Foreign Faction: Who Really Kidnapped JonBenet?

by A. James Kolar

  “Keep your babies safe…” she admonished viewers, for there was a “killer on the loose in Boulder.”

  This monster’s final act of cruelty was determined to be the ultimate causation of JonBenét’s death. The pedophile tied a ligature around her neck and used it to strangle the last bit of life from her tiny body. Petechial hemorrhaging in her eyes indicated that she was still alive when strangled. As further insult, the perpetrator is believed to have inserted the broken end of the paintbrush, used as a handle in the garrote, into her vagina at or near the time of her death.

  Death was ruled by the coroner to be a homicide by asphyxiation, and time of death was later estimated to have been at approximately 1:00 a.m. on the morning of December 26, 1996.

  The target of his abduction, now deceased, was placed on the floor of the Wine Cellar. “Monster” stood over the unmoving form before him and tried to understand his feelings. Nothing. He felt nothing. Scanning the room, he observed a set of window screens along one wall and a couple of wrapped Christmas presents standing against another. Curious, the wrapping had been torn away at the top ends of each present.

  Monster took one last look around and exited the room, carefully latching the door behind him. Unbeknownst to him, he had left behind an impression from the poon of his Hi-Tec boot in the mildew on the floor next to JonBenét’s body, another clue left behind for investigators to contemplate.

  Radio transmissions from his partners encouraged him to leave the residence, but Monster wanted to see and hear the reaction of the family when they discovered the disappearance of their daughter. This was no longer about money, but cruel and unusual vengeance.

  The hours of the night slowly ticked by, and eventually Monster heard the tell-tale signs of an awakening family in the floors above him. He eventually heard Patsy scream out for John and listened as they discussed the ransom note and debated their calling of police. He listened to Patsy’s near-hysterical telephone call to 911 and settled back into the shadows of the basement when he heard the voices of the first police officer arrive on scene.

  It was not long thereafter that a uniformed sergeant swept through the basement, missing him in his darkened hiding space. The light of dawn was slowly beginning to creep its way through the basement windows, and Monster could make out the voices of additional police officers arriving at the scene.

  Yet another police officer ventured into the basement and shining his flashlight here and there, passed by Monster in his hidey hole. He was flushed with excitement as the officer returned upstairs and then began to hear the voices of family friends who had been summoned to console Patsy.

  And then some period of time later, a third person came through the basement calling out JonBenét’s name as he looked around. This man was not a uniformed officer, but he spent some time inspecting the area around the Train Room window well, and Monster began to worry that his route of escape might have been discovered.

  His heart nearly burst when the man unlatched the block of wood securing the Wine Cellar door and then stepped inside. Surely the girl’s body would be discovered by this activity. But the man had apparently seen nothing, for he soon re-latched the door and reluctantly climbed the stairs back to the kitchen.

  Monster felt that he had seen and heard enough. He had successfully eluded the observation of three people who had been through the basement that morning and the voices of those on the floor above him suggested that the house had been filling with a growing number of people. It was time to get out.

  He moved to the window well and stood upon a Samsonite suitcase that had been used to help his partners leave the basement earlier that morning. Preparing to leave, he began to carefully leverage himself into the window well and then froze. Movement in the windows directly across from the grate caught his attention, and he observed John Ramsey standing in the den not more than fifteen feet from where he hid.

  Craning his neck to get a better view, he saw John speaking to a female. It wasn’t anyone Monster recognized, and it dawned on him that it must be a police detective. She held in her hand a small tape recorder and the handset of the telephone. “Damn”, he thought. Ramsey would be stationed in the den to receive the ransom call, and he couldn’t possibly escape in full view of all of the windows that faced the back yard from that room.

  Monster climbed back down out of the window well and cursed as he accidentally scuffed the wall beneath the window with his foot. With a growing sense of panic, he began to consider his options.

  After several minutes, he decided to venture up the stairwell to the first floor and nearing the top of the stairs, he again froze in place. A toilet had flushed. He listened intently as a water faucet was turned on and off, and then a door was shut. It was apparent that someone had been using the guest bathroom located near the top of the stairs.

  Cursing himself for not doing a better job of memorizing the floor plan of the house, Monster remained in place listening for additional sounds that would alert him to the presence of another person. There is a butler door somewhere near the top of these stairs he thought: “All I have to do is make it to that door, and I’m home free.”

  Monster inched quietly toward the top of the stairs, knowing that at any instant another person could emerge from the doorway to enter the basement. His damp hand clutched a semiautomatic pistol in readiness.

  His heart pounded in his chest as his ears searched for the tell-tale sign that anyone was nearby. Peering beneath the crack of the door, Monster decided to make his next move, and he lightly grasped and then turned the door knob. By millimeters the door slowly edged open, and the distant sound of voices opened up to him. They seemed to be coming from the far side of the house.

  Stepping across the threshold of the door, Monster swore beneath his breath: “Which way is it? This place is a God-damned maze!”

  Monster turned away from the voices and crept along a short hall. He was about to turn a corner when a police radio crackled so close he thought he was almost standing on top of it. He dared not peek around the corner, for the radio hung from the belt of a CSI processing the door for latent fingerprints.

  The team in the compact vehicle had pulled back to Chautauqua Park located several blocks away on Baseline Road. Daylight was now in full bloom, and they were growing not only impatient, but alarmed. They had watched as a number of marked and unmarked police cars had visited the Ramsey home over the course of the morning. None had carried their companion away in handcuffs, so they presumed he still remained hidden somewhere in the home.

  “What in the hell was he thinking?’ protested the female.

  Suddenly there was a break in radio silence, and Monster whispered his predicament to his partners on the outside. It was agreed that from their positions of surveillance, they would track as best they could the movement of the police officers and other people in the home and advise Monster when it might be possible for him to escape the home.

  It was decided that no ransom call would be made and perhaps that would give cause for John Ramsey to leave the den and the police to retreat from the home.

  The female started up the car and decided to make another pass by the house. It only took a minute before she pulled up to a Stop sign at the intersection of Cascade and 11th Street, a few blocks southwest of the Ramsey home. Another vehicle moving slowly in her direction caught her attention.

  “Get down” she said urgently to her partner. He quickly slumped down into his seat and out of view of the passing vehicle. Her face darkened as she tracked the movement of the passing car. She made a quick right turn and drove away from the neighborhood.

  “Okay, you can get up now.”

  The male passenger pulled himself out of the foot well and peered through the rear window. “What was it?”

  “There was an unmarked police car. The passenger was videotaping all of the license plates of cars parked on the street.”

  Monster had moved back to the Train Room in anticipation of receiving the “all cl
ear” signal to “go” from his partners on the outside of the home. He paced back and forth in the tiny space and then set a chair blocking the threshold of the doorway to the room. Anyone wishing to enter the room after him would have to move the chair and thereby alert him to their presence. It was risky, but it would give him a moment to be prepared to face any additional visitors who might come to the basement before his escape.

  Time seemed to stand still until the radio transmission blurted into Monsters’ earpiece:

  “John Ramsey is in Burke’s bedroom. He’s scanning the street with a set of binoculars…”†

  Monster knew this was his best opportunity for escape, and he quickly stepped onto the suitcase and climbed into the window well. As best he could, he peered into the windows of the den and at the rear entry door just feet from the grate. He could see no one, and he slid the grate forward and was rapidly out of the window well. Two seconds to replace the grate, and Monster sprinted for the back alley of the house.

  There were no shouts of alarm or police officers yelling at him to “freeze.” He continued his sprint to the north end of the alley and then slowed to a walk. Glancing in both directions and seeing no one, he crossed the street and continued up the next alley. Eventually, he circled around to the van and quickly climbed into the side door.

  His partner greeted him with open arms.

  “No police calls on the scanner…I think you got away clean.”

  Monster leaned back wearily and caught his breath. He glanced around the interior of the vehicle and grabbed a plastic bag. Pulling the remainder of the polymer cord from his pocket, he stuffed it, the stun gun, the roll of black duct tape, and the practice pages of the ransom note into the bag and cinched it closed.

  Taking a quick look around before stepping out of the van, Monster moved to the trash can behind the Barnhill residence and deposited the “evidence” of the crime into the container.

  Several moments later, the van moved off through the alley, and the trash can slowly receded from view as Monster turned the corner at the next block. Smiling, he turned to his partner:

  “It never hurts to have a patsy ready to take the fall for you…”

  The misleading clues left behind by the members of the foreign faction were confusing and puzzling, and ultimately sent some investigators flying away on the tails of wild geese.

  “I didn’t – I couldn’t read the whole thing. I had just gotten up. We were on our, it was the day after Christmas, and we were going to go visiting, and it was quite early in the morning and I had got dressed and was on my way to the kitchen to make some coffee. And we have a back staircase from the bedroom areas, and I always come down that staircase, and I am usually the first one down.

  And the note was lying across – three pages – across the run of one of the stair treads and it was kind of dimly lit. It was just very early in the morning and I started to read it, and it was addressed to John.

  It said ‘“Mr. Ramsey.”’ And it said, ‘“We have your daughter.”’ And I, you know, it just, it just wasn’t registering. And I, I may have gotten through another sentence. I can’t. ‘“We have your daughter.”’ And I don’t know if I got any further than that.

  And I immediately ran back upstairs and pushed open her door and she was not in her bed and I screamed for John.”

  —Patsy Ramsey’s description of finding the ransom note during the CNN interview aired January 1, 1997.

  Photo 1 - Ramsey Home 755 15th Street Boulder, Colorado/ Source: Boulder PD Case Files

  Chapter Three

  Kidnapped

  It was nearing shift change at the Boulder County Regional Communications Center in the early morning hours of December 26, 1996. Having worked most of the holidays, dispatcher Kimberly Archuleta was looking forward to spending the next few days off with her teenage son.

  Dayshift relief dispatchers were coming into the center, receiving their briefing on the night’s events when the light of a 911 phone console lit up at Archuleta’s station at 0552 hours. She took the call, and immediately sensed the urgency of the hysterical voice of a female on the line.

  A hush came over the center, and co-workers turned their attention to Archuleta as she repeated the words of the 911 caller: A six year old girl had been kidnapped.

  Text of 911 Call

  Patsy Ramsey: (Inaudible) police

  Archuleta: (Inaudible)

  Patsy Ramsey: Seven fifty-five Fifteenth Street.

  Archuleta: What’s going on there, Ma’am?

  Patsy Ramsey: We have a kidnapping…Hurry, please.

  Archuleta: Explain to me what’s going on, Okay?

  Patsy Ramsey: There we have…There’s a note left and our daughter’s gone.

  Archuleta: A note was left and your daughter is gone?

  Patsy Ramsey: Yes

  Archuleta: How old is your daughter?

  Patsy Ramsey: She’s six years old…she’s blond…six years old.

  Archuleta: How long ago was this?

  Patsy Ramsey: I don’t know. I just found the note and my daughter/s (inaudible)

  Archuleta: Does it say who took her?

  Patsy Ramsey: What?

  Archuleta: Does it say who took her?

  Patsy Ramsey: No…I don’t know it’s there…there’s a ransom note here.

  Archuleta: It’s a ransom note?

  Patsy Ramsey: It says SBTC Victory…Please.

  Archuleta: Okay, what’s your name? Are you…

  Patsy Ramsey: Patsy Ramsey. I’m the mother. Oh my God, please…

  Archuleta: I’m…Okay, I’m sending an officer over, Okay?

  Patsy Ramsey: Please.

  Archuleta: Do you know how long she’s been gone?

  Patsy Ramsey: No, I don’t. Please, we just got up and she’s not here. Oh my God, please.

  Archuleta: Okay.

  Patsy Ramsey: Please send somebody.

  Archuleta: I am, honey.

  Patsy Ramsey: Please.

  Archuleta: Take a deep breath (inaudible)

  Patsy Ramsey: Hurry, hurry, hurry, (inaudible)

  Archuleta: Patsy? Patsy? Patsy? Patsy? Patsy?

  Officer Rick French was the first to arrive on scene at 0556 hours and was greeted at the front door of the residence by Patsy Ramsey. John Ramsey was visible from the front door, standing in the kitchen at the end of a length of hallway that ran toward the rear of the house. French observed John Ramsey to be dressed in a long-sleeved blue and white pin-striped shirt and khaki pants. Patsy Ramsey’s hair and make-up appeared to be neatly done, and she was dressed in a red sweater and black slacks.

  Mrs. Ramsey immediately stated that their 6-year old daughter, JonBenét, was missing from her bedroom and that a ransom note had been found indicating that she had been kidnapped. John Ramsey directed French to three pages of paper spread out on the floor of a back kitchen hall. Mrs. Ramsey told French that she had stopped by JonBenét’s bedroom at approximately 5:45 a.m. when headed downstairs that morning and found that her daughter was not in her room. She had come across the note as she proceeded down the back spiral staircase to the kitchen. She stated that she had originally found the three-page note spread on the bottom treads of the stairs, but that her husband had moved it to its current location on the floor of the hallway, just outside of the kitchen.

  French was told that Patsy Ramsey had immediately called 911 after showing the note to her husband, and he advised French that the house appeared to be locked as it had been left the previous evening. An alarm system for the home had not been used in some time, and they reported hearing nothing unusual during the night.

  Ramsey told French that he had conducted a cursory search of JonBenét‘s room and that of his 9-year old son’s while awaiting the arrival of officers. He reported that his 9-year old son, Burke, was still asleep in his upstairs bedroom. He had not been awakened by either of the parents to determine if he knew anything about JonBenét’s disappearance.

  French re-checked Jo
nBenét’s bedroom with John Ramsey and noted that the bedding had been pulled back as though one would be getting in to or out of bed. There was no sign of a struggle in the room and no sign of forced entry into JonBenét’s locked second floor balcony door. It looked like the typical room of a 6-year old.

  Sergeant Paul Reichenbach was the night shift patrol supervisor and finishing up the night’s paperwork at his desk when he overheard French dispatched to the Ramsey home. He immediately headed for his car and was the second officer to arrive on scene at approximately 0610 hours.

  French met Reichenbach at the front door and gave him a quick briefing, telling him there was a ransom note and he believed there may have been a kidnapping, but something didn’t seem “right” to him. Many years of dealing with people under stress and at the peak of their emotions often give peace officers a “sixth sense,” and something was beginning to tickle the edges of French’s radar screen.

  Reichenbach was shown the ransom note on the floor and, reading it, he began to formulate a response plan to the kidnapping. The note had specifically stated that the family was being watched. It seemed unlikely that a kidnapper would be parked outside the Ramsey home watching for police activity, but it wasn’t unreasonable to think that they could be monitoring police radio frequencies, so Reichenbach ordered radio silence for the remainder of the call. Any further communication between officers working the case would be conducted by cell phone.

  He called on the resources of the on-duty and off-duty Crime Scene Investigators, notified Sergeant Robert Whitson, the on-call detective supervisor, of the kidnapping and requested that Victim Advocates respond to the scene to assist in comforting the family. Reichenbach also took steps for the telephone company to set up a trap and trace on the Ramsey phone so that the source of any incoming phone calls for ransom could be traced.