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Speaker 2: Hi, everyone, welcome back. This is Facing Evil from Tenderfoot
Speaker 2: TV and iHeartRadio. We are your host. I am Evech
Speaker 2: and Telay.
Speaker 3: And I'm Rascha Pecerrero. So welcome back to our two
Speaker 3: part episode on the murder of John Benny Ramsey. So
Speaker 3: this is part two, so please make sure that you
Speaker 3: listened to last week's episode if you want to be
Speaker 3: completely caught up, because there is a lot on this case.
Speaker 2: And since this is part two, we're just gonna dive
Speaker 2: right back in. So here is a quick refresher. Okay.
Speaker 2: On our last episode, we talked about the Ramsey family
Speaker 2: and how their daughter John Bennet, was active in the
Speaker 2: child beauty pageant scene. We talked about my experience in
Speaker 2: the pageant scene as well. So then we went through
Speaker 2: a detailed account of the night she was killed, about
Speaker 2: how there was a strange handwritten ransom note left behind.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and we also talked about how John Benet how
Speaker 3: she actually was killed, and then we discussed the fallout
Speaker 3: as her parents, John and Patsy became prime suspects in
Speaker 3: her murder, despite appearing on television multiple times to plead
Speaker 3: their innocence and push the idea that the killer was
Speaker 3: actually an intruder.
Speaker 2: Lastly, we ended with the announcement of the special Grand
Speaker 2: Jury in nineteen ninety eight, where witness accounts would be
Speaker 2: heard and new evidence revealed. So today we're going to
Speaker 2: talk about what happened at the grand jury. We're also
Speaker 2: going to discuss some of the odd discrepancies in this case,
Speaker 2: and finally we'll explore some common theories as to what
Speaker 2: actually happened. So Trevor start us off. What happened at
Speaker 2: the grand jury.
Speaker 1: So the grand jury officially began on September fifteenth of
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety eight, and it was initiated by Special Prosecutor
Speaker 1: Michael Caine. So, according to the prosecution team, the goal
Speaker 1: of this whole grand jury was to consider inditing the Ramses,
Speaker 1: John and Patsy for charges related to the murder. So
Speaker 1: many people have actually noted how Cain called witnesses to
Speaker 1: the stand specifically to point the finger or express blame
Speaker 1: towards the Ramsey family. One of those people was Detective
Speaker 1: Linda Art who we've talked about a bunch. She was
Speaker 1: one of the first people on the scene who didn't
Speaker 1: do a fantastic job of cordoning off the crime scene. However,
Speaker 1: Detective Arn't was very publicly suspicious of the Ramses. She
Speaker 1: has some thoughts about how the Ramseys behaved that was
Speaker 1: potentially condemning them or making it seem like they were
Speaker 1: hiding something. So Cain, the prosecutor, also summoned to the
Speaker 1: stand a handwriting expert who believed that Patsy forged the
Speaker 1: ransom note that was found in the house on those stairs.
Speaker 3: So on October thirteenth, forensic evidence, including DNA, hair fibers,
Speaker 3: and handwriting was all heard by the grand jury, but
Speaker 3: nothing so far as really matching up or pointing in
Speaker 3: any direction. And on December third of nineteen ninety eight,
Speaker 3: investigators even asked for more DNA samples from all of
Speaker 3: the extended Ramsey family.
Speaker 1: Right and supposedly the goal was to rule out the
Speaker 1: family members that's why they told them they were doing this.
Speaker 1: We just want to make sure your DNA doesn't match
Speaker 1: that sort of thing. So, on May nineteenth of nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety nine, John Benaye's brother Burke Is officially ruled out
Speaker 1: as a suspect in his sister's murder, and then, finally,
Speaker 1: almost after thirteen months of deliberation, the grand jury adjourned
Speaker 1: on October thirteenth of nineteen ninety nine.
Speaker 2: The result, though, was, as I could say, a bit
Speaker 2: anti climactic, because the Boulder County District Attorney, Alex Hunter,
Speaker 2: ultimately decided not to prosecute the Ramses. He said that
Speaker 2: they did not have enough evidence to prosecute anyone at all.
Speaker 3: Like, huh right, Yeah, And although the grand jury ended
Speaker 3: without any real conclusions, the investigation was still ongoing. So
Speaker 3: and so you might think it would have been kind
Speaker 3: of smart for the Ramses to maybe keep their head down,
Speaker 3: stay out of the spotlight.
Speaker 2: But no.
Speaker 3: In fact, on March seventeenth of two thousand, John and
Speaker 3: Patsy actually published a book called the Death of Innocence.
Speaker 3: It was all about John Benet's murder and how it
Speaker 3: impacted them after it release. They were actually sued for
Speaker 3: defamation by two individuals initially named by the Bolder police
Speaker 3: as suspects, but those cases, I guess were later dropped.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then you have to remember that this entire time,
Speaker 2: Patsy was still battling cancer and in the last episode
Speaker 2: we mentioned how she was diagnosed in nineteen ninety three
Speaker 2: with ovarian cancer. And sadly, I mean, it came back
Speaker 2: on June twenty fourth of two thousand and six and
Speaker 2: Patsy Ramsey she ultimately died from the cancer and she
Speaker 2: was laid to rest next to John Benay in Marietta, Georgia.
Speaker 2: So can you imagine John now has his older daughter Elizabeth,
Speaker 2: he has his younger daughter, John Benay, and now his
Speaker 2: wife that are gone.
Speaker 4: Yeah, sad, so sad.
Speaker 1: Well, later that year, something kind of weird happened. Strange
Speaker 1: suspect came forward. On August sixteenth of two thousand and six,
Speaker 1: a person from Georgia named Alexis Valerin Reich, formerly known
Speaker 1: as John Mark Carr, was arrested in Thailand. So, just
Speaker 1: as a quick disclaimer, Reich is a transwoman. But at
Speaker 1: the time of this incident that all of this was
Speaker 1: going down, they were presenting as a man. So Reich
Speaker 1: was a former school teacher that had moved to Thailand
Speaker 1: supposedly to avoid being charged with possession of child pornography
Speaker 1: in the United States. And apparently Reich had made a
Speaker 1: bizarre confession where she claimed she was in fact John
Speaker 1: Benet's killer and described the strangulation in very graphic, very
Speaker 1: sexual detail. So, according to NBC, she told reporters, quote,
Speaker 1: I was with John Benay when she died. Her death
Speaker 1: was an accident end quote. And then when asked if
Speaker 1: she was innocent of the crime, Reike said no. However,
Speaker 1: it was very quickly discovered that the confession was entirely false.
Speaker 1: DNA tests ruled Reich out almost immediately, and then Reike's
Speaker 1: family actually provided very strong evidence that Reike was with
Speaker 1: them in Georgia at the time of John Benney's murder
Speaker 1: in Colorado, so like thousands of miles away. So I
Speaker 1: don't know what happened here. I guess this was just
Speaker 1: a person who was very obsessed with the case, maybe
Speaker 1: wanted some time in the spotlight, or.
Speaker 2: Mentally not well or yeah, well, definitely, we know that
Speaker 2: has to be one of the main factors, right or
Speaker 2: somebody trying to take credit for a murder right and
Speaker 2: describing it in graphic detail like it's super super disturbing. Finally,
Speaker 2: in July of two thousand and eight, the Ramsey family
Speaker 2: members are officially cleared as suspects in John Benney's murder
Speaker 2: thanks DNA testing. And I didn't know that fact until
Speaker 2: I was doing research for this podcast, Like the DA
Speaker 2: even apologized to the entire Ramsey family, And that was
Speaker 2: all the way back in two thousand and eight, and
Speaker 2: we're in twenty twenty two right now. In that same report,
Speaker 2: police said that they had actually identified some third parties
Speaker 2: DNA on John Benny's actual panties and if they could
Speaker 2: actually match that DNA, that would be incredibly strong evidence.
Speaker 4: But they have yet to do that.
Speaker 3: That was again, all the way back in two thousand
Speaker 3: and eight, and sadly that more or less concludes the
Speaker 3: official investigation of the murder of John Benny Ramsey.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but there's I mean, there's still a ton more
Speaker 2: to discuss here, because, like we said, people online have
Speaker 2: absolutely broken this case down like bit by bit by
Speaker 2: peace by piece, I mean, and there are tons of
Speaker 2: theories and discrepancies that change everything and it's constantly, right,
Speaker 2: constantly change.
Speaker 3: Started in those chat rooms back in the nineties, right,
Speaker 3: like Trevor Sacly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So buckle up, y'all. This case is about to
Speaker 2: get wild.
Speaker 1: And we will dig into all of that right after
Speaker 1: we take a quick break.
Speaker 3: So this case is full of wild discrepancies, things that
Speaker 3: absolutely do not add up, and that has led to
Speaker 3: a huge number of theories and suspects. Let's start with
Speaker 3: the discrepancies first. That nine to one one call, the
Speaker 3: first call to the police placed by Patsy Ramsey on
Speaker 3: the morning of December twenty sixth, has become a big
Speaker 3: point of contention. The nine to one one operator has
Speaker 3: actually said that Patsy's tone at the time seemed rehearsed,
Speaker 3: and some believe that her panic seemed staged. There's also
Speaker 3: the weird issue with Burke and the phone call and
Speaker 3: hearing Burke in the background, because John and Patsy actually
Speaker 3: claimed that he was still asleep, so why would we
Speaker 3: be hearing Burke's voice on that enhanced nine one one call?
Speaker 4: And Burke being awake points to.
Speaker 3: The possibility that he was actually more involved in the
Speaker 3: situation than the family had claimed, and honestly, you know,
Speaker 3: in my opinion, I think all these years that's what
Speaker 3: I thought had happened. I personally thought that maybe Burke
Speaker 3: had accidentally killed his sister and the parents were desperately
Speaker 3: trying to protect him.
Speaker 2: Okay, So next up is that famous ransom note. You
Speaker 2: do remember it, right? It was found on the stairs
Speaker 2: that morning, and many believe that there was something fishy there.
Speaker 2: I mean, first of all, as we know, it was
Speaker 2: written on paper from Patsy's personal stationery and with a
Speaker 2: pin from inside the Ramsays home. And it was also
Speaker 2: filled with a ton of strange language choices that can
Speaker 2: I just say no by he really understands what the
Speaker 2: hell it means.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and for context, I will read a few choice
Speaker 1: excerpts that I pulled. Here's the first one. Quote listen
Speaker 1: carefully with an exclamation mark. We are a group of
Speaker 1: individuals that represent a small foreign faction. We in redacted
Speaker 1: respect your business, but not the country that serves it.
Speaker 1: End quote, which kind of I guess implies that this
Speaker 1: is some sort of like foreign terrorist group.
Speaker 3: Oh, okay, share, I'm not sure.
Speaker 1: Here's another one quote, don't try to grow a brain, John,
Speaker 1: You are not the only fat cat around. So don't
Speaker 1: think that killing will be difficult. Don't underestimate us, John,
Speaker 1: use that good Southern common sense of yours. It is
Speaker 1: up to you now, John end quote. So again, this
Speaker 1: is weird. It's like somehow they're implying that they have
Speaker 1: some agenda, you know, that's like about the country, but
Speaker 1: then they somehow also know John personally and getting that
Speaker 1: detail away. To me, this feels fake, is the only
Speaker 1: thing I'll say about this. Well, I know we're going
Speaker 1: to talk about some of the popular theories in a minute,
Speaker 1: but my main takeaway reading this note is this all
Speaker 1: feels like inconsistent and made up by somebody.
Speaker 2: This is my thought, right.
Speaker 3: It's also suspicious that the ransom amount that they demanded
Speaker 3: was one hundred and eighteen thousand dollars, which is the
Speaker 3: exact amount that John had just recently received for his
Speaker 3: Christmas bonus. And since John Binney was sadly most likely
Speaker 3: dead by the time that this ransom note was written,
Speaker 3: the whole thing makes it look like the parents were
Speaker 3: involved in the murder and they were just attempting to write,
Speaker 3: like Trevor said, a fake ransom letter to divert attention
Speaker 3: away from themselves. So yes, I think that that's plausible,
Speaker 3: especially when you realize that the ransom was never really
Speaker 3: brought up, like.
Speaker 4: While they were searching for Jumpine. No, they don't even
Speaker 4: talk about it.
Speaker 3: And maybe it's because one hundred and eighteen thousand dollars
Speaker 3: isn't that much money to them. I mean, I don't know,
Speaker 3: but John never bothered to talk about the money, addressed
Speaker 3: it in any way, or even talk about these kidnappers.
Speaker 3: It was almost completely ignored and dropped.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean my instinct if like I had learned that,
Speaker 1: you know, my child or loved one had been kidnapped
Speaker 1: by somebody and was holding them ransom, would be to
Speaker 1: like communicate with them, like get them back, you know,
Speaker 1: but that like has never brought up. Instead, they're like, well,
Speaker 1: we got to search the house for John Benet, right right, right?
Speaker 1: If they know she's in the house somehow that like
Speaker 1: she hasn't been kidnapped somewhere else.
Speaker 3: Right yeah right?
Speaker 2: Yeah, Because see when you think about that, like the
Speaker 2: first thing would come to mind is get the money, right,
Speaker 2: go get the money that they asked for.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Okay, so there's so many weird things, but I promise
Speaker 2: this is the last one, but it's not. As we know,
Speaker 2: there was some crime scene contamination when they found John Benet.
Speaker 2: We of course have no idea whether that was intentional
Speaker 2: or not, but any possible evidence we could have gotten
Speaker 2: from the house on that particular day or the body,
Speaker 2: we know it was ruined after the cops arrived. So Trevor,
Speaker 2: please remind us of what happened.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so, pretty much from the moment that cops walk
Speaker 1: into the house, a number of things go wrong. One
Speaker 1: of those is that guests arrive at the Ramsey house.
Speaker 1: You remember fleet White and his wife arrived shortly thereafter,
Speaker 1: and police let them in. So that was a failure
Speaker 1: to cordon off the crime scene. They just were letting
Speaker 1: people kind of come, which is bad. And then of
Speaker 1: course they allowed the family members to search the house
Speaker 1: with them, right, so they assigned John and fleet White
Speaker 1: the task of searching the house and touching things and
Speaker 1: looking for the body. And the result of this is
Speaker 1: that John finds the body. Even though police couldn't find
Speaker 1: the body, he picks it up, so he touches the body,
Speaker 1: he rips off the duct tape. Police never even investigate
Speaker 1: the spot where her body is found or if they
Speaker 1: investigate it, they don't investigate it in the way it
Speaker 1: was when she was like found dead.
Speaker 2: Does that makes sense?
Speaker 4: Yeah, yes, it was moved.
Speaker 1: We have no idea what that crime scene actually even
Speaker 1: looked like because John messed with it and we just
Speaker 1: kind of took his word for it. So finally they
Speaker 1: let Patsy also touched the body when she was brought
Speaker 1: into the living room, and so maybe we could have
Speaker 1: learned that Patsy's fingerprints or DNA were on John Benny's
Speaker 1: body before that point, in which case that would have
Speaker 1: told us something. But because you know, we know that
Speaker 1: she touched her when she was grieving, supposedly, you know,
Speaker 1: it's impossible to identify whether that DNA or fingerprints were
Speaker 1: from that, you know, occasion or from a different occasion
Speaker 1: from before when the police arrived. So again we have nothing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we yeah, exactly, we have nothing. I mean, and
Speaker 2: I just go back to that first police officer, Linda
Speaker 2: Aren't like she let them just like you said, you know,
Speaker 2: go look for the body. Like that just doesn't sit
Speaker 2: right with me.
Speaker 3: So with all of that in mind, in the contaminated
Speaker 3: crime scene, let's talk about the different theories that are
Speaker 3: floating around, because as we have discussed, there are many
Speaker 3: and they're a little wild. But of course one that
Speaker 3: we do need to talk about, which like y'vett originally thought,
Speaker 3: you know, that Patsy was the killer. So a lot
Speaker 3: of people believe that it was John Benay's mom. According
Speaker 3: to Rolling Stone, some believe that, while you know, cleaning
Speaker 3: up one of John Benet's bed wedding incidents, that Patsy
Speaker 3: got crazy, angry and slammed John Benet's little head against
Speaker 3: the side of some hard, blunt surface, like maybe a
Speaker 3: bathtub or the bed frame. So another thing to support
Speaker 3: the idea of Patsy killing John Benet was that she
Speaker 3: was at least partially killed by a garrot, which is
Speaker 3: like a wire used for strangulation, and that handle was
Speaker 3: determined to have been made from one of Patsy's paintbrushes.
Speaker 3: So the last thing is that the ransom note again
Speaker 3: was written on Patsy's stationary, and that initially her handwriting
Speaker 3: was not ruled out when they were comparing it with
Speaker 3: the note. So those are kind of the few big
Speaker 3: things that point to Patsy being being the killer.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, and again, I go back to I
Speaker 2: thought from the very beginning, like that was my first impression,
Speaker 2: is that Patsy was this obsessed, you know, pageant mom
Speaker 2: who you know, or maybe her daughter wasn't performing the
Speaker 2: way that she wanted her to perform. I don't know.
Speaker 2: And then watching Patsy on television, like they're just she
Speaker 2: didn't seem like she was all there, So I thought, Okay,
Speaker 2: well that's plausible she could possibly have flipped out and
Speaker 2: done this. I don't know, what do you guys think?
Speaker 1: It seems like a bit of a weird horror story situation, right,
Speaker 1: like this obsessed mom like taking her you know, anger
Speaker 1: out on her daughter and killing her. It reminds me
Speaker 1: of a movie by a Sotoshi Cone called Perfect Blue.
Speaker 1: Have you've ever seen that? So? Perfect Blue is about
Speaker 1: a pop star musician in Japan. It's an animated film,
Speaker 1: and the whole idea is that as a pop star
Speaker 1: with a lot of visibility and like fame, she has
Speaker 1: like all these like kind of like creepy stalkers who
Speaker 1: and so the movie like is making you think that,
Speaker 1: you know, they are these creepy stalker people had to
Speaker 1: like kill her or harm her in some way, and
Speaker 1: then you realize at the end, like the person who's
Speaker 1: most trying to harm her, her mom, is like her,
Speaker 1: not her mom, but her agent, who is also like an.
Speaker 4: Order like close person close to her.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was kind of like the story of Selena. Also, yeah,
Speaker 1: if you know about that, right, it's like this other
Speaker 1: woman who's older, who is like very envious, ended up
Speaker 1: being like the most danger.
Speaker 2: To her, right, Yeah, that's true in pop movies like Bodyguard,
Speaker 2: right when Whitney Houston is this famous superstar, remember, and
Speaker 2: then the killer ends up being her sister, the one
Speaker 2: who's sending the ransom notes and stuff like that.
Speaker 4: So yeah, I can't imagine that it's Patsy.
Speaker 3: I mean, like, well, of course, you know, may she
Speaker 3: rest in peace, says she's not alive to defend herself.
Speaker 3: But I can't see a mother harming a child. But
Speaker 3: you know, sadly, we do know that it happens.
Speaker 1: But well, there are more theories, so yeah, oh, let's more.
Speaker 2: Sorry, Okay, there's this theory. So the dad, John Ramsey,
Speaker 2: was responsible. So this is the other theory, right, and
Speaker 2: this is because, as we said earlier, he was the
Speaker 2: one who found the body before the investigators did. And
Speaker 2: the thing about this is nobody saw him find the body.
Speaker 2: He just said that he found her and he brought
Speaker 2: her upstairs. And like you said earlier, right, Trevor, he
Speaker 2: took the duct tape off of her mouth as well,
Speaker 2: So all that evidence is gone because he's already touched it, right.
Speaker 2: So the theory is maybe he already knew where John
Speaker 2: Bennet was and the whole discovery was just an act.
Speaker 1: Very possible. I mean, the police officer wasn't able to
Speaker 1: find them. They spent hours searching and never found her.
Speaker 1: So the fact that he John was able to find
Speaker 1: her so quickly is certainly suspicious.
Speaker 3: Yeah again, Devil's Advocate. It was a fifteen room house
Speaker 3: and really large too, So maybe he just got lucky.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 2: I don't know if you get lucky in your own house.
Speaker 1: But okay, yeah, yeah, I mean there was one other
Speaker 1: piece of I guess you can call it evidence that
Speaker 1: pointed to John. Really, this is just a theory that
Speaker 1: people have talked about online. So if you remember, John
Speaker 1: Benay was found with vaginal ligatures, so many people put
Speaker 1: forth this idea that John was you know, somehow sexually
Speaker 1: abusing John Benney his daughter and that that's where that
Speaker 1: came from, and that like maybe this was a night
Speaker 1: where he was like creeping into his daughter's room to
Speaker 1: do this and something went wrong and he killed her. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a theory online, right, that one I'm skeptical of
Speaker 1: and certainly don't want to ever accuse anyone of that
Speaker 1: without any proof. And that's the thing, there was no
Speaker 1: real proof of this theory. The family vehemently denied it,
Speaker 1: and they even said publicly, quote, there is no history
Speaker 1: of sexual assault. A person doesn't just go throughout their
Speaker 1: lives as a normal human being and then one night
Speaker 1: turn into a monster, slaughter their daughter, go to bed,
Speaker 1: get up and act normal from there on. That doesn't
Speaker 1: happen end quote. And I mean, I don't know if
Speaker 1: that actually did happen. That's horrible, but it sounds really
Speaker 1: weird to me. I mean, I think there's some truth
Speaker 1: to that quote, right, Like, there's really no history of
Speaker 1: this and there's nothing else to bet.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and normally abusers have a pattern and a history
Speaker 3: and a Yeah, it doesn't just come out of nowhere
Speaker 3: and then go away again.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and he was for some reason for me, he
Speaker 2: was not at the top of my list.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and he's very active today in talking about John Benney,
Speaker 3: like he goes to crime con he I believe, he's written,
Speaker 3: you know, other books and he's he just seems so
Speaker 3: authentic and so real and so devastated by everything that's
Speaker 3: happened to his family. And sadly, no matter what happens,
Speaker 3: people are always going to think that possibly that he
Speaker 3: or Patsy did it.
Speaker 2: Well, that's the thing. And you know, I love Elizabeth
Speaker 2: Vargas and there's a special that she did and it's
Speaker 2: called Hunting John Benney's Killer. And there's many things that
Speaker 2: they talk about in this, but one of the things
Speaker 2: that was that stood out to me is John Ramsey
Speaker 2: said that if they did find the killer, right all
Speaker 2: these years later, they found the DNA of who killed
Speaker 2: John Beney, still twenty percent of society would still put
Speaker 2: the blame on the Ramsey family.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So another huge theory out there is that her brother Burke,
Speaker 3: somehow actually did the killing. And that's you know what
Speaker 3: I had thought for a long time. It felt like
Speaker 3: the parents were covering up something and maybe they were
Speaker 3: trying to protect their son. You know, investigators discovered what
Speaker 3: they called a perfectly rectangular defect in John Beney's head.
Speaker 3: They suspected that it came from a blow from a
Speaker 3: big flashlight, which can actually be seen in a photo
Speaker 3: that was on the kitchen counter in the crime scene photos.
Speaker 3: So supposedly the flashlight fit the eight and a half
Speaker 3: inch gash in her skull to perfection, but no evidence
Speaker 3: of either John Benet or Burke were actually found on
Speaker 3: the flashlight.
Speaker 1: So yeah, there was also something else that pointed to Burke,
Speaker 1: if you remember, John Benay also had a couple of
Speaker 1: injuries on her back that looked like maybe.
Speaker 4: Cuts or lacerations.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, So investigators initially thought they were from like
Speaker 1: a stun gun, like some sort of home in trader
Speaker 1: or something, or somebody like hit her with a stun gun,
Speaker 1: but they later discovered that they the marks were consistent
Speaker 1: with the edges of one of Burke's toy train tracks,
Speaker 1: so police thought Burke used them to like nudge or
Speaker 1: poke his sister's unconscious body for a response, like after
Speaker 1: some incident had happened. Yeah, the question of whether or
Speaker 1: not Burke did it to me is the only big
Speaker 1: plausible one out of the three of the parents. I
Speaker 1: don't want to like make any false accusations, but if
Speaker 1: we're just purely looking at the facts, I think, like
Speaker 1: you said, the parents seemed to be lying for a
Speaker 1: reason to cover up something going on this night. We
Speaker 1: don't know what, but it feels like if they were
Speaker 1: trying to get themselves out of the situation, there are
Speaker 1: things they would have done differently. It very much felt
Speaker 1: like they were covering up for somebody else, and the
Speaker 1: only other person there was Burke. And remember, like Burke
Speaker 1: was heard in the background of that nine one one call,
Speaker 1: so he was clearly awake and involved in some capacity
Speaker 1: that they are not telling us about. So it feels
Speaker 1: like they are lying for Burke many times.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 1: So, Okay, there's one more theory that we need to
Speaker 1: talk about, and this is really the one that's most
Speaker 1: prominent today. But we have to take another break, so
Speaker 1: we'll talk about that theory when we come back.
Speaker 2: Okay, So, the last big theory is the intruder theory.
Speaker 2: So CBS would report that there were thirty eight registered
Speaker 2: sex offenders in a two mile radius of the Ramsays home,
Speaker 2: and that there were over a hundred burglaries in their
Speaker 2: namemborhood in the months before the murder. So this is
Speaker 2: another theory. You have thirty eight sex offenders. That's a
Speaker 2: huge number, and especially in you know, this is a
Speaker 2: money area.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and this is the theory that was being pushed
Speaker 1: by the Ramsey parents themselves, like on TV, like, we
Speaker 1: live in a dangerous area and some wacko did this
Speaker 1: to our daughter. And this is now essentially where the
Speaker 1: investigation stands because it's been ongoing. So the investigation currently
Speaker 1: believes that it was in fact two intruders. They think
Speaker 1: this because there were actually two distinct bootprints in the
Speaker 1: room where John Bennie was found, the wine cellar that
Speaker 1: they later discovered. There was also a report of a
Speaker 1: ban that was at some point squatting outside the Ramsey house.
Speaker 1: They had two accounts of this. One was the night
Speaker 1: before she was murdered and then also the day after.
Speaker 1: So multiple times they're seeing this van, which makes people
Speaker 1: think there's somebody stalking Jump and at I think there's
Speaker 1: a lot of a lot of evidence to back this up. Frankly,
Speaker 1: I mean, this is kind of what we've been alluding
Speaker 1: to this whole episode or two two episodes, which is
Speaker 1: that you know, Jean Benet had a very public profile, yep,
Speaker 1: and you know there are a lot of creepers out there.
Speaker 1: Whoever the creepy dude was on the float that night,
Speaker 1: you know, the night before or a couple nights before
Speaker 1: she went missing.
Speaker 2: I mean for me, like again, I started with Patsy,
Speaker 2: then I thought it was Burt. But what seems the
Speaker 2: most plausible for me is an intruder, but an intruder
Speaker 2: that knew their comings and goings. Yes, Like I feel
Speaker 2: like somebody was watching them and got into the house
Speaker 2: and did this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, if you remember too, that actually makes
Speaker 1: sense because one of the first suspects they looked at,
Speaker 1: and I mentioned this on part one was Bill McReynolds,
Speaker 1: who was the guy who played Santa Claus that night
Speaker 1: at the holiday party.
Speaker 3: I don't they always the creepers, the ones that play
Speaker 3: Santa or clowns.
Speaker 2: Don't say that about Santa Russia.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm sorry, Santa impersonators, nothing personal, but you're kind
Speaker 3: of creepy.
Speaker 1: I've always thought Santa's were creepy. I'm sorry. I don't
Speaker 1: even anyhow he would actually fit that profile really well, right,
Speaker 1: because he knew them. He was like a neighbor, so
Speaker 1: he knew their comings and goings. However, he was officially
Speaker 1: dismissed as a suspect eventually, So.
Speaker 2: Right, right, it could have been like you know, John
Speaker 2: Bennet was in the pageant scene. She was, you know,
Speaker 2: on this flow. It could have been another pageant father
Speaker 2: who was obsessed with young girls. I mean, I just
Speaker 2: really think that it was somebody other than one of
Speaker 2: the family members.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think so too.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was just I mean a couple of days
Speaker 1: earlier that she had one little Miss Christmas pageant in Denver,
Speaker 1: so like there was a lot of like eyes on
Speaker 1: her around that time. I think one thing that backs
Speaker 1: up this idea too is the fact that she was
Speaker 1: clearly sexually assaulted in some way. Yeah, so in this theory,
Speaker 1: it would mean that one of these creepy dudes had
Speaker 1: desires to sexually harm this child, and so that would
Speaker 1: make sense of the trauma they found on her body.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, it's whoever did it was clearly a pedophile, absolutely,
Speaker 5: And I just have to say, you know, while we're
Speaker 5: talking about you know, the whole pageantry, like a lot
Speaker 5: of people have really criticized, you know, Patsy for pushing
Speaker 5: John Bennet into it.
Speaker 2: And you know, there's definitely something about that, right, because
Speaker 2: trying to make your child, you know, compete like in
Speaker 2: an industry that she was once in, right by dressing
Speaker 2: her up and doing the heavy makeup in the dresses,
Speaker 2: like she's trying to live vicariously through her daughter, right,
Speaker 2: But at the same time, like we have to remember
Speaker 2: she's five years old.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean there's some danger to like making your
Speaker 1: child an object of sex appeal for sure.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I think it kind of makes her
Speaker 1: a target in a really messed up way. And I
Speaker 1: hate to say it that way, but you know, this
Speaker 1: just gets I think, into a philosophical conversation about whether
Speaker 1: or not you believe in child beauty pageants should be
Speaker 1: a thing or not, like if they are dangerous. And
Speaker 1: I think that's probably where a lot of that criticism
Speaker 1: of Patsy comes from, not saying she did it herself,
Speaker 1: but that indirectly she like set way up to be
Speaker 1: stocked and eventually killed.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, So I do want to point something out, right,
Speaker 3: So once again, the media was absolutely relentless in this
Speaker 3: case and very similar to the cases of Lacy Peterson
Speaker 3: and Matthew Shepard. This case was on every TV station,
Speaker 3: every magazine. It was in the news cycle for literal years,
Speaker 3: and people were obsessed and I was one of them.
Speaker 4: Me too.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I had a really hard time reading the details,
Speaker 3: but I wanted to and I want to know who
Speaker 3: killed John Benny Ramsey. But like, it just it makes
Speaker 3: me sad, like especially like having a voice, and we're
Speaker 3: all having this discussion, right It's like we could be
Speaker 3: having this discussion at Yvette's you know house in San Francisco,
Speaker 3: and no one else would be hearing it, but the
Speaker 3: world is hearing it. So whether that's good or bad,
Speaker 3: it definitely can negatively impact the Ramsey family. And you know,
Speaker 3: we're not the only ones talking about the John Benney
Speaker 3: murder case, and we have to think about it. Right,
Speaker 3: The Ramses were completely thrown into the spotlight when their
Speaker 3: little girl was murdered, and I can only imagine what
Speaker 3: they went through, what Burke went through, and John and Patsy,
Speaker 3: like everyone in the Ramsey family, and Burke, you know,
Speaker 3: has since led a very private life, with the exception
Speaker 3: of the fact that he was actually interviewed by Yvette.
Speaker 4: Our friend doctor Phil.
Speaker 2: Yep, doctor Phil, Yep.
Speaker 4: We love our doctor Phil.
Speaker 3: So let's listen to a clip of Burke being interviewed
Speaker 3: by doctor Phil.
Speaker 6: Now, I remember the casket is small and her eyes
Speaker 6: were closed. I think one of her eyes was a
Speaker 6: little bit like droopy or something. I thought that was weird.
Speaker 1: How did you feel seeing her?
Speaker 6: A lot of sadness. I don't think I really fully
Speaker 6: grasped like after this, I won't see her again.
Speaker 3: So when you listen to Burke, there's clearly a lot
Speaker 3: of pain there because at nine years old, he went
Speaker 3: through horrific trauma. And of course I know that people
Speaker 3: want to know the truth. But I can only imagine
Speaker 3: that this ruined Burke's life, and I truly, truly, truly
Speaker 3: believe that we should do our best to give him
Speaker 3: and the entire Ramsey family, you know, some some peace, greed.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think you know, whatever the truth is, you know,
Speaker 1: Burke went through something horrible. Yeah, you know, as far
Speaker 1: as the facts tell us, you know, both he and
Speaker 1: his parents are not responsible for this murder, so until
Speaker 1: proven otherwise, Like, people need to stop harassing Burke, Yeah,
Speaker 1: people need to stop accusing him of things and unless
Speaker 1: there's something concrete, yeah, exactly, you know, and either way,
Speaker 1: he was just a kid. He was. Even if something
Speaker 1: did happen, it wouldn't have been intentional.
Speaker 4: Yeah, right.
Speaker 3: I just hope he's had the opportunity to go through
Speaker 3: like PTSD and trauma therapy and it can really help.
Speaker 2: We all know that, you know, generational trauma is a
Speaker 2: real thing. So and you can imagine him being nine
Speaker 2: years old and having to deal with this his whole life.
Speaker 6: Right.
Speaker 2: So some people, you know, when they saw that clip
Speaker 2: of him on Doctor Phil, you know, everybody is trying
Speaker 2: to analyze like, Okay, well, is he did he do it?
Speaker 2: Is he right in the head?
Speaker 6: Is it?
Speaker 2: This?
Speaker 6: Is that?
Speaker 2: But you have to remember whether he's speaking the way
Speaker 2: that you want him to speak or making the eye
Speaker 2: movements like that, doesn't none of that matters, Like you know,
Speaker 2: like you said, there's no concrete evidence. But what what
Speaker 2: we do have to remember we have to have some
Speaker 2: compassion for what the family has gone through.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: Well, we're near the end of the show today, and
Speaker 2: that means it's time for our Emua, our final message
Speaker 2: of hope and healing. We may never find out what
Speaker 2: happened to John Bennet or who killed her. So it's
Speaker 2: impossible to find any mua in the case like this,
Speaker 2: almost impossible, almost impossible, where a young girl was taken
Speaker 2: before she could even blossom, and too the woman she
Speaker 2: was meant to be.
Speaker 3: But we always have to find the light in the darkness,
Speaker 3: and we will do that here.
Speaker 4: Our emua today is about.
Speaker 3: The innocence of the cakey and Kiki and Hawaiian means child.
Speaker 4: So our emoa is dedicated to the innocence of children.
Speaker 2: Yes, and especially to the children like John Bennet who
Speaker 2: were robbed of their innocence. And I'll just leave you
Speaker 2: with this thought. Let children be children. Onward and upward,
Speaker 2: Emoa Emoa.
Speaker 4: That's our show for today.
Speaker 3: If you want to reach out and share a thought
Speaker 3: about today's discussion, please find us on social media at
Speaker 3: Facing Evil Pod or email us at Facingevil Pod at
Speaker 3: tenderfoot dot tv until next time.
Speaker 1: Facing Evil is a production of iHeartRadio and Tenderfoot TV.
Speaker 1: The show is hosted by Russia Pacquerero and Avett Gentile.
Speaker 1: Matt Frederick and Alex Williams, our executive producers on behalf
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio with producers Trevor Young and Jesse Funk. Donald
Speaker 1: Albright In Payne Lindsay our executive producers on behalf of
Speaker 1: Tenderfoot TV, alongside producer Tracy Kaplan. Our researcher is Claudia Dafrico.
Speaker 1: Original music by Makeup and Vanity Set. Find us on
Speaker 1: social media or email us at facingevilpod at tenderfoot dot tv.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio or Tenderfoot TV, visit the
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