Reading the Oracle

Well, as we now know, the Oracle has spoken. And, as with a great many Oracular Utterances, this one is definitely cryptic. Brief, but hardly to the point.

Patsy and John Ramsey, each indicted separately, "did ... permit a child to be unreasonably placed in a situation which posed a threat of injury to the child's life or health which resulted in the death of JonBenet Ramsey." And, in a second indictment both parents, also indicted separately, "did ... render assistance to a person, with intent to hinder, delay and prevent the discovery, detention, apprehension, prosecution, conviction and punishment of such person for the commission of a crime, knowing the person being assisted has committed and was suspected of the crime of murder in the first degree and child abuse resulting in death."

Grand Jury Indictment to be Released

Yes, you read that right. As announced today in the Boulder Daily Camera, 

A judge has ordered the release of the grand jury indictment against John and Patsy Ramsey in the JonBenet case that has been sealed since the grand jury was dismissed in 1999.

Retired Weld County Judge Robert Lowenbach ruled Wednesday morning that the indictment will be released Friday in response to a lawsuit brought by Daily Camera reporter Charlie Brennan and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press seeking the release of the unprosecuted indictment of the Ramseys.

While I, like everyone else following this case, am eager to read what the Grand Jury had to say, I must confess I am far from thrilled. Yes, according to what we've heard so far, the GJ did decide to indict both John and Patsy Ramsey, thus ruling against Lou Smit and his absurd intruder theory. That's the good news. The bad news is that the GJ appears to have accepted Steve Thomas's version of what happened, which is equally absurd. The indictment is also meaningless, as far as justice is concerned, since the charge they apparently came up with was something like involuntary manslaughter associated with child abuse, a crime that can no longer be prosecuted, since it carries a three year statute of limitations that expired years ago.

Dispelling Some Myths

Myths abound in this case. More than I could possibly deal with in a single post. But here are some of the most persistent and misleading:

1. Patsy Ramsey is responsible for the notorious "and hence" in the Ramsey Christmas message, a phrase that also appears in the "ransom" note.

• Not likely. The Christmas message was a collaboration between John and Patsy, so technically we have no way of knowing which of them wrote it. We do know, however, that John made use of it in the Newseum interview of Oct. 12, 2000 (this was online at one time, but the link is now broken, unfortunately): "The police as a gov-, …you know, the justice system is a government organization. And hence, should be looked at with some degree of skepticism, and, uh…and, uh…suspicion."  I don't know of any place where Patsy is on record as using that phrase, and indeed it would seem uncharacteristic of her communication style, which always tended toward the colloquial and informal. John, on the other hand, tends to express himself in a more formal, and even academic, manner, so his use of "and hence" would not be surprising.

Either Or

The key to the JonBenet Ramsey case has always been that puzzling "ransom" note. And in the minds of just about everyone following the case, it's a matter of either/or. EITHER the note was written by some crazed, but elusive, intruder OR it was written by Patsy Ramsey. Clearly no other alternative is possible. Burke, at the age of nine, was far too young to have written it. And John was "ruled out" by some of the leading experts in the field of document analysis. So he couldn't have written it.

How to Lie with Statistics

A recent email from a reader of this blog pointed me to a website I'd seen but forgotten about, in which the author attempted to prove that Patsy and only Patsy could have written the Ramsey "ransom" note by means of a statistical analysis. If you're curious, here's the URL: http://gemart.8m.com/ramsey/note

I had to laugh, because this person's use of statistics was clearly a travesty. It reminded me of the title of a book I'd heard about, published back in the 50's by Darrell Huff, entitled How to Lie with Statistics. Here's how his little game worked: