Third Impressions -- The Phony Investigation.

Third Impressions -- a/k/a Plausible Deniability.

During the protracted battle of wills between the Boulder authorities and the Defense Lawyers, it was clear the Boulder Authorities knew that time was on their side. The Defense Lawyers were being undermined by their own clients who were desperate to see progress made on the case no matter what the cost. The authorities were clearly the source of media leaks and had some grinning mouthpiece holding formal press conferences so the authorities knew they had the lawyers outgunned.

The Boulder Authorities did have available to them the concept of Plausible Deniability. The BPD in failing to test a blood spot on the panties knew that they could always avail themselves of that tired old standby excuse: we were awaiting further technological developments prior to submitting the sample for destructive testing. The BPD also knew that in sending investigators around to gather dirt on the Ramseys they need only demonstrate the depth and breadth of their efforts. Anecdotal statements from the various interviewees that the BPD were clearly fishing for dirt and ignoring any positive statements by the witness are simply never sufficient to overcome the public's belief that there was a neutral investigation.

Sending a team to the Vietnamese underwear factory or testing endless numbers of unsold packages until some human dna is finally found demonstrates the lengths to which the BPD would stoop in order to maintain their anti-Ramsey stance. Having a legitimate belief that the dna found at the crime scene came from the sneeze of a Vietnamese factory worker is absurd. As to how such a sneeze could cause dna to fall only on those minute portions of the panties on which Jonbenet's blood would later fall makes even the contemplation of such an absurd possibility an almost criminal waste of investigative resources and constitutes clear proof that there was no investigation going on. Clearly the BPD were conducting an enterprise that was closer to a legal witch hunt than an investigation.

Yet the police can always fall back on their plausible deniability stance. They control access to the investigative files and the allocation of resources. They know how the resources were deployed and they know what the real agenda was but they also control the speechwriters and public information spokesmen. So there is really no way to force the police to move in any direction than that which they choose.

There are notable cases wherein police forces have carried this to an extreme. Rapid LAPD were repeatedly urged by relatives of the victim to look at one female officer but this was resisted until dna tests were performed almost two decades later. Lothian and Borders police had even announced the magic phrase of "no other suspects" and "not a sex crime" despite the dead 14 year old girl having the dna from several men associated with her corpse and clothing. Only the boyfriend whose dna was not found at the crime scene was ever a suspect. The police are simply without proper oversight. One police force was able to properly deal with twelve separate homicide scenes during a one-day killing spree. A nearby police force found one corpse in a wooded area and simply left it unattended and uncovered in a rain storm until the next morning. Yet nothing happens to these incompetent police officers who are skilled mainly at finding excuses for themselves. After all, if two fourteen year old teenagers can make it over a low wall and half the drug buyers in the village can routinely make it over a low wall, don't you think a police officer should be able to make it over that wall so as to preserve the crime scene?

While the police are careful to maintain a facade of Plausible Deniability sometimes its just clear that the situation is simply "We Don't Want To Do Anything That Is Contrary To Our Whims"!