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Rosa Brooks: No Escaping Sexualization of Young Girls With JonBenet back in the headlines, it's hard for a parent to avoid paranoia. August 25, 2006 IT'S BEEN a good week for the media, and a bad week for parents. The arrest of former schoolteacher John Mark Karr in the slaying of child beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey launched a flurry of excited stories about pedophiles, child abduction and murder. The cable news stations could hardly hide their glee, and even the New York Times joined in. In a two-part series on pedophilia, the newspaper reported that many pedophiles now use Internet...

Boulder District Attorney investigator Mark Spray has contacted a man who believes he could have encountered the JonBenet Ramsey murder suspect on a bus in the early morning hours of Dec. 26, 1996. Daniel Pride, now of Portsmouth, N.H., said he was at the downtown bus station in Boulder sometime shortly after 12:30 a.m. when a man arrived, behaving strangely and bearing a resemblance to John Mark Karr, arrested last week in the case. He said the man didn't want to be noticed and pulled away when Pride asked if he had a light for a cigarette. The man boarded...

NEW YORK -- A notorious prank caller and Howard Stern fan from North Wales, Pa., managed to get onto CNN's "The Situation Room" and was interviewed about the Ramsey case. In a live phone interview Tuesday with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, Thomas Cipriano pretended to be Wendy Hutchens, a California woman claiming that five years ago she had detailed chats about the death of JonBenet Ramsey with murder suspect John Mark Karr, the New York Daily News reported Thursday. "Wendy Hutchens is joining us on the phone right now," Blitzer told viewers. "Wendy, thanks very much for doing this. Tell our...

CNN) -- The suspect in the slaying of JonBenet Ramsey made additional statements about the child's death once he reached the United States, a source told CNN. As he was being driven to the Los Angeles County jail, John Mark Karr began talking calmly to himself while looking out the window, a source involved in Karr's transfer said.

Nearly a decade since her brutal murder in the basement of her parents’ home, the JonBenet Ramsey case was once again thrust into the public eye last week, when authorities arrested John M. Karr for the murder of the six-year-old girl. Since his arrest, Karr has confessed to the murder of Ramsey, although the validity of his confession is being questioned by those investigating the case due to inaccuracies in his testimony. Local handwriting expert Don Lehew, of Mt. Selman, has obtained several samples of John M. Karr’s handwriting, as well as, a copy of the Ramsey ransom note, and...

Karr treatment seen as 'brilliant move' By ROBERT WELLER, Associated Press Writer Mon Aug 21, 12:44 AM ET DENVER - Authorities probably had a very good reason for allowing JonBenet Ramsey murder suspect John Mark Karr to live it up on the 15-hour flight to the United States, legal experts say — they wanted him to talk. Denver attorney Larry Pozner, past president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, said the royal treatment during Sunday's journey — king prawns, champagne, French wine — was "a brilliant move." "What the cops want most is this guy to talk. They...

Karr was eyeing sex change * * Email * Print * Normal font * Large font August 20, 2006 - 2:30PM Karr (left) and JonBenet Ramsey Karr (left) and JonBenet Ramsey AdvertisementAdvertisement 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, told the New York Daily News yesterday that 41-year-old John Mark Karr was a patient of theirs - but wouldn't say how close he was to...

HAMILTON, Ala. - Tara Estes was almost breathless with excitement because she thought one of the more mysterious elements of the JonBenet Ramsey ransom note finally had been revealed. She climbed the steps to Jeff Brown's rickety porch, brushed aside an orange wasp and sat down on a dirty ice cooler. "Shall be the conqueror," she said Friday afternoon to a couple of quizzical looks. "S.B.T.C." Ah, yes. The ransom note that asked John Ramsey to turn over $118,000 for the safe return of 6-year-old JonBenet has been analyzed over and over for nearly a decade. The long, rambling ransom...

(CNN) -- JonBenet Ramsey's body was discovered on December 26, 1996, in a storage room in the basement of her family's home in Boulder, Colorado. A three-page hand-written ransom note demanding $118,000 was found on a back staircase leading down from the home's bedroom areas, according to the late Patsy Ramsey. JonBenet's autopsy report, released by the Boulder County coroner in August 1997, is the main source of what is publicly known about the crime scene. The report included the following details:

Confession in JonBenet case questioned By CATHERINE TSAI and JON SARCHE, Associated Press Writers 38 minutes ago BOULDER, Colo. - For a moment, it seemed the decade-old mystery surrounding the slaying of a child beauty queen had been solved. But authorities Thursday cautioned against rushing to judge the schoolteacher who made a stunning confession that he killed JonBenet Ramsey. For now, the only public evidence against John Mark Karr are his own words. And questions have already been raised about the details of his story, including whether he drugged the 6-year-old girl, sexually assaulted her or was even in Colorado...

In June, 2000, in what can only be described as the main event of what had become a media circus, the Ramseys challenged Steve Thomas to face them on national television and make his accusations in person. Thomas agreed and appeared alongside the Ramseys on CNN's Larry King Live. It was the first time they had been face-to-face since Thomas, then a Boulder police officer, questioned them about their daughter's death. The meeting quickly disintegrated into a verbal shouting match with Thomas exchanging accusations with the Ramseys as King struggled to maintain control. Finally, Thomas challenged the Ramseys on their...

BANGKOK, Thailand - The American suspect in the killing of JonBenet Ramsey told investigators that he drugged and had sex with the 6-year-old beauty queen before accidentally killing her, a senior Thai police officer said Thursday. An autopsy on Ramsey said a blood screening showed no drugs or alcohol in her body but said she had vaginal abrasions. Lt. Gen. Suwat Tumrongsiskul, head of Thailand's immigration police, said by telephone that he was not present for the questioning, which was conducted by U.S. law enforcement officials. But, according to what the general said he was told of the questioning, the...

BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) - A former American school teacher said publicly Thursday he was with JonBenet Ramsey when she was killed and called the 6-year-old's death "an accident," a stunning admission that should help answer 10 years of questions in the unsolved murder case. "I am so very sorry for what happened to JonBenet," he told The Associated Press.

John Mark Karr's arrest in Thailand after he had vanished for several years was a mixed blessing for his 85-year-old father. "I thought someone had killed him," Wexford Karr said Wednesday afternoon while sobbing during a telephone interview from his home in Atlanta. "This is such a surprise that he is alive." But learning his son was alive came with the news that his son, who is 41, was arrested in the Dec. 26, 1996, slaying of JonBenét Ramsey, he said. John Karr had disappeared after his release from jail in 2001. Karr, who relatives said had long spoken of...

BANGKOK, Thailand - Thai police said Thursday that a 41-year-old American man has admitted to the killing a decade ago of 6-year-old beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey in the United States. Lt. Gen. Suwat Tumrongsiskul, head of Thailand's immigration police, told The Associated Press that John Mark Karr confessed to the killing after his arrest Wednesday at a downtown Bangkok apartment. "He told police while under arrest that he did kill the girl but so far he has not pleaded guilty in writing. This is needed as official evidence," Suwat said.

PETALUMA (KRON) -- It now appears the only person ever arrested in connection with the murder of Jon Benet Ramsey once taught in Petaluma schools. The Sonoma County district attorney's office is now confirming 42-year old John Mark Karr was charged with possession of child pornography in April, 2001. Other reports indicate Karr served as a substitute teacher in the Petaluma elementary school system. Prosecutors say Karr failed to show in court in December, 2001. He's been a fugitive ever since. Thai police arrested Karr Wednesday in connection with the Jon Benet Ramsey case. The little girl was found dead...

Suspect arrested in JonBenet Ramsey case By CATHERINE TSAI, Associated Press Writer 34 minutes ago BOULDER, Colo. - A former schoolteacher was arrested Wednesday in Thailand in the slaying of 6-year-old beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey — a surprise breakthrough in a lurid, decade-old murder mystery that had cast a cloud of suspicion over her parents. Federal officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, identified the suspect as John Mark Karr, a 42-year-old American, and one law enforcement official told The Associated Press that Boulder police had tracked him down online. The Ramsey family's attorney in Atlanta pronounced the arrest vindication for...

In the nearly ten years since Jon Benet Ramsey’s death, I’ve spent little time pondering the identity of that little girl’s murderer. I’ve known the answer to that question for years. And so have you. But one time several years ago - during the height of the media coverage of the case - I did hear one interesting assertion about the parents of Jon Benet Ramsey; namely, that there was absolutely no evidence they had ever sexually abused their little girl. When I heard the assertion that there was “absolutely no evidence” of sexual abuse of Jon Benet Ramsey, I...

AN ARREST in Bangkok raised hopes last night of a breakthrough in the decade-old murder of JonBenet Ramsey, the American child beauty queen. An American primary schoolteacher was taken into custody in the Thai capital as a possible suspect in the strangling of the six-year-old girl at her home in Colorado on the night of Christmas Day 1996. US reports said that John Karr, 41, had been in custody in Thailand on unrelated sex charges. The case provoked a media frenzy in 1996 because of the spotlight it shone on the affluent parents and their daughter’s participation in child beauty...

Aug 16, 2006 3:37 pm US/Central Arrest Made In JonBenet Ramsey Case CBS News Interactive: The JonBenet Case (CBS) DENVER A man arrested in Thailand is being held in connection with the slaying of JonBenet Ramsey, U.S. law enforcement officials said Wednesday. Federal officials familiar with the case, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the man was being held in Bangkok on unrelated sex charges. Details on the arrest are developing, according to CBS affiliate KCNC-TV in Denver. Patsy Ramsey made the 911 call on December 26, 1996, telling police that her daughter was missing. "There's a note left...