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The Ramsey Stun Gun Myth
Proof there was no stun gun used in the crime
 

UPDATED WITH NEW INFORMATION
We told you a stun gun was NOT used on JonBenét.
Now you can see the PROOF for yourself.






The Autopsy Report
The official autopsy states the following about the marks on the body of JonBenét:
 

On the left lateral aspect of the lower back, approximately sixteen and one-quarter inches and seventeen and one-half inches below the level of the top of the head are two dried rust colored to slightly purple abrasions. The more superior of the two measures one-eighth by one-sixteenth of an inch and the more inferior measures three-sixteenths by one-eighth of an inch. There is no surrounding contusion identified.

 

The Actual Marks On JonBenét
The marks on the lower back, as shown the week of 5/1/01 on the NBC Today Show:


The actual marks shown on TV after former detective Lou Smit
turned over autopsy photos to a morning news show.







Until now, the distance between the marks were believed to match the prong spacing on an Air Taser stun gun, but the size and shape of the marks are NOT equal, and do NOT match the stun gun prongs (below).


A close detail and measurement of the Air Taser stun gun
showing the distance between electrodes to be 3.4 cm.









Wrong Spacing and Wrong Alignment
A close look at a comparison of the actual scaled marks and scaled detail of the Air Taser prove there is no way the Air Taser stun gun could have created the marks on the back of JonBenét!   Not only is the spacing between marks incorrect, but the rectangular aspect of the larger body mark shows that it could NOT directionally match up to the Air Taser stun gun.  The rectangular mark is literally "going the wrong direction" to meet the second smaller mark.


 










The Problem With Pigs
In the Today Show, part of Lou Smit's presentation was the tests that were conducted on pig skin.  But the results shown on the broadcast further proved a stun gun wasn't used on JonBenét.  The marks on the pig skin were shown to be in PERFECT alignment and the correct distance apart, unlike any of the marks on JonBenét.


Actual marks created on pig skin by an AIrTaser.
The marks are consistent size, shape, and distance apart to the electrodes.
The mark on the left is slightly larger than the electrode because it was either
moved during the initial start of the discharge or pressed further into the skin.







Additionally, Lou Smit claimed on the show that the blue vein showing between the marks on JonBenét was a product of the blue arc produced by the stun gun when discharged.  Apparently Mr. Smit failed his high school electronics class, or he would have known that the color of an electrical arc has nothing to do with the burn you get from it.  The arc from an Air Taser stun gun could no more leave a blue line than a lightening bolt could turn a person blue if they were struck by it.  Welders who expose their skin to the intense blue arc produced by arc welding get a typical red sunburn, they don't turn into blue smurfs--nor would their finger turn blue if they were stupid enough to touch the arc. (And where are the blue lines on your pig tests, Lou?  Didn't the fact that they weren't reproduced on the pig tell you anything?)
 
 

UPDATE 5/28/01 - Lou Smit appeared on Larry King Live tonight and for the first time cast doubt on his own theory.  Either someone finally gave Smit a ruler with numbers big enough that he could read them, or he accidentally stumbled across this web page and found the facts presented in black & white.  A portion of the transcript for the show follows:
SMIT: I am not positive that it is an Air Taser stun gun. 
KING: Meaning?
SMIT: Meaning that the Air Taser stun gun is as close as we've been able to find to the marks on JonBenét. 
(Gee Lou, you should have paid attention to us last December!)

UPDATE 7/11/01 - In a new crockumentary shown today in the UK, Lou Smit repeated his far-fetched ideas, "When the stun gun is energized you see a light blue mark and if you look closely at the blow-up you'll see a light blue mark extending from one of the marks to the other on the back of JonBenét."
(Hey Lou, ask your wife to turn on the gas stove so you can stick your hand in the flame and tell us if it turns BLUE!)

UPDATE 7/18/03 - On the MSNBC Dan Abrams Show last night, Michael Kane (the special prosecutor brought in to handle the Ramsey case) commented for the first time in public about the stun gun myth:
KANE: The thing about the stun gun that everybody keeps coming back to. There was one person who was qualified who actually looked at that little girl’s body on the autopsy table and that was Dr. Meyer, who’s a forensic pathologist. He looked at those very marks and said that they were abrasions. It is a quantum leap-you can take a stun gun and put it up against somebody’s body...and it’s going to leave a burn. It dosen't leave an abrasion. So all these other opinions that have come out that said that this was a stun gun, there is absolutely no way they would ever get into evidence because there is no evidence that these were burns.
ABRAMS: But, ... there were other experts like Mr. Doberson and others and Lou Smit who have said they absolutely believe that there was a stun gun used.
KANE: But they’re basing that based on photographs of marks on her body. When the uncontradicted evidence of Dr. Meyer is that these were not burns.

 

And what about Lou Smit's partner in this fantasy theory, Arapahoe County Coroner, Michael Dobersen?  Mr. Dobersen's opinions seem to depend on where he can get the most publicity from them at the time. In the new UK crockumentary he had this to say:
 

Mike Dobersen: "My experiments, and the observations that we made and all the work that's been done, I feel that I can testify to a reasonably degree of medical certainty that these are stun gun injuries."

Unfortunately, Mr. Dobersen is already on record as making completely contradictory statements.  Apparently one minute he can't tell by looking at a photograph, the next minute he can:
 

"They came over and showed me some pictures from the (Ramsey) autopsy and asked for my opinion, whether they could be stun gun injuries," Dobersen recalled.  "I told them that they could be; that was a possibility.  But there were a lot of things they could do to narrow down the possibilities of what it could be." 

Dobersen told Boulder investigators to do what The New Yorker reports they eventually did - measure the distance between the wounds and compare that to stun guns.

"Besides", he added, "the only definitive way to tell if electrocution was involved in JonBenet's death is to re-examine her body and look for very characteristic changes in skin tissue."

"You really can't tell from a photo," Dobersen said.

(The Boulder Daily Camera - January 13, 1998)

Besides not exhuming the body, it looks like Mr. Dobersen forgot to take his own advise and "measure the distance between the wounds" -- or he would know that 2.9 centimeters does NOT equal 3.4 centimeters.  Dobersen appears to be a good politician though, he knows exactly how to cover his bases.  On the Today Show broadcast (filmed after the UK crock) he changed his statement to a lack of real commitment:
 

"Dobersen: Unless some other evidence is presented to me, the most likely explanation for those injuries is that they were caused by a stun gun."

With that silly rhetoric Dobersen could just as easily have said that until some other evidence comes along, she was bitten by a vampire.  It's too bad Mr. Dobersen can't do his own research or he would know that besides the marks not matching, the effects of an Air Taser don't even fit the crime.

Maybe Lou Smit should listen to a different forensic pathologist who seems to have a better handle on the facts:
 

Dr. Cyril Wecht: "The stun gun theory has been around for some time.  I know for a fact that this was submitted to various experts in stun guns and manufacturers, criminalists, forensic pathologists, law enforcement people, they all rejected it." 
"I also know for a fact that Mr. Smit, pursuant to his own request, presented this to one of the top-flight forensic scientists, who along with another top-flight forensic scientist of a different subspecialty, rejected it."

(Court TV - The Crier Report - 05/01/01)

 
 

Wading Through The Misinformation
It comes as no surprise that the pro-Ramsey propagandists do not like this web page.  They've even gone as far as creating imitation pages with false/misleading information that is meant to scam the public.  Fortunately these non-technical charlatans are way out of their league when it comes to presenting factual information and their scams are obvious and easily detected by even an average person.  Below is an example of a graphic farce they produced and posted.  Notice the red arrows, which point out how they misaligned the ruler on the OUTSIDE of the body mark, and compared it to the ruler measuring the INSIDE of the stun gun prong.  Hopefully they will learn to leave the measuring to people who know what they are doing -- their scam fooled no one.

Ironically, this is the same type of sloppy work that Smit and Dobersen did which created the Stun Gun Myth to begin with.


Note how the rulers are incorrectly aligned
in this hoax posted on another web site.




The Boggs Hoax
Another scam that has been played-out on the Internet is the posting of photos from an actual case where a stun gun was used and its comparison to the JonBenét autopsy photos.  The body of Gerald Boggs was exhumed after it had been buried for 8 months by the infamous Dr. Doberson.  It was then proven that a stun gun was used on him which helped convict his ex-wife and her lover of Boggs' murder.  A stun gun which matched the marks just below Boggs' ear was found in his ex-wife's car.

Sadly, people are now posting the photos taken at Boggs' exhumation and comparing them to the JonBenét autopsy photos.  However, the photos taken at Boggs' autopsy (before his body had decayed for months in the ground) look nothing like any marks on JonBenét.  (Of course they forget to post that photo, or even mention it...)






The 20/20 Disaster
In March 2000, ABC 20/20 aired a report on the Ramsey case and showed an artist's rendering of the stun gun marks on JonBenet's back.  Barbara Walters clearly stated it was not an actual photo when she introduced the graphic as an "artist's depiction".  Supposedly, Lou Smit traveled to New York and showed the 20/20 producers the actual autopsy photo of the marks.   Smit didn't want the actual photo shown on TV, so an artist created an exact copy of the photo for use in the program.  20/20 attempted to show that the marks on JonBenét matched the prongs on the Air Taser, but their graphic was so different than what the actual autopsy photo looks like the journalistic integrity of the 20/20 program must now be called into question.
 

Not only was the 20/20 graphic a sham of a depiction, it's still not clear how ABC 20/20 even managed to get marks to match the prongs on the Air Taser, since proportionally the graphic they created doesn't match the dimensions as written in the official autopsy report.  (Can you say, "artistic license"?)  To see exactly how much liberty 20/20 took with their graphics, click "HERE".
 
 

About the Air Taser
Several people from the internet forums contacted a representative from the company that manufactures the Air Taser stun gun.  They were fully aware of the JonBenét case, and had already seen an actual autopsy photo of the marks when they were visited by Ramsey investigators.  The company representative stated that at no time had they ever witnessed one of their products causing marks that shape on a person's skin.  Steve Tuttle, an executive at the Air Taser company, confirmed that the gap between the Air Taser's prongs is 3.415 centimeters  and 4.070 centimeters to the outside edges.  "We have never seen those types of marks when you touch somebody with a stun gun," he said. "We are talking hundreds of people that  have been touched with these devices. I can't replicate those marks."  He also said the Air Taser does not render people unconscious and zapped himself on camera to prove it.

The AIR TASER power supply consists of an alkaline 9-volt battery that is capable of supplying less than three watts of electrical power for a few minutes.  It boosts the voltage of the battery up extremely high, but doesn't increase the amperage.  By contrast, the typical household current of 110 volts is dangerous because it can pump many amperes of current throughout the body causing death.  The spark from an Air Taser is not hot enough to ignite gunpowder.  A good description of how the Air Taser functions can be found HERE.


The Air Taser Stun Gun






Conclusion
It would be impossible for the Air Taser stun gun with electrodes that are 3.4 centimeters apart to create marks on JonBenét that are 2.9 centimeters in distance.  It would also be impossible for the fixed electrodes on the Air Taser to match up to the wounds left on JonBenet's back because the wounds are a completely different alignment that the stun gun prongs.  Lou Smit didn't take enough time, didn't do his homework properly, or is trying to pull a major scam on the public with his stun gun theory for reasons unknown.

Tests on pig skin which Smit hoped would support his theory turned out to be meaningless to the Ramsey case.  The marks created on the pig skin don't even resemble the marks on JonBenét, and it is now proven the marks on JonBenét can't even match up to the Air Taser like the marks on the pig do.  The question remains as to why the stun gun and body mark measurements weren't properly verified BEFORE application tests were even considered?
 
 

Parody, or reality?


 







(Note: The images shown on this page are drawn proportionally correct but may vary in display size due to the  size of your computer screen - what resolution you have your video set - and how the vertical and horizontal frame positioning is adjusted.)


The images produced or modified specifically for this web page are
(C)opywrite and may not be taken or used without permission.
Special thanks to CensusGrrl for her excellent video capture photos!

The context of this web page is the opinion of its author and is based on
published information readily available on the Internet via any public library.
All original writing is copyright and can not be used without permission.
 

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This web page is part of a continuing series of articles which dispel the
myths and expose the real facts in the JonBenét Ramsey murder case.
For a complete index of those articles,
CLICK HERE



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Revised: 07/18/03