The Cases That Haunt Us (56 page)

Prior to my testimony, Detective Sergeant Tom Wickman, who was now heading up the investigation for Boulder PD, introduced himself and told me he’d read all of my books and particularly admired the
CrimeClassification Manual.
He thanked me for the work I’d done in the area of criminal profiling and what he considered its significant contribution to law enforcement. I was very appreciative of all of Wickman’s comments.

On October 13, 1999, Alex Hunter and the grand jury announced that it had found insufficient evidence to indict anyone in the JonBenet Ramsey case. Some speculated that the final decision might have been Hunter’s, because under Colorado law, both the grand jury foreman and the district attorney must sign a true bill of indictment for it to take effect.

Steve Thomas condemned Hunter for not indicting the Ramseys and letting a jury decide the truth. Attorney and Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz declared Hunter a “constitutional hero” for taking all the barbs and not bringing a case to trial that he did not feel could be supported. This was just one more example of the huge and seemingly unbridgeable divisions this case has engendered.

LOOSE
ENDS

There is no way to be exhaustive on a case of this scope, and anyone who studies it will have his own crucial element or piece of evidence. I’ve tried to present what I considered to be the important points. But items are always left over in any discussion, and we’ll try to deal with some of them here.

1.If there was an intruder, why didn’t his footprints show up in the snow aroundthe house?

This is another of those greatly misreported “facts.” Contrary to what was originally reported, only a light dusting of snow was on the ground on the night in question, plus the walk had been shoveled. So even if the intruder had left through the window well, he would not necessarily have left tracks.

2.How would an intruder get in?

Smit believed he got in through the window well to the basement. This may well be the case. It is also possible that he gained access by using a key. At least twenty keys to the house were floating around that were not in the Ramseys’ possession. If the offender was someone who knew them well, or knew someone who had worked for them or had a key through some other legitimate reason, this is a likely possibility.

It is also possible that one or more doors had been left unlocked. This was a low-crime area, and the Ramseys sometimes did leave doors unlocked when they were not at home. This was also true of ground-floor windows. During a search on the morning of December 26, a police officer reportedly found the door on the south side of the house unlocked.

3.If neither of the Ramseys killed JonBenet and the real killer is still out there, whyhasn’t he been caught and why hasn’t there been any evidence of his subsequentwork?

First of all, this was not the work of a serial killer. This is not someone who killed for the fulfillment and satisfaction of exerting manipulation, domination, and control over a victim of opportunity. This was an inexperienced, mission-oriented offender. So there is no particular reason to believe he would repeat the same signature crime over and over.

And it is unfortunately true that many homicides go unsolved, particularly in jurisdictions without a lot of experience working them. On December 21, 1997, almost exactly a year after JonBenet’s murder, Susannah Chase, a University of Colorado student, was murdered in downtown Boulder. Like the Ramsey murder, Boulder PD has been unable to solve this one. Where is that killer?

4.If JonBenet’s body was discovered on December 26, 1996, but the Ramseyschose to mark the date of death on her tombstone as December 25, doesn’t that implyspecific knowledge that only the killer would have?

That’s apparently what the police believed. Having dealt with many bereaved families of murder victims, I think the use of this date as a “clue” is ridiculous.

Parents will always search for some meaning or significance out of the tragedy of their child’s death. Christmas Day had a happy and symbolic significance to the Ramseys. If they didn’t actually know whether JonBenet died before or after midnight, it was perfectly natural that they would choose the date that had the most meaning to them. On one level, I believe choosing this date was an attempt to remind people of the presence of evil in the midst of innocence and joy.

5.Would an intruder risk this much time in the house?

Certain types of intruders would. In 1988, my unit worked a kidnapping case in Jackson, Mississippi. On July 26, Annie Laurie Hearin, seventy-two years of age, in poor health and the wife of Robert M. Hearin, one of the state’s wealthiest men, was abducted from their elegant Georgian home in a well-to-do neighborhood in broad daylight. Only about an hour window of opportunity existed between the time Mrs. Hearin’s brunch guests left at 3:30 P.M. and her husband returned home at 4:30. Nothing in Annie Hearin’s background or lifestyle suggested her as a target, yet the
UNSUB
was willing to go to great risk to get to her. Clearly, this was not a victim of opportunity.

There was a ransom note, as bizarre in its way as the Ramsey note. It was typed on an old typewriter and referenced School Pictures, a company that Robert Hearin had controlled, although it was only a small part of his holdings. The note also listed twelve individuals who had been franchise owners of the company and directed Hearin to “Put these people back in the shape they was in before they got mixed up with School Pictures.” So the
UNSUB
was someone who felt he, and School Pictures, had been wronged by Robert Hearin.

Bill Hagmaier, who, by the time of the Ramsey case, headed up
CASKU
, the FBI’s Child Abduction and Serial Killer Unit, the successor to my Investigative Support Unit, took on the profile of the
UNSUB
and put in his usual first-rate effort. As I recall from our case consultation discussions, he defined Mrs. Hearin as a symbolic victim and the offender as mission-oriented, with a strong commitment, even though the crime was crudely planned and somewhat impulsive and high risk. He believed the residence was probably surveilled ahead of time and that the
UNSUB
had most likely been inside before, either through legitimate or illegitimate means. Despite the ransom note, Hagmaier believed the motive was primarily anger rather than material gain.

Working from the profile, the ransom note, and such leads as the fact that a white van with Florida plates had been observed on several occasions near the crime scene, investigators identified a prime suspect. Newton Alfred Winn, one of the individuals listed in the ransom note, lived in Florida and was losing virtually everything he had as the result of a lawsuit over School Pictures. At Winn’s home, police found a typewriter that appeared to be linked to the note, and a map of Jackson, with the Hearins’ neighborhood circled. Winn was convicted of extortion, conspiracy to kidnap, and perjury and sentenced to nineteen years.

But like the Ramsey case, this one continues to haunt me. Annie Laurie Hearin was never found and no one has ever been charged with her murder. Her husband, Robert, died two years after her disappearance of a heart attack. But there are enough similarities between the two cases, particularly in the astuteness of Bill’s profile, to open our minds to the possibilities in the Ramsey case.

SUMMING
UP

Actually, there is no way to sum up a case like this. I don’t claim to know who did it; I only think I have a pretty good idea who didn’t do it, and that is what I’ve tried to present.

Having said that, though, it would be ducking the issue if I did not at least present a theory of what might have happened.

The behavioral evidence I have discerned and the forensic evidence I have seen and read, plus what has been conveyed to me by Lou Smit, lead me to believe that JonBenet Ramsey’s killer was a white male, relatively young, who had a personal grudge against John Ramsey and intended to carry it out by defiling and robbing him of the most valuable thing in the world to him.

I believe he entered the house while the family was out, either through the basement window well or with a key, bringing with him a stun gun, a roll of duct tape, and a spool of cord. His intention was to incapacitate JonBenet, abduct her, and molest her. This was a personal-cause crime rather than a criminal enterprise. The ransom consideration was secondary and may not even have occurred to the
UNSUB
until he was in the house. This could account for the note’s being written on Patsy’s pad, and this could account for the $118,000 figure. That is, he had no real intention of collecting so low a sum; he was just trying to make a point.

Or maybe he brought a briefer ransom note with him, but when he had the time, he altered his plan and wrote a note on the Ramseys’ own paper that was lying out on the counter, getting out more of his anger and resentment. How bad or insulting would this look for the Ramseys?

The high risk for the intruder would have been mitigated by the complexity of the physical layout of the house. He could have hidden out in the basement, which he would have illuminated with the flashlight he brought, getting familiar with the warren of rooms.

The
UNSUB
stole up to JonBenet’s bedroom after her parents were upstairs asleep, incapacitated her with an Air Taser stun gun, which would not make a loud noise when fired, taped her mouth, and carried her down to the basement, which he had already checked out, and where he used Patsy’s paintbrush handle and his own cord to form a garrote around the child’s neck. He also bound her hands tightly. Whether he intended to or not, his tightening of the neck ligature either killed her or nearly did so. When he realized what he had done, he panicked and finished off the job with a blow to her head. Then, instead of removing her from the house, he fled in panic.

This is only one possibility. Another would be that this actually was an intended kidnapping, planned by one or more teens or young adults who had been inside the Ramsey house and had seen John’s pay stubs. Maybe they were friends of one of JonBenet’s baby-sitters, workmen, or friends of friends; that’s just a guess. But to a teen, $118,000 would be a lot of money. He would also be so unsophisticated as to have no idea how difficult it is to pull off a kidnapping, even the kidnapping of a six-year-old girl.

He would be bold and foolhardy enough to enter the house and wait there, during which time he could have written the ransom note he forgot to bring with him. In this case, both the stun gun and the garrote may have been instruments of control rather than torture. The digital penetration of the child’s vagina would have represented the young man’s casual sexual experimentation while he had the opportunity. This type of behavior would not be rare. Again, when he realized he had killed or nearly killed his victim, he would have panicked and fled.

Normally, a teen or group of teens will fold like a house of cards when confronted by investigators. But if the heat was never on him because of the focus on the Ramseys, he may have been able to slide under the radar.

The fact remains, I’m not sure who killed JonBenet Ramsey, and the fact that her killer has not been found and charged represents a terrible injustice. That injustice will only be compounded if the wrong people are accused.

I always said that having a child murdered was the worst possible thing that could happen to a person. I guess I was wrong. Having that happen and then being blamed for it is even worse.

I
n examining the themes these cases share to figure out what continues to haunt us about them, one idea that comes to mind is that of “archetype” or “icon.” From lurking evil to the inner workings of family, from celebrity and its implications to the mystical and arcane, from sexual obsession to the corruption of innocence, each of these cases, as we’ve seen, represents an archetype we can all understand. Each of these cases represents the dark side of something potent and elemental. That’s why they’re fascinating.

But they’re also important and instructive. Because while they give us a window onto the human condition, these cases also show us what can happen when we’re not prepared to deal with them.

Each of these cases suffered from serious investigative difficulties, errors, irregularities, or other problems. In the Whitechapel murders, the investigators didn’t yet understand what they were dealing with. In the Borden slayings, they were hamstrung by societal stereotypes about women and class. In the Lindbergh baby kidnapping, well-meaning and sympathetic officials lost control and let the connection to the kidnapper slip away from them. In the Christine Schultz and JonBenet Ramsey murders, the crime scenes and evidence were compromised from the get-go and the investigations stymied by departments with questionable agendas. With the Boston Strangler, a confession provided a simple, quick “solution” that ultimately proved unsatisfying and unconvincing.

These cases are also representative of much larger issues in crime solving and criminal justice. So what can be done?

Several things, I think.

We’ve made a lot of progress in the century-plus that this book spans, and as we’ve said, we think we could help solve some of these cases that haunt us if they were presented to us today. We have techniques, abilities, and understanding we didn’t have back then, whether we’re talking about the 1880s or the 1980s.
DNA
analysis, medical examination, computers, preservation of evidence, laser enhancement, modern psychology, profiling, interview techniques, threat assessment, and other fundamentals of investigation are just a few of these. And yet even as you read this, several thousand unidentified dead are lying in the nation’s morgues. In 1960, the clearance rate for homicide was around 91 percent. Now, due to factors such as proliferation of “stranger” murders (that is, offenders and victims unknown to one another), it’s around 65 percent.

Unless we actually use what we’ve got and learn how to consistently manage investigations in a uniform and competent way, all of the modern developments and improvements are going to be meaningless. If you have excellent techniques for hair and fiber analysis but adulterate the crime scene before the evidence team arrives, you’ve got nothing. If you can identify murder weapons from bullet markings but don’t determine who was in possession of the weapon, you’ve got nothing. If
DNA
evidence can determine which specific individual in the entire world was at a scene but your chain of custody is called into question, you’ve got nothing. We could go on and on with examples.