Earlier, well, yesterday now, after reading a news account about the arrest of John Mark Karr in Thailand after he confessed to the killing of 6-year-old JonBenet Ramsey in Boulder, Colorado, a decade ago, I said to Melanie that something was bothering me about the case. I had a strange suspicion that perhaps this was an unstable perv who got so obsessed with the case that he created a delusion that inserted him into the event.
According to the reports, Karr was obsessed with the murders of both JonBenet and Polly Klass of Petaluma, California, to the point that he wrote college papers about them (after which his professor said he should write a book) and even interviewed JonBenet’s grandparents. And, apparently he faces several charges related to child p**n and thus you could see how he could become obsessed with the little girl. After all, don’t police get crazies confessing to high profile crimes all the time?
Now we’re starting to see new information that lends credence to my doubts. Rod Dreher says that Karr’s ex-wife says he was in Alabama with her on the night JonBenet was killed. Then there was his alleged claim to have picked her up from school before killing her, except she died the night after Christmas when school wasn’t in session.
Ultimately, it should be the DNA evidence that shows whether he’s the killer or not. It would be too bad if the killer hasn’t been caught, because he could still be out there harming other kids. As for justice, well, no one escapes Justice in the end.
Technorati Tags:crime, John Mark Karr, JonBenet
Very true, Dom. If the DNA is a match, he’s the killer. But if the DNA doesn’t match, he almost certainly isn’t the killer.
“What does it say about our society where someone would break marriage vows and get a divorce and develop a sexual interest in kids?”
I don’t really understand this statement. I doubt his interest in kids developed as a result of his divorce. He was surely a creep since Day 1, and his wife was naive, blind, or deep in denial. I am also not sure it really says anything about our society. He’s a sicko, and sick people exist everywhere. Maybe I’m misinterpreting what you mean?
This case is SO intriguing, isn’t it? I thought for sure the mother had something to do with it, b/c there were so many things that made the intruder story seem implasuible. What I don’t get is, why did the police continue to focus on the parents if a stranger’s DNA was found on JonBenet’s undergarments?
So happy to see Matt Abbott posting here. That makes a good blog even better!
Take care, all –
“they surely played an indirect roll by dressing up their 5 and then 6 year old as a 20 year old slut”
You raise a good point (though I hate the word, “slut”) and if I had children, I wouldn’t want them participating in the pageant world. I don’t think it shows great judgment on the part of parents for alot of reasons, one of which is what you mention, ie, attracting the attention of pervs. I had a college friend who did lots of pageants, and it doesn’t sound very nice – sort of cutthroat, or at least that was my friend’s experience. I tend to think that a good number of the women who do that stuff have eating disorders too. However, JonBenet’s mother was apparently a former Miss West Virginia, and maybe her experience with pageants was better, since she was introducing her daughter into it. (Or, maybe her judgment was just pretty poor, I don’t know.) But I guess I don’t agree that the parents share culpability for her murder, if it truly was an intruder who became aware of JonBenet thru the pageants.