JonBenet Ramsey - a question for those who follow this story

[goofy !]

I walked away from the Dateline special wondering more about Bill McReynolds (Santa Bill).

Google seems to provide some interesting information about him and his wife. Now, this case has been talked about all over the internet and I honestly don't have a clue if any of this stuff is true so take this for what it is worth which is probably nothing.

Bill McReynolds talked for quite awhile at JBR funeral. He said some things that raised red flags for some and sent out the creep vibe to others. This was noted on Dateline. He had been in the Ramsey home many times. He was cleared because he had heart surgery in August and they didn't feel he would have been strong enough to commit the crime. He was strong enough to play Santa, though. He was also well enough to vacation in Spain with his wife less than a month later.

His own 9 y/o daughter and her friend were kidnapped on 12/26/74 (exactly 22 years to the day before JBR) and his daughter had to watch her friend get sexually abused.

Janet McReynolds was his wife. She wrote a play 20 years before JBR was murdered and two years after her daughter was kidnapped about a girl who was sexually abused in a basement and later died in a hospital. She was also a huge movie/TV buff and the ransom note seemed to have a number of Hollywood references.

All of that probably means absolutely nothing, but I read most of it on the internet so it must be true!

FWIW, Santa is the locals favorite suspect, but apparently DNA does not match.

 

[EMom]

I only watched the Dateline special. I thought Patsy was higher than a kite in that CNN interview. She seemed very much sedated to me especially comparing her to later interviews where she seems so much more alert and coherent.

If my child had been murdered, especially in the manner JonBenet was, I would have to take a Valium the size of my fist on an hourly basis just to keep breathing. Yes, Patsy was heavily medicated during the CNN interview.

I never cease to be amazed by the miniscule things people fixate on to "prove" the family did it. They had fresh pineapple in the house. Who does that? Murderers! JB seems to have eaten pineapple between the time she came home and the time
she died. Who fed it to her, because heaven knows no 6 yo ever came downstairs and put a little fruit in a bowl for themselves. Why are Patsy and Burke's prints on the pineapple bowl? Because after they come out of the dishwasher, we all know dishes magically put themselves away and no prints ever touch them. (Seriously. If the police cannot even make the leap of logic that anyone would unloaded the dishwasher got prints on that bowl, as did anyone who reached into the cabinet to get another bowl, then they just aren't very imaginative.) JB was in child beauty pageants and that means she must have had a sick, twisted family. Never mind that her mom had been a beauty queen and as obnoxious as some people find those contests, plenty of relatively normal people do them, along with dance and cheer families....skimpy-ish costumes and all. And the kids mostly grow into well-adjusted adults. She had previously been treated for vaginal inflammation. Okay, that proves that when anything was the least little bit wrong with JB, Patsy ran her to the pediatrician, just the opposite of hiding sexual abuse. Heck, the same thing happened with my sister. Eventually, my mother stopped using bubble bath and bleach on underwear and the problem went away. It is an incredibly common issue with little girls. The parents lawyered up and only guilty people do that. No, wealthy people who are familiar with how things work and have figured out THEY are the target of the police and not a tool to help solve their daughter's murder will lawyer up. How could someone hide in your house and you not know it? Well, if you have a four story 10,000 SF house (and that may not even include the basement SF), it's actually relatively easy, Scary to think of, but easy.

The bottom line is, they seem like a pretty normal family. Albeit a wealthy one where the mom is a little over the top, bigger than life, and Miss Social, but that is not a crime. It's just a personality some find annoying. They had survived a great deal. The loss of John's daughter, Patsy's cancer.....I'm sorry, but a 6 yo wetting the bed was not going to push Patsy Ramsey over the edge after surviving ovarian cancer. It's just silly. As a mother, once you have come that close to having to leave your two young children behind, every day is a gift. Wetting the bed might be bothersome, but that's the extent of it. There is NOTHING to indicate those parents weren't devoted to JonBenet. So even if you go with the "covering up an accident" theory, the Ramseys don't fit. That body was abused. Tortured. The parents wouldn't have done that. If anything, they would have rushed to the hospital and started calling in top specialists so that JB had he best chance of surviving any accident. That is more in keeping with their personalities.

I watched the latest special last night and again, am amazed at what some people see as red flags. The police send John off to search. Why they did this is beyond me, but to blame him when he finds the body is really their problem, isn't it? At least they should have had a police officer accompany him step for step. He was a civilian, a terrified father and it is not his job to know procedure and think about evidence collection. One person said it was a red flag that he went straight for the basement. Why? The house has 4 floors and in his shoes, I'd start in the top floor and work my way down or the bottom floor and work my way up. It's logical. When he finds the body, the starts ripping off duct tape. Horrible idea, but as a father, I can see that he had the tiniest hope she might still be saved. Desperate hope. Again, had the police been right there, they had the ability to stop this. They dropped the ball. To me, so much of the police commentary over the years about the Ramseys and "what they did wrong " is really a reflection of how poorly the police handled the case and upon consideration, the Ramseys would have done a lot less "wrong" had the police done their jobs correctly.

I am not a person who usually looks to undermine police or constantly doubts their motives. But in this case, I think they did get tunnel vision and it has allowed a killer to walk free for 20 years, while an innocent, suffering family has lived under the worst cloud of suspicion imaginable.

 

[Snap Crackle Pop]

What I basically learned so far from the last few specials I have seen is that they are nowhere even close to solving what happened and they are just up for speaking about conspiracy theories. So nothing new.

 

[msjprincess]

I watched the Dateline story last night. I don't know why it never dawned on me that the killer could have broken in and waited while they were at the party. That would have given him hours to write the note.

Santa Bill seems really suspicious to me.

 

[LisaR]

If my child had been murdered, especially in the manner JonBenet was, I would have to take a Valium the size of my fist on an hourly basis just to keep breathing. Yes, Patsy was heavily medicated during the CNN interview.

Just to be clear, I was responding to the poster who asked how a mother could give an interview on CNN only six days after her child was murdered and mentioned that she would have needed to be sedated. I was just pointing out that Patsy was clearly sedated in that interview. I don't blame her in the slightest. I'm guessing I would have needed to be sedated until the day I died if that had happened to my child.

I never cease to be amazed by the miniscule things people fixate on to "prove" the family did it. They had fresh pineapple in the house. Who does that? Murderers! JB seems to have eaten pineapple between the time she came home and the time
she died. Who fed it to her, because heaven knows no 6 yo ever came downstairs and put a little fruit in a bowl for themselves. Why are Patsy and Burke's prints on the pineapple bowl? Because after they come out of the dishwasher, we all know dishes magically put themselves away and no prints ever touch them. (Seriously. If the police cannot even make the leap of logic that anyone would unloaded the dishwasher got prints on that bowl, as did anyone who reached into the cabinet to get another bowl, then they just aren't very imaginative.) JB was in child beauty pageants and that means she must have had a sick, twisted family. Never mind that her mom had been a beauty queen and as obnoxious as some people find those contests, plenty of relatively normal people do them, along with dance and cheer families....skimpy-ish costumes and all. And the kids mostly grow into well-adjusted adults. She had previously been treated for vaginal inflammation. Okay, that proves that when anything was the least little bit wrong with JB, Patsy ran her to the pediatrician, just the opposite of hiding sexual abuse. Heck, the same thing happened with my sister. Eventually, my mother stopped using bubble bath and bleach on underwear and the problem went away. It is an incredibly common issue with little girls. The parents lawyered up and only guilty people do that. No, wealthy people who are familiar with how things work and have figured out THEY are the target of the police and not a tool to help solve their daughter's murder will lawyer up. How could someone hide in your house and you not know it? Well, if you have a four story 10,000 SF house (and that may not even include the basement SF), it's actually relatively easy, Scary to think of, but easy.

The bottom line is, they seem like a pretty normal family. Albeit a wealthy one where the mom is a little over the top, bigger than life, and Miss Social, but that is not a crime. It's just a personality some find annoying. They had survived a great deal. The loss of John's daughter, Patsy's cancer.....I'm sorry, but a 6 yo wetting the bed was not going to push Patsy Ramsey over the edge after surviving ovarian cancer. It's just silly. As a mother, once you have come that close to having to leave your two young children behind, every day is a gift. Wetting the bed might be bothersome, but that's the extent of it. There is NOTHING to indicate those parents weren't devoted to JonBenet. So even if you go with the "covering up an accident" theory, the Ramseys don't fit. That body was abused. Tortured. The parents wouldn't have done that. If anything, they would have rushed to the hospital and started calling in top specialists so that JB had he best chance of surviving any accident. That is more in keeping with their personalities.

I watched the latest special last night and again, am amazed at what some people see as red flags. The police send John off to search. Why they did this is beyond me, but to blame him when he finds the body is really their problem, isn't it? At least they should have had a police officer accompany him step for step. He was a civilian, a terrified father and it is not his job to know procedure and think about evidence collection. One person said it was a red flag that he went straight for the basement. Why? The house has 4 floors and in his shoes, I'd start in the top floor and work my way down or the bottom floor and work my way up. It's logical. When he finds the body, the starts ripping off duct tape. Horrible idea, but as a father, I can see that he had the tiniest hope she might still be saved. Desperate hope. Again, had the police been right there, they had the ability to stop this. They dropped the ball. To me, so much of the police commentary over the years about the Ramseys and "what they did wrong " is really a reflection of how poorly the police handled the case and upon consideration, the Ramseys would have done a lot less "wrong" had the police done their jobs correctly.

I am not a person who usually looks to undermine police or constantly doubts their motives. But in this case, I think they did get tunnel vision and it has allowed a killer to walk free for 20 years, while an innocent, suffering family has lived under the worst cloud of suspicion imaginable.

I agree with you 100%.

 

[LisaR]

This is my completely unscientific, no proof whatsoever guess. Santa and his wife hatched a plan to kidnap JB for ransom money. He knew they'd be at the party so he had plenty of time in the home alone. He was to get JB since he had a good relationship with her and was pretty sure she'd go with him. That would explain JB telling people that Santa was going to visit her after Christmas. He got her to go with him downstairs, but I'm guessing his sick perversion kicked in and he wanted to abuse JB before kidnapping her and it went wrong. I am wondering if the plan was to even remove her from the home to begin with? Maybe he wanted to lock her in the wine cellar. A cement cellar with a lock on the outside of the door is pretty sound proof and she couldn't get out herself. Maybe the plan was to leave her there for a few hours, get the ransom money at 10am, and then tell them where she was. He could have knocked her on the head initially with the hope that she wouldn't remember anything when she came to. If she came to and her story was all about "Santa," it may seem like she was having memory issues. The lack of DNA is likely because the body had been moved and touched by many people and the police didn't do their job correctly. Santa and his wife weren't even interviewed until February 7th so they had plenty of time to dispose of any evidence including taking any soiled clothing to Spain and dumping it there. Probably far fetched, but it's my theory and I'm sticking to it...until I come up with another one!

 

[EMom]

ETA: I have no idea why that posted. Sorry.

 

[Hikergirl]

I never heard about Santa Bill and his wife before, definitely suspicious to me.

 

[Kitty 34]

I never heard about Santa Bill and his wife before, definitely suspicious to me.

I never heard about Santa Bill either until 20 years later and only until I started reading this thread.....weird.

 

[CdnCarrie]

This is my completely unscientific, no proof whatsoever guess. Santa and his wife hatched a plan to kidnap JB for ransom money. He knew they'd be at the party so he had plenty of time in the home alone. He was to get JB since he had a good relationship with her and was pretty sure she'd go with him. That would explain JB telling people that Santa was going to visit her after Christmas. He got her to go with him downstairs, but I'm guessing his sick perversion kicked in and he wanted to abuse JB before kidnapping her and it went wrong. I am wondering if the plan was to even remove her from the home to begin with? Maybe he wanted to lock her in the wine cellar. A cement cellar with a lock on the outside of the door is pretty sound proof and she couldn't get out herself. Maybe the plan was to leave her there for a few hours, get the ransom money at 10am, and then tell them where she was. He could have knocked her on the head initially with the hope that she wouldn't remember anything when she came to. If she came to and her story was all about "Santa," it may seem like she was having memory issues. The lack of DNA is likely because the body had been moved and touched by many people and the police didn't do their job correctly. Santa and his wife weren't even interviewed until February 7th so they had plenty of time to dispose of any evidence including taking any soiled clothing to Spain and dumping it there. Probably far fetched, but it's my theory and I'm sticking to it...until I come up with another one!

I think its possible he was involved BUT I highly doubt he did it for ransom money. He seemed like he was fairly wealthy retired professor.

 

[SueM in MN]

Pretty much all the TV specials have been slanted to one point of view or the other.
The "Team Ramsey Innocent" ones skew things to emphasize things that exonerate the Ramseys and minimize things that make them look guilty. The "Team Ramsey Guilty" ones do the opposite.

 

[Hikergirl]

Pretty much all the TV specials have been slanted to one point of view or the other.
The "Team Ramsey Innocent" ones skew things to emphasize things that exonerate the Ramseys and minimize things that make them look guilty. The "Team Ramsey Guilty" ones do the opposite.

I totally agree but I do remember at the time of the murder everything was slanted to the point of view that the Ramsey's were the guilty ones.
I think its very interesting to see alot of evidence that could point the finger at someone else.

 

[lovin'fl]

Today is Dr Phil with BR and tonight at 10pm, on ID channel, starts a 3 part series of the case.

 

[fly girl]

Today is Dr Phil with BR and tonight at 10pm, on ID channel, starts a 3 part series of the case.

Both are set on my DVR.

Apparently Burke gives new light to the pineapple on Dr. Phil. Should be interesting.

 

[pryncess527]

Pretty much all the TV specials have been slanted to one point of view or the other.
The "Team Ramsey Innocent" ones skew things to emphasize things that exonerate the Ramseys and minimize things that make them look guilty. The "Team Ramsey Guilty" ones do the opposite.

I agree that the coverage is always slanted one way or the other, but I also feel like even when I watch the "Team Ramsey Guilty" stuff, they are relying on poor logic, flimsy connections and overall just grasping at straws. There are a lot of questions the "Team Ramsey Innocent" people can't answer, but not having an answer doesn't mean there isn't one out there.

I can't believe I'm going to watch Dr. Phil, but this stupid thread has piqued my interest again and now I"m going to have to tune in, darn it. ;p

 

[RitaE]

I agree that the coverage is always slanted one way or the other, but I also feel like even when I watch the "Team Ramsey Guilty" stuff, they are relying on poor logic, flimsy connections and overall just grasping at straws. There are a lot of questions the "Team Ramsey Innocent" people can't answer, but not having an answer doesn't mean there isn't one out there.

I can't believe I'm going to watch Dr. Phil, but this stupid thread has piqued my interest again and now I"m going to have to tune in, darn it. ;p

Yeah, it's amazing just how hard it is to let this case go in my mind. It's been 20 years and each time I start paying attention to it again I find it just as fascinating. I guess maybe because I went to CU Boulder for my undergraduate degree and I have a son who was almost exactly JonBenet's age, it just seemed like a personal connection. But ... it has been 20 years. Without any sort of new evidence or new scientific testing methods I can't conceive of any angle of this case that hasn't been scrutinized endlessly by experts and amateurs. It's the definition of wheel spinning.

I've watched snippets of the Burke Interview teasers and he does seem neurologically outside of normal standards. It's impossible for me to say whether it is some sort of condition or simply the mechanisms he has developed over the years to cope with the subject of his sister.

 

[cabanafrau]

I

I watched the latest special last night and again, am amazed at what some people see as red flags. The police send John off to search. Why they did this is beyond me, but to blame him when he finds the body is really their problem, isn't it? At least they should have had a police officer accompany him step for step. He was a civilian, a terrified father and it is not his job to know procedure and think about evidence collection. One person said it was a red flag that he went straight for the basement. Why? The house has 4 floors and in his shoes, I'd start in the top floor and work my way down or the bottom floor and work my way up. It's logical. When he finds the body, the starts ripping off duct tape. Horrible idea, but as a father, I can see that he had the tiniest hope she might still be saved. Desperate hope. Again, had the police been right there, they had the ability to stop this. They dropped the ball. To me, so much of the police commentary over the years about the Ramseys and "what they did wrong " is really a reflection of how poorly the police handled the case and upon consideration, the Ramseys would have done a lot less "wrong" had the police done their jobs correctly.

You are very on target as far as crime scene protocols absolutely not being followed in the case. To be fair, I'm sure part of it had to do with the fact of the time of day, the cold and the fact another young child was still in bed when police came on the scene. Nonetheless, if the police presence in the house wasn't being hidden on some pretext of supposedly paying a ransom to a kidnapper who was insisting on no police involvement, the activity and movement within the house should have at the very least been contained and monitored. Asking a parent to do searches unsupervised is a definite no no.

As far as the father's behavior when discovering the body, entirely within the norm. I have talked to more than one parent of a murdered child (not necessarily murdered in childhood, but their child nonetheless) who has told me directly or cried in my presence about having to identify their child or only being able to see their deceased child in the hospital from ten feet away because the body was considered a crime scene.(I've heard the same claim from other people about identifying their loved ones in the aftermath of their murder.) None of these were cases where in any way the parent was considered to have any involvement in their child's death, but any evidence involving the body had to be preserved for investigation -- including cases where the victim received treatment from EMS and hospital medical personnel prior to death or in an attempt to verify death. It's common for law enforcement to have to physically restrain a distraught parent to preserve the evidence.

The gaping neglect of law enforcement to preserve the crime scene in this case is mind boggling. The lousy search that was done of the home by law enforcement is also a sign of very poor investigative techniques. This girl was not found behind a faux wall or secret room. She was in a closet with an obvious door and crude exterior latch. If the house was so large and had so many hidden areas that the police could have been forgiven for not finding her, wouldn't the same claim provide excellent cover for an intruder?

 

[Snap Crackle Pop]

Did any of you guys watch Dr. Phil's part 1 of the 3 day special?

 

[pryncess527]

Did any of you guys watch Dr. Phil's part 1 of the 3 day special?

I was hoping to stream it online after it aired, but it isn't up yet. I'm not sure if they put full episodes of Dr. Phil online or not . . .

 

[CdnCarrie]

I saw the first episode of Dr Phil today. So much of it was a recap of the story with excerpts of an interview with John Ramsey. Brooke seemed uncomfortable but then again how many people are comfortable being interviewed on a sensitive topic in what will be viewed by millions.