Author: By Evan Fray-Witzer

Date: SUNDAY, March 7, 1999

Page: H1

Section: Books

Perfect murder, Perfect Town
JonBenet and the City of Boulder
By Lawrence Schiller. HarperCollins. 621 pp. $26.

Did they do it? This is, of course, the question everyone wants answered. Did her parents kill JonBenet Ramsey? And if not, who did?

The questions have been asked for more than two years, since the world first learned of the murder of the 6-year-old veteran of child beauty contests. It was the morning after Christmas 1996 when the Ramseys called 911 to report that their daughter had been kidnapped from their home and a bizarre ransom note left behind. Hours later, JonBenet's body would be found in the basement, her skull fractured and a noose tightened around her neck. Later, the coroner would report the possibility that she had been sexually assaulted.

Lawrence Schiller, author of ``Perfect Murder, Perfect Town: JonBenet and the City of Boulder,'' does not know the answer to these questions any more than you or I do. Indeed, despite having written an exhaustive (and sometimes exhausting) 600-plus page examination of the case, Schiller professes outrage at the very idea that anyone feels qualified to advance a theory as to what actually happened to JonBenet Ramsey.

``The more I learned about the murder from those investigating the case,'' Schiller writes, ``the more clearly I saw, as did some of the detectives, that no one theory included all of the evidence.'' Schiller's frustration is understandable. The murder has produced dozens of suspects, but no real motive. Indeed, the only definitive conclusion that can be drawn from ``Perfect Murder, Perfect Town'' is that, even if someone is eventually tried for the murder (which is itself far from certain), no one will ever be convicted. There are simply too many potential suspects and not enough evidence. Schiller's book is the perfect road map for a good defense lawyer.

Even so, Schiller's outrage is more than a little disingenuous: The book, with its minute-by-minute, day-by-day recitation of facts, is a clear invitation for the reader to play detective. And this seeming contradiction is emblematic of a book laden with contradictions.

Even the title, ``Perfect Murder, Perfect Town'' is intended to highlight the contradictions inherent in the Colorado city itself -- a city that appears to be nirvana but whose inhabitants have grown increasingly disenchanted with their earthly paradise. The book itself is a dichotomy. It is at times enthralling; though more often than not, plodding. And although it wants, desperately, to be The Definitive Work about the Ramsey case, Schiller chose to release it before the end of the story has been written. (Even now, a grand jury is meeting to review the evidence.)

Ironically, the book that wants to be all things to all people will most likely prove unsatisfying to most readers. For diehard Ramsey case-watchers, the book contains few revelations. For those with a casual interest in the case, the book will likely tell them more than they ever wanted to know. (If it is not illegal to write a 600-page book without an index, it should be.) Consider Schiller's description of the home of John and Patsy Ramsey and their two children: ``A wrought-iron sideboard had a marble top. Patsy told many of her guests that it had been purchased from Tiffany's in New York, though Tiffany's sells jewelry, table settings, and decorative pieces but no furniture.'' What are we supposed to gain from this bit of information? That Patsy Ramsey lied about where she bought her furniture, so she must have killed her child?

Still, credit must be given. People talked to Schiller (and to Charles Brennan, the Rocky Mountain News reporter who served as Schiller's investigator). According to Schiller, he and Brennan conducted in excess of 500 interviews, many of which are reproduced in the book, though altered slightly so that Schiller could present them as if the person interviewed was telling the story in the first person.

That so many people were willing to speak openly to Schiller is perplexing. It is no secret that his forte is kiss-and-tell books (he wrote two books on the O. J. Simpson case and was Norman Mailer's coauthor on ``The Executioner's Song''). And yet, one after another, the moths surrounding the Ramsey investigation are drawn into Schiller's flame. Predictably, everybody gets burned.

The worst-scorched is Boulder County District Attorney Alex Hunter, who cannot hide his utter contempt for the head of the Boulder Police Department's detective division, John Eller. Hunter goes so far as to encourage reporters for various tabloid papers to investigate Eller's work history, suggesting that if they dig hard enough, they will find a history of sexual harassment complaints lodged against him.

Not that Eller emerges otherwise unscathed. Think what you may of John and Patsy Ramsey, it is hard not to be disturbed by the revelation that Eller threatened not to release JonBenet's body for burial unless the Ramseys agreed to submit to police interrogations. Hunter also had other (legitimate) reasons for distrusting the Boulder police. The police, believing that Hunter and his staff were leaking information to the press, embarked on a campaign to withhold relevant information from the district attorney's office. Early on in the investigation, for example, the Ramseys had told the police that their son, Burke, was asleep in his room when they first called 911. An enhancement of the 911 tape, however, would prove that this was not true.

``[Boulder Police Detective Melissa] Hickman listened to the tape and wrote down what she heard.

`` `Help me, Jesus, help me, Jesus.' That was clearly Patsy's voice. Then, in the distance, there was another voice, which sounded like JonBenet's brother.

`` `Please, what do I do?'' Burke said.

`` `We're not speaking to you,' Hickman heard John Ramsey say.

``Patsy screamed again. `Help me, Jesus, help me, Jesus.'

``And then, more clearly, Burke said, `What did you find?' '' The police decided not to tell Hunter or anyone on his staff what they had learned. They feared leaks of this valuable evidence.

That such vital information might be withheld from the district attorney's office is representative of an investigation gone awry. Even more interesting than the war between the police and the prosecutors are the bizarre antics of Jeffrey Shapiro, a rookie reporter for the supermarket tabloid the Globe. Shapiro, a recent college graduate, was plunked down in the middle of Boulder with $2,000 in his pocket and told to find the dirt. He was strangely successful, gaining access to both the police and district attorney in ways that other journalists couldn't seem to manage. Still, you can't help but feel there is something seriously wrong with Shapiro, who sees himself as JonBenet's avenging angel, and who talks as if he were a character in a bad made-for-TV movie:

`` `Jeff, is your loyalty to the DA's office, the police, or the Globe?' [Boulder County Police Detective Steven] Thomas asked.

``I looked at him seriously. `My loyalty is to JonBenet. I will work with whoever I have to work with to do whatever it takes to avenge that girl.'

``At that moment I saw a look in Thomas's eye that I had never seen before in my life. It was a look of total respect and admiration.''

So the questions remain. And there is one more: Why do we care so much about this particular crime? Where are the books about Roxbury's Eric Dawood, New Hampshire's Elizabeth Knapp, or New York's Elisa Izquierdo -- all 6-year-olds, all murdered in the last few years. The answer comes in an incident in ``Perfect Murder, Perfect Town'' concerning the principal of JonBenet's elementary school, Charles Elbot:

``During recess that day, Elbot walked around to see how the students were doing. A second grade girl came up to him. `If I died, no one would care.'

`` `What do you mean,' Elbot asked.

`` `You know. If I die, there wouldn't be all these people around -- there wouldn't be all this fuss.'

`` `If something happened to you, I would care and your parents would care and your friends would care,' Elbot replied.

`` `Yeah, but all the people -- the world wouldn't care. . . . The reason people care about JonBenet is because she was rich and pretty, and things like that.' ''