Perfect Murder, Perfect Town - Lawrence Schiller [289]
When Mark Beckner arrived at work that morning, he found a copy of Thomas’s letter:*
Chief Beckner,
On June 22, I submitted a letter to Chief Koby, requesting a leave of absence from the Boulder Police Department. In response to persistent speculation as to why I chose to leave the Ramsey investigation, this letter explains more fully those reasons.
The primary reason I chose to leave is my belief that the district attorney’s office continues to mishandle the Ramsey case. It became a nearly impossible investigation because of the political alliances, philosophical differences, and professional egos that blocked progress. The wrong things were done, and made it a matter of simple principle that I could not continue to participate as it stood with the district attorney’s office.
We [detectives] conducted an exhaustive investigation, followed the evidence where it led us, and were faithfully and professionally committed to this case. We were never afforded true prosecutorial support. How were we expected to “solve” this case when the district attorney’s office was crippling us with their positions? I believe they were, literally, facilitating the escape of justice.
Thomas went on to detail some of his grievances.
During the investigation, detectives would discover, collect, and bring evidence to the district attorney’s office, only to have it summarily dismissed or rationalized as insignificant. The most elementary of investigative efforts, such as obtaining telephone and credit card records, were met without support, search warrants denied. The significant opinions of national experts were casually dismissed or ignored by the district attorney’s office, even the experienced FBI were waved aside.
Those who chose not to cooperate were never compelled before a grand jury early in this case, as detectives suggested only weeks after the murder, while information and memories were fresh.
In a departure from protocol, police reports, physical evidence, and investigative information were shared with Ramsey defense attorneys, all of this in the district attorney’s office “spirit of cooperation.”
I was advised not to speak to certain witnesses, and all but dissuaded from pursuing particular investigative efforts. Polygraphs were acceptable for some subjects, but others seemed immune from such requests. Innocent people were not “cleared,” publicly or otherwise, even when it was unmistakably the right thing to do, as reputations and lives were destroyed.
There is evidence that was critical to the investigation, that to this day has never been collected, because neither search warrants nor other means were supported to do so. Not to mention evidence which still sits today, untested in the laboratory, as differences continue about how to proceed.
Then Thomas vented his frustrations about being muzzled during the investigation.
As the nation watched, appropriately anticipating a fitting response to the murder of the most innocent of victims, I stood bothered as to what occurred behind the scenes. We learned to ignore the campaign of misinformation in which we were said to be bumbling along, or else just pursuing one or two suspects in some ruthless vendetta. Much of what appeared in the press was orchestrated by particular sources wishing to discredit the Boulder Police Department. We watched the media spin, while we were prohibited from exercising First Amendment rights. Last year, when we discovered hidden cameras inside the Ramsey house, only to realize the detectives had been unwittingly videotaped, this should have rocked the police department off its foundation. Instead, we allowed that, too, to pass without