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Who killed JonBenet Ramsey?

The case of JonBenet Ramsey is what I usually bring up when I attempt to derail other threads about IMPORTANT THINGS IN THE NEWS on CNN and other like US "News" channels. So I am a bit slow in responding to this thread.

I think that the true answer is that we'll never know -- given the lousy job the police did at the crime scene. I suppose there might be a deathbed confession (with evidence) that would "explain all" but I don't see the police solving it.
 
Segnosaur said:
The author had explained that the intruder would likely have broken in to the house hours before the Ramsey's arrived home, and as such would have had ample opportunity to compose rough drafts of ransom notes.

ETA: The author does say that one of the unknown questions is why didn't the killer bring a note with him. He suggests a couple of ideas... perhaps the killer did bring one, but decided to re-write it while waiting, or perhaps, if this had been his first 'kill', he may not have thought of a note until later. Its one of the elements that we may never understand.

He also pointed out that it would not have been likely for anyone to compose a ransom note AFTER the murder, since the excitement/thrill/or whatever would have made it difficult for the killer to focus. So, if the mother had done it, she would have had to compose the note FIRST (including any rough drafts), THEN kill the daughter.
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How about the following scenario:

A burglar breaks into the Ramsey home, is encountered by JonBenet. One or both panick, the burglar either kills her in panic, or tries to silence her and accidentally kills her in the process.

Now the burglar is in a *real* panic. He decides to hide the body and write a ransom note - which turns out to be easier thought than done, thus the rough drafts. He obviously doesn´t have any experience with kidnapping, is unable to think clearly due to panic, and/or is not very smart - thus the very low amount demanded in the note. Thus also the idea that nobody would find the body, so people would believe it to be a kidnapping.

That done (for any given value of "done"), the burglar/murderer absconds, never to be seen again.
 
I bet it was one of her 6-year old beauty pageant rivals.

Serious 6 year old beauty pageants are serious.
 
Chaos said:
A burglar breaks into the Ramsey home, is encountered by JonBenet. One or both panick, the burglar either kills her in panic, or tries to silence her and accidentally kills her in the process.

Now the burglar is in a *real* panic. He decides to hide the body and write a ransom note - which turns out to be easier thought than done, thus the rough drafts. He obviously doesn´t have any experience with kidnapping, is unable to think clearly due to panic, and/or is not very smart - thus the very low amount demanded in the note. Thus also the idea that nobody would find the body, so people would believe it to be a kidnapping.

That done (for any given value of "done"), the burglar/murderer absconds, never to be seen again.
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Seems unlikely, mainly because the ransom note mentions Ramsey by name, seemed very personally directed at him, and even demands a sum of money that was very close to a bonus he had recently received. It seems likely that the kidnapper knew Ramsey at some point (this is also from the John Douglas book mentioned above).
 
Segnosaur said:
Ummm... which note would that be?

If you're referring to the ransom note, that's not likely. While there may have been similarities between the mom's handwriting and the note's, the similarities were so broad that millions of people would have been similarly matched. (In other words, the handwriting would have been enough to exclude someone as a susptect, but not enough to include someone as a suspect.)

Furthermore, some of the elements of the note wouldn't match what you would expect a mom to write; it made references to certain action movies that were recently released (not the type of movie a young mother would go see), and the amount of money asked for was very small.
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Unless something has changed since the early days of the case, the police were supposed to have found evidence that a note (I assume the one you mention, but do not know for sure) had been practiced on paper found in the house.
 
I tend to respond as soon as I see a question re my post/s so did not see the answer to this point. I will say whatever the R's did or didn't do they worked hard to be unhelpful in any way.
 
fuelair said:
Unless something has changed since the early days of the case, the police were supposed to have found evidence that a note (I assume the one you mention, but do not know for sure) had been practiced on paper found in the house.
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They did find evidence that the killer started writing the note on a writing tablet, then stopped and wrote on a new page. The notepad in question was in their hallway, where an intruder would have had easy access to it. He/she apparently tried to disguise his/her handwriting but gave up.

fuelair said:
I tend to respond as soon as I see a question re my post/s so did not see the answer to this point. I will say whatever the R's did or didn't do they worked hard to be unhelpful in any way.
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In what way? The Ramseys responded to written questions. They met with police and prosecutors more than once, and went through several days of questioning.

They became uncooperative when it became clear that the police had little interest in investigating any other theories other than that they were the ones who killed their daughter. The police early on knew they had unidentifiable DNA in JonBenet's underwear, and an unidentifiable palm print at the crime scene. Instead of looking into those leads, they invented excuses to continue to focus on the Ramseys. At some point, I don't blame the Ramseys for becoming uncooperative. But they sure weren't from the start.
 
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Could have been blood thirsty Jews who drink the blood from Christian children. I heard reports there were dancing Israelis seen in Colorado that week.
 
I just want to state, for the record, that although I lived in Boulder at the time, I was not in town that week, and was at my sisters the night of the murder. Honest!
 
To this day, whenever I'm reminded of this crime, I still feel sympathy for that child. Why this one, I really don't know --- for sure there are plenty of others to have sympathy toward --- but yet I do.
 
Probably because it looks like her parents manipulated and objectified her? I know nothing about this 'pageant' business but it doesn't look like she had a great childhood to me.
 
ARubberChickenWithAPulley said:
A burglar breaks into the Ramsey home, is encountered by JonBenet. One or both panick, the burglar either kills her in panic, or tries to silence her and accidentally kills her in the process.

Now the burglar is in a *real* panic. He decides to hide the body and write a ransom note - which turns out to be easier thought than done, thus the rough drafts. He obviously doesn´t have any experience with kidnapping, is unable to think clearly due to panic, and/or is not very smart
Click to expand...
Seems unlikely, mainly because the ransom note mentions Ramsey by name, seemed very personally directed at him, and even demands a sum of money that was very close to a bonus he had recently received. It seems likely that the kidnapper knew Ramsey at some point (this is also from the John Douglas book mentioned above).
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A good point.

A couple of other things that wouldn't exactly fit with the 'suprised burglar' theory...

- A burglar would have to remain in the house for some time after the murder/accidental killing in order to write the note. Unless he was some stone-cold killer, I doubt whether he'd have the presence of mind to stick around the house at all. You would expect some sort of panicing burglar-turned-killer to want to flee the scene as quickly as possible

- JonBenet was strangled; that doesn't exactly seem like the mode of death that could 'accidentally' be caused by a burglar.

- There didn't seem to be any evidence of missing or disturbed property. Unless Jonbenet suprised the burglar the second he entered the house, he would have had at least SOME time to go through their valuables, and you'd expect at least some items to be missing/out of place. There were no reports of that however.

ETA: One other reason to discount the 'surprised burglar' theory.... rope and duct tape used in the assault did not match anything available inside the home, so it was likely brought by the intruder. Those aren't exactly the type of tools that someone needs for 'just' breaking into a house.
 
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Dorcas said:
Probably because it looks like her parents manipulated and objectified her? I know nothing about this 'pageant' business but it doesn't look like she had a great childhood to me.
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Personally, if I had a daughter I would probably not want her participating in pageants myself. However, even if you or I question the wisdom of allowing children participate in pageants, by all accounts JonBenet actually enjoyed participating in them. She enjoyed the 'acting', and she enjoyed the ability to do stuff with her mom (who helped her with the pagaents).

So, even if it seems 'strange' to make a 6 year old child parade around on stage, it wasn't an activity that made JonBenet unhappy.
 
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