Family friend says couple, eager to clear their name, await grand jury's decision
By Charlie Brennan
and Lisa Levitt Ryckman Denver Rocky Mountain News Staff Writer
John and Patsy Ramsey would rather be indicted and tried for their daughter's murder than continue to live under the suffocating public attention that defines their lives, a family friend says.
"They know they're innocent," said Jim Marino, a longtime friend and business associate. "They want to clear their names."
The Boulder County grand jury that has been investigating the death of 6-year-old JonBenet Ramsey is expected to complete its work soon.
The Ramseys are anxiously awaiting the jurors' decision, Marino said.
"They simply want it to be done with, and to move on with their lives."
While the Ramseys wait for the rest of their lives, they've become moving targets, pursued around the clock by supermarket tabloid reporters.
If they thought they'd find peace by the banks of the Chattahoochee River in Georgia, far from the Flatirons of Boulder, they were wrong.
The couple are tracked constantly by teams of field operatives working for the papers.
One surveillance crew last week ate breakfast 10 feet from the Ramseys' table while the family was on an out-of-state trip -- listening to them talk, scrutinizing every movement.
The Ramseys' 21/2-year evolution through the public eye from grieving parents to wealthy murder suspects has earned them a curious brand of celebrity-through-notoriety.
"There is a psychological envy of people that have money," said Dr. Robert R. Butterworth, a Los Angeles clinical psychologist and frequent commentator on popular culture.
"People think, 'It's always the rich who are going to get away with it, and we can't let that happen."'
Popular culture can't seem to get enough of the story.
The Ramseys may see themselves portrayed in a television movie, and at least five books about their daughter's death are available in stores.
And The Associated Press sent a story about their apparent departure from their Atlanta home last week as part of its daily "people in the news" column.
John and Patsy Ramsey's movements were mixed among chatty tidbits about Vince Gill, Fred Rogers, Nelson Mandela and Rosemary Clooney.
The Ramseys have learned some of the lessons of celebrity since their daughter's body was found in the basement of their Boulder home on Dec. 26, 1996.
Atlanta photographer Mike Wood bumped into them June 4 outside the Atlanta Bread Company, an upscale delicatessen near the Georgia home where they've lived since July 1997.
Wood's encounter with the Ramseys came during his lunch break from the media stakeout at the Ramsey residence.
The nearly round-the-clock surveillance has intensified in the waning weeks of the grand jury investigation in Boulder.
Wood watched the couple meet briefly in the parking lot with an unidentified woman driving a sport utility vehicle. When the meeting ended, he tailed the unidentified woman in the SUV -- not the Ramseys' teal Honda Accord.
"We've tried that before," Wood said. "They're very good. We've lost them many a time."
So good, in fact, that when 12-year-old Burke Ramsey testified before the grand jury May 19, the Ramseys accompanied him to Boulder and back to Georgia without being seen.
Helping them go undetected was their decision to travel in John Ramsey's private nine-seat Mitsubishi aircraft, which he bought a year ago.
Ramsey, an instrument flight-rated pilot, purchased the plane through his Bennett Ramsey Group Inc., a corporation registered in Wilmington, Del.
Earlier in 1998, Ramsey had sold an older model Beech nine-seater.
The family continued shedding assets this year, selling their Victorian-style vacation home in Charlevoix, Mich., in March.
They filed a real estate transaction tax valuation affidavit, keeping private the sale price of their getaway, which they bought in 1992 for $336,000.
Marino said the Honda that John Ramsey drives reflects a scaling back in lifestyle.
"They've realized they don't need things like a vacation home anymore," he said. "The boat's for sale, too."
The Ramseys' lifestyle can nevertheless still accommodate tuition for Burke at the exclusive Lovett School, ensconced on a 100-acre campus almost across the street from their Atlanta home.
The school, where Patsy volunteers, boasts a $31 million endowment and an average class size of 17 students in the upper grades.
And, despite the fierce intensity of the media focus upon them, the Ramseys have shown an ability to fight back.
When the May 25 Star blared on its front page, "JonBenet was killed by brother Burke," the family swiftly won a nearly unprecedented front-page retraction.
That's small consolation for the Ramseys.
Marino said John Ramsey, formerly the president and chief executive officer of Boulder's Access Graphics, which had annual sales of $1 billion in 1996, doesn't have a job.
Ramsey hasn't been actively involved in any business ventures since he stepped down in March as CEO of Jaleo, a Spanish-based computer software firm.
"He's busy taking care of his family," Marino said. "This man is innocent. They've chased him out of his house. They've ruined his business."
On occasion, Marino said, strangers driving past the Ramseys' Atlanta home slow, roll down their windows and scream, "You murderer!"
Thursday afternoon, Atlanta police were called after a free-lance photographer scaled the front gate to get a closer look at the vacant home.
The end can't come too soon, Marino said.
"They want to be done with it," he said. "They want closure.
"But they're going to be captives of the grief forever."
June 13, 1999
