DocG is much better at laying out the case against John Ramsey. Here is an excerpt from his blog of John Ramsey police interview:
Here's an excerpt from his 1998 police interview:
7 JOHN RAMSEY: I came down the stairs. I went in this room here. This door was kind of blocked. We had a bunch of junk down here and there was a chair that was in front of the door. . . . I moved the chair, went into this room, went back in here. This window was open, maybe that far.
LOU SMIT: Okay. You said -- or how far were you? An inch?
JOHN RAMSEY: An inch, maybe, or less. It was cracked open.
LOU SMIT: Which window?
JOHN RAMSEY: I think it was the little one. There's three windows across here, as I recall. I think it was the middle one. It was that was broken. There was pane [of g]lass broken out of it, which I attributed to breaking myself. . .
JOHN RAMSEY: But it was open and there was a suitcase under it. This hard Samsonite suitcase.
LOU SMIT: Describe how the suitcase was positioned?
JOHN RAMSEY: It was against the wall. I think the handle was on top. It was directly under the window, as I recall. And I closed the window, I don't know why, but I closed it.
LOU SMIT: When you closed it, did you lock it or close it?
JOHN RAMSEY: I latched it. There's a little latch on it.
LOU SMIT: And you're sure of that?
JOHN RAMSEY: Pretty sure, yeah. Yeah, I am sure. I don't think I looked anywhere else. . .
SMIT: Did you tell anybody about that?
JOHN RAMSEY: I don't really remember. I mean, part of what is going on you're in such a state of disbelief this can even happen. And the, you know, the window had been broken out. And you say hah, that's it. But it was a window that I had used to get into the house before.
He accounts for the window being broken by claiming he's the one who broke it months before.
It was cracked and open a little bit. It wasn't terribly unusual for me. Sometimes it would get opened to let cool air in because that basement could get real hot in winter.
Now he accounts for the window being open by claiming he'd kept it open anyhow in the past. Pretty lame! So what if it wasn't that unusual, that's still no reason for secretly closing it! And what about the suitcase, shouldn't he have reported THAT at least?
From the previous year, John's 1997 police interview. ST is Steve Thomas:
ST: OK. When you had previously broken that basement window to gain entry to the home when you had been locked out, can you approximate what month that was?
JR: Well, I think it was last summer. Because Patsy was up at Lake (inaudible) all summer, and it would have been July or August probably, somewhere in that time frame.
ST: Did you remove that grate and get down into the window well?
JR: Uh-huh.
ST: And what did you use to break the pane?
JR: Ah, I dont remember. Might have been my foot, I dont know.
ST: OK. You reach in, Im assuming, unlatched it and gain entry through that small window.
JR: Yeah.
ST: Did you then replace the grate onto that window well?
JR: Oh I probably would have done it that night. Im sure I didnt the next morning or, you know, or thereafter.
ST: Did you remove that whole grate off onto the, off the well, to jump down there and get in?
JR: Ah, probably. I dont remember.
ST: Is there any reason that window went unrepaired?
JR: No. I mean its, Patsy usually took care of those things, and I just rarely went to the basement, so it just, I guess, got overlooked. Although she did think that she asked the cleaning ladys husband to fix it over Thanksgiving when they were doing some repair work there, but I dont know if thats ever been confirmed whether he fixed it or not.
In my original post I interrupted the above dialogue from time to time with some sarcastic comments. What bothered me, as it should anyone reading here, is how much John can't recall, how vague he is about so much in his story. He's not sure if it was last summer or not. He's not sure how he got in the well, how he broke the pane, not sure when he replaced the grate. But worst of all, he's not sure whether or not the window was ever repaired. As I wrote at the time,
How can you not know whether or not that window had been repaired? You have a whole team of investigators working for you. If the window HAD been repaired, then the break must have been done by the intruder, no? Wouldn't that be one of the most important things you'd want to determine?