The ransom note

I have heard this stated before by some long-term posters I admire. And I respect your point which I can conceive could be true. But I’ve a few concerns which keep me from embracing that idea as an absolute. I don’t doubt that Patsy physically wrote the RN. However, given the housekeeper LW claimed the verbiage in the RN reflected both of the adult Rs’ speech, I can’t dismiss that JR had a hand in directing some of the material in it....

As another poster has noted, you seem to be talking about LHP rather than LW. I looked at the first chapter of LHP's book. (It's
supposed to be hers, anyway.) I don't remember seeing anything about John's language. It did say that Patsy used hence frequently and also mentioned that she was particular about putting the accent aigu in JonBenet's name.

I looked at the ransom note and it might be that the acute accent is missing in attache. (I think we're just seeing a forward tick on the downstroke of the y in the line above. Other y's in the RN exhibit that.) I looked at Forensic Linguistics by Gerald McMenamin to see what he decided the ransom note and Patsy's five exemplars exhibit vis-a-vis attache. If I'm interpreting his "vertical score format" correctly, he thinks that both the RN and Patsy (consistently) omit the accent in that word.

It seems a little odd to me that a French-accent fan like Patsy would omit the accent in her exemplars. I would put it in and I'm no Francophile. (I can't see the actual exemplars for that word so I'm going by what the word-processed text indicates.)

John, on the other hand, puts an accent on attache in at least one of his exemplars. At least, the book says that John uses the "longer form" of attache in his second exemplar. That makes it into John's stylemarker list because only forms that differ from the ransom note are allowed into Patsy's and John's stylemarkers. (Don't get me started.)
 
As another poster has noted, you seem to be talking about LHP rather than LW. I looked at the first chapter of LHP's book. (It's
supposed to be hers, anyway.) I don't remember seeing anything about John's language. It did say that Patsy used hence frequently and also mentioned that she was particular about putting the accent aigu in JonBenet's name.
~RSBM~

Nope, I know who my reference is. (PMPT, pg.629, Kindle edition.)
 
~RSBM~

Nope, I know who my reference is. (PMPT, pg.629, Kindle edition.)

I don't have the kindle edition, but I looked up all the references to Linda Wilcox in the paperback's index. I'm not seeing what you're talking about.

Why not cut and paste the relevant passage? I'm sure others would appreciate.
 
~RSBM~

Nope, I know who my reference is. (PMPT, pg.629, Kindle edition.)

OK, I see what you're talking about, though it's not the best day to be farting around with amazon's Look Inside function:

"It was his voice in the ransom note and her hands. I can see it in my mind. She's sitting there. We need paper, we need a note. He's dictating and she's doing. Like he's almost snapping his fingers. She grabbed her notebook and her felt-tip pen. That is not her language, but the essence of her is there, like the percentages: '99% chance' and '100% chance.' That is how she talked because of her cancer or how you talk when you're around someone with cancer...."

So from this I would conclude that in her opinion both of them talk in percentages a lot. OK. (I'll just note that John used many percentages at different points in his second interview.)
 
OK, I see what you're talking about, though it's not the best day to be farting around with amazon's Look Inside function:

"It was his voice in the ransom note and her hands. I can see it in my mind. She's sitting there. We need paper, we need a note. He's dictating and she's doing. Like he's almost snapping his fingers. She grabbed her notebook and her felt-tip pen. That is not her language, but the essence of her is there, like the percentages: '99% chance' and '100% chance.' That is how she talked because of her cancer or how you talk when you're around someone with cancer...."

So from this I would conclude that in her opinion both of them talk in percentages a lot. OK. (I'll just note that John used many percentages at different points in his second interview.)

Wilcox's quote is strange: first she says it's not Patsy's language and then she says it is.

The quote actually weakens the case for John dictating the note because it says that either Patsy or John might have said "percent this, percent that."

But it's weak testimony in any case because Wilcox is imagining most (or all) of it rather than recalling.
 
"....Professor McMenamin’s choice of the features used in document comparison is arbitrary and subjective, and unmotivated by any empirical research; another set of features could well have been chosen that would have given very different results. His method could not pass the test of independent replicability...."

Geoffrey Nunberg quoted by Carole Chaski in "Best Practices and Admissibility of Forensic Author Identification"


McMenamin states that he chose style-markers for Patsy that contrast with the ransom note--and then he concludes that she is excluded as the author because she doesn't share style-markers with the ransom note writer. Below are Patsy's style-markers according to Gerald McMenamin:

PR 01 Correct spelling of "business"
PR 02 Correct spelling of "possession"
PR 03 Misspelling of "advise" as "advize"
PR 04 Lack of correction in spelling "denied" (In her exemplars she would have had to spell it "din..." and then fixed it)
PR 05 Misspells "burial" as "buriel" (Got a real chuckle out of that.)
PR 06 Misspelling and correction of "advise" as "advize" with additional correction
PR 07 Misspelling of "scrutiny" as "scruitiny" in passes 1 and 2 (after which she spells it right)
PR 08 Use of capital "S" in "Southern"
PR 09 Presence of periods in "am"
PR 10 Periods (instead of "!") after "Victory" (in passes 2, 3, 4, 5. In her first pass--from dictation-- she uses "!")
PR 11 No periods used in "SBTC"
PR 12 "Unharmed" is one word (Uh ahem, excuse me, in pass 5 Patsy writes "un harmed.")
PR 13 Uses the correct article in "an earlier"
PR 14 "Pick up" has no hyphen
PR 15 Writes "counter measures"
PR 16 Use of single word for "outsmart"
PR 17 Use of single word for "underestimate"
PR 18A $118,000. has no trailing zeroes
PR 18b $100,000. has no trailing zeroes
PR 18C Wrote "100 dollar" without "$"
PR 18D Wrote "$18,000." with no trailing zeroes in pass 3
PR 18E Use of word "dollar" without "$"


"Lack of correction in spelling 'denied'" is particularly amusing. Does McMenamin really think that correcting the spelling of "denied" is a style-marker for the ransom note writer? That the ransom note writer would habitually do that?

I've mentioned elsewhere that it looks like the ransom note writer actually wrote "ri" or "ni" before covering it over with "de." (The "i" is hard to see, but what else could it be?) There don't seem to be good word candidates for that particular sentence which begin with "ri" or "ni." I notice that "burial" is almost directly underneath "denied," which makes me wonder if she was copying from a previous draft and lost her place. Maybe that could happen if, say, the paper she was copying from was partially covering the paper she was writing on.
 
Does anyone have handwriting analysis information about the words that were crossed out in the RN?
The word after "we" (pg.1) and the word "delivery" (pg.2) are both scratched out using similar pen stokes.

There is a circular stroke on top of the first letter of both words.

The words and letters aren't completely scribbled out.

Are scratch-outs included in handwriting analysis? If so, were the ones in the RN looked into?

I searched before I came here to post about it but couldn't get an answer. Maybe I used the wrong key words.
 
Does anyone have handwriting analysis information about the words that were crossed out in the RN?
The word after "we" (pg.1) and the word "delivery" (pg.2) are both scratched out using similar pen stokes.

There is a circular stroke on top of the first letter of both words.

The words and letters aren't completely scribbled out.

Are scratch-outs included in handwriting analysis? If so, were the ones in the RN looked into?

I searched before I came here to post about it but couldn't get an answer. Maybe I used the wrong key words.

As I understand it, on Patsy's first pass the note would have been dictated to her by Detective Arndt without Arndt providing information about spelling or punctuation. I don't think Arndt included the cross-outs. There probably wouldn't be much opportunity to compare manners of crossing-out.

But now that you mention it, in her exemplars Patsy does do some over-writing like the RN writer did on "denied." In the ransom note there are two occurrences of "advise." On her first three passes Patsy writes "advize" for the first and "advise" for the second. She over-writes what looks like a "z" on pass two of the second "advise." God knows what she's doing on the third pass, there's a bunch of weird scribbling: it looks like she's going over and over the "s."

After those three exemplars on January 4, Patsy's lawyers are provided a photocopy of the ransom note. When she comes back for two more exemplars on February 28, she's decided that the proper spelling is "advize."
 
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Hi folks, I’m a long time lurker and I felt compelled to make a comment on this thread so I made an account. In reading analysis of the RN I saw a lot of speculation about the use of the unusual and redundant phrase ‘and hence’, which was also used later by the family in a church notice.

I just felt like sharing that this is a lyric in the very popular Mary poppins song ‘spoonful of sugar’-

And hence (And hence),
They find (They find)
Their task is not a grind.

It’s even repeated by Mary poppins’ reflection in the mirror, so the listener hears it twice.

I don’t think this is probably going to cause anyone to have a huge revelation about anything, it’s just something I thought of straight away and didn’t see anyone mention in the past- pardon if it’s pointless or was already discussed.
 
Hi folks, I’m a long time lurker and I felt compelled to make a comment on this thread so I made an account. In reading analysis of the RN I saw a lot of speculation about the use of the unusual and redundant phrase ‘and hence’, which was also used later by the family in a church notice.

I just felt like sharing that this is a lyric in the very popular Mary poppins song ‘spoonful of sugar’-

And hence (And hence),
They find (They find)
Their task is not a grind.

It’s even repeated by Mary poppins’ reflection in the mirror, so the listener hears it twice.

I don’t think this is probably going to cause anyone to have a huge revelation about anything, it’s just something I thought of straight away and didn’t see anyone mention in the past- pardon if it’s pointless or was already discussed.

I don't think "and hence" is that unusual but your point is interesting because, as you say, it shows up in a post-murder Ramsey writing and also because "Mary Poppins" was on TV Christmas night at 8:35pm (Disney channel). Whether they watched it at the Whites', I don't know.
 
For those who are interested here is a report about a former FBI Agent giving a talk about Criminal Profiling and the Ransom Note in the JonBenet case is mentioned:

Former FBI agent talks to students about profiling - Daily Reflector

ty, jj

noteworthy:
"Other phrases and writing habits, like using acronyms and exclamation points were specific to JonBenet’s mother, Patsy. The note was flat and not folded, which Van Zandt said was peculiar because if it came from outside the house, it would have been folded."
 
Whoever made the point about there being no tears on the ransom note -- that is a great point. I've always wondered that myself; how would PR be able to not get any of her tears on the note? It's all but unanimous that she wrote the note; and that the note was written after the victim had died -- I personally still believe this, but nonetheless, it's something that's a mystery. I suppose it wouldn't be absolutely impossible for her to keep her tears off the paper, assuming she was holding some sort of tissue in her other hand. I can't help but think of that box of tissues that was found on the dining room table, near where the bowl of pineapple and empty glass were recovered.
 
ty, jj

noteworthy:
"Other phrases and writing habits, like using acronyms and exclamation points were specific to JonBenet’s mother, Patsy. The note was flat and not folded, which Van Zandt said was peculiar because if it came from outside the house, it would have been folded."

Good that you posted this. We all have different opinions but I believe the ransom note was written by someone as a warped 'joke' and that person was an intruder who was in the house for hours and as Lou Smit said it was written before the crime. Of course we have different opinions though.
 
Dont get me wrong I think one of the Ramseys penned the ransom note, but Ive always thought it was wierd that there were no tears found on the paper, think about this, with all that went on that night how could anyone be composed, and not in a state of chaos, and yet be be able to pen a ransom note that was pristine?
No footprints either yet Patsy's entire body weight was then when she walked down stairway,
 
Good that you posted this. We all have different opinions but I believe the ransom note was written by someone as a warped 'joke' and that person was an intruder who was in the house for hours and as Lou Smit said it was written before the crime. Of course we have different opinions though.

As I say we have different opinions in this case and who knows who is right but there should be justice for JonBenet and hopefully one day there will be. Perhaps she can speak from the grave as such through DNA. As I say my opinion is an intruder wrote it as a joke because they had a sick and twisted sense of humour. It was a Ransom Note because they intended to remove the her from the house but as Lou Smit said they were unable to do this but left the note anyway. The idea might have come from the movie photos and beauty pageants of JonBenet. Whoever did it although American in my opinion did like not like the US very much. This is just my opinion with their 'joke' they have been having a 'laugh' at most FBI Profilers in the case since.
 

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