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I believe that uh sometime during uh December 25th 1996 Christmas night Christmas night someone got into
00:02:03
the house of John and py Ramsey I believe there is some evidence to suggest strongly that he may have come
00:02:09
in through a basement [Music] window L Smith also found tracks and Mar on the little girl's back and neck that
00:02:32
he thought pointed to a stun gun being used in the case that perhaps she'd been taken from her bed and kept quiet
00:02:38
because she'd been [Music] stunned I think that the stun gun is one of the best Clues left behind by the
00:02:52
killer as far as a clue but it also may explain why John banet did not cry out when she was first abducted I am
00:03:01
convinced that a stun gun was [Music] [Music] used Lou detailed 10 11 12 13 points
00:03:21
that led him to believe that an intruder had committed this homicide and not an inside job by any one of the three
00:03:30
family members in 1966 Lou Smith joined the Colorado Springs Police Department after years of service he
00:03:43
worked his way up to the rank of detective L Smith eventually would become the Department's top homicide
00:03:51
investigator he was involved in a number of notable cases including the conviction of spree killer Freddy Glenn
00:03:58
for a series of murders this included at the time the Cold Case killing of Karen Grammer the younger
00:04:06
sister of actor Kelsey Grammar later at the request of his one-time Protege and lifelong friend
00:04:14
John Anderson Lou joined the El Paso County Sheriff's Department John Anderson was the
00:04:21
recently elected sheriff and one of his major goals during his tenure as Sheriff
00:04:27
was to solve the murder of Heather on Church Heather was a 13-year-old 8th grader at Falcon Middle School when she
00:04:36
vanished September 17th 1991 from her home off of eastonville Road in El Paso County
00:04:45
Colorado her mother had left the house around 5:30 p.m. when she returned at 10:15
00:04:52
p.m. Heather was missing Heather Dawn Church's father had been one of the the original suspects in
00:05:00
the daughter's murder El Paso County sheriff's deputies FBI agents and a battalion of volunteers
00:05:08
spent 2 years looking for Heather in 1993 a hiker discovered a human skull near an old abandoned car
00:05:18
off of Rampart Range Road exactly 2 years after her disappearance dental records were used to identify the
00:05:26
remains of Heather L Smith through dogged detective work discovered that the abductor and killer was the victim's
00:05:35
neighbor Robert Charles Brown Brown ultimately confessed to a total of 48 murders he was convicted for
00:05:45
the murder of Heather Dawn church we covered the Heather Dawn Church case in True Crime garage
00:05:52
episodes 339 and 340 Smith retired in 1996 from the Alp Paso County Colorado Sheriff's
00:06:01
Department where he had served as the captain of detectives Lou Smith had become a master
00:06:09
detective in 1997 3 months after the murder of John Benet Ramsey L SMI was asked by the boulder
00:06:17
District Attorney's office to come out of retirement and to assist with the investigation Smith resigned from the
00:06:26
case after 18 months having concluded that the ramies were not responsible for the murder and that the Boulder Police
00:06:33
Department had been unjustifiably pursuing the Ramsay as suspects despite DNA and other evidence that showed that
00:06:42
some other person was responsible for the killing as a detective Smith boasted that he had never lost a homicide case
00:06:51
in a career in which he worked on more than 200 murder cases in which a suspect had been arrested and tried for their
00:06:58
crime the master detective Lou Smith died at age 75 in August of 2010 he never stopped working the Ramsay
00:07:10
case Until the End Lou continued working for John Benet and today former homicide
00:07:17
detective and retired Sheriff John Wesley Anderson continues to lose work this is true crime
00:07:26
[Music] garage [Music] [Music] welcome to the garage Mr Anderson you have a legendary law enforcement career
00:07:53
and fantastic books that you've been putting out over the last several years could you tell our list a little bit
00:08:00
about yourself and a brief overview of your law enforcement career I'll be happy to Nick and thank you for having
00:08:06
me on your your show um I have had a phenomenal law enforcement career just fortunate be in the right place at the
00:08:14
right time with the right plan and more importantly with the right people around
00:08:19
me and Lou SMI was certainly one of those he and I first met the month after I graduated high school in 1972 and I
00:08:28
had applied for the all Springs Police Department in their a police cadet program and in Colorado anyway you have
00:08:34
to be 21 to be a police officer so I was only 18 and for the next two and a half
00:08:39
years I did um various um positions as a police cadet in the department one of those was in the identification record
00:08:48
section and that's where I met L Smith and he'd come in to pull a criminal record on a suspect or look for a mug
00:08:55
shot or something like that and I became really fascinated with his approach to criminal investigations so from the time
00:09:02
I was 18 for the rest of my life or his life I was fortunate to be with him and through him really learned the
00:09:11
investigative process firsthand and working homicide investigation so when I went on the police department my my
00:09:18
intent was to be a uniform officer and work the streets and that was fun but after uh meeting Lou I decided you know
00:09:26
I think I'd like to to try to become a detective and maybe be Lou's partner and I was fortunate to have that opportunity
00:09:33
for six years in the homicide division with Carl Springs Police Department and worked um a number of dozens and dozens
00:09:41
of cases with Lou and then um I'd gotten promoted and then a little later he retired and when he retired he went to
00:09:50
the District Attorney's Office in El Paso County Colorado and work for the coroner's office and then I ran for
00:09:58
Sheriff of El Paso County our our County Sheriff's Office in 1994 and part of my
00:10:04
intent to run I'd had family and law enforcement and an uncle who was a a sheriff so it always had in the back of
00:10:11
my mind maybe running for County Sheriff when I was um old and gray and finished
00:10:16
my career of the police department but that time got accelerated because of a cold case that we had in El Paso County
00:10:25
the heatherd Don Church murder and some of you may have heard about that one is it's the reason I ran for Sheriff when I
00:10:31
ran for sheriff in 1994 and one of the first people I told I was going to do this was Lou smid and I said Lou if if
00:10:40
I'm successful in being elected I I really want you to come in and be the captain of detectives for the Sheriff's
00:10:47
Office and take over the heatherd Don Church case and at that point it had languished it was a four-year-old Cole
00:10:53
case Lou when he took over the investigation had the case solved Within three and a half months the C the
00:11:00
suspect in custody and he later pled guilty took a a life sentence later Lou formed a Cold Case unit and they were
00:11:12
able to get another conviction for first degree murder on the same suspect eventually that suspect confessed to 49
00:11:20
other a total of 49 murders so if that's true he certainly was one of the most prolific serial killers in American
00:11:27
history uh L and his team was only able to get six or seven confirmed um victims
00:11:33
on him and and after having two life sentences back to back there wasn't a lot of interest in pursuing him further
00:11:39
but that suspect was still in our community and I'm convinced would have continued killing had Lou and his team
00:11:46
not come along when they did and taking him off the streets you also worked with
00:11:51
Joe Kenda is that correct I did yes Joe was um for several years the sergeant of
00:11:57
the homicide Division and and I worked for Joe and appeared on five of his episodes of his television show and
00:12:05
recently You released a book called Lou and John Benet could you tell us a little bit about that book yes I'd be
00:12:12
happy to and part of the motivation was we had just surpassed the 25 year anniversary of John benet's death and um
00:12:22
the year before um one of the other partners homicide partners that worked with Lou and I Dave Spencer who was part
00:12:29
of our uh SMI Family Team um who had helped uh investigate um the case after uh Lou had passed on and uh tragically
00:12:41
Dave passed away in um uh 2020 and on the anniversary date December 26th of 2020 and what it caused
00:12:51
me to do was to realize that um that it really was up to me to document a lot of the
00:12:59
information that we had developed and and also really look at um presenting lose facts uh publicly so that other
00:13:10
people could understand how was it that Lou had reached the conclusion that an intruder had entered the Ramsey home and
00:13:18
that the murder was not committed by uh Ramsey family member and that was really
00:13:23
important to to Lou so I thought the book it's titled Lou and John Benet a legendary law man's quest to solve a
00:13:31
child Beauty Queen's murder I thought that that was my way of helping document the case as completely as I could coming
00:13:41
up on that 25y year anniversary but also this the second purpose was to encourage
00:13:48
law enforcement to continue to uh reevaluate the physical evidence to look at the possibility of the DNA the
00:13:57
foreign DNA that was found under the little girl's fingernails and on her clothing um and use that unknown male
00:14:05
DNA to help identify the Killer and one of the things Lou had done before he passed away in 2010 he knew he was he
00:14:13
was dying he he had cancer and and um was in remission for a short time and then it returned and when he was in
00:14:21
hospice and right before he went into hospice he made sure that the case was as um organized as possible
00:14:29
in that not only I but Dave Spencer and other detectives and his most importantly lose family knew how to find
00:14:37
information in the case his case File how it was organized and what his dying wish was is to make sure that the case
00:14:45
didn't die with him and he had um a wonderful quote on trying to keep a cold case from going cold and that was he
00:14:54
often said you have to stir the pot and that's what I think this this call is today this this U interview Nick is is
00:15:03
another chance to stir the pot because you never know who's going to hear this and what leads will come out of this but
00:15:10
what I hope the the the book does is clear the the Ramsay family from this this cloud of Suspicion this umbrella of
00:15:22
Suspicion as the Boulder Police alluded to so often and and then maybe through the book and the effort of the
00:15:31
family and others to to encourage law enforcement you know to re-evaluate the evidence and to look at you know
00:15:38
identifying that unknown male DNA do you remember your first conversation with Lou about the John benay Ramsey case I
00:15:46
don't know if it was the first one but it was certainly the most meaningful one and it happened while um Lou was um
00:15:53
getting ready to be the best man at my wedding uh second wedding we we were in Las Vegas and Lou had picked up my
00:16:02
fiance and I at the airport the day before we were to be married in a stretch limousine and I remember exactly
00:16:09
the the conversation because this stretch limousine that Lou had rented for us to pick us up the airport the
00:16:16
roof was open and he had had a a bottle of champagne and in a silver ice bucket we just uncork the champagne we're
00:16:24
standing up looking at the through the the sunroof the the of the limo looking at the lights um in Las Vegas and he
00:16:34
said Johnny you may be getting a call from Alex Hunter the district attorney in Boulder because he's putting together
00:16:42
a task force this is in in March of 97 and he said the The Da is is um putting together a task force and he's invited
00:16:51
me to come out of retirement to be a part of that and he asked for references and I gave the district attorney Alex
00:16:57
Hunter your name and phone number so so you might be getting a call and sure enough that the next day I did get a
00:17:04
call from Alex Center the district attorney who asked if I would recommend Lou to be a part of the John Benet
00:17:11
Ramsey task force that he was putting together in Boulder and of course I said absolutely that would be the one of the
00:17:17
smartest moves that you could make and so Lou worked for the DA for the next 18 months during that time did he share
00:17:25
information with you he did very frequently almost every time we saw each other which was prob maybe not weekly
00:17:32
but you know probably every other week we'd get together and have coffee or lunch or we'd talk and almost without
00:17:39
exception the conversation would come around to you know how are things progressing in Boulder what's new there
00:17:45
anything I can do to help I was still the sheriff of El Paso County so we did have some resources I remember when Lou
00:17:53
um accepted the District Attorney's invitation to come up and be part of the task force he really didn't think this
00:17:59
was going to be a prolonged investigation he like so many of us you know had only gotten our information
00:18:07
through the the media and a lot of that was distorted or misinformation and and so when I think I'm fairly confident
00:18:16
that the conversations we had prior to him going to Boulder was you know trying to determine which of the family members
00:18:24
probably one of the parents was responsible for the murder and like so many other people because their early
00:18:31
reports from the media talked about no footprints in the snow no Forest entry but I remember specifically the I think
00:18:40
it was the following weekend after he'd been at the boulder daaz off he was back
00:18:45
in Colorado Springs and it was the first time that we had actually talked since he had become part of the task force and
00:18:51
one of the first things he told me is he said Johnny there's there's something wrong in Boulder he said the physical
00:18:57
evidence is not not supporting what is being touted in the in the media and he talked about how there there were reason
00:19:05
there was no uh footprints in the snow is because on the southern facing side of the of the home where the the sun
00:19:13
warms the sidewalk or the building it melts the snow quicker here in in Colorado on the south side of the the
00:19:20
home he said there is definitely a uh evidence of forcible entry with a window in the basement on the south side of the
00:19:28
house house that was accessible through a window well that was left standing wide open and it had a um a window pane
00:19:36
at the top that had been broken out that was used by John benet's father the previous summer and he had reached
00:19:44
through he locked himself out the house so what he did was he crawled into that window well there's a heavy metal grade
00:19:50
on it so he removed the grade crawled into the window well and he broke this one window pane out at the top of the
00:19:57
window closest to where the lock was re reached in unlocked the window opened the window went inside through the
00:20:04
basement turned around and locked the window behind him but he he said to his regret the rest of his life was that he
00:20:12
never had that window Paine repaired and that was what L believe the suspect used
00:20:19
to enter the ramsy home on Christmas night the thing that fascinates me about that situation is not just that he finds
00:20:27
a possible point of entry for an intruder you know there there are some that that say well there's evidence to
00:20:35
suggest that that's not the way that one would have gotten to that home but what
00:20:40
fascinates me about that aspect is it's the total reverse of what we had been told up until that point no signs forced
00:20:49
entry into the home and what's so confusing about this crime scene to most people most of us don't live in a home
00:20:57
that big with that many doors that many windows and we clearly know that Boulder
00:21:02
PD overlooked a lot of in valuable information and possible evidence at the crime scene heck they didn't find the
00:21:10
victim for several hours after being on the scene you're you're right ni a matter of fact they weren't even the
00:21:18
ones who found the the victim's body it was her father 7 hours after the 911 call came in and from the time the first
00:21:27
Boulder Police police officer arrived at the Ramy home there was a series of of fatal errors that were made to
00:21:34
investigate the case properly the first officer was handed The Ransom note who looked at it handed it back and that
00:21:40
Ransom note got passed around to many people in the home there was probably as many as maybe up to two dozen people who
00:21:49
were allowed into the home it was never secured in the Boulder Police there there was other uniform officers arrived
00:21:56
a sergeant the the commanding off the the Comm the commander on duty at the time came so there were a number of
00:22:04
uniform plane clothes and crime scene uh technicians from Boulder PD who arrived
00:22:10
to initially process the scene after about two hours they all left and um one detective Linda AR was was tasked with
00:22:19
remaining at the home just in case the the suspect um called and and made arrangements for the ransom demand to be
00:22:28
picked up it was this detective Linda AR after um several hours later um with nothing happening is when she instructed
00:22:38
John Ramsay to take one other man who was in the home and to search the the house again from top to bottom to see if
00:22:45
anything was out of place so John Ramsay took one other um friend of his an another gentleman and they started in
00:22:54
the basement when he went into the basement he pointed to that open window and he said that's that window that's
00:23:00
standing open and there's this blue suitcase that's underneath that window standing upright and he said that wasn't
00:23:07
like that before that window was closed that's the window that I used to get in when I locked myself out of the out of
00:23:13
the home last summer and then John in the basement searched there's it's it's only a half basement so it's a Hu it's a
00:23:23
large house four levels but the basement was not huge and when he there's only like four rooms in the basement so when
00:23:30
he walked through the room where the window was standing open they called that the train room just because there
00:23:36
was a toy model train set up in the basement for the kids to play with but he walked into another room that they
00:23:42
called The Boiler Room and then adjacent to the boiler room was a smaller room that they called The Wine Seller
00:23:49
although there was no wine in it and when he opened the door to the Wine sellers when he saw his daughter laying
00:23:56
on the on the floor and she um was deceased um he didn't know that his first in reaction is to try to help her
00:24:05
as any of us would and he he noticed immediately that there was black duct tape over her face over her mouth so he
00:24:14
ripped that off again contaminating the scene uh tries to untie the knots that were around her wrists and around her
00:24:21
throat from the garant he scream for help he picks her up and then he carries her upstairs through
00:24:28
the the kitchen laser on the floor by the Christmas tree hoping that the detective or someone you know can help
00:24:35
revive his little girl from the time that the police officers first arrive to the time that her body is found 7even
00:24:42
hours later there's unnown number of of neighbors and friends and police officers First Responders crime scene
00:24:50
investigators that have contaminated the crime scene so um it's a it's a real tra
00:24:57
tragedy one of the baffling things I guess for me as being a police officer in 30 years and probably a lot of police
00:25:03
officers is how can you enter a a home to search for a missing six-year-old girl and not search the entire house for
00:25:13
wherever that little girl could be I've been on many calls and you you know you a six-year-old little girl kindergarten
00:25:22
is not very big but you want to look anywhere she can be you know is she under the bed is cuz she be in the
00:25:28
clothes hamper is she hiding in a closet is she sick or injured or scared and um
00:25:33
the other thing as an officer is you want to search the en entire house to also see if there's a suspect in there
00:25:40
you you don't want to turn your back on a on a possible suspect a threat so you search every the the rooms and on every
00:25:50
floor carefully to make sure that you're not turning your back on a on a suspect
00:25:54
and that was not done and that and that's just um defies even common sense if you're looking for a lost little girl
00:26:02
little girl that's missing that can't be found who who who the ransom note says was abducted and being held for ransom
00:26:10
you you should you should search wherever that that child might be and that was not that was not done and you
00:26:17
don't ask you know someone else that's not law enforcement you you know to to search to try to find them because that
00:26:25
they're going to do the natural thing like like her dad did and contaminate the scene and try to try to help them
00:26:31
and unfortunately my opinion Linda aren't she's kind of she's left there to try to Corral several adults into one
00:26:39
room and she's having trouble keeping a couple of them in the room and so I I think she kind of did that as a way
00:26:48
to keep people busy and with very little knowledge or information being provided
00:26:54
to her while she's left alone with all the I I I just can't believe for a second that we have a police department
00:27:02
that is under the impression that a child is missing has been abducted and there's a ransom and yet we only put one
00:27:09
officer posted up at the house with the parents and now their their friends and Priests are there with them as well and
00:27:18
very obviously highly emotional uh setting she's dealing with a number of different people in in a very stressful
00:27:27
in and environment and um you know the the ramies are um and we're a very religious uh family and the priest was
00:27:36
allowed into the home and he's assembling prayer circles and and uh you know that that adds a lot to the um very
00:27:45
stressful environment that that Linda art was in by herself so I think you're right I think she's trying to you know
00:27:52
keep these people busy for several hours waiting for the phone to ring which never happens one of the things that I
00:27:58
do have trouble with Linda and I don't know if this was just the way she's wired or La lack of training but I I do
00:28:06
know that she made a statement later and and repeated the statement about when John Ramsey brings her little girl his
00:28:14
little girl upstairs layser on the floor um that Linda aren't checks for Vital Signs doesn't find any and then and then
00:28:23
she says she looks into the eyes of John Ramsay knew she was count knew she was looking in the eyes of the Killer and
00:28:31
then made some statement about counting the number of bullets in her gun because
00:28:35
she was afraid that he was going to kill everybody else in the house and and I know John Ramsey I've met with him
00:28:42
several times Lou had in um U introduced us and he is uh not I mean he's a very humble very very uh calm person but I I
00:28:54
can't and I've looked into the eyes of a lot of different killers and I can't imagine how she could immediately jump
00:29:00
to the conclusion that she's looking into the eyes of a killer and that she feels so threatened that she's counting
00:29:07
the bullets in her gun so I don't know if she just was that inexperienced or lack of skill or or or training or lack
00:29:16
of confidence but I think it does show some preconceived belief that a Ramsay family
00:29:24
member was involved before the body was found and and you just can't objectively
00:29:31
investigate a crime without all the the facts especially a complex frme like this one yeah possibly something that
00:29:38
like you said preconceived notions or was it a situation where she created a better story later to sell her book oh
00:29:49
that that that could be too yes and it it's really unfortunate there there were no winners out of this case um she left
00:29:57
the Department uh not under good circumstances uh Steve Thomas who is the for a short for a Time the lead
00:30:04
detective who who left in to write a book and um you know this this this case ended a lot of a lot of people's
00:30:13
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purchase [Music] now when you were having your almost weekly meetings with Lou like you mentioned there's
00:36:43
misinformation like the the footprints I mean I I remember when we looked into this case and going well there's no
00:36:51
footprints in the snow so therefore it had to be a inside job and then you later find out that there's there was
00:36:59
parts of the yard that didn't have snow so there obviously couldn't be any Footprints
00:37:06
was was there other pieces of misinformation that that Lou was pointing out to you that that you
00:37:13
remember being shocking uh yes and and I don't want to misrepresent um my involvement um because it was minimal um
00:37:23
right and again it was probably only once or twice a month that Lou and I would uh talk uh or in Social um in
00:37:32
encounters you know or just have lunch or coffee just to stay in touch with friends and then the case would come up
00:37:39
so I don't want it to come across like I was advising him you know we're Consulting on the case because that
00:37:45
that's not the the circumstances at all but um what I can say though is when we would
00:37:54
meet he would Contin continue to add one more uh piece of evidence or one more layer of information that excluded the
00:38:04
Ramsay family and pointed again to the Intruder and within the first several months he had developed what I thought
00:38:13
was an undeniable case that um the family was not involved and that um uh the killer uh
00:38:23
who intended to commit uh an abduction for ransom that something had gone wrong um in the commission of that that crime
00:38:32
after he had contact with with the little girl and that a very violent sexual assault happened in the basement
00:38:40
of the home and culminated with with her being bludgeoned with some type of a heavy blunt force object but I I know
00:38:50
that um Lou had a difficult time trying to to communicate to the boulder detectives the evidence that really
00:39:00
should be pursued that again would convince most people Beyond any reasonable doubt that that the ramies
00:39:06
weren't involved and um some of that evidence had to do with um what was brought into the home by the Killer and
00:39:15
what was taken away for example Lou put a lot of emphasis on the Paracord the B the the white parachute cord that was
00:39:27
um used to Fashion the garat that was was found on John B's uh around her throat um and also is the same cordage
00:39:38
that was used to bind her wrist and uh what Lou knew was um uh and we have all in investigations been taught
00:39:47
this the idea of the uh um transfer Theory with that states whenever crime is committed the suspect either takes
00:39:56
something into the crime scene or take something away from the crime scene take something with them and what L pointed
00:40:03
out was the C the Paracord is a good example because it's called par paracord 550 the it's not a common cordage
00:40:12
especially back in the 90s it was mostly for military purposes it was used for suspension lines on a parachute and um
00:40:22
later it became more popular with outdoor people hunters and one because it is such um it's so so strong and um
00:40:32
but there was no uh paracord anywhere in the Ramsay home other than what was used
00:40:37
on the garat and around John benet's wrist same way with a black duct tape that was on her mouth uh was about a 6in
00:40:46
strip of black duct tape that was torn on both edges uh Lou pointed that out it they weren't cut and I remember Lou
00:40:55
telling me that you know when you look at the duct tape where it was was uh torn if you could find the parent roll
00:41:04
you'd be able to match the one edge of the of the torn duct tape to that roll or if you could find anywhere in the
00:41:12
house where that duct tape had been used um anywhere um on the back of a picture
00:41:17
frame or around um some some duct duct work but he said the Ramsay didn't own any black duct tape the house was
00:41:25
searched from from top to bottom and there was no duct tape that was found and he said um you know when you think
00:41:32
about that that 6inch piece of duct tape you know most everybody's handle duct tape you know that sticks to everything
00:41:39
so how do you get that into the house if it's not um part of that role and then Lou also talked about the stun gun and
00:41:48
that was something else that he put a lot of time and energy in um as the case continued to evolve when he was still
00:41:55
with the district attorney's office and trying to get the the boulder detectives
00:42:01
to look at the stun gun marks that the wounds that were on uh John benet's back on the left side and on the right side
00:42:08
of her cheek below her her right ear and what Lou pointed out is that these These
00:42:14
are thermal uh wounds abrasions um and and they were rectangular uh in shape and measured 3.5
00:42:25
CM apart both on on the side of her face and not on her her back and Lou became convinced they were thermal wounds
00:42:34
caused from a stun gun the discharge of a stun gun when it is placed in contact with a flesh not not with the barbs
00:42:42
being shot into the the the the person but by the cartridge from the top being removed and the electrodes actually come
00:42:50
in direct contact with with the body and um the the detective even up to the last time I talked to the
00:42:59
homicide detectives 20 several months ago um they denied you know that that was even a remote
00:43:07
possibility so one of the things Lou had done when he left the boulder uh DA's office he he resigned in protest when
00:43:15
they were getting ready to take the case in front of the grand jury he could see
00:43:19
that the whole purpose was politically charged to indict the parents and he he just and he wrestled with with that he
00:43:28
he showed me the the um draft of the letter he was sending to the district attorney to resign from from the task
00:43:36
force and he said I know this is going to be really hard to work this case from the outside looking in but he told me he
00:43:42
said I just can't be a part of you know this because they're using the grand jury system to indict these parents who
00:43:50
are grieving parents who are not involved in this murder and they're trying to uh indict them for the the the
00:43:57
the death of their little girl and he said I just can't be a part of that so what Lou tried to do was in protest was
00:44:04
to draw attention to the fact that somebody some objective um body needs to look at U the evidence that the Boulder
00:44:14
Police had refused to acknowledge U and it wasn't just the police it was the district attorney and Boulder the
00:44:21
special prosecutors that were appointed by the governor at the time and luk um asked to be um allowed in to present
00:44:30
um his side of the the case because um it was not being U presented and one of the most forceful things he wanted to
00:44:39
get in front of the grand jury was the evidence of the Intruder the the um uh the photos that the crime scene that
00:44:49
showed the window standing open in the basement that there was no snow out there but one of the most important
00:44:55
things was the uh foreign DNA that was left um on the uh under John B's fingernails and on the crotch of panties
00:45:05
and that that eliminated um any member of the the Ramsay family within 3 weeks of the murder and that information was
00:45:14
never released in fact it didn't get to the district attorney's office where Lou
00:45:18
was working for several months I think it was July of 97 when that report finally that lab report finally came
00:45:27
through to the DA's office and Lou knew immediately that that was information that was not being released anywhere
00:45:35
that that really did exclude the the Ramsey family in all of your years in law enforcement and as a detective as a
00:45:43
sheriff you've seen it all have you ever witnessed or been a part of or experienced such a divide between a
00:45:55
police department and a district attorney's office in a homicide a child abduction a situation
00:46:05
where parents killed the child any any number of those scenarios have you ever witnessed a situation more divided than
00:46:12
what was going on in Boulder with the John Benet case I have not and that was very out of character with the law
00:46:21
enforcement agencies that Lou or I had ever worked with in in fact in um our 30 40e career if you count the homeland
00:46:31
security work that I did um all of all of the law enforcement agencies work very much as partners we were aware of
00:46:40
where one jurisdiction began and another ended so we wouldn't step on one another's um you know get out get into
00:46:48
out of bounds but what we what we try to do is utilize their strengths uh a good
00:46:54
example is if there was I don't know Grand lony Auto that crossed you know state lines the FBI
00:47:00
could prosecute and um uh you know had a greater reach you know than than we did
00:47:06
and and at that time felony gr Larson the auto carried a higher penalty so we would readily work with the FBI and not
00:47:13
say wait minut this my case back off it was the opposite or or armed robberies where you have federally insured Bank we
00:47:20
knew that under federal charges we could get um a higher penalty and then both what was just alarming the FBI was
00:47:30
notified immediately and in fact they were allowed to put up a phone trace on the ramsy phone but they were never
00:47:38
allowed in the house which was baffling because everybody else was being allowed
00:47:42
in the house but the FBI um from the very first within the first few hours um the the um resident agent in charge of
00:47:51
the Denver office said look you know we have experts that we can bring in we have have U you know crime scene
00:47:57
investigators you know let us let us help and Boulder PD to include up to the staff officers refused to let the FBI
00:48:05
even step foot into the crime scene other than the phone trap said we don't we don't want your help we don't need
00:48:10
any help we got this covered you know go away and then that was exasperated with
00:48:15
the uh within a few days when the Denver Police Department offered two homicide detectives to be loan from Denver's
00:48:23
homicide unit to the B Boulder Police Department at no charge and the problem that Boulder PD was dealing with is none
00:48:31
of not only none of their detectives but none of their supervisors or Rank and file none none of their chain of command
00:48:38
had worked um a murder either so this was new to all of them but the homicide detectives out of Denver for people who
00:48:46
don't know Carl Springs is a large large police agency and we worked um several dozen you know homicides every year but
00:48:57
Denver just being such a larger Community would probably work two or three times the number of cases we did
00:49:03
so they those homicide detectives had even more experience than someone like like me would have so when um Denver PD
00:49:12
The Command Staff offered two homicide detectives these were I don't I don't know the names of who they offered but I
00:49:18
do know the uh caliber and the training of the bould or of the Denver homicide unit is is almost unparalleled that they
00:49:27
really are true experts and they could have from from the very first day pointed out the physical evidence that
00:49:35
Lou months later is trying to get them to focus on one of the biggest mistakes from the first day second day third day
00:49:42
of the investigation was refusing any help from any outside agencies and I know that's something that John Ramsey
00:49:50
also um uh has commented on in some of the contexts discussions that he and I have had in where he's spoken out
00:49:59
publicly either on documentaries or in a public forum he said you know I don't blame Boulder Police for not having you
00:50:08
know a lot of experienced homicide detectives because it it's a smaller Community they didn't have a lot of
00:50:14
violent crime but he says the thing that it that I will never forgive them for is
00:50:19
that they turned down help from the very beginning that would have completely changed the course of this invest a and
00:50:26
perhaps the outcome frankly my speculation is this we have Boulder PD who doesn't seem Alex Hunter the da
00:50:35
they're not getting along seeing eyi completely on this investigation Boulder PD is is steadfast saying well paty
00:50:45
Ramsey killed John Benet Alex Hunter is simply saying well we don't have enough evidence to take this to trial or beyond
00:50:52
that get a conviction so essentially is brought in by Alex Hunter simply to find that
00:50:59
evidence right he's he's corre so many homicide investigations yeah over 200 yes over
00:51:05
200 with with with the clearance rate of what uh Pro I think Lou probably had about a 98% clearance rate may yeah
00:51:14
right at that that very few cases um did did he not clear and the other amazing thing is he never lost the case in court
00:51:23
he had 100% conviction rate so he's worked 200 more homicide cases than John Eller the captain of the detectives for
00:51:31
Boulder PD worked 200 more homicide cases than Steve Thomas who was one one of the lead detectives on the John Benet
00:51:39
case and he's brought in essentially to find evidence to take this to take paty Ramsey to trial that they could not find
00:51:48
and when he comes back to Alex Hunter and says the evidence you're looking for is not here because I'm finding evidence
00:51:55
that something else happened another theory is probably the more likely and Alex Hunter eventually says I'm going to
00:52:03
take this to the grand jury who's already been tainted from the media for you know for months and months and
00:52:10
months and we're going to get our we're going to get this thing to trial that way
00:52:17
and and Lou basically says well I got to get out of this because you're not you're not respecting the the
00:52:24
investigation I'm following the evidence where it led me and I'm here to tell you
00:52:29
that this is not my findings correct that that is correct well one one slight um
00:52:37
uh change there or or focus and we may never know the truth to this is I'm not so sure taking the case to the grand
00:52:45
jury was Alex Hunter's idea and not um uh the the the governor uh at the time or someone with the Colorado um at a G's
00:52:56
office or or somebody and the reason I say that is because um Alex Hunter had the jurisdiction to assemble the grand
00:53:06
jury on his own in Boulder it was his County he was the district attorney but that didn't happen what happened is the
00:53:12
governor of Colorado at the time appointed Three Special prosecutors for the grand jury they're the ones who came
00:53:20
into Boulder and they opened up the and panel the grand jury and then they ran for months and months taking testimony
00:53:29
and um once that was over the uh um the grand jury did return a true bill inditing both the John and paty not for
00:53:41
a murder but for a lesser crime of and I can't remember the statue that was cited
00:53:46
but it was something about enabling um or endangering you know their child or something like that and
00:53:52
then Alex Hunter quashed the um uh true bill he he just took the true bill rather than than charging the
00:54:00
parents and that's when he makes the statement that you just referred to Nick but there's no evidence to convict
00:54:06
anybody in this crime and so what what Alex Hunter did was he just put both of those um true bill indictments in his
00:54:13
bottom death drawer never acknowledged him and it wasn't until later when he's out of office and the next district
00:54:20
attorney comes in her name was Mary Lacy and she's the one who um issues the letter to the parents saying that they
00:54:31
they Boulder U District Attorney's Office acknowledge that no one in the Ramsey family was involved and then this
00:54:39
next district attorney to Boulder Stan Garnett he's the one who first acknowledges to my to my understanding
00:54:48
that there was actually a true bill indictment from the grand jury because that was never released and when he does
00:54:53
this he points out that the statute limitations on that charge had uh ran out now had they been charged with a
00:55:01
first-degree murder there's no statute limitations there but um by the time that that information surfaces years
00:55:09
later that the grand jury did return a true bill on both the parents that was um that was new information but it was
00:55:17
Alex Hunter who made the determination there's there there's no way you know that they can be convicted of this crime
00:55:24
and and I did not talk to Alex hunder specifically about this but I know him and he's a brilliant man and um and
00:55:32
could think through a criminal investigation methodically was well known in Colorado um law enforcement
00:55:38
circles as as as as a bright prosecutor I have absolutely no doubt that he knew that his biggest um challenge um if he
00:55:49
did adite the parents was the defense attorney's star witness was going to be his former investigator L
00:56:02
[Music] SMI make sure you check out the Great Book Lou and John Benet a legendary law
00:56:13
man's quest to solve a child Beauty Queen's Murder by John Wesley Anderson and make sure you come back here to the
00:56:20
garage tomorrow and join us for part two until then be good be time and don't [Music]
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