JonBenét Ramsey

[VelociRapture]

@Kailashand @Mela99

Regarding polygraphs -

They can be useful at times, but are notoriously unreliable. Which is why they aren't admissible in court. 

As for Ms. Hallis, I don't believe she overheard a conversation between the Ramseys. She received a call from an unnamed woman who told her the story about John molesting his daughter and Patsy accidentally striking JonBenét while trying to hit her husband. Hallis passed the polygraph because she truthfully indicated that she had received the call - not because she overheard the Ramsey's discussing it.

All that to say - there was no indication that her claim that John abused his daughter was true.

source: http://www.acandyrose.com/s-diane-hallis.htm

Additionally, if I recall correctly, sexual abuse wasn't a forgone conclusion. The irritation found could indicate abuse, prior injury not sexually related, infection, or it could mean nothing at all. I don't think Doctors were even able to agree on when the injury occurred - some say it happened before Christmas 1996, others say it happened immediately before or after death occurred.

[ClaraOswin]

59 minutes ago, General Jinjur said:

I'm definitely in the BDI camp. I would love to see the rest of those early interviews with him. The way he acted when he was shown the picture of the bowl of pineapple cinched it for me.

I thought it was so weird how quiet he got and didn't just say it was pineapple.

[General Jinjur]

1 hour ago, ClaraOswin said:

I thought it was so weird how quiet he got and didn't just say it was pineapple.

And the way he stopped moving and said, "Oh." Like, "Oh crap, they know."

 

2 hours ago, OyToTheVey said:

The lawsuit is for defamation. So not very surprising. But the evidence is just damning.

I read somewhere that James Kolar hopes they do sue him, because that would give him the opportunity to depose Burke.

[HermioneSparrow]

What. CBS is getting sued?!? Well they opened a can of worms and the fact they're standing by their investigation... Oh boy...

[HerNameIsBuffy]

12 hours ago, Blahblah said:

Has anyone here heard of having pineapple in milk, let alone eaten it? Is it a regional thing? 

Strawberrys in milk as a kid.  And pineapple with cottage cheese.  Pineapple in milk isn't something I've heard of but its not a stretch to me since it's so common with cottage cheese.  

[General Jinjur]

Over at http://www.acandyrose.com/s-evidence-pineapple.htm there's an interesting bit about pineapple with milk. When Patsy was in pageants, her "talent" was dramatic reading. One of the readings she did was from "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie." There's a passage in that book about eating pineapple with cream.

[HerNameIsBuffy]

11 hours ago, VelociRapture said:

They found on the CBS show that strangulation was not the cause of death though - the traumatic blow to the head was. The Doctor who concluded that has a ton of expertise in the area (he worked the JFK assassination case for example.) He said there could have been an illusion of life due to her heart continuing to beat a short while, but the cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head. 

I seriously doubt her parents would have strangled her to death if she had a pulse. And I'm not convinced that Burke would have had the knowledge or strength needed to make the garrote. I think that was part of the staging in order to draw attention from the actual cause of death.

They also explained on the show that there wasn't any evidence found supporting sexual abuse in general. There was some irritation in the vaginal canal, but not really to the extent you'd see with recent or recurring sexual abuse. So I'm doubting the idea that they deliberately staged it to look like a sexually based attack and murder. 

As for the pineapple explanation - I doubt they knew she had eaten pineapple at first. The question may have caught them off guard - or they may have known at that point that the pineapple wasn't digested enough to make a pre-bedtime snack a plausible explanation. They talked about on the show how they apparently were given some police reports to look at before they spoke with police. They could have seen the information about the pineapple there.

I find it so strange that experts can have such varied opinions on whether or not there was sexual abuse.  The link above while starting off as opinion has quotes from other doctors about damage to the hymen and acute vaginally injury.  Cyril Wecht has come under criticism, but he wasn't the only one.  Doesn't mean it was ongoing, though.

vaginitis itself isn't an indicator to me because I have very clear memories of being little and heartbroken because I had to give up Mr. Bubble and my special bath soaps that were shaped like colorful bears (and only being allowed cotton undies although I don't recall being upset about that one) because of those types of issues.  

I certainly hope the doctors who claim there was no evidence of sexual abuse are right.  My complete lack of medical credentials make it impossible for me to parse that stuff out for myself.  

If no pulse and you're going to stage it, why the garotte at all?  Accident something slipped out of someone's hand and inadvertently hit her, say she fell and hit her head in furniture or the counter...seems like a million ways to stage it that wouldn't require the garotte and I honestly don't get how a parent could bring themselves to do it.

[HerNameIsBuffy]

Link to the 911 call cleaning it up.  I can hear what they do after they say it, but it sounds like the ghost hunter shows to me where they hear things in static.  Honestly, I have crappy hearing so idk.  Can you guys hear it?

http://ijr.com/2016/09/696806-new-suspect-named-in-jonbenet-ramsey-case-after-911-clip-decoded-according-to-private-investigators/

[ClaraOswin]

I have a hard time understanding what Patsy is saying. But I do hear a child's voice at the end, of sure. And the sound of an adult male.

[HermioneSparrow]

1 hour ago, ClaraOswin said:

I have a hard time understanding what Patsy is saying. But I do hear a child's voice at the end, of sure. And the sound of an adult male.

I can't understand what Patsy says either but the child's voice is very clear to me, and the other one too.

[VelociRapture]

1 hour ago, HerNameIsBuffy said:

If no pulse and you're going to stage it, why the garotte at all?  Accident something slipped out of someone's hand and inadvertently hit her, say she fell and hit her head in furniture or the counter...seems like a million ways to stage it that wouldn't require the garotte and I honestly don't get how a parent could bring themselves to do it.

Only explanations I can think of:

They panicked completely and didn't know what else to do. I can honestly see how they could panic if it was Burke who accidentally killed her. And, to an extent, I can also get wanting to protect him by covering it up too. It's wrong on so many levels, but I think it's a basic parents instinct that can be tough to overcome.

And I'm not sure it's possible to make the type of head injury she received look like an accident - like she fell down the stairs or something. That was a really serious injury and a pretty distinctive break in the bone. 

The only explanation I have for the garrote is that they needed to conceal she died somehow and, for whatever reason, that was what came to mind. Did John or Patsy have sailing experience at all? Or military or Scouting experience? That could be where they got the idea for the garrote - it looked like a serious knot. The person who made it would have likely had knowledge about that kind of stuff.

I mean, the only valid course of action would have been to call 911 immediately and told the truth about what happened. The fact that they likely didn't do that is deplorable to me. If they did it to protect Burke it's kind of understandable, but still deplorable nonetheless.

And I completely agree about the sexual abuse evidence and allegations. I really really hope they aren't true - but it's confusing with so many professionals having such vastly different opinions on it.

[Kailash]

@VelociRapture Thank you for correcting my assumption that the secretary overheard the conversation. I didn't even realize I made that leap myself, until I read what you posted and then I went back and read the part from the polygraph. It must be hard not to make assumptions when you (general you) investigate, and interview people. No wonder there is such a tangled web regarding this case!

[VelociRapture]

1 minute ago, Kailash said:

@VelociRapture Thank you for correcting my assumption that the secretary overheard the conversation. I didn't even realize I made that leap myself, until I read what you posted and then I went back and read the part from the polygraph. It must be hard not to make assumptions when you (general you) investigate, and interview people. No wonder there is such a tangled web regarding this case!

No problem! I didn't know the Secretary had even taken a test until you mentioned it and then my natural curiosity took over. Lol!

I think you're right. It's got to be so tough not to make assumptions in cases like this - especially for the people actually investigating or reporting on it. I mean, it's hard enough for me not to draw conclusions and I'm not even connected to the case in anyway. The closer you are to the case the harder it's got to be to try and separate yourself from it. 

[Chickenbutt]

According to Wikipedia, John Ramsey joined the Navy in 1966. I also read in some article he owned boats and planes.

[VelociRapture]

20 minutes ago, Chickenbutt said:

According to Wikipedia, John Ramsey joined the Navy in 1966. I also read in some article he owned boats and planes.

Then I can see why he may have made a garrote if he was involved in a coverup then. If you're panicking you may turn instinctively to something you know how to do well because you don't have to think much to do it. 

[Chickenbutt]

For your viewing pleasure. More than you ever wanted to know about knots. A couple of the hitches look similar to me.

http://www.netknots.com/rope_knots

[nausicaa]

5 hours ago, HerNameIsBuffy said:

If no pulse and you're going to stage it, why the garotte at all?  Accident something slipped out of someone's hand and inadvertently hit her, say she fell and hit her head in furniture or the counter...seems like a million ways to stage it that wouldn't require the garotte and I honestly don't get how a parent could bring themselves to do it.

Yeah, that confuses me as well. If Patsy and John are not the murderers, I am going to assume they are not total sociopaths, and so like 99% of the population would find it damn near impossible to take their daughter's corpse and put a garotte around her neck. 

And they wouldn't quite know what the head trauma looked like internally, neither had any medical training, add to that, they're panicked and probably not thinking incredibly clearly. So pretending she had fallen and hit her head on a counter or the stairs makes a lot more sense to me. Not only does it seem more dignified to the corpse, it just seems like the more obvious choice. I mean, if they understand forensics so well, then they would know that it could be proven that she died from head trauma and not the garotte. 

God this case. I cannot figure it out. 

[Chickenbutt]

I think JB was probably already dead when they found/were told about her. When they discovered that she had been killed (by Burke IMO) they had to make it look like a crazy psychopath killed her. Not a little boy with a flashlight, hence the garrote. How can you pin a murder on a 9 year old when she was killed by a sophisticated weapon like a garrote?

I doubt they ever thought that it would be discovered that she essentially died of the head injury not the garrote.

[HerNameIsBuffy]

1 hour ago, nausicaa said:

Yeah, that confuses me as well. If Patsy and John are not the murderers, I am going to assume they are not total sociopaths, and so like 99% of the population would find it damn near impossible to take their daughter's corpse and put a garotte around her neck. 

And they wouldn't quite know what the head trauma looked like internally, neither had any medical training, add to that, they're panicked and probably not thinking incredibly clearly. So pretending she had fallen and hit her head on a counter or the stairs makes a lot more sense to me. Not only does it seem more dignified to the corpse, it just seems like the more obvious choice. I mean, if they understand forensics so well, then they would know that it could be proven that she died from head trauma and not the garotte. 

God this case. I cannot figure it out. 

Fell down the rabbit hole at websleuths.  I'll never find my way out.  

Re head injury even the coroners had no idea how severe it was until skin was removed - they wouldn't know how to stage it so a fall would make more sense in a panic.  Or even 'he was tossing a flashlight and didn't see her and it hit her head."  I'm with you - if not sociopath s that staging makes no sense to me.

something else really bugs me about the Burke did it theory.  If he killed her, however accidentally, J & P committed serious felonies in covering it up.  Taking huge risks to protect him...which as a parent I understand.  But he was 9.  Obviously a traumatic event and especially if he was the cause...who would let him out of their sight to go with friends?  For a minute?  Killing a sibling would have been a new and horrific experience for him, how on earth would they assume he wouldn't lose it and talk?  As a parent I'm keeping him with me and not letting him out of my line of vision one to make sure he's okay and two to make sure he stays quiet.  

i saw the Dr. Phil thing and my God was it a bad idea to put him in front of the camera.  I'm still not judging body language - I'd be equally awkward in the same circumstance but I'd know I'd come off like a monster and leave the interviews for someone who has more approachable affect when under stress.

None of this makes any sense.

 

[HerNameIsBuffy]

2 hours ago, Chickenbutt said:

For your viewing pleasure. More than you ever wanted to know about knots. A couple of the hitches look similar to me.

http://www.netknots.com/rope_knots

Im not in the Burke did it camp, but wasn't he a Boy Scout?  They do knots, I think.  I'm in my 40s and my shoes are always coming untied so definitely not an expert on this.  

I'm not judging him on the Dr. Phil interview, but the interview when he was small?  Really disconnected.  They found that pretty sinister and it can be, we know kids are capable of evil cuts, but I think mental escaping and being out of touch with massive trauma is a understandable defense mechanism.

Im not sure I know how I feel about that tape being released.  He was a child seems Iike there should be some protection of police statements of children even after they become adults.  I may be over thinking it and info is important - but if he had nothing to do with this then his affect at 9, 10, and 11 could ruin the rest of his life.  One thing I think is clear is that there was some serious dysfunction and few 9 year olds have the tools to rise above that.

[Blahblah]

Occam's Razor for me. No matter how unlikely it is that John/Patsy/Burke did it/staged it/lied about it, it is infinitely more unlikely that an intruder was involved.

it's the sum of the parts for me as well:

The ransom note - 3 pages long written on and with tools found in the house which were then replaced. And would have taken at least 20 minutes to write it?

The pineapple.

The paintbrush.

The cobweb in the window.

The size 12 underpants.

John finding her in a pitch black room.

I could go on and on....

[laPapessaGiovanna]

Premise: I've discovered this case on FJ, I've never seen any specials (nor will in the future since they won't be aired here) so what little I know comes from here, from the links you all posted and from reading the autopsy report.

Imho the garrotte as a cover up makes no sense at all. The child receives a terribe head blow in some way we don't know and loses consciousness, the albeit very severe blow doesn't show very much and doesn't kill her immediately, there's still an heartbeat and maybe she's even still breathing. If you want to stage a cover up to minimize damages at this point the logical choice is faking an accidental fall or something then call the 911 and try to act like a credibly concerned parent and try to save your daughter. But this isn't what happened. The unconscious girl whose heart was still beating was also strangled, the only reason that makes sense is that whoever killed her wanted to make sure she was dead because there's no way that you can conceal or explain away a head blow in this way. If the killer or the person who ipotetically tried to cover up the murder wanted give the head blow an accidental appearance it could have been done in a hundred ways none of which include strangulation. This is an assumption I make on the basis that her heart was still beating before being strangled because attempted strangulation post mortem leaves completely different marks on the body that shouldn't be difficult to distinguish during the autoptic examination and that it would have been difficult if not impossible for anyone to understand on the moment that the head blow was mortal since the exterior signs didn't show the severity of it. Hence the need for whoever murdered her to strangulate JB in order to make sure she was really dead.

Or in the IDI hypothesis (that I personally can't believe) someone tried to kidnap her and gave her a blow to silence her or make her compliant and then hide in the cellar because someone, maybe Burke, woke up, down there waiting to be sure none was aware of what was happening the intruder understands that the blow was too severe and this disrupts the kidnapping project, intruder decides to kill her and leave her there. Parents wake up discover the horror and stage the ransom note and the cover up so that people don't think they are guilty. But this hypothesis requires too many leaps and leaves too many open questions. 

Either way imho this pretty much rules out BDI. The parents must be involved or at least in the know of whatever happened since they very successfully destroyed evidence and deflected investigation and the ransom note is the most improbable ever written. Burke is the most obvious scapegoat since he wasn't and therefore isn't imputable. Maybe they muddled things in that way to make it seem like they wanted to cover things up to protect their guilty but not imputable son, but may be this is too far fetched. I don't think we will ever know the truth. 

[Fascinated]

@laPapessaGiovanna, you should be able to watch the specials on YouTube. 

I haven't finished watching them yet but I do wonder if the new investigators worked with the pre-conceived notion that it was a family member.  It has been discussed upthread, but I think their interpretation of the 911 tape is suspect.  I certainly couldn't decipher the words they were claiming to hear.  The 911 operator did not ever, at least in the interview that I watched, say that she heard those same words.  

If Burke did it, and knows he did it, why would he even agree to be interviewed by Dr. Phil?

[VelociRapture]

31 minutes ago, Fascinated said:

@laPapessaGiovanna, you should be able to watch the specials on YouTube. 

I haven't finished watching them yet but I do wonder if the new investigators worked with the pre-conceived notion that it was a family member.  It has been discussed upthread, but I think their interpretation of the 911 tape is suspect.  I certainly couldn't decipher the words they were claiming to hear.  The 911 operator did not ever, at least in the interview that I watched, say that she heard those same words.  

If Burke did it, and knows he did it, why would he even agree to be interviewed by Dr. Phil?

Dr. Phil had said that people had found Burke recently and he kind of knew his anonymity was gone. It's the 20th anniversary - I think he might have realized it's better to just do one interview on his terms than have tons of reporters possibly following him around. Can't say I really blame him if that was his reasoning.

This entire case makes me ill. Talking about whether parents or a little boy were capable of such... Evil towards a little girl they loved. I know very well it's entirely possible and is the most likely scenario... But it's so difficult to wrap my mind around. 

Rolling Stone actually released an article talking about a few major problems with the CBS show:

http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/3-big-ways-the-case-of-jonbenet-ramsey-got-it-wrong-w440970

1. Selective hearing and confirmation bias with the 911 recording. They failed to disclose that the recording was leaked and that the interpretation they came to was included in two books about the case from the 90s. It also wasn't clear what was being said at all. Then they used that information to flat out claim the Ramseys had lied.

2. Dismissing the DNA evidence entirely. The article does give credit to Dr. Lee and Dr. Spitz for saying that the DA shouldn't have exonerated the Ramseys based off the available DNA evidence and for providing some great assessments of the physical evidence. However, that doesn't mean the DNA evidence is completely useless - if the DNA came back at some point as matching a child molester that never worked in an underwear manufacturing company then that could point towards the Intruder theory being true. So ruling it out completely is a bad idea.

3. The high emphasis on linguistic forensics and behavioral analysis as conclusive. This makes a touch more sense since the two leads of the show are specialists in these fields. But the show never makes it clear that these fields are extremely subjective and courts view them with varying degrees of reliability for that reason. I said it a lot during the Amanda Knox trials - but human behavior is not a one size fits all area. People can, and do, act very oddly when confronted with dangerous or extremely stressful situations even when they've done nothing wrong. Burke's behavior in the police interviews or Patsy's language during the 911 call are great examples of that - reacting in an odd manner during a stressful situation. It's irresponsible to present that as proof that someone is hiding something or guilty of a crime.

4. Bonus issue: The experts mentioning repeatedly that John Ramsey disappeared for 1.5 hours the morning his daughter was found missing and making it seem highly suspicious... In actuality, he was in his study the whole time and police just didn't notice. Because the Police were completely unprepared and completely incompetent - which, in my opinion, is the biggest problem with this entire case. The police fucked up so badly from the very start that it would have been damn near impossible to solve the case, even if the family had been completely cooperative from the beginning.

After reading that, I'm much more skeptical of the show and the conclusion they've reached to be honest. The ID show was relatively worthless. CBS had some good moments, but it was developed more for entertainment purposes because ratings - not as a serious effort to really solve the case. 

[nausicaa]

8 hours ago, HerNameIsBuffy said:

Something else really bugs me about the Burke did it theory.  If he killed her, however accidentally, J & P committed serious felonies in covering it up.  Taking huge risks to protect him...which as a parent I understand.  But he was 9.  Obviously a traumatic event and especially if he was the cause...who would let him out of their sight to go with friends?  For a minute?  Killing a sibling would have been a new and horrific experience for him, how on earth would they assume he wouldn't lose it and talk?  As a parent I'm keeping him with me and not letting him out of my line of vision one to make sure he's okay and two to make sure he stays quiet.  

i saw the Dr. Phil thing and my God was it a bad idea to put him in front of the camera.  I'm still not judging body language - I'd be equally awkward in the same circumstance but I'd know I'd come off like a monster and leave the interviews for someone who has more approachable affect when under stress.

None of this makes any sense.

 

I don't get the purpose of the elaborate staging either if BDI. If Patsy and John are such brilliant cover artists, wouldn't they also realize a 9 year old isn't going to do life in prison for losing his temper and hitting his sister with a flashlight? Some counseling and maybe a special school for a few years. And pretending an intruder came in is only going to increase publicity and therefore attention and stress on Burke. And in either case he knows he did it. Why not go with honesty and report it as an accident and try to keep things as quiet as possible? 

I don't know. I know of kids in my town growing up who accidentally killed siblings (playing with a gun, car accidents). It's terrible and sad, but it happens. 

@laPapessaGiovanna Since you're Italian, I'd love to hear your take on the Amanda Knox case.