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Stress. He was in fear of losing his mother to cancer. His life was in upheaval as a result with his mother probably gone a lot for treatment and we know his father was always working. They may have loved him but neither had the time to shower him with attention. Also, some kids are just born with their personalities--he could have been an angry child for no other reason than having been born that way.
His sister was cute, was doted on when Patsy was well enough to devote the time, won trophies, got attention on tv, rode in parades, and must have won praise from the extended family. How did that make Burke feel. Like a nobody.
I think it affected both children. That was probably why Jonbenet was so babyish for her age. Burke was probably a hard child to interact with. He seems, from reports and the video we have of him as a child, moody. Wanting attention, but seeming "shy".
They were in a rush. Also, I think John was smarter than Patsy. That's why I never really believed he dictated that stupid rambling note. He's a business man. He probably got memos all the time. He knows to be short and precise and when poetic waxing is need. I could imaging her using line from movies she saw with him and Burke (more rough tough men movies) and thinking she was so smart for not saying things she would say in person. Or more likely, due to the time constraints, having these lines which sounded more manly pop into her head and not realizing they were from movies. For years, my friend and I had this saying. She said it once and we laughed and kept saying. Until I it said to someone else. They said "That's from a Snickers commercial". I really think SHE thought the note sounded like a man wrote it and many people have said it's a very feminine sounding.
I question hurry being a sufficient explanation for any of the weird things in the note that anyone who has a few minutes to think about it would never put in the note. Why were they in that much of a rush? Let's just assume the murder was the latest possible time, say 5:15am (most people would give a time much earlier, but 5:15 might still leave time for the level of rigor mortis and any sign of the decay Arndt reported). Their flight wasn't scheduled to leave until 7:00am. Patsy called 911 at 5:46am. That left a half hour for all the staging and writing the note. That would have been a really tight, frantic time frame, but could have conceivably been done (and would mean one primarily staging and cleaning evidence and the other primarily doing the note). But if they could have used more time, why call then? 6:45am was not some sort of a deadline, after which their whole house of cards would collapse, so it was then or never. Why not wait another fifteen minutes, why not half an hour, even, to think through this and maybe trash that crazy note note for another?
At 7:15am [EDIT: of course I meant 6:15] they could have called 911 and very easily explained that they didn't see the ransom note right away because they went down the other stairs to take a quick look in the living room for any presents or anything they wanted to take to Charlevoix, and they didn't check JBR's room or disturb her before then because they were letting JBR &BR sleep in a little; after all, how much getting ready to travel does a six or nine year-old need to do?
But, instead of spending another fifteen or thirty minutes to take a deep breath and double-check the staging and getting their story straight and trying to anticipate questions, they call 911 at 6:46am [EDIT: I mean 5:45] . There's no logical reason on Earth I can think of why they needed to be in THAT much of a hurry if 15-30 minutes would have helped them be sure they'd thought of everything they could. Why, instead, wouldn't they say, "wait a minute, this is sort of important. Maybe we should take a few seconds to think this through." The fact that no other physical evidence implicating either parent in the crime is an answer to the knee-jerk reaction I expect from some who say, "they were panicked and not in their right mind and careless." There isn't much other evidence of them being THAT careless because of being rushed that they would think that wacky note was the best they could come up with.
If the murder was (as virtually everyone believes) some time before 5:15am (any time after 11:00pm), they had that much more time for staging and cleaning evidence and coming up with a story, so that a little extra time to fine-tune the note would have been a piece of cake.
I don't assert that this changes any of the other evidence, but I think an assumption of "hurry" as any explanation for certain inscrutable actions is just stretching. If they felt they needed more time, they had it and could have taken it. A 6:15am wake-up call for JBR before they discovered her missing would be perfectly believable.
That's the way I see it.
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Last edited by meibomius; 10-16-2016 at 10:45 PM..
Reason: correct typoes in times
He probably has mixed feelings. You can have a love-hate relationship. Of course he loved her because she was his baby sister but at the same time he had rage at her. Probably. Of course, no one really ever tells us enough.
But I can remember my very first thought when this came on the news--that there could be a sibling who was jealous. I didn't even know Burke existed but I kept hearing about this pretty beauty queen who strutted around on the stage in expensive costumes. Then I thought--what if there is a sibling who doesn't get that kind of attention? What if there is a sibling who's an ugly duckling?
We all know how painfully strong sibling rivalry can be. Deep down inside they love their sibling but the jealousy can take over. I think Burke truly does hope she's having fun in heaven. She was a fun loving girl and he loved her. But he was jealous of her too.
The problem is that there is no evidence I know of from any of their friends or acquaintances or extended family members that anyone anywhere at any time observed anything indicating this, or that the idea had even occurred the them. I haven't heard of anyone who actually witnessed the golf club incident who would have any reason than to think it was anything other than an accident, childhood carelessness (someone you hit with your back swing is behind you and out of your sight; does anyone report different?)
Could have been, I suppose, but there is no evidence for it, it's pure conjecture.
Stress. He was in fear of losing his mother to cancer. His life was in upheaval as a result with his mother probably gone a lot for treatment and we know his father was always working. They may have loved him but neither had the time to shower him with attention. Also, some kids are just born with their personalities--he could have been an angry child for no other reason than having been born that way.
His sister was cute, was doted on when Patsy was well enough to devote the time, won trophies, got attention on tv, rode in parades, and must have won praise from the extended family. How did that make Burke feel. Like a nobody.
Kids don't understand serious illnesses like cancer as well as adults, and are generally not prone to worry about things unless they have been conditioned to have a reason. Patsy had cancer, underwent treatment, and was in remission. Everyone was optimistic that everything was hunky dory. There's no reason at all it would be likely for Burke to be burdened by a cloud of worry about cancer and his mother. Kids pretty much live in the present, and there isn't anything to indicate the present wasn't worry-free.
Pasty arranged with her father to have an entire parade float build for Burke's Boy Scout troop. Burke won one or more ribbons along with JBR in a bicycle-decorating contest in Charlevoix around 1993. Burke and JBR were playing together with neighbor children earlier in the day 12/26/96, and Patsy collected them to clean up for the party.
It doesn't fit to me, either. If anything it seems like an abused child who had an abused sibling. I don't really believe any child enjoys pageants. If nothing else, those pageants were abusive.
Despite your own feelings about them, there is no evidence that pageants themselves are abusive, as compared with sports or dance or math or spelling or any other pursuit that some parent may push their child to participate in at an early age. Studies have shown that a large percentage of mothers of children in pageants were in pageants themselves when they were young. If pageants are abusive and all these women should have hated them so much, why would any of them put their child through the same thing? Don't try to get psychoanalytical, most mothers simply do not deliberately force their children to endure something they didn't like themselves if there's not a damn good reason for it. That's certainly what I've heard from just about every woman I know who has a daughter. Most mothers want to avoid the mistakes of their mother, not repeat them.
If you can find some photos, or one photo, any photo that has perceptible signs of abuse, jealousy, fear, trepidation, or even unhappiness at the weather, I'll be happy to discuss it and debate what any expressions mean. You might say that photos don't prove anything, some people are sociopathic and can present a totally believable front even when there might be horrible, terrible things going on in their lives. Well, the vast majority of people can't And in the absence of evidence to the contrary, there is no valid reason to suppose any expression that appears genuine and sincere is not.
I say this because photos, to one degree or another, are evidence. Speculations about jealousy, or stress, or anger, or abuse or anything else are only that--speculation--they are not evidence.
Last edited by meibomius; 10-17-2016 at 02:32 AM..
^^^ My creaky old computer won't let me add photos here, but there are pictures showing JonBenet with unexplained bruising on her upper arms, as if someone has grabbed and held her too firmly.
There is a family picture from an earlier Christmas season, when JonBenet appears to have been around four, showing a very tense posture on her part - this is the photo with Burke standing behind his parents, while JonBenet, who's wearing a black and white plaid dress with red trim, is in front, slightly to the side of her father, twisting her feet and not looking directly into the camera, with a facial expression which is not particularly unhappy, but which is certainly not the glowing smile you describe.
There are others: pictures taken of JonBenet in the showgirl costume in particular show her with an open mouth and no smile whatsoever. That over-the-top costume drew murmurs of disapproval from the other pageant moms and was worn only once. JonBenet was a bright child, and she may well have overheard negative remarks or picked up on the disapproval and felt self-conscious as a result.
And who can forget the "I don't feel pretty" tearful incident at a pre-Christmas party?
One cannot judge a child's physical or emotional well-being based on facial expressions in photographs. I could show you pictures of kids with special needs who are barely hanging onto life in the forgotten institutions of the developing world - yet they break into huge smiles when someone pays them a little rare attention. In my profession, I occasionally encountered children who'd been neglected - they also smiled, in fact, it's common for kids who've developed attachment issues due to neglect to smile broadly at any adult and behave in a "charming" manner.
You just cannot assume that all was well with JonBenet because she was photographed smiling.
Despite your own feelings about them, there is no evidence that pageants themselves are abusive
Agree about this. Also, pageants in the mid-1990s were certainly nothing like they are today. There's a discussion somewhere in these threads about how much JB enjoyed the pageants; in one, PR stated to an interviewer that she thought the first performance would be the end of JBR's participation, but JBR begged her mother to continue.
from acandyrose: "JonBenet was a veteran of dozens of contests, a confident and adorable pixie who kept scrapbooks documenting her pageant appearances. Those who saw her perform say she was a force to be reckoned with. "She was such a natural," says LaDonna Griego, director of the Colorado program for the All Star Kids organization, based in Dallas. "But she was untouched by it. When JonBenet won, she was just as giddy as the first time, and she was just as happy, it seemed, to be an alternate. At the Christmas pageant, she sat there and just said to herself, 'Please call my name.' When they called it, her face lit up."
"TOM HANEY: Was there anything in this prior behavior that looking back now seems unusual?
PATSY RAMSEY: Well, Priscilla was never crazy about me doing this whole pageant with JonBenet, she thought that was just totally unnecessary, because she said you know, it's just not the thing to do. Well, you know, I had grown up doing it, I enjoyed it, I had a lot of friends who had done it. I had very good experience with it. So that's what I brought to the table. My daughter was a performer, she was beautiful, she was outgoing, and flourished in that type of an environment. Daphne was not. You know. So Priscilla would oftentimes say to me, you know, you just, you shouldn't do that, you know, that's not a good thing to happen. I thought, you know, well, you raise your children the way you do and we don't all raise our children the same. So you know, kind of looking back at that and think, you know, did that really get to her or something.I don't know (INAUDIBLE)."
-June 1998 Patsy Ramsey Interrogation by Thomas Haney and Trip DeMuth
"In regard to the cause of death, it should be remembered that the device wrapped around JonBenet's neck was not designed to be a garrote. It was too elaborately built. Garrotes are usually nothing but a simple length of wire or rope. The rope device on JonBenet had ligatures and a wooden stick handle and was a complicated erotic asphyxiation device designed to be used in dangerous sex games involving breath control.
According to the FBI, about 500 to 1,000 Americans accidentally lose their lives each year messing with erotic asphyxiation techniques to enhance orgasms while masturbating. Statistics are hard to calculate because the deaths are often covered up family members to prevent embarrassment.
Had the perp hit JonBenet on the head first, an elaborate EA device would not have been put on JonBenet after death in order to portray a vicious strangulation. That wouldn't make any sense. The perp would have needed only a single length of rope to portray a strangulation. Therefore, it appears the proper sequence of events would have been:
1. Accidental strangulation while EA was being performed on JonBenet;
2. Hit on the head and extreme tightening of the ligature already around the neck to portray the work of a foreign terrorist."
Not sure I agree w/ the foreign terrorist part, but I do think the garrote was used to strangle her as part of his game....no way would a parent--not these parents, anyway--do this to their 6 year old. And of course the FBI has no record of a parent ever using this device on their own child.
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I really think SHE thought the note sounded like a man wrote it and many people have said it's a very feminine sounding.