Foreign Faction: Who Really Kidnapped JonBenet? (34 page)

So, under those circumstances, I had to ask myself:

• Why did Patsy remain behind in the solarium when Fleet White was shouting for an ambulance?
  
• Was it because she already knew that her daughter was dead?
  
• If that was the case, how did she come to know that information?
  
• Further, if she already knew of her daughter’s death, did she play a role in that crime?
  

In our constitutional system of jurisprudence, people are presumed innocent until proven otherwise. It is the responsibility of the defense attorney to represent their client’s best interests, and this necessarily requires them to make the prosecution prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt.

One of the tactics commonly used by the defense bar is to counsel their client to deny at the outset, any and all accusations of criminal conduct. In their attempt to divert attention away from the actual
conduct
and
behavior
of their client, defense attorneys are forever searching for plausible deniability and circumstances that will muddy the waters.

When the facts are in dispute, the first line of defense is frequently to deny, deny, deny.

When the facts are incontrovertible, then it is time to move to the next tactic, and raise questions about the process by which those facts were established. It is their intention to undermine the foundation of the presentation of the physical evidence that would be used at trial. Succeed at throwing out the defendant’s bloody fingerprint found at the scene of the crime, and it is likely that no conviction will follow.

If those first two tactics are not successful, the next strategic move is to attack the honor and credibility of the men and women who are tasked with seeking the truth of the matter. Evidence linking the defendant to the crime was “planted,” and the cops are lying about investigative procedures.

Or, as witnessed in JonBenét’s case, Boulder Police lacked the expertise to investigate a murder case on their own.

We witnessed the successful implementation of these tactics in the O.J. Simpson trial, and I thought it curious that Patsy Ramsey would specifically refer to the O.J. “situation” during her CNN interview.
⁶¹

To place this in perspective, Brian Cabell had offered the following observation during the interview:

Cabell: “Inevitably, speculation on talk shows will focus on you. It’s got to be sickening…”

John Ramsey: “It’s nauseating beyond belief.”

Patsy Ramsey: “You know, America has just been hurt so deeply with the…this…the tragic things that have happened. The young woman who drove her children into the water, and we don’t know what happened with the O.J. Simpson…and I mean, America is suffering because we have lost faith in the American Family.

We are a Christian, God-fearing family. We love our children. We would do anything for our children.”

Patsy Ramsey’s reference to high-profile murder cases was intriguing, and I wondered why she had chosen these two cases in particular. Why not summon remembrances of the horrific crimes committed by the likes of the Son of Sam, Jeffrey Dahmer, or Theodore Bundy?

The public sentiment following O.J.’s acquittal seemed to be one of astonishment. The “dream team” of defense attorneys had completely twisted the physical evidence collected in the case, and focused their attention on the destruction of the credibility of the investigators of the crime. Their arguments ultimately set O.J. free, but a civil jury would not be so easily misled.

In the case of Susan Smith, Patsy was calling into her court the cold-blooded details of a South Carolina mother who had intentionally driven her two young boys into a lake, and left them to drown. Susan then concocted the story of a carjacking, and proceeded to blame a mysterious black man for the crime. She shed plenty of tears during her broadcast-television interviews, and pleaded with the public to help track down the kidnapper who had taken her children from her.

The deception of Susan Smith would not survive the skepticism of investigators, however, and she ultimately confessed her sins to Union County Sheriff Howard Wells. The black “carjacker” who had kidnapped her children was non-existent, and it was Susan who had driven her two young boys into the lake, and left to drown.

In my viewing, Susan Smith’s tearful pleas for help were strangely reminiscent of Patsy Ramsey’s accounting of events on CNN, and I couldn’t help but feel that there was a similarity between the two events.

Patsy Ramsey’s proclamation of innocence due to her God-fearing, Christian status seemed too convenient. It was the type of alibi often used by those attempting to divert attention from their guilt, and was classic material drawn from the text of police interrogation manuals: The argument being that a loving, Christian family would be incapable of committing horrendous crimes of violence. For those crime historians among you, I suspect that this line of reasoning holds little weight, for our prisons are full of Christians convicted for their participation in similar crimes of violence.

More to the point, Patsy’s spontaneous reference to these two murder cases gave me pause. In her prescription-induced, medicated state, was she subconsciously aligning herself with people who had brutally murdered members of their own family?

I looked to the possibility that this dialogue consisted of a “spontaneous utterance,” the unguarded words we speak that sometimes reveal the workings of our internal thoughts.

Detective Steve Thomas had made note of an additional utterance made by Patsy during the collection of non-testimonial evidence on Saturday, December 28, 1996. To put the statement in perspective, I cite the entry from his book,
JonBenét – Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation.
⁶²

Patsy was unsteady as I had her lift the sleeves of her loose denim blouse so I could check her for bruises or scratches on the fronts and backs of her hands and arms. Then I checked her face and neck and found nothing unusual. We were standing in a row at the counter, with Patsy in the middle, when she shifted slightly and whispered to [Detective] Gosage, “Will this help find who killed my baby?”

He carefully replied, equally softly, “I hope so.”

Patsy looked at her inked fingers and spoke again. “I didn’t kill my baby.” The [Ramsey] lawyer apparently did not hear her, but my head snapped around as if on a swivel. Colorado Revised Statute Procedure 41.1 spelled out that we couldn’t ask investigative questions during this evidence collection, but we could certainly listen if anything was said voluntarily, and the mother of the murder victim had blurted out something totally unexpected. I directed my comment to Gosage. “What did she just say?”

Patsy Ramsey repeated, to me this time, “I didn’t kill my baby.”

The lawyer lurched away from the wall, placed his hands on her shoulders, brought his face to within inches of her ear, and whispered emphatically. She didn’t say another word during the entire session, but what she had already said hung like thunder. I didn’t kill my baby.

No one suggested that she had.

There were a couple red flags raised in this instance, the first being that John Ramsey and his attorneys had continued to characterize this December 28meeting with Boulder Police as an “interview” and evidence of their continuing “cooperation” in the investigation.

For the lay public, it is important to understand that this collection of non-testimonial physical evidence could be viewed as
cooperation,
but in no way should it be construed as an
interview
with authorities.

The attorneys and private investigators accompanying the Ramseys on that day made certain no interview or testimonial evidence would be collected by police investigators, and I viewed the Ramsey’s representations of cooperation as a continuing part of their media spin.

Why would they strive to buttress the perception that the parents had been cooperating with authorities, when clearly, they halted any productive communication with Boulder investigators as soon as they left their home on the afternoon of December 26, 1996?

Secondarily, Patsy Ramsey was stating to investigators that she did not kill her baby. At that point in time, Boulder investigators were still gathering facts, and had no clue as to who had actually been involved in the murder of JonBenét.

A ransom note had been left by her kidnappers, and evidence of her restraint and abduction were readily apparent. Why would Patsy feel it necessary to proclaim her innocence in the death of her daughter?

Spontaneous utterances can take many forms, and by way of further example, I refer to the well-publicized California murder investigation involving the family of Scott and Lacy Peterson. Scott had uttered an interesting question during his conversations with the detective who was investigating the disappearance of his pregnant wife.

When advised that the police department had been using K-9 teams to assist in the investigation, Scott asked if they “had used cadaver dogs yet.”
⁶³

The question gave the detective pause: Why would Scott ask if a dog trained in the recovery of dead bodies was being brought into the investigation? At that early point in their inquiry, Lacy Peterson was only thought to be overdue and missing. What possible benefit would a cadaver dog bring to the investigation?

This spontaneous utterance was a red flag for the investigator, and this statement, combined with many of the other behavioral clues discovered during their investigation, proved to be instrumental in helping prove Scott Peterson’s consciousness of guilt at trial.

Another illustration of a spontaneous utterance involves a sexual assault investigation that I directed in the early 1990’s. I refer to some aspects of this investigation in other portions of this book, but the specific reference to be made here is with regard to statements made by the suspect who became the primary focus of our pursuit for the perpetrator.

We had obtained a court order for the collection of non-testimonial evidence in the case, i.e. blood samples that would be compared against DNA evidence left at the scene of the assault. When served with notice of the 41.1 Court Order demanding his compliance in the collection of this physical evidence, the suspect read the cover page of the warrant and uttered the following words:

“First degree sex assault? No way, first degree!”

I viewed these spontaneous comments as representative of his consciousness of guilt. Though not stated, he apparently thought that the commission of this residential burglary and rape constituted the crime of a Second or Third Degree Sex Assault, and that our warrant had it all wrong.

There was good reason that this suspect had flunked out as a self-sponsored student of a police academy, and the evidence collected in our court order eventually sealed his fate. He subsequently entered a plea of guilty to this crime and served eleven years in the Colorado Department of Corrections.

We are all creatures of habit, and the fact that the ransom note had been written on Patsy’s personal notepad served to drive this home for me as one more red flag that needed to be considered.

Under the stress of the moment, confronted with the sudden and violent death of her daughter, I wondered whether Patsy, if she were the writer of the note, had failed to consider the possibility of finding a
different
pad of paper and pen when it came time to craft the evidence of a kidnapping. She would have been acting as she normally did when writing something down –grabbing her own pad and a felt-tip pen that she frequently used over the course of her daily activities. While thought was being given as to how attention could be diverted away from the family, another key detail was overlooked as the staging of the crime scene took place.

I don’t know exactly how many pads of paper were available in the home that day, but I had to wonder what the odds would be that an intruder had located
her
pad of paper to write the ransom note, and then that handwriting experts would be unable to eliminate Patsy as the author.

Boulder investigators had located the pad in the rear kitchen hallway, and the Sharpie pen that was eventually identified as the instrument used to write the note was in a cup below the kitchen phone Patsy had used to call 911. They thought the note had been crafted shortly before the 911 call to authorities, hence the placement of the pen near the phone.

I am certain that many of those in the reading audience could think of the many habits and routines that have become a part of your daily experience. Do you always start shaving on the same side of your face? Does the right shoe always go on before the left? Do you drive the same path to work every day, even when another route may be available? It takes some conscious effort to alter those activities, but when stress is added to the equation, we frequently fall back on what we are used to doing – primarily because the habit has served us well.

Take for example police firearms training. There is an old axiom that has developed over the years, and it is this: we are likely to perform in the field as we train in the classroom.

Several decades ago investigators were sometimes confronted with trying to figure out why an officer involved in a shooting incident took the time to retrieve the spent shell casings dumped from their revolvers - all while engaged in the heat of a gunfight with bad guys. In a number of instances, officers fatally wounded during the exchange of gunfire were found to have their own empty shell casings in their pockets.