JOHN MARK KARR may be a hoaxer or he may be deeply disturbed. Who knows?
A week’s worth of intense international press coverage of the spooky, wispy little man produced little light and much heat.
It was interesting to know that Karr has a penchant for marrying young girls, that he may or may not have acted improperly with his students when he was teaching and that he had been charged with possessing child pornography. Also interesting, if true, was the allegation that he was contemplating sex reassignment surgery. As unsettling as those bits of information were, they at least seemed to be useful clues to his character.
Of no use at all were the breathless reports of minutia about his extradition from Thailand. What did it matter that he was flown back to the United States in business class? How many times was it necessary to repeat that his meals on the plane included king prawns (big shrimp) and that he may or may not have had a glass of champagne?
News organizations — particularly the 24-hour news channels — could not decide whether to treat Karr as a murder suspect or a celebrity. In the end, they opted for both. By the time Karr arrived in the United States, it was difficult to tell the reporters from the paparazzi in the shouting swarm that surrounded him.
It would not be fair to say that news organizations created the John Mark Karr story. Karr did that himself, by rambling on mysteriously to Thai police, and anyone else who would listen, about the little girl who was killed in her Colorado home 10 years ago. But the subsequent news reports did convey an unwarranted sense of certainty that JonBenet Ramsey’s killer had at last been captured. Any quiet reservations expressed by authorities, reporters or news readers was immediately drowned out in the clamor for immediate trivia.
The result of that fascination with trivia is that Karr now drifts beyond of the focus of the world’s attention little better known that he was when he first stepped into the spotlight.
Karr may be sick and he may be dangerous. But the only thing that can be said for certain about him is this:
He did not kill JonBenet Ramsey.
He was not in the house. He was not in the basement. He was not even in Boulder when the little girl was killed.
For Karr, the news organizations, their viewers and their readers, the whole clamorous week was nothing but a fever dream.
While they were dreaming, the real world, with its life-and-death news, went on, ignored.
Patrick S. Kelley
Editorial Page Editor