I don't know anything about this.
By Mathew Scott August 21, 2006 01:00am
THE man who confessed to killing JonBenet Ramsey had another bizarre secret up his sleeve in the months before his arrest - he was visiting a surgical centre that specialises in sex-change operations.
Staff at the Pratunam Clinic, Thailand's top transgender centre, confirmed 41-year-old John Mark Karr was a patient of theirs - but wouldn't say how close he was to getting "sexual reassignment" surgery.
"Yes, he had treatment here," a representative said. "He was our patient. But we cannot give out details on his treatment as we are ethically bound to keep these things private."
It was also revealed that Karr, who boarded a US-bound flight from Thailand last night at 11pm (AEST), sought a Bangkok cosmetic surgeons' help in changing his facial features. In his nine months there, he made 12 phone calls from his hotel room - nine of them to plastic surgeons.
Two calls were to the Pratunam Clinic, which specialises in putting men under the knife to become "ladyboys" and also sponsors the annual World's Most Beautiful Transsexual competition. It charges $1600 for the surgery, which could cost up to $25,000 in the West.
Karr was nabbed in Bangkok last week for JonBenet's 1996 murder, telling police and reporters that he accidentally killed the little girl in an assault motivated by his obsessive love for her.
He will face charges of first-degree murder, kidnapping and child sexual assault.
Karr is the first suspect arrested in the death of the child beauty queen - who was strangled and had her skull fractured - after years of investigations and grand jury hearings.
US authorities tracked him down after reading four years' worth of emails between Karr and University of Colorado journalism professor Michael Tracey, 58, who produced documentaries about JonBenet's murder - and who tried to draw out more details about Karr through their hundreds of messages.
The email exchanges began four years ago after Karr met an American writer while staying in a hostel above a Paris bookstore. They immediately revealed his fixation on the beauty princess' mysterious death.
An email he sent on December 23, 2005, just before the anniversary of her death read, in part: "JonBenet, my love, my life.
"I love you and shall forever love you".
As authorities continued to build their case against Karr ahead of his return to the US, prison guards searched the death row cell of Polly Klaas' s killer Richard Davis after learning he may have corresponded with Karr.
No letters were found.