Perfect Murder, Perfect Town - Lawrence Schiller [174]
In the most recent ad, they asked for information regarding a man who is alleged to have approached young children in Boulder late last year. The implication is that JonBenét was the randomly selected victim of some pervert.
The suggestion of a specific alternative criminal at least muddies the water, and plants that crucial seed of doubt in the public mind.
It’s not the first time that’s happened in cases handled by Haddon, Morgan and Foreman, John Ramsey’s law firm.
No wonder Koby and District Attorney Alex Hunter are proceeding cautiously. Among other reasons, they’re up against the best and they know it.
—Editorial
Rocky Mountain News, May 19, 1997
Laurion told Hunter that “Koby’s stock is plunging at the moment” and that his own image needed immediate rehabilitation. It would take about two weeks of hard work, but he’d be pleased with the results, she said. Laurion then listed for her boss the upcoming stories that the DA’s office should be prepared to respond to:
Release of information in the autopsy
Fifth handwriting sample
Timetable for investigation of ransom note
Unsealing search warrants
Haddon wanting DNA evidence
Contents of DNA tests
Next meeting with Scheck and Lee
Next development on Elowsky
Laurion also told Hunter that his staff should give thought to how information should be released and the effect of releasing information. Her memo stated that the DA’s office “needed to get comfortable with a system for information dissemination.” The staff should consider whether information would harm the case if released, whether it would advance the case if released, and whether it was information the public had a right to know. She also pointed out that Hunter had to be concerned at all times with the effects of what he said on “police detectives working the case, Hunter’s own office, an eventual jury pool, the general public, news reporters, leakers, the Ramsey camp, spectators-turned-actors, those who will judge the Hunter legacy and the Boulder County voters.”
Until now, Hunter and his staff had merely been reacting to events, playing catch-up—and none too effectively—with the press. With Laurion on board, they finally had someone who not only saw their predicament clearly but could also plan ahead.
Meanwhile, Steve Thomas visited McGuckin Hardware, which John Ramsey—or someone impersonating him—had called in January. In the sporting goods department, Thomas found white nylon cord similar to the cord around JonBenét’s neck. He bought four packages of Coghlan’s Cord, for $2.29 each. In addition, he found black duct tape with the brand name Suretape. Both items sold for the same price and came from the same department that appeared on Patsy Ramsey’s December 1996 sales slips.
A week after Thomas made his purchases, Dave Williams, an investigator for the Ramseys, called Joanne Hanks at McGuckin and asked for itemized receipts of Patsy’s December 2 and December 9 purchases, only to discover that the police had them. In Patsy’s April 30 police interview, Thomas had asked her about the purchase of duct tape, and Williams was following up for his clients.
Now both the police and the Ramseys’ investigators knew that the items could have been purchased by Patsy just weeks before JonBenét’s murder.
The court’s protection of the search warrants for the Ramsey house was due to expire Sunday, May 25. Hunter’s office told Judge Diane MacDonald on May 22 that nothing had come to light to remove the Ramseys as suspects and that there was no “smoking gun,” but his office still objected to the release of the warrants. “Damaging as any particular leaks may have been,” Hunter’s office argued, “it would be much more destructive to the investigation to release to the media, and through the media to the killer or killers, the sworn documents which present in such highly organized