 yr old that had been taken from her room, and a ransom note left yet she was murdered by stangulation, would be mentioned in the very book John was reading?
 
After recently reading Mindhunter I find there are several "coincidences" to the murder of JonBenet. Since this book was found on John's nightstand, and John Douglas was later brought (bought) into the RST, it's too much for me to ignore.

In chapeter 7, The Heart of Darkness, Douglas discusses four serial killers in the following order:

Son of Sam
BTK
Trailside Killer
Carmine Calabro

In the same chapter he mentions a case that Bob Ressler had been "terrified and intrigued by" while growing up in Chicago. It was the case of Suzanne Degnan. She was a 6 year old girl, taken from her bedroom in the middle of the night, on January 7, 1946. A ransom note was left, but Suzanne was strangled, and dismembered in a basement laundry room. Her body parts were dumped into various storm drains.

William Heirens - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Is Mindhunter the source of SBTC? There was the sound of metal scraping concrete heard that night. Was someone thinking of dumping JB in the storm sewer? What are the odds that the murder of a 6 yr old that had been taken from her room, and a ransom note left yet she was murdered by stangulation, would be mentioned in the very book John was reading?

Nom de plume,
Interesting points. I could accept this is where JR found his abduction scenario.

The SBTC part, well maybe, but whats the rationale, why indirectly reference Mindhunter?

That reminds me of the lone JDI theory where he leaves out the information in the RN that JonBenet is gone, before he has finished all his staging.

Apart from the religious theme, your explanation is at least directly linked to the forensic evidence, making it credible.

.
 
Nom de plume,
Interesting points. I could accept this is where JR found his abduction scenario.

The SBTC part, well maybe, but whats the rationale, why indirectly reference Mindhunter?

That reminds me of the lone JDI theory where he leaves out the information in the RN that JonBenet is gone, before he has finished all his staging.

Apart from the religious theme, your explanation is at least directly linked to the forensic evidence, making it credible.

.

I don't know that he was referencing Mindhunter. It may have just been something that stuck in his mind. Maybe it was just to make reference to several serial killers. :dunno: It just seemed like a VERY strange coincidence.

What do you mean "where he leaves out the information in the RN that JonBenet is gone, before he has finished all his staging"? I'm not following you.

I'm not seeing any "religious theme" in anything I posted here. Where are you seeing that?
 
I don't know that he was referencing Mindhunter. It may have just been something that stuck in his mind. Maybe it was just to make reference to several serial killers. :dunno: It just seemed like a VERY strange coincidence.

What do you mean "where he leaves out the information in the RN that JonBenet is gone, before he has finished all his staging"? I'm not following you.

I'm not seeing any "religious theme" in anything I posted here. Where are you seeing that?

Nom de plume,
"where he leaves out the information in the RN that JonBenet is gone, before he has finished all his staging"?
I wrote that too fast, so its badly phrased. What I mean is that JR told the world that JonBenet was gone, by placing the ransom note on the steps, before he had completed all his staging. Of course I do not buy that theory at all.

And the religious theme is not meant to apply to you, but is the other popular meaning for SBTC: Saved By The Cross.

Maybe it was just to make reference to several serial killers. :dunno: It just seemed like a VERY strange coincidence.
Not sure why but if that was his intention. Assuming you are correct maybe his original staging was along serial killer lines, later amended and adapted to an abduction. So Columbo always asks the last question and wants to know why its a terrorist faction and not a serial killer who has JonBenet?

.
 
Thanks for the clarifications UK.

I don't know if he put the RN on the steps before the staging was done or not. Obviously it got there before she was out of the house though, and I'll always believe the intention was to dump her elsewhere.
 
7NEWS has
confirmed it involves a book by a well-known FBI profiler John Douglas.
The book is called Mindhunter. 7NEWS has confirmed that investigators
discovered the book in the Ramsey's bedroom. Sources tell us one of the
parents was reading it, but we don't know which one. The Ramsey's have
been questioned about it. The book describes many of the cases Douglas
worked on while he was at the F.B.I. Investigators are particularly
interested in a chapter that explains how the FBI helped catch Larry
Gene Bell, who was convicted and sentenced to death for kidnapping and
killing two girls in South Carolina in 1985. Experts say there are
several similarities between the case described in that chapter and the
Ramsey case. While the book doesn't mean anything by itself, when you
put it together with all the other details of the murder, it's an
important piece of information. We tried to contact the Ramsey's lawyers
about this, but they did not return our call. John and Patsy Ramsey have
said repeatedly they did not have anything to do with the death of their
daughter.


http://www.acandyrose.com/s-evidence-mindhunter.htm


---------------------------



http://eotd.wordpress.com/2008/10/04...rry-gene-bell/


Larry Gene Bell



Today is given over to one particularly unsavoury character, who was convinced he was Jesus Christ up to the day he died.

His name is Larry Gene Bell and the American was sent to his death for murdering the sister of a former beauty queen hailing from South Carolina, among others.

28 days later

His evil activities spanned a mere 28 days and in that time, he did enough to earn the lurid title of serial killer in many people’s eyes. He would kidnap his intended prey, then rape them and ultimately kill them by suffocating them.

-------------------

1 MIKE KANE: Okay. What about "Mind
2 Hunter", John Douglas's book was there in the
3 house, had you purchased that?4 JOHN RAMSEY: No. It was there in
5 '96? Interesting.
6 MIKE KANE: Was it interesting?
7 JOHN RAMSEY: I never never heard
8 of John Douglas or that book before.
9 MIKE KANE: So you never read that?
10 JOHN RAMSEY: No. I bought one of
11 his books the next summer, his newer book.


1 How about the book Mind?
2 PATSY RAMSEY: No.
3 TOM HANEY: Do you recall that? Do you
4 recall seeing it around the house?
5 PATSY RAMSEY: Huh-uh.
6 TOM HANEY: You were not reading.
7 PATSY RAMSEY: No.
8 TOM HANEY: It is a book by John Douglas.
9 PATSY RAMSEY: I don't know.
10 TOM HANEY: Do you know who he is?
11 PATSY RAMSEY: John Douglas I know.

----------------------

PETER BOYLES: "We'll talk about the police interview and we'll talk about the books by the bed. One of the stories we broke was about John Douglas' book Mindhunter being seen in the crime scene photos. You know a little bit about books by the Ramseys beds..."

LINDA WILCOX: "Well, they each had a pile of books in the corner by the bed. Even though they had nightstands. Originally the nightstands weren't there until they redid the upstairs. And even afterwards, they tended to just throw the books there. So, I kind of knew who read what. So, Patsy's side had things like, you know poems for women and not really what I would consider true trash-like Harlequin romances, but more like Mary Higgins Clark, woman novels. Some of them, I had even read.

John's side of the bed was usually some kind of suspense-thriller. He tended to buy books by, what I call, by the numbers, I mean whatever's number 1 on the bestseller lists. Occasionally it would be something like the 7 habits of successful people, or financial things or even a (didn't hear) occasionally. But, generally it was some kind of suspense novel."
__________________


1998-08-04: Enquirer (Week of August 4, 1998):
Police reveal 'murder manual' found in mom & dad's bedroom

In a dramatic development in the JonBenet Ramsey murder case, police found a "hot-to murder manual" in the bedroom of the little beauty queen's parents!

The true-crime book describes a 1985 murder with amazing similarities to the brutal killing of JonBenet, who would have turned 8 on August 6.

And incredibly, it was written by John Douglas, former head of the FBI's behavioral science unit - and one of the first experts hired by JonBenet's father John after he and wife Patsy set up their own investigation team.

"The book was among several found during a search of John and Patsy's bedroom after JohBenet's body was discovered in the basement," said a source close to the case. "One of the investigators recently read through it in detail and was stunned at what he saw in one chapter.

"For someone planning a murder or staging its aftermath, it could amount to a how-to manual."

The book "Mind Hunter," was published in 1995, the year before JonBenet was murdered.

It describes the case of Larry Gene Bell, who abducted and murdered high school senior Shari Faye Smith and a 9-year-old girl near Columbia, S.C.

And Douglas, who helped solve the killings, lists circumstances in the case that were later eerily echoed in the JonBenet murder:

* After snatching Shari, the killer called her mother. His first words to her were, "Listen carefully." In the JonBenet case, the ransom note - which cops believe was written by Patsy Ramsey - starts with the words, "Listen carefully!"

* Shari was suffocated with duct tape, which was later pulled from her mouth and nose. When John Ramsey found his daughter's body he ripped duct tape from her mouth.

* Before she was killed Shari wrote a "last will and testament" to her family on a legal pad. The fake JonBenet ransom note was written on a yellow legal pad.

* Shari's killer collected *advertiser censored* featuring bondage. JonBenet's hands had been bound with cord before she was murdered.

* Shari's sister Dawn later won the Miss South Carolina beauty title and went on to finish as a runner-up in the Miss America pageant. Patsy Ramsey is a former Miss West Virginia - and she also competed for the Miss America title.

Both John and Patsy were questioned about the book in June, and they dismissed the similarities between the book and JonBenet's murder as sheer coincidence, The Enquirer has learned.

But Gregg McCrary - Douglas' fellow FBI profiler who was also approached to work for the Ramseys and turned them down - declared: "The longer you are in my business, the less you believe in coincidences.

"I believe the JonBenet crime scene was staged. Many times when people stage a crime scene it's based on their perception of what a real criminal would do - and they get that information from books or movies.

"The grand jury will have to weight whether these are a series of coincidences - or something else.

---

A movie about Bell's killings, called "Death of Innocence," was made in 1991 and filmed partly in York.


http://www.heraldonline.com/2007/10/...-murderer.html

-------------------

Chapter 16 tells of the kidnapping and murder of Shari Faye Smith May 31, 1985. Link JonBenet, Shari was a pretty blonde youngster who loved to perform on stage. Her sister was a beauty queen who - like Patsy - appeared in the Miss American contest. When Shari's killer called her family, he twice warned them to "listen carefully." The phony ransom note, which cops believe Patsy Ramsey wrote, began with the words "listen carefully."

Shari had duct tape stuck over her mouth. So did tragic JonBenet.

"The investigators believe that Patsy was deeply moved by the story of Shari's murder because of the similarities to her own family," the insider explains. "She later used it to invent a bogus kidnapping and ransom demand."

* On page 350, Douglas tells how perverts are sometimes first turned on by Barbie Dolls. A pink Barbie nightdress was placed close to JonBenet's body - planted, detectives believe, to reinforce the idea she was the victim of a perverted intruder.

------------------

12 A. No, but Tom Wickman swears up and
13 down it was in the parents' bedroom.
14 Q. Does anyone else, besides Tom
15 Wickman, swear that up and down?
16 A. No, but Tom Wickman has told that
17 to several people.
18 Q. Where in the bedroom?
19 A. I was always under the impression
20 as we recollect it now on one of the two
21 night stands.


8 A. Yeah, Wickman is the source of
9 Mind Hunter by Douglas.
10 Q. Anyone else, besides Wickman, is
11 all I'm trying to find out?
12 A. Not that I'm aware of.
 
I watching a documentary about the Joel Kirkpatrick case,dunno if you heard of it....there are some similarities....doors locked,mom thinks kid was kidnapped,police finds kid dead in the house,she screams intruder,etc.....his mom is a free woman now (great lawyers,no argue,interesting strategy to blame it on the death row guy who of course "confessed" cause a new investigation puts death on hold!))..but my gut feeling after I read a lot about it and watched her is that she did it...I wanna slap her arrogant fake crier face whenever I see her....lucky her,what can I say and damn the system....
 
Great post Madeleine! It really is a "how to" book. Mostly, "how to" stage and cover it up, and "how not to" get caught. He clearly tells what tripped up each of these killers. Mindhunter was his/her/their murder manual.

There were some similiarities to the Bell case. It was thought that he was really after the older sister but grabbed the younger one, possibly by mistake. He tormented the older sister with phone calls for quite a while.

Even more similar is the Suzanne Degnan case. A 6 yr old, taken from her bed & strangled, yet he still left a ransom note. That screams JonBenet!

Everything about JB's murder points directly back to that book, and one case or another. I think he got ideas from several different cases in the book. The only thing about JB's murder that differs from the book is that, IIRC, there weren't any parents that were guilty in the cases he discussed. It was all stranger & serial killers. Guess he figured JB's murder would look the same, and if he would have dumped her elsewhere, it probably would have!
 
Great post Madeleine! It really is a "how to" book. Mostly, "how to" stage and cover it up, and "how not to" get caught. He clearly tells what tripped up each of these killers. Mindhunter was his/her/their murder manual.

There were some similiarities to the Bell case. It was thought that he was really after the older sister but grabbed the younger one, possibly by mistake. He tormented the older sister with phone calls for quite a while.

Even more similar is the Suzanne Degnan case. A 6 yr old, taken from her bed & strangled, yet he still left a ransom note. That screams JonBenet!

Everything about JB's murder points directly back to that book, and one case or another. I think he got ideas from several different cases in the book. The only thing about JB's murder that differs from the book is that, IIRC, there weren't any parents that were guilty in the cases he discussed. It was all stranger & serial killers. Guess he figured JB's murder would look the same, and if he would have dumped her elsewhere, it probably would have!

BBM -- This is the crux of the case for me. I cannot accept that JB was specially prepared "like a papoose" according to JR, to be left hidden in the WC. I believe her blanket was used as a 'shroud' of containment for her body for easier carrying during the removal from the home. If anyone other than a family member would have wrapped her up like that, the first available blanket would have been used, since anyone else would never have realized that the white one was JB's, unless it did come directly from her bed, which is unlikely according to statements by several. They never would have used it if it was in a dryer.

For some reason the body removal was thwarted. And the case would have, indeed, mimicked the cases in Mindhunter. Also, JR states in DOI, that his lawyers contacted John Douglas to bring him into the case.
So, who hired the lawyers and signed their checks? Not Patsy. That makes me more than suspicious that JR was the one who was most familiar with John Douglas.

Also, as you know Nom, Mindhunter was on the list of bestsellers at the time of JB's death - which were on John's reading lists according to the housekeeper.
 
Madeleine: Awesome post - especially the point about the Barbie nightgown possibly being planted to add to the depiction of a pedophile.
Especially bearing in mind that JR made a public statement during one of his air time interviews that they thought it was a PEDOPHILE who had committed the crime.
 
I watching a documentary about the Joel Kirkpatrick case,dunno if you heard of it....there are some similarities....doors locked,mom thinks kid was kidnapped,police finds kid dead in the house,she screams intruder,etc.....his mom is a free woman now (great lawyers,no argue,interesting strategy to blame it on the death row guy who of course "confessed" cause a new investigation puts death on hold!))..but my gut feeling after I read a lot about it and watched her is that she did it...I wanna slap her arrogant fake crier face whenever I see her....lucky her,what can I say and damn the system....
I went and googled this story and don't know what to think. Something about Sells' confession, caught my eye. He claimed that he broke into her house because she had been rude to him earlier in the day. Not saying this is what actually happened, but I find it interesting that even in a made up story, he thought rudeness was justification for violence. Back in the 90s, my family went to a mall carnival, here in Texas. While we were walking around, a man working a booth, jumped over the table, got in front of me and started yelling at me. He claimed that he had said 'hello' and I ignored him. I told him I didn't hear him, but he was on a rant and didn't want to hear any excuses. He said if he hadn't been wearing 'this shirt', (and he tugged on his carnival shirt), I wouldn't have thought I was too good to speak. He kept accusing me of thinking I was better than him and kept going on about how rude I was. My mother kept pushing me back away from him, and tried to calm him down, (she was an RN at a mental institution), but it didn't do much good. He kept screaming that I was rude, and finally something dawned on me, so I said, 'Hey. I was talking to my mother, so when you said 'hello', you interrupted my conversation, so YOU were the rude one'. And it was like a light bulb went off, and I could see the shift in his emotions. About that time, my husband walked up, (a big muscular guy), so 'Tommy', (that's what a female worker called him), backed off and she guided him away. She rolled her eyes, and said 'not again', and apologized for him. Anyway, I looked at Tommy Lynn Sells' pictures, and I can't say one way or another if he was the same guy. The main thing I remember about this guy's looks were that he appeared young, was nice looking, but had wild spaced out eyes. Afterwards, my mother started crying because she felt so much sympathy for his obvious problem with people looking down on him. My daughter was with us, and to this day, she hates carnivals. That experience traumatized her for life... just walking and enjoying the day, and then BOOM, right out of nowhere, comes this assault. And I've never thought I was better than anybody! We barely had a pot to you know what in, so I don't know where all of this came from. Like you though, I doubt that Sells murdered Joel Kirkpatrick, because he mainly targeted women and girls 1st. The little boy's dad sure seemed convinced that the mother was guilty. And yes, I see some similarities to the JBR case. Often times, a parent kills a child to punish the other parent, and I've wondered if there was some of this involved with JB.
 
don't wanna hijack the thread but if you have time dodie try and find/watch

On The Case With Paula Zahn/Season 4/Episode 8 /A mother's nightmare

I noticed how PZ usually smiles and is very warm/kind to REAL victims when interviewing them....not that it counts or changes anything as far as I am concerned but you can see she's not impressed at all with Julie's story....and after watching Julie in this episode all I can say is "the worse actress ever!".....while I was watching her all I felt was this is the female version of Michael Peterson!made my blood boil!poor Joel......
 
Often times, a parent kills a child to punish the other parent, and I've wondered if there was some of this involved with JB.


So true....and yes,I often wonder whether JB's murder wasn't premeditated...their behavior post JB's death doesn't suggest accident to me!It's like they finally got rid of a "problem"...
 
I have looked through all the crime scene photos I can find. I didn't see any pictures from inside JR and PR's bedroom. Can you provide a link that has photos inside their bedroom?
 
Messy house = messy mind.


(PR.....what were you doing and what were you not doing)????


Just my random thoughts and :twocents:
 
I'll take your word for it. I opened the image, and zoomed it in as far as my laptop would go, but still can't read a title. I can see that there is a book there, but not the title. Funny that the cops didn't take a direct photo of the book.
 
I'll take your word for it. I opened the image, and zoomed it in as far as my laptop would go, but still can't read a title. I can see that there is a book there, but not the title. Funny that the cops didn't take a direct photo of the book.

That is just a photo of the master bedroom. Personally, I couldn't see any books in the picture. LE may have taken a picture of it, and may have taken the book into evidence. I'm sure, or at least I hope, they have thousands of photos we've never seen.
 
BBM -- This is the crux of the case for me. I cannot accept that JB was specially prepared "like a papoose" according to JR, to be left hidden in the WC. I believe her blanket was used as a 'shroud' of containment for her body for easier carrying during the removal from the home. If anyone other than a family member would have wrapped her up like that, the first available blanket would have been used, since anyone else would never have realized that the white one was JB's, unless it did come directly from her bed, which is unlikely according to statements by several. They never would have used it if it was in a dryer.

For some reason the body removal was thwarted. And the case would have, indeed, mimicked the cases in Mindhunter. Also, JR states in DOI, that his lawyers contacted John Douglas to bring him into the case.
So, who hired the lawyers and signed their checks? Not Patsy. That makes me more than suspicious that JR was the one who was most familiar with John Douglas.

Also, as you know Nom, Mindhunter was on the list of bestsellers at the time of JB's death - which were on John's reading lists according to the housekeeper.

midwest mama,
Columbo asks out of all the expert witnesses why does JR elect for John Douglas?

Answers on a postcard to the Ramsey's Are Innocent Defence Fund Colorado!


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