Monday, September 24, 2012

Ramsey's Denial Two and One-Half Years Later...


As requested: 
Here is statement analysis of a recorded denial by the Ramseys, 2 1/2 years after the death of Jonbenet Ramsey. 
If you were falsely accused of killing your daughter, how long would it take you to say, "I didn't kill Jonbenet"?  
This would be a reliable denial if found  in the Free Editing Process (one speaking freely).  A reliable denial has 3 components:
1.  First person singular pronoun, "I"
2.  Past Tense Verb  "didn't"
3.  Allegation or event specific "kill Jonbenet"
Patsy Ramsey: I didn’t do it, John Ramsey didn’t do it, and we didn’t have a clue of anybody who did do it. This child was the most precious thing in my life.”
Unreliable denial. 
Note that besides not addressing the specific event or allegation, there is something of note here:
"...we didn't have a clue" indicates, first, the weakness of changing from "I" to "we" while stating what another thought, but also that she uses the past tense "didn't have a clue"; and not present tense.  Strong is when one speaks for oneself. 
As to the pronoun, "it", what is she referring to?  Is this referring to killing Jonbenet?  Is it referring to writing the ransom note?  Is it referring to lying? Many have accused Patsy of writing the ransom note in covering for her husband, but not of killing Jonbenet.  We do not know what "it" refers to.  Unreliable denial. 
John Ramsey: “It was hard for us to believe that we were considered suspects. They were trying to fit a square peg in a round hole and we were the square peg.”
Weak use of the plurual.  This is also not a denial; only a statement of what it felt like to be considered suspects.  It may have been hard to believe, but not impossible.  By refusing to be interviewed, by refusing the polygraph, by lawyering up, and by overall sabotaging of an investigation, suspicion will fall upon one.  I do not see how it was "hard" to believe, but I do note that he does not say that he had a hard time believing it, but "us" and "we" are used instead. 
That’s John and Patsy Ramsey speaking in videotaped interrogations by the Boulder Police Department taken in June 1998 and obtained exclusively by NBC News. On the tape they reassert that they are innocent two and a half years after her murder.
John Ramsey: “We know we didn’t do it. There’s a killer out there.”
Unreliable denial.  His use of "we" violates principle #1.  The pronoun "it" violates principle #3.  Even after 2 1/2 years, John Ramsey still does not make a reliable denial.  
Please note that sentence two is truthful:  there is a killer out there. 
One can be coached to say "I did not kill Jonbenet" by simply reading analysis and repeating it.  This is not the easy free editing process where someone is speaking for oneself.  The first moment an innocent  parent believes that he is a suspect, he will say, "I didn't kill Jonbenet" early, and easily.  He will not retreat to "we" (sharing of guilt/Dillingham) nor avoid addressing the allegation.  
Most people believe that one of the Ramseys killed Jonbenet, and that her death was unintentional, and due to fear, created a ruse as a cover up, using a fake ransom note written by Patsy Ramsey.  Because the intruder notion was so far fetched, the story quickly fell apart.  
Analysis of the 911 call indicates deception.  The ransom note proved to be deceptive and false, and then the practice note was found. 
Jonbenet was dressed up in a sexualized manner for her pageants, like a Las Vegas showgirl. 
She had a history of urinary tract infections, something often occurring in sexual abuse. 
Statement Analysis of John Ramsey's language affirms sexual abuse. 
Her dead body was staged in its scene. 
What do you believe happened to Jonbenet?


23 comments:

Maggie said...

I have never wanted to believe the parents killed Jon Benet, and looking at the ransom note, still wanted to believe their innocence. But I believe they are guilty. Your analysis of their statements convinced me of their guilt, but still I wanted to believe something in the ransom note would point to someone else--that maybe a profile would emerge of a demented killer who intruded the house. But now I believe the mother killed her. I googled the case, and there was an analysis of the handwriting, grammar, etc of the letter. Well, the handwriting matches Patsy's--you can see just by looking at samples of her handwriting and her way of writing exclamation points is even identical. The handwriting is identical. Also, on that site the writer mentions something that I found compelling--that the note contains messages to John. The part about "there are other fat cats around", "use your good common sense", and "it's up to you now John" he claims are actually messages to John from Patsy. At first I was skeptical, but I actually think it is the only thing that makes sense, and it points the arrow at Patsy as having been the killer of Jon Benet.
I think there were some sick things going on in that house. I think that the father was molesting JonBenet and the mother was turning a blind eye. I think that Patsy was using Jon Benet for attention in the pageants and that she saw Jon Benet as an object to get her that attention. I think when Jon Benet starting protesting about not wanting to do the pageants, the mother wanted to destroy her. I read that Patsy's mother was always disappointed that Patsy did not win Miss America, so she had pinned her hopes on Jon Benet winning this title. I think that Patsy had this crazy pressure from her mother when she was younger, the disappointment, it sounds like Patsy's mother objectified her and so it was also something she did to Jon Benet and projected onto Jon Benet her mother as well as her own desire that Jon Benet should win Miss America. I think the way her psyche was constructed, it was to her, in fact, essential that Jon Benet win the Miss America title. I think her crazy control freakery side went nuts when Jon Benet was protesting going to the pageants and whatever Superego ruled Patsy's brain would not allow this possibility of Jon Benet letting her down as well as her, Patsy (this is where the superego comes in) letting down the demands of her own mother if Jon Benet refused to go to pageants or stopped putting effort into performing in the pageants. Patsy's psyche depended on it. In short, Patsy was crazier than a bat out of hell. She killed her daughter and then wrote that ransom note with veiled yet decipherable threats towards John that he should go along with the plan and not rat out Patsy as she had plenty on him from knowing about his abuse of Jon Benet also.

Anonymous said...

After reading a few of the transcripts, and watching only one of Paridise Lost and hearing Byers make a few remarks that seemed odd, like comparing his family to the Ramseys, I concluded this is an ongoing thing that draws in spectators, terrorizes the general population, and is often used for charitable deeds that aren't so charitable.

West Memphis Three happened in '93. (Sadly, I didn't hear about it until '11 or '12).

Noting some similarities: odd activities prior to both murders.
Police are taken to task to find the killer immediately-politics.
FBI made a farce out of the Ramsey case. God only knows what they did in West Memphis, if anything.
Strange animal hairs;dead animals
Not much about the three boys deaths; a whole helluva lot about this one girl's death.
Stun gun;garrote;military knife ( weapons used for/by defense or agitators)
Cracked skulls
Tying of knots
Hair was a big deal in the boy's case;no bleeding of the skull in the girl's case.
One family rich;the other families were poor.

Christmas will never be the same for those terrorized by her murder.

The media made as much as they could off both. Unfortunatly, three others were thrown in jail as they weren't as rich as the Ramseys.

I think in both cases one was targeted specifically, the other because of location.

Anonymous said...

Here is a good link on theories:http://jonbenetramsey.pbworks.com/w/page/11682481/Interpreting%20the%20Evidence

Never heard about the packed suitcase before, nor evidence of rope being in the guest bedroom.

equinox said...

I think that whatever happened to JonBenet contained elements of shame and culpability which strongly affected both parents. Of the evidence I am aware of, the story that John was sexually abusing her, and Patsy killed her "accidentally" in a fit of rage - fits to a T. They each share blame and therefore have reason to protect each other, even after (Patsy's) death, and to create certain elements of the staging and cover-up to draw suspicion away from the actions of the other.

I also believe that they acted to simulate a kidnap/torture death for their child, and at some later date came to know that in fact, their staging (with the garrote) actually caused her death. I think they thought she was dead when they dressed her up to appear tortured and suffered a terrible shock upon being told that she died of suffocation, not head trauma.

Patsy obviously wrote the note, John placed JonBenet in the basement room, and then struggled in anguish all day as she was not discovered until he could not stand it any longer and when asked to finally search he bee-lined it to where he had deposited what he had thought was her dead body. Only now she really was dead and he took the opportunity to spoil the evidence that he was the one to place her there to begin with. His deliberate actions demonstrate that he obviously knew well of that room and you will never convince me that any father of a missing child would not have long-since searched every crawl space and pantry cupboard for his baby girl.

I'm really surprised the Ramsey's were publicly exonerated, there's mountains of evidence showing someone inside the house, who knew it well, committed this crime.

OldPsychNurse said...

@Anonymous 5:26
Leave your worship Damien Echols, the bipolar schizophrenic, propaganda at your home! Realize that the WM3 PLED GUILTY and they CONFESSED their guilt multiple times to various people and in front of a judge. Reread Damien Echols' medical report by the DOUBLE BOARDED LICENSED physician. Reread his psychiatric records describing his extremely frightening behavior. Pray this monster continues to take his antipsychotic meds and his money-grubbing freaky wife keeps him on a very short leash!
http://callahan.8k.com/wm3/gwoods.html

equinox said...

Anonymous 7:01
The Hi Tec bootprint belonged to Burke and was found to be unconnected with the murder as he no longer owned the boot, probably outgrown, at the time of the crime. Footprint specialists worked over 600 leads btw.

MissUnderstood said...

"...we didn’t have a clue of anybody who did do it..."

But they do have a clue now (at the time of this statement), as to who did it, whatever it is?

brosnanfan said...

I’m going to start by saying that I don’t know exactly what happened to JonBenet, but I do have a couple of theories that may or may not be plausible to others. Both have strong points and weak points.

For one, I am curious as to what part, if any, Burke played in all of this. When they enhanced the 911 call, they heard a voice which could have been Burke’s. I am wondering if perhaps Burke was curious about sex and was using his sister as his guinea pig, so to speak. Children who grow up in a sexualized environment (in any way) often become sexually curious and active early:

"They [the Paughs, Patsy’s family] were so meshed up in each other, and it was my gut instinct that told me something wasn't right there," says [Jan] Stobie [a former manager for John’s company]. "They were going on and on about the size of Burke's penis. This, to me, was so bizarre....”

Perhaps Burke was molested by someone, and this in turn caused him to molest his sister, or perhaps he was influenced by the way his sister was treated for her pageants.

A bowl of pineapple was found on the kitchen table, which both John and Patsy said wasn’t put there by them. It had Burke’s fingerprints and pineapple was found in JonBenet’s stomach. Perhaps this “midnight snack” was partaken of by the two siblings, and when they went back upstairs Burke went with JonBenet to her room to molest her. In the process she struggled or became angry. Maybe he hit her with something; kids often don’t know or understand that hitting someone with something hard doesn’t bounce off like it does in cartoons or movies. He would have wanted her to be quiet, not to sustain a traumatic head injury. Maybe then he panicked, and ran back to his room to hide, hoping it would all go away.

Or maybe while he was in there, Patsy heard the commotion and went to investigate; she saw what was happening and got mad. She either threw something or grabbed a heavy thing and aimed at Burke, only to miss and hit JonBenet instead. I wasn’t sure what would be in her room that would be that heavy; until I remembered her pageant trophies. Those often have heavy bases or, if they are big enough, have a heavy base and two or three heavy tiers to them. Once she saw what happened, she made Burke go back to his room so he wouldn’t see anything else.

Substitute “John” for “Burke” in the paragraph above, and the same thing applies; maybe it was John after all.

Or…maybe, as I have read in other articles, Patsy was upset because JonBenet had once again wet her bed or had woken Patsy up for something. Patsy was tired, and possibly cranky, and this could have been the last straw. She lost her temper and threw JonBenet against the corner of a cabinet or dresser. I’m not altogether sold on this theory, however. Personally, I find it the least plausible, mainly because the coroner found blood and urine stains on the underwear she was wearing that night, indicating that perhaps molestation had taken place earlier that night.

Neighbors heard a “loud, piercing scream” around midnight; could this have been Patsy accidentally killing her daughter, discovering her daughter dead or near death, or discovering someone molesting her daughter? (to be continued)

brosnanfan said...

If it were Burke, Patsy could have covered for him so she wouldn’t lose him too (to CPS or whatever they call it in Colorado). Maybe she was afraid he would forever be tainted with the stigma of being a molester; maybe she was afraid she wouldn’t get him back or that he would be punished by the law in some way. To this family, appearances are everything. But he was only nine at the time; wouldn’t he have cracked when people asked him questions about that night?

Something else in the above article I found interesting:

The ransom note warned the couple not to contact the police but to await a phone call between 8 and 10 that morning. Arndt wrote in her report that "between 10:30 and noon, John Ramsey left the house to pick up the family mail," which she later saw him open and read. At one p.m., when no call had rung, Arndt asked Ramsey and Fleet White to follow her to the kitchen. An investigator describes the scene: " She said, ' I want you to search this house. From top to bottom.' She had barely finished speaking when John Ramsey went directly to a small broken window on the north side of the house and paused. Fleet said to Ramsey, 'Hey John, look at this.' And John said, 'Yeah, I broke it last summer.' He wanted Fleet to see the window to set up an intruder theory, but no one but a small child or a midget could have crawled through that space. While Fleet is looking at the window, John disappears down the hall directly to the little room where the body is. It's a huge basement with a lot of rooms and corridors, but Ramsey went directly to that room. He screamed and Fleet ran to him." White had previously peered into that windowless storage room, but had not seen the body.

Lying on the cement floor was the lifeless JonBenet, dressed in a white knit shirt and long underwear. There was duct tape over her mouth. A garrote made of white cord and a broken artist's paintbrush handle was around her throat, and there was a cord around her right wrist. The body was covered with a white blanket from her bed. Nearby was her red "pageant nightgown" described by a relative as "her favorite possession." Ramsey yanked the tape from her mouth, and according to the investigator, "holding her with both hands around her at the waist, the way you would a doll," carried her upstairs and laid her on the hardwood floor in the living room. " What was interesting was when Ramsey brought the body upstairs he never cried," related a source present at the time. "But when he laid her down, he started to moan." Linda Arndt lifted the child from the floor and placed her along side the Christmas tree. "Patsy collapsed right on top of JonBenet," said the source, "and then she got on her knees and screamed, 'Jesus, you raised Lazarus from the dead, Please raise my baby!'" Arndt asked Father Rol to gather everyone into a circle around the child and lead them in a prayer. Numb with grief and horror, they bowed their heads and said the Lord's Prayer.


If you found your daughter lifeless on a cold basement floor, would you pick her up with your hands around her waist, or would you cradle her like a baby?

I may have talked myself into a corner. Regardless, I think that either John or Burke accidentally killed JonBenet while molesting her, and Patsy participated in the cover-up.

brosnanfan said...

I'd also like to say that I've not completely convinced myself; only that I think these things happened. I also think they could have happened in a totally different way. I don't pretend to be an expert, I just let my imagination run a bit while I was thinking of how this terrible murder could have happened and what could have led up to it.

Anonymous said...

One of the later investigators did crawl through that window and demonstrated doing so and stepping down on a suitcase to the floor.

Anonymous said...

@OldPsychNurse

The name Damien Echols never once was mentioned, let alone mentioned enough to be considered worship.Albeit, I can see, judging from the name used, how you would view it that way.

I haven't read his medical reports. I did read they confessed given their only opportunity to be free again and save Echols from the death chamber. He did sound like a strange guy. But, then again the area seemed strange, peppered with strange characters.

What I found bipolar was the boy claiming he'd been photgraphed a couple months prior to his death. The really scizo thing was one of the step-father's hairs was found in the knot of a shoelace. Another friend's hair on a stump near the site. No mosquito bites though they were thick in the area.The lies told by morons in order to cash in on a reward like attending an esbat, the boys carrying staffs (laughable),rumors of Damien having been photographed on the sofa of one of the family with the boys on it too.

He may have been a weird kid, but it sounded as though they put equally weird people in charge of their care.

My opinion only

Lis said...

"It was hard for us to believe that we were considered suspects" can also be due to the fact that they were not used to, and did not expect to, be held to the same accountability as other people.

I don't know what happened to JonBenet but there was a reason both parents conspired to cover it up. Some feel JonBenet's brother may have been responsible for her death and that is why both parents covered it up together. If this is so, her death would have to have occurred in such a way that it was not a simple accident that would cast no shame upon the family. I believe the phony ransom note reveals that Patsy was angry at John and held him at fault.

We have often heard the theory that Patsy became angry at JonBenet for wetting the bed. I am curious why no one seems to feel that John may have been the one angered? Is it considered that mothers are the only ones who can get angry at a child wetting the bed?

Maggie said...

I watched an interview w Linda Arndt, and she described Jon Benet's skull fracture as being horrific, the length of her entire head--8 and 1/2 inches long. There is no way this could have happened accidentally. Someone had to have given her an incredibly brutal blow to the head (in my opinion).

Lis said...

Equinox, I think that is a good theory about the parents, in staging a phony death scene, actually causing her death.

Eliza said...

I think that Patsy killed her when Jonbenet wet the bed... Maybe it was an accident, maybe she pushed her and the girl hit her head... But I do believe that she and John thought she was dead, whereas she really died when they strangled her with the garotte to fake a sexual homicide. I think that she would have died anyway from the blow to the head, but the garotte made it quicker. I remember reading that the head trauma and the strangulation were equally capable of causing death.

John Ramsey told the first officer that came to their house that morning that Jonbenet was awake when they came home from the party, she went up the stairs herself to go to her room. He even said that he read to her before sleeping. Then, he suddenly changed his story and said she was asleep the whole time and carried upstairs to her bed. I think the first version is the truth and if so, she could have eaten the pineapple when she got home, before going to bed.

I have mentioned in another post that I find interesting the fact that the Ramseys marked as Jonbenet's date of death on her gravestone the 25th of December. For me, it is a proof that they know she died before midnight.

I would find it more conforting in a way if Burke was the one that caused a horrific accident that cost his sister's life, because that would justify to a point the actions of John and Patsy. They would be protecting their son, that's why the lied. But, personally I doubt it. Steve Thomas' book convinced me on Patsy's guilt This is of course my personal opinion on a case that I find particularly haunting.

Lemon said...

Patsy Ramsey's life was about image. I believe she wrote the fake ransom note, and was the impetus behind the cover up. Her contempt for John and her warnings in the note to him are telling. I believe JonBenet wet her bed that night in the midst of abuse by her father. He reacted with rage. Alcohol may have been an aggravating factor. Both parents staged her body downstairs. In Patsy's mind of a female kidnapping was one she would be well aware of, Patty Hearst's. The S.L.A. in Patty's kidnapping translated into S.B.T.C. for Patsy, as well as 'small foreign faction', and 'attaché' sounding foreign.

I believe Patsy could cover for John because of her love for image (scandal being anathema) and that in her religious mind it would be 'noble' to 'protect' her husband, and keep what was left of her family together. This would be the "Victory!" for Patty. A successful cover-up and protecting John, thus herself and her image, would be 'victory' for Patsy.

Jen said...

This case is so haunting & confusing! Like many others I WANT to believe Burke killed JonBenet, either in some fumbling attempt at sexual contact or possibly even an act of pure anger/jealousy,..I WANT to believe this because it allows for the idea that this poor little girl didn't spend her entire life objectified, sexualized and victimized by the people who should have been her protectors. The Burke theory places every parent in that protective frame of mind, no matter what your child does you want to help/save them, and after all they have just lost their daughter...if Burke is taken from them they have lost everything. That being said, I sadly don't think that was how this went down.

Given the profile of this family and all of the apparent dysfunction it appears something a lot more sinister was going on...meaning the pagents, focus on appearances and PR campaign, the infections, impeding the investigation, and soft language toward 'the killer', (I know some of these things would be explained by the Burke theory but some of the dysfunction pre-dates the death of JonBenet'. Some of my personal reasons for believing that the parents are the killers are the 'ransom note', 3 pages left in the home 'where the body of the ransomed kidnapped child was present'...is so bizarre, its obvious that Patsy wrote the note & as strange as it was, it may have drawn attention elsewhere, IF they had removed the body from the home!

Also, something I heard John Ramsey say to Oprah after Patsy died has always stood out to me...he said 'Patsy didn't live long enough to see our name cleared'...then he quickly added,'or to see JonBenet's killer brought to justice'. Then Oprah says, 'I heard she always kept a certain dress with her to wear when that day came', and John answers...'Yes, a navy blue dress to wear when we were interviewed about her killer being found, because the color...' and then Opran says something about how dark blue looks best under the harsh lights they use in filming. I remember hearing this exchange and being dumbstruck...did he REALLY just say that her first concern regarding 'finally finding their daughters killer' was the right dress to wear for her 'VICTORY INTERVIEW'?!? I would think most people would find the idea of finally knowing who and what happened to their child almost as unbearable as NOT knowing. I would assume most parents would be taken right back to the raw emotions & pain/anger they felt when their child was murdered...the absolute LAST thing on their mind being...'what color looks most flattering for my big moment on camera'! In my opinion their are some very dark secrets binding the Ramsey's to their lies...if the Burke theory were true they would have folded..it's their shared culpability that kept them loyal and committed to the coverup in my opinion.

Eliza said...

Wow, it's the first time I read about the special dress.. It seems so theatrical, just like the way Jonbenet was staged when she died, with her blanket, her favorite nightgown, her doll etc. Or like the staging of a sexualized murder with the garotte- if it happened that way.

Patsy was all about appearences. Even in a moment like that she visualized what she would be wearing if such a press-conference would take place.

equinox said...

If we assume that Patsy knew who the killer was, then the selection of the dress was Patsy's attempt to behave in a way she thinks the mother of a murdered beauty queen should behave, and failing miserably. If she is to blame there will never be a Victory Interview, so the dress is to use to persuade others that she anticipates one day wearing it, while knowing she never will. Oprah was the one, according to you, who mentioned the dress, meaning it was made public knowledge. It's like OJ searching the golf courses of America for the 'True Killer' - the twists and turns just never stop.

Jen said...

If I remember right I think the interview was recorded either around the time that the guy living in Thailand fake confessed to being the killer or it may have been right after Patsy died...either way I just happened to be watching and that whole dress conversation stuck out to me. I agree with you that it was done as a show...for those around her to see that she is SO innocent and that she actively anticipates the day that the 'real killer' is caught so much that she actually has her clothes all laid out already...fail!

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Anonymous said...

People are just so dense in this case. There's an elephant in the room people.

BOTH Patsy and JB were abused. Only one person could have done it with the complicity of their wife.

It started when Patsy was a child the same age JB was when she was killed or maybe a year earlier.