An essay on crime and cultures.

Three men go into an Irish bar. The College Professor presents a well-reasoned analysis of the JonBenet Ramsey murder and offers precise citations as to his authority for every statement that he makes thus impressing the bartender who greatly respects men of education. The Catholic Priest presents an analysis of the murder that is sensible and inspiring and greatly pleasing to the Catholic bartender. The Cop utters absolute absurdities offensive to anyone of the slightest intelligence and directly insults the bartender and the bartender's mother. The bartender has no wiggle room. He must accept one and only one man's statements as being the absolute truth. Whose comments does he choose to embrace? Well, we all know he adopts the statements made by the Cop as clearly the absolute truth. But why?

The answer does not lie in the fact that the cop is the one with the handcuffs and the gun. Those don't particularly worry the bartender. The cop has a citation book, friends on the force and friends in city hall. The cop lives in a world wherein the arbitrary and capricious enforcement of the law is a way of life. The cop can make DUI stops and call it routine enforcement. The cop can issue citations for all manner of violations the bartender has never even heard of. The cop can have his friends from the vice squad pay a vist. And the bartender knows the cop is not above sending a few drug-possessing hookers into the bar just prior to the vice squad's arrival. Its these cultural considerations that are paramount.

Consider a photograph of two young women at the beach. A male viewing the photo will form different opinions than a female who views the photo. After all, it is a staple of nightclub comics and tv soap-operas that males and females live in totally different worlds. If the photo is a crime scene photo then the investigator does not have the luxury of reacting from just one point of view. The investigator is obligated to notice that the two young bathing beauties were obviously standing up prior to having suddenly been shot to death. The photo is not proof that a police officer approached them, quickly drew his weapon and shot them, but its a good direction to follow based upon the cultural considerations that females at a beach tend to be horizontal not vertical.

We interact with certain sub-cultures quite frequently. Consider a gym. No, not a health club, a gym! No ferns, no valet parking, no pretense. The men who go to a real gym often share certain values irrespective of their occupations and life-styles.

Consider a pool hall. I don't mean some fancy bar and billiards parlor catering to the yuppie crowd. I mean a real pool hall. Its in a seedy part of town and many of the young men hanging out there are going to be quite familiar with the raw underbelly of life in that town. Value systems will be different than elsewhere. Its not by accident that scriptwriters often have upper middle class males suddenly in need of a hitman or arsonist do their recruiting in a pool hall. The world of pool halls and strip clubs is a sensible place to interact with those who live in a different world as far as value systems are concerned. Wives who have a sudden desire to become widows often approach their hairdressers. Its a sensible and fertile field. This does not mean that a homicide investigator need only make a bee line to the widow's hairdresseer and the case will be solved, it simply is a frequently utilized avenue for breaching cultural barriers. A rich suburban wife who wishes to become a rich suburban widow can not go to pool halls and strip clubs, but she can approach a variety of hairdressers. Hollywood scriptwriters use hairdressers and pool halls because often real life involves perpetrators from different cultures. There are certain sub-cultures and certain well known bridges to reach sub-cultures. It might be time for the investigators to consider sending someone into the world of a different culture to seek leads on the JonBenet Ramsey murder.

Are there different cultures in Boulder, Colorado? Well, one need only look at the interior decorating styles. What I've referred to as Southern Foo-Foo clashes with Rustic Western that Bouldarians proudly prefer. Do cultural differences go deeper than that? Sure they do! Even in Boulder a man from the Middle East might be offended at receiving a gift for his wife. A gift to him or to his children would be perfectly acceptable in his world but a gift to his wife is an insult to his masculinity and is therefore a serious insult indeed.

So in what ways would the consideration of sub-cultures influence our analysis of the JonBenet Ramsey murder?

Let us view the family circle event. This was a church group composed largely of singles who held their annual dinner in the Ramsey home because Patsy Ramsey was the generous type who would never think twice about volunteering the use of her home. It became apparent to Patsy Ramsey that the food that had been brought by the participants was inadequate and ofcourse Patsey Ramsey did not hesitate to obtain on short notice a large quantity of Chinese food for the participants to enjoy. Now in a world of White Anglo Saxon Protestants where even the Lady Fingers that are served are right-handed this act of generosity would not be a potential source of trouble. Let us now review this incident from a cultural perspective.

All such gatherings are organized on a committee basis and there is always someone somewhere who wants to take the credit if the job is well done but who is not willing to shoulder the blame for a job that is poorly done. An act of generosity in greatly supplementing the food will be viewed differently by a male from a different culture. Does this mean that a homicide investigator need only scan the committee list looking for a foreign-sounding name and the case will be solved? Don't be absurd. Its just that an investigator has to be aware that activities recently engaged in by the Ramseys must be carefully examined from a variety of perspectives.

In Miami, one well brought up young lady returned an expensive gift from a man but was unaware that in Latin America a male is brought up to react quite differently to such an event. The young lady's lapse of cultural awareness resulted in a senseless homicide. Can such a lapse have taken place in the interactions of John Ramsey or Patsey Ramsey? I do not know. Cab drivers, convenience store owners and street vendors do not normally kill the daughters of their customers. I am not suggesting that such occupations are a fertile field for inquiries to be made. I am only suggesting that such fields are more fertile than having no leads to follow at all.

Lou Smit, and many others, appear convinced that a pedophile performed those dastardly deeds. Perhaps they are quite correct in their beliefs. There is certainly considerable evidence to support such a conclusion, but I focus on the presence of so many absurd trappings that I am forced to confront the question of whether the perversion was a primary goal or merely yet another absurd trapping. In the search for a suspect amongst the deviant subculture of pedophiles we should not necessarily forget that a suspect might be found in a culture that is simply different rather than deviant.