Ex-officer reached out to Ramsey
Arndt was in Boulder home when child's body was found

Linda Arndt says Patsy Ramsey was "imprisoned by secrets

Special section: JonBenet Ramsey
By Charlie Brennan, Rocky Mountain News
June 28, 2006
Patsy Ramsey died before Linda Arndt could fulfill her pledge to JonBenet's mother.
"Last year, I was told just about this time of year that she was on her deathbed and gravely ill," said Arndt, the former Boulder Police officer who was the lone detective in the Ramsey home when JonBenet's body was found in the basement on Dec. 26, 1996.

"That spurred me to reach out to her and find her again, which I did. She responded."

Ramsey battled her disease for 13 years, succumbing to ovarian cancer early Saturday at her father's home in Roswell, Ga. She was 49. She will be laid to rest Thursday alongside JonBenet in Marietta, Ga.

Their renewed contact in May 2005, Arndt said, "was a heart-to-heart connection, common decency, showing courtesy and empathy to someone who really had a lot of tragedy."

She talked about what the contact between the two meant to her.

"Knowing that she was dying, that was the impetus I needed to finish, to fulfill the promise that she asked of me," said Arndt, 45.

Officer 'gave her my word'

The day was Jan. 8, 1997. Arndt was at the Child Advocacy Center in Niwot where JonBenet's older brother Burke - now 19 - was being interviewed by a child psychologist.

"Patsy and I were alone for over an hour, and she shared a lot of things in that conversation. She did, and I did," Arndt recalled.

"And one of the things she demanded of me, she looked me in the eye and grabbed my hand and said, 'Promise me, promise me you will stay on this case and you will find out who did this to JonBenet.'

"I don't remember my words, but I gave her my word that I would. And I cannot hold her story any longer."

Arndt wasn't allowed by department brass to stay on the case. She was pulled off in April 1997, quit the force two years later and unsuccessfully sued the department for defamation. Arndt, who still lives in the West but is no longer a police officer, is now occupied, she said, "putting my life back together, trying to find my way back in the world."

And she's writing a memoir in hopes of keeping her promise.

'The right thing to do'

In her first in-depth print interview, Arndt remembered Ramsey as "a lady of grace and courage and spirit, particularly in the face of such unrelenting adversity."

"She was imprisoned by secrets. This whole case has been imprisoned by secrets."

Arndt was reluctant to reveal many details of her contact with JonBenet's mother in the final year of her life.

"I gained nothing and risked everything to contact her. And it was just the right thing to do," Arndt said.

"There's no way to undo the wrong that was done (to the Ramsey family). But (it was) just to acknowledge what you could or couldn't do, and apologize for any error on my part and to offer myself in any way that was helpful to her."

Arndt would not discuss her theories of the case, saying only that she doesn't hold the "prevailing view" within the Boulder Police Department, which increasingly keyed on Patsy Ramsey.

"I'm able to confirm a lot of things that Patsy was maintaining for 10 years," Arndt said.

Asked if what she is writing will eliminate anyone's suspicions about Ramsey, Arndt stopped short of saying so.

"I think our expectation of the justice system is that you clear 'em or you don't, but you don't leave people hanging in the wind this long - at least, that's my interpretation," Arndt said.

"I don't know that (the book) will exonerate. It will give people a context that they have not had before, and it will give them an understanding for everyone involved - but, particularly, for Patsy."

Ramsey hard to reach

National airwaves have been buzzing since Saturday with legal pundits weighing in on the question of how Ramsey's death affects the investigation - whether it represents an ending or perhaps even the opening of a new chapter.

Arndt leans toward the latter.

"I think it's just starting," said Arndt. "I think the real story is just coming out now. . . .

"I think her death really shakes the foundation of what people have been content or comfortable in believing, refusing to accept or refusing to look at."

The mere act of connecting with Ramsey, who along with her husband was identified in December 1997 as being under an "umbrella of suspicion" by then-Boulder Police Chief Mark Beckner, was not easily accomplished by Arndt.

"I contacted every attorney she's ever worked with," she said. "I was willing to contact anyone in order to get a message to her."

Arndt spoke of a bond of trust that evolved between them during her time on the case - cutting against the grain of her department's overall approach.

"I knew that would not be allowed directly during the time that I was on the case, (because of) individuals from both sides. Direct contact between the two of us was never allowed."

During her June 2001 defamation trial at U.S. District Court in Denver, however, Arndt admitted to arranging an hourlong meeting with Ramsey in March 1997, independent of her fellow investigators, after concerns grew about Ramsey's health.

"When Patsy heard I wanted to reach her, every time, she allowed me to meet with her and call her," Arndt said Tuesday.

Despite the renewed contact between Arndt and Ramsey in 2005, the former detective admits she was blindsided by her death.

Not owning a television for the past few months, Arndt got word from her brother, who lives in the Denver area.

"I had no idea" she had taken a turn for the worse, Arndt said. "I knew she was just in Boulder (in February). Different people call and tell me, because I don't follow a lot of it. I was really stunned. I thought she had beaten it again."

Arndt said she would "absolutely" want to attend Thursday's services for Ramsey but she won't.

"Those around her see my presence differently than she does," Arndt said.

"There would be nothing positive for the people assembled there from my presence. Patsy would appreciate it. I doubt anybody else would."

Arndt admitted she doesn't have the answers as to who did what that Christmas night to the 6-year-old who, in death, became the nation's most famous child beauty queen.

"Nobody does," Arndt said. "But I have the information, for somebody else who might. All the information is there."

She said 90 percent of the case details have not been disclosed accurately.

"If anyone wants to understand and make sense of this case, yes, the information I have allows them to do it," Arndt said.

"You can make an informed decision, rather than uninformed speculation."

Who is Linda Arndt?

• On the case: Arndt was left by her colleagues at the Ramsey home with JonBenet's parents and family friends in the first hours of the investigation. She shouldered the blame for numerous police errors at the crime scene that day in December 1996.

• Off the case: Arndt, a 14-year veteran of the Boulder department, well-respected as a staunch victim advocate, was taken off the case in April 1997.

• Against the force: Arndt sued Boulder police brass for defamation, alleging a departmental gag order left her unable to defend herself against accusations that she mishandled the crime scene.

• Off the force: Arndt quit the department in April 1999.

• Afterward: A U.S. district court judge issued a summary judgment against Arndt in a June 2001 trial of her defamation suit. She is now 45, lives outside Colorado and is writing a book.

Ex-detective admits withholding notes
Arndt testifies that she kept notebooks from a meeting with Patsy Ramsey in 1997

By Owen S. Good, News Staff Writer
June 8, 2001

A former Boulder detective admitted she withheld notes taken during the first two weeks of the JonBenet Ramsey murder investigation and never filed a report on their contents, which a police attorney repeatedly described as critical to prosecuting the killer.
Linda Arndt, the only Boulder police officer present when JonBenet's body was discovered, kept notes of a Jan. 4, 1997, meeting during which Patsy Ramsey gave handwriting samples to police to compare with a ransom note. Arndt administered the handwriting exam.

Arndt testified Thursday that she never transcribed the notes. Arndt stored the notebooks in a locked desk drawer at her office and then, after she quit in 1999, took them home and later had a friend keep them for her.

"I did not trust the members of the investigative team or my supervisors . . . to handle the notes in a way that they would be maintained accurately," Arndt said on cross-examination.

"And you were content to let the Ramsey investigation proceed without these critical reports?" police attorney Theodore Halaby asked. Arndt answered yes.

She also said there may be other investigative notes that she never transcribed into reports.

Police did not learn of Arndt's notes until she gave a March 8, 2000, deposition for the defamation suit she has filed against former chief Tom Koby, current chief Mark Beckner and the city of Boulder.

She alleges that her reputation was damaged when the chiefs did not publicly rebut press reports that her errors at the crime scene hampered the Ramsey investigation. A gag order preventing her from speaking out had the same effect, she says.

Thursday, Halaby argued the press reports were substantially correct. He said Arndt based her claim that they were inaccurate on a literal reading of the words.

For example, Arndt denied claims made in a September 1997 Vanity Fair article that called her "the Mark Fuhrman" of the Ramsey investigation and said her errors destroyed or contaminated evidence.

Arndt said the article inaccurately reported she picked up JonBenet's body and laid it next to a Christmas tree. The statement is inaccurate because she placed the body next to a piano, Arndt said.

The article's claim that Patsy Ramsey "collapsed" on her daughter's body also is not accurate, Arndt testified.

"The top part of Patsy's body was on the lower part of JonBenet's body, which was covered by a blanket," Arndt said.

"You wanted to deny their literal accuracy, whether or not they were substantially accurate," Halaby argued.

Arndt also reiterated an earlier statement that her work at the scene was "phenomenal," given the chaos when the body was found.

But Arndt agreed that keeping the notes was "probably not" proper conduct, even though she said she verbally conveyed their contents to other detectives.

The trial resumes Monday. Judge William F. Downes has told lawyers to finish up by Wednesday.

www.denverpost.com

Judge dismisses Arndt suit Action called merely a personal grievance

By Mike McPhee, Denver Post Staff Writer,

In a highly unusual move, a judge on Tuesday abruptly threw out former Boulder police detective Linda Arndt's First Amendment lawsuit in the ninth day of trial, saying her complaint was nothing more than a personal grievance.

'Speech which discloses any evidence of corruption, impropriety or other malfeasance on the part of city officials clearly concerns matters of public import,' said U.S. District Judge William F. Downes, who granted the city of Boulder's motion for summary judgment after listening to evidence presented by Arndt's attorneys.

But speech isn't protected if 'its aim is simply to air grievances of a purely personal nature,' he said.

After the ruling, Arndt carried several of the awards she had received while a Boulder officer to the defense's table and dumped them. An aide carried them back to Arndt's attorneys, who removed them from the courtroom.

Arndt, later in the day, called it 'a sad day for the First Amendment, police officers, the jury system and the truth.' Her lawyers, Bruce Jones and Jude Biggs, said they are preparing an appeal.

Arndt had been placed in charge of the JonBenet Ramsey murder scene the morning of Dec. 26, 1996. Investigative records later showed that she had been unable to control the Ramsey family and friends when the body was found and that critical evidence had been contaminated.

Arndt was lambasted in the international media for allowing the body to be moved twice, once by her; for allowing Patsy Ramsey to lie on the body; and for covering the body with a sheet that allegedly contaminated evidentiary fluid.

Arndt says she was made the scapegoat for the unsolved murder and was prevented by her superiors from speaking out to defend herself. She eventually left the Boulder Police Department, worked briefly at the University of Colorado campus police department and was fired from there. She now works as a tree trimmer.

Arndt, 40, sued the city and the Police Department in 1998. After rejecting numerous attempts at negotiating a settlement, including one meeting with a former federal judge days before the trial began, Arndt and her attorneys picked a jury and presented their case.

The strongest argument they gave the six-woman, two-man jury was a letter from Brooke Jackson, Arndt's lawyer in 1997 and now chief justice of Jefferson County District Court, which asked former Police Chief Tom Koby to defend Arndt publicly against eight charges. Koby refused, as did his successor, Mark Beckner.

Downes ruled that 'her sole concern dealt with how she was being portrayed in the public media.'

He said if her complaints were considered a public concern, instead of a personal grievance, 'the ramifications would be profound, for it would certainly create the possibility of a constitutional claim each and every time an officer is subjected to public criticism for his or her performance in the line of duty.'

Attorney Ted Halaby, who represented Boulder, Koby and Beckner, said the case was frivolous.

'There were numerous settlement discussions,' he said. 'In 35 years of practice, this is the first trial where I didn't think anyone's interests could be served.'

www.rockymountainnews.com

June 13, 2001

THE END TO A VERY BAD CASE

EX-BOULDER DETECTIVE LOSES HER LAWSUIT
OUR VIEW: A VICTORY WOULD HAVE SET TROUBLING PRECEDENT

Thanks to Linda Arndt, America has a new definition of chutzpah. It's suing your former bosses for failing to defend your professionalism as a detective even though you readily admit in court that you withheld investigative notes from your own department.

As fiction, such an incident would be rejected out of hand by an editor. Too implausible. But the implausible has been routine in the JonBenet Ramsey case, so former Boulder Detective Arndt's remarkably brazen behavior is not surprising.

Then again, it's also not surprising that U.S. District Judge William F. Downes would rule against Arndt in a summary judgment, as he did Tuesday. As he explained, a victory for Arndt would make the reputations of individual officers in an investigation more important than "the integrity of the investigation itself." And that precedent could end up distorting the priorities of detective work across the country.

Detectives should have thick skins - or they should find a profession not subject to second-guessing by the tax-paying public.

Downes also insisted that his ruling was no reflection on Arndt's professional behavior. Perhaps not, but consider what Arndt herself admitted under cross-examination. She said she withheld some of her notes because she didn't "trust the members of the investigative team or my supervisors . . . to handle the notes in a way that they would be maintained accurately."

"And you were content to let the Ramsey investigation proceed without these critical reports?" Boulder police attorney Theodore Halaby then asked.

Yes, Arndt replied, acknowledging that she may have failed to transcribe other notes into official reports, too.

Remember, this is a woman suing her former superiors for refusing to defend her (and refusing to let her defend herself) from media stories suggesting she had botched the case. Didn't she stop to think that the fact that she'd withheld official reports would make her appear at least a tiny bit unprofessional?

For that matter, the trial reminded the public again that she had moved JonBenet's body, allowed one parent to cover the victim and another to lie on top of her, and permitted a number of other people to mill about the house where the murder took place rather than order them outside until police had a chance to examine the entire residence.

"There was an utter failure to protect the evidence," Halaby maintained, and who could possibly argue?

Arndt was hardly the only Boulder police officer to stumble through the early going of the Ramsey investigation, of course, but it is nonetheless remarkable (and slightly pathetic) for her to suggest, as she did in court, that her performance was in fact "phenomenal." An expert witness who defended her handling of the crime scene argued what Halaby described as mistakes were merely "human decisions" - as if a detective should be modeling herself on Florence Nightingale.

Detectives are of course human and sometimes, under the pressure of a major crime, they make mistakes. Rather than let an unpleasant episode recede, however, Arndt chose to expose herself again to public ridicule. It was a sad coda to a once promising career.

Candy, you wrote, "She won't have any problems getting a book published because it's pro-Patsy. It's only our side that can't get any deals, because of ST's settlement payoff."

Bullshit - - if "YOUR SIDE" is having problems finding publishers willing to risk paying off bif lawsuits, it is because they have seen that the EVIDENCE and the AUTHORITIES have made it clear

YOUR SIDE IS WRONG!

If they didn't give out names they would have been hiding something. If they give names, they are throwing people under the bus. Sickening. They acted the same way anyone else would who had a loved one murdered.