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Authors: Lawrence Schiller

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BOOK: Perfect Murder, Perfect Town
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With much admiration for the unique talents of Jason Epstein, I offer my grateful appreciation for his vital understanding and help with every aspect of this book.

 

The editorial assistance of Jennifer Mears, Judith McNally, and Veronica Windholz, was central to this book. Jennifer Mears, a reporter for the Associated Press, became my right hand, reviewing all the interviews and organizing the material. Her work laid the foundation for the writing. Judith McNally was my consultant during the early stages of this book. Her counsel, as in my previous book,
American Tragedy
, was invaluable. Veronica Windholz worked with me through the book’s completion. Her advice and suggestions helped shape this work.

 

A further thanks to Marianne Wesson, who advised and drafted the majority of the legal footnotes in the book. And to Deborah Goeken of the
Rocky Mountain News
, who approved Charlie Brennan’s leave of absence to work on this book.

 

My personal assistant Brenda Williams’s commitment to this book also made it possible, and Sandy Lyon, Nickey
Hernandez, and Pat Rankin aided me in Los Angeles. A special thanks to Paul Amerman, Casey Brennan, Janet Brennan, and Terry Swartz, who kept our work in order. And to my son Howard Schiller who designed the book’s jacket.

 

My thanks to Joelle Delbourgo, Cathy Hemming, Jane Friedman, James Fox, Tim Duggan, Robin Arzt, Joseph Montebello, Patti Wolf, and Brenda Woodward at HarperCollins.

 

A much earned thanks to John Taylor Williams of Palmer and Dodge, who has assisted me on four book projects.

Floor plans of the Ramseys’ Boulder Home

 

Chief Beckner,

 

On June 22, I submitted a letter to Chief Koby, requesting a leave of absence from the Boulder Police Department. In response to persistent speculation as to why I chose to leave the Ramsey investigation, this letter explains more fully those reasons. Although my concerns were well known for some time, I tried to be gracious in my departure, addressing only health concerns. However, after a month of soul searching and reflection, I feel I must now set the record straight.

 

The primary reason I chose to leave is my belief that the district attorney’s office continues to mishandle the Ramsey case. I had been troubled for many months with many aspects of the investigation. Albeit an uphill battle of a case to begin with, it became a nearly impossible investigation because of the political alliances, philosophical differences, and professional egos that blocked progress in more ways, and on more occasions, than I can detail in this memorandum. I and others voiced these concerns repeatedly. In the interest of hoping justice would be served, we tolerated it, except for those closed door sessions when detectives protested in frustration, where fists hit the table, where detectives demanded that the right things be done. The wrong things were done, and made it a matter of simple principle that I could not continue to participate as it stood with the district attorney’s office. As an organization, we remained silent, when we should have shouted.

 

The Boulder Police Department took a handful of detectives days after the murder, and handed us this case. As one of those five primary detectives, we tackled it for a year and a half. We conducted an exhaustive investigation, followed the evidence where it led us, and were faithfully and professionally committed to this case. Although not perfect, cases rarely are. During eighteen months on the Ramsey investigation, my colleagues and I worked the case night and day, and in spite of tied hands. On June 1-2, 1998, we crunched thirty thousand pages of investigation to its essence, and put our cards on the table, delivering the case in a formal presentation to the district attorney’s office. We stood confident in our work. Very shortly thereafter, though, the detectives who know this case better than anyone were advised by the district attorney’s office that we would not be participating as grand jury advisory witnesses.

 

The very entity with whom we shared our investigative case file to see justice sought, I felt, was betraying this case. We were never afforded true prosecutorial support. There was never a consolidation of resources. All legal opportunities were not made available. How were we expected to “solve” this case when the district attorney’s office was crippling us with their positions? I believe they were, literally, facilitating the escape of justice. During this investigation, consider the following.

 

During the investigation, detectives would discover, collect, and bring evidence to the district attorney’s office, only to have it summarily dismissed or rationalized as insignificant. The most elementary of investigative efforts, such as obtaining telephone and credit card records, were met without support, search warrants denied. The significant opinions of
national experts were casually dismissed or ignored by the district attorney’s office, even the experienced FBI were waved aside.

 

Those who chose not to cooperate were never compelled before a grand jury early in this case, as detectives suggested only weeks after the murder, while information and memories were fresh.

 

An informant, for reasons of his own, came to detectives about conduct occurring inside the district attorney’s office, including allegations of a plan intended only to destroy a man’s career. We carefully listened. With that knowledge, the department did nothing. Other than to alert the accused, and in the process burn the two detectives (who captured that exchange on an undercover wire, incidentally) who came forth with this information. One of the results of that internal whistleblowing was witnessing Detective Commander Eller, who also could not tolerate what was occurring, lose his career and reputation undeservedly; scapegoated in a manner which only heightened my concerns. It did not take much inferential reasoning to realize that any dissidents were readily silenced. In a departure from protocol, police reports, physical evidence, and investigative information were shared with Ramsey defense attorneys, all of this in the district attorney’s office “spirit of cooperation.” I served a search warrant, only to find later defense attorneys were simply given copies of the evidence it yielded.

 

An FBI agent, whom I didn’t even know, quietly tipped me off about what the DA’s office was doing behind our backs, conducting an investigation the police department was wholly unaware of.

 

I was advised not to speak to certain witnesses, and all but dissuaded from pursuing particular investigative efforts. Polygraphs were acceptable for some subjects, but others seemed immune from such requests.

 

Innocent people were not “cleared,” publicly or otherwise, even when it was unmistakably the right thing to do, as reputations and lives were destroyed. Some in the district attorney’s office, to this day, pursue weak, defenseless, and innocent people in shameless tactics that one couldn’t believe more bizarre if it were made up.

 

I was told by one person in the district attorney’s office about being unable to “break” a particular police officer from his resolute accounts of events he had witnessed. In my opinion, this was not trial preparation, this was an attempt to derail months of hard work.

 

I was repeatedly reminded by some in the district attorney’s office just how powerful and talented and resourceful particular defense attorneys were. How could decisions be made this way?

 

There is evidence that was critical to the investigation, that to this day has never been collected, because neither search warrants nor other means were supported to do so. Not to mention evidence which still sits today, untested in the laboratory, as differences continue about how to proceed.

 

While investigative efforts were rebuffed, my search warrant affidavits and attempts to gather evidence in the murder investigation of a six-year-old child were met with refusals and, instead, the suggestions that we “ask the permission of
the Ramseys” before proceeding. And just before conducting the Ramsey interviews, I thought it was inconceivable I was being lectured on “building trust.”

 

These are but a few of the many examples of why I chose to leave. Having to convince, to plead at times, to a district attorney’s office to assist us in the murder of a little girl, by way of the most basic investigative requests, was simply absurd. When my detective partner and I had to literally hand search tens of thousands of receipts, because we didn’t have a search warrant to assist us otherwise, we did so. But we lost tremendous opportunities to make progress, to seek justice, and to know the truth. Auspicious timing and strategy could have made a difference. When the might of the criminal justice system should have brought all it had to bear on this investigation, and didn’t, we remained silent. We were trying to deliver a murder case with hands tied behind our backs. It was difficult, and our frustrations understandable. It was an assignment without chance of success. Politics seemed to trump justice.

 

Even “outsiders” quickly assessed the situation, as the FBI politely noted early on: “the government isn’t in charge of this investigation.” As the nation watched, appropriately anticipating a fitting response to the murder of the most innocent of victims, I stood bothered as to what occurred behind the scenes. Those inside this case knew what was going on. Eighteen months gave us a unique perspective.

 

We learned to ignore the campaign of misinformation in which we were said to be bumbling along, or else just pursuing one or two suspects in some ruthless vendetta. Much of what appeared in the press was orchestrated by particular sources wishing to discredit the Boulder Police Department.
We watched the media spin, while we were prohibited from exercising First Amendment rights. As disappointment and frustration pervaded, detectives would remark to one another, “If it reaches a particular point, I’m walking away.” But we would always tolerate it “just one more time.” Last year, when we discovered hidden cameras inside the Ramsey house, only to realize the detectives had been unwittingly videotaped, this should have rocked the police department off its foundation. Instead, we allowed that, too, to pass without challenge. The detectives’ enthusiasm became simply resigned frustration, acquiescing to that which should never have been tolerated. In the media blitz, the pressure of the whole world watching, important decisions seemed to be premised on “how it would play” publicly. Among at least a few of the detectives, “there’s something wrong here” became a catch phrase. I witnessed others having to make decisions which impacted their lives and careers, watched the soul searching that occurred as the ultimate questions were pondered. As it goes, “evils that befall the world are not nearly so often caused by bad men, as they are by good men who are silent when an opinion must be voiced.” Although several good men in the police department shouted loudly behind closed doors, the organization stood deafeningly silent at what continued to occur unchallenged.

BOOK: Perfect Murder, Perfect Town
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