From the chapter…
Sexual Deviant or Just Deviant
Crimes and criminals, devils and deviants will always defeat logical inquiry, they will sidestep our attempts at nailing down forensics. All can be covered-up, all can be concealed but never the cogent psychology it springs from, even when that psychology is evil incarnate.
It’s interesting that a week after JonBenét’s murder John’s reinforcing [on CNN] the assumption that there was a kidnapping, and he does so by invoking the note. What’s also worth noting is Patsy’s response to the question. Interviewer, Brian Cabell has asked John whether he thinks a kidnapping is the “wrong assumption” and John, invoking the note, seems to suggest that no, the idea of a kidnapping still makes sense. What does Patsy think? Is the kidnapping a wrong assumption?
From cnn.com:
PATSY [shaking her head]: It don’t sound like kidnapping to me. [John shoots Patsy a dark look].
JOHN: I guess that’s what concerns me because if we don’t have the full resources of all the law enforcement community on this case, I am going to be very upset.
It’s amazing how John already associates the idea of his concern with police resources around his assumption that it’s a kidnapping. Isn’t this John already hedging an outcome where the police don’t think it’s a kidnapping, and John can then say, see, it’s because of the poor resources involved in this case.
The point is, a week after JonBenét’s murder, John’s focus is on defining the crime as a kidnapping. There’s zero mention of “strangling” or of a “garrotte” or that JonBenét was tied up. There’s also zero mention of JonBenét’s head injury; that Little Miss Christmas was bludgeoned.
Meanwhile, the same day the Ramseys took CNN into their confidence, Boulder’s Daily Camera confirmed what they knew.
From dailycamera.com:
- A handwritten ransom note was found at the house requesting $118,000.
- Between 1:30 and 2 p.m. Thursday, an undisclosed family member found JonBenét’s body in the basement. Police ruled the death a homicide.
- The autopsy revealed that JonBenét had been strangled.
- There were no signs of a break-in at the house.
- Many people – including multiple housekeepers, gardeners, caterers and a landscaper – had keys to the house.
- Police collected blood, hair and handwriting samples from John Ramsey and his children. No samples were collected from Patsy Ramsey.
- John Ramsey hired Denver criminal lawyer Bryan Morgan.
Now it’s clear early on that television audiences would have been aware of the kidnapping aspect, while readers of the local newspapers ought to have known JonBenét was strangled to death.
Steve Thomas presciently observes in his book, when he first learned of the crime at night over the radio while driving from Denver with his wife, he wondered why the kidnapper would leave a dead body behind when he could still get the ransom? The Lindbergh case is a case in point where precisely this happened. Why go to the trouble to break in, abduct, write your note but then leave the most vital part behind after she’s been immobilized?
Jumping ahead to the Ramseys’ second press conference on May 1st, 1997, the words: “kidnapping,” “abduction,” and “strangled” are now entirely absent from the Ramsey narrative. What are present for the first time are the words “sexually molested” and John is…..
sequin star interrogates sixteen years of ‘post-truth’ surrounding the unsolved case. This first narrative of the trilogy spans nine lawsuits, two books, John’s first political campaign and the circumstances surrounding Patsy’s death. It also interrogates the psychological fabric holding these “sequins” together.
Available on Amazon
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