Folkore 2 -- The Oversized Panties Saga

At some point someone on one of the Internet forums decided to investigate reports that JonBenet had been redressed in panties several sizes too large, labeled with the word "Wednesday." Patsy had been questioned about these panties, since the investigators were trying to determine whether they might have been brought into the house by an intruder. During Patsy's interview of August 28, 2000, the interviewer, a Mr. Morrissey, makes this clear. Here is the relevant dialogue:

Folklore

Over the years, a wide range of colorful notions regarding various aspects of this case have accumulated. Most appear to have originated with fanciful theories offered in various books and tabloid articles on the case, but their widespread dissemination and acceptance is no doubt due to the popularity of certain Internet forums, where they have come to be accepted as gospel truth.

"Passing" the Polygraphs

In May, 2000, John and Patsy Ramsey took polygraph (i.e. "lie detector") tests administered by an "expert" hired by their lawyers, one Edward Gelb. Not surprisingly, they "passed."

From the Denver Rocky Mountain News:

Edward Gelb, a respected California-based polygrapher, said he administered two tests to John Ramsey and three to Patsy Ramsey earlier this month. Both were asked whether they killed JonBenet or knew the killer. Patsy Ramsey also was asked whether she wrote the ransom note found in their home. "What are the chances that two separate individuals would take a series of five polygraph examinations and pass them all — and yet be lying?" Gelb said. "You're going to find it's somewhere between four in 1,000 and one in a trillion." 

Innocent Little Nancy -- OR -- "Moving Finger" Update

Turns out I've been doing some cherry picking of my own. Based on a document sitting dormant on my hard drive for years that I thought could have been penned by John Ramsey. I presented it a while back on a blog post titled The Moving Finger, along with a comparison with the ransom note that revealed some striking similarities. As I stated, I could not be sure this was written by John, and admitted in a comment that it could be a hoax. Nevertheless, I thought it worth looking into, and wrote to Ramsey case maven Jameson, from whom I had obtained this file, to see if she could shed some light on who wrote it and why. She could. And did. Here's the email I received from her this morning:

Big Bad Wolf -- OR -- The Dangers of Cherry Picking

At one point, the Ramsey defense team focused its attention on a Boulder reporter named Chris Wolf, based on a report from his girl friend of suspicious behavior on the morning after JonBenet's murder. Wolf subsequently sued the Ramseys for defamation, in a trial that gave "New York Lawyer" Darnay Hoffman an opportunity to present his case against Patsy (see previous posts). As a result of his girl friend's accusations, Wolf was investigated -- and considerable attention was paid to his handwriting. I recently discovered the following youtube video, which purports to demonstrate how close his writing is to that of the note:

The "Experts" See Patsy - Part 8: Cherokee

On to Cherokee's "Handwriting Analysis," which begins with post no. 10 of his Forums for Justice thread. [Added on 1-23-1017: the threads containing Cherokee's analysis seem to have vanished. However, smaller versions of some of his/her comparisons can still be found here: http://www.forumsforjustice.org/forums/showthread.php?5354-Handwriting-Comparisons-of-John-amp-Patsy-Ramsey-with-Ransom-Note-Author] He immediately excludes Burke, as "The handwriting, vocabulary and syntax of the Ransom Note are those of an adult." I agree. He decides, therefore, to focus on "the two adults who were there at the time, John and Patsy Ramsey." Here too I agree, since imo there is no evidence of an intruder that's ever stood up to close examination, nor was there any reason for any intruder to both leave a hand printed ransom note and fail to remove his victim from the house. What makes his approach superior to all the others, in my opinion, is his willingness to consider John as well as Patsy, rather than uncritically accept the verdict of the "experts" who ruled him out.

The "Experts" See Patsy - Part 7: Cherokee

"Cherokee" is the name used by someone posting for several years at the Forums for Justice forum, among others. I have no idea whether this person is a he or she, but I have feeling it's a "he," so that's how I'll refer to "him" until I'm informed otherwise. I also have no idea whether Cherokee is a bona fide "expert," but I'm including him here because 1. he definitely sees himself in this category and 2. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. In the interest of full disclosure, I'll mention that Cherokee and I have a "history" on the Internet, going back many years, which I won't get into here, except to say that this person is extremely touchy and quick to take offense -- which may be the reason why I have managed to offend him so many times both past and present. On the other hand, I may simply be an offensive sort of person, who offends everyone, in which case I hereby apologize to one and all. (Incidentally, my offensiveness is intimately associated with my "popularity," oddly enough, as discussed in this amusing blog post.)

The "Experts" See Patsy - Part 6: David Liebman

Cina Wong's teacher and mentor, David Liebman, appears to have excellent credentials indeed, as he is (or was) president of the National Association of Document Examiners. However, there is absolutely nothing in the brief report he prepared for Darnay Hoffman that could not have been achieved by a diligent amateur.

The "Experts" See Patsy - Part 5: Tom Miller

Tom Miller, a criminal defense attorney and "court-certified document examiner" based in Denver, has a long history with this case. He was apparently the source for the various exemplars provided to Darnay Hoffman's team of "experts," and joined that team in matching Patsy's exemplars with those in the "ransom"note. He eventually wrote an indignant book about the case, JonBenet Ramsey: Prostitution of Justice. 

The quality of his work as a document examiner is evident from the report he provided to Darnay Hoffman. Here are some examples:

The "Experts" See Patsy - Part 4: Gideon Epstein on the Distinguished Panel

Before moving on to our next "expert," I want to dwell a bit on an all important aspect of Gideon Epstein's testimony.  Time and again, whenever I find myself arguing against Patsy's involvement and presenting all the many reasons to suspect John and John alone, the "Patsy lovers" remind me of those six "experts" who unanimously agreed that John could not have written the note. And when I argue that this conclusion makes no sense and needs to be questioned, eyes begin to roll.

What they fail to recognize is the equally significant fact that this same panel of experts also found it "unlikely" that Patsy wrote it. They could not rule her out. But nonetheless, the consensus was that she probably did not. Which means anyone wanting to insist Patsy must have written that note also has to go against the "expert" findings of this same panel. In other words, if this was an inside job, as so many rightly believe, then there is something very wrong with the methodology employed by this distinguished panel. And if you want to accuse them of being wrong about Patsy, then you can't avoid the possibility that they were wrong about John.

The "Experts" See Patsy - Part 3: Gideon Epstein

The documents analyzed by Cina Wong were supplied by "New York Lawyer" Darnay Hoffman, an odd character who inserted himself into the case out of a deep seated and unshakeable conviction that Patsy Ramsey and only Patsy Ramsey could have written the notorious "ransom" note. To prove his point, he hired a team of forensic documentation specialists (aka "experts") whose job very clearly was to confirm his theory. Which of course they did. All used the same set of totally inadequate exemplars as those initially used by Wong -- the ones displayed on my previous post, plus two others, also very brief, that I haven't been able to get hold of. Other than the longhand letters signed by her, no one has ever to my knowledge confirmed that any of these were actually written by Patsy -- and there is good reason to suppose that at least one -- "Rainbow Fish Players" -- was not (it looks totally different from all the others).

The "Experts" See Patsy - Cina Wong Part 2

The alphabetical comparisons exhibited in the previous post are, of course, only one part of Wong's analysis. In November of 1997, she provided a written report, (currently available at ACandyRose's website) at the request of "New York Lawyer" Darnay Hoffman (now deceased). In it, she lists her sources and, fortunately for us, ACandyRose (bless her heart) has made all but two available from links on the same webpage.

The "Experts" See Patsy - part 1:Cina Wong

[NB: 1-25-2013 - Yesterday I received a notice from "The Blogger Team" that this blog post was being temporarily removed due to a notification they had received regarding the supposedly unauthorized use of copyrighted material. I was told I could repost it once the material was removed, but given no information regarding exactly who filed the complaint. In my view all such materials are covered under the Fair Use provisions of the copyright laws, but that's not my call in this instance, so I have no choice but to comply.]

From the Boulder Daily Camera, Nov. 25, 1997: 

On a scale of "1 to 10" with "10" being a "probable" match to the ransom note found at the JonBenet Ramsey murder scene, one handwriting expert gave Patsy Ramsey an "8.5."

New York City Attorney Darnay Hoffman today plans to file in Boulder County District Court a preliminary handwriting analysis completed by expert Cina Wong. The handwriting analysis will be added to Hoffman's recently filed lawsuit against Boulder District Attorney Alex Hunter.

Wong's analysis shows 32 points of comparison and similarities between seven samples of Patsy Ramseys handwriting and the ransom note. However, one page of the report was redacted in media copies, Hoffman noted, to prevent JonBenets mother from disguising her handwriting in the future.

"The relatively large number of distinctive similarities found in both the 'ransom note and exemplars allegedly written by Patsy Ramsey ... cannot be ignored," wrote Wong, a board certified document examiner from Norfolk, Va., hired by Hoffman. "Statistically, it can only be concluded that it is very likely the same hand wrote all the documents involved."

The most widely disseminated example of Wong's work is a letter by letter comparison of exemplars from the note, on the top row, and Patsy Ramsey's exemplars, on the bottom:

The Moving Finger

The Moving Finger writes;
and, having writ, Moves on:
nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it

                                            Omar Khayyam

 There's a file I've had for some time without knowing quite what to do with it. It's a .gif file, titled "writing sample via Jameson." For the life of me I can't recall exactly where or when I got it, but it has to have been several years ago. Possibly it's something Jameson posted on her Webbsleuths forum, after much prodding from me, because she'd let it be known she had samples of John Ramsey's writing, but was refusing to share them. I was never sure what to do with it because of its slightly ragged appearance, probably the result of a poor quality xerox. If you right click on it and select "Open Link in New Tab," and then click on it again, you'll get a better look: