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Jim Marino They were loads of fun too. I've been friends since the 70's back to johns original marriage. I was with John when Beth was run over by a Mack truck. I was with him when Jon Benet was murdered. He's fine now. We talked last week. Jon Benet had Patsy ' s eyes. They were regular folks till that Christmas. What would you do in that circumstance? I defended the family to a fault on Geraldo, the view, people mag etc etc. sad and still haunts me


Jim Marino Well we will never know what culpability they have in the matter. However it doesn't matter above the love I have always had for those two

Jim Marino Kathy Buck Lezovich - not sure what that is? I was not an informant because I was surprised at the murder the same as everyone else. I defended all the crazy speculation against them... it was a nightmare.




Jim Marino Thats me and wife above John and Patsy at our company Christmas party a couple of years before



Jim Marino my position hasn't change and I have moved on. I think there will always be questions about the ransom note etc.... but its all speculation., The family has all been cleared so we have to leave it there.

all of the friends and employees were suspects till all were cleared, including me.

on Steve Thomas

Jim Marino He used to come to my house often with his evidence bag in tow. I would answer the door and tell him to leave it outside or don't come in.

He kept digging for evidence against the Ramsey's . He was so focused on them that he missed the truth. Which we still don't know because "keystone cops" Boulder cops blew it from the beginning trampling all over the crime scene

Jim Marino - John and I go back to the early seventies. We were friends, business partners, and I was in Boulder and had just left Access graphics when the murder occurred. All of the family friends and employees had to be screened as suspects... DNA etc... Thats how I know the boulder cops. I was in all the rags and appeared on Geraldo several times in his defense. I had not been to their house . It changed my life and I have moved on now. I spoke to John just this month. He is in Utah, but still looking for leads.

on John "He seems fine . He is working to pay the bills"

A quote from Jim Marino - Copy and paste from FB;
My note about culpability or in other words having any fault has been misconstrued. What I meant was things like the house alarm off or not fixing the window or having an open house Christmas Eve or giving out so many keys on and on. Are they to blame. ?? Of course not !!!at least to those of us that knew them well. I was speaking in general terms.

He worked for Access Graphics for a while and when he left there were apparently no hard feelings. But when Jeff Merrick was let go it seemed Marino supported Merrick's claim that his termination was unjust. That is my understanding of the situation.

1997-04-30: Patsy Ramsey Interrogation by Steve Thomas, Tom Trujillo

Patsy Ramsey Interrogation by Steve Thomas, Tom Trujillo
Also present, Pat Burke, Bryan Morgan, Pete Hoffstrom, Jon Foster
April 30, 1997 - Boulder, Colorado
http://www.jonbenetindexguide.com/1997BP...mplete.htm


(SNIP)


TT: Okay. Some of this stuff, may not be able to help us a whole lot. I’m kind of going back to access Graphics a little bit. Um, I think I need to touch on it again, but I will. Any concerns that John’s brought home from work about problems at Access (inaudible). Any employees other than the, we’ve got a couple of employees that you guys were talking about.
PR: Yeah.
TT: And that Ellis has given us.
PR: Yeah. Well, I uh, remember, I don’t know the time frame exactly, but this fellow named Jeff Merrick . . .
TT: Um hum.
PR: . . .who was, has known John for several years, I guess from, I think they worked together at AT&T when John was out of college or something like that, but he came to work at Access and was subsequently asked to resign, I think. . .
TT: Okay.
PR: . . .and I remember John and my dad, you know, works there too, that they were both concerned that he was, you know making threats. . .
TT: Um hum.
PR: . . .to Access and he didn’t go quietly in other words.
TT: Right.
PR: Uh, and that was, you know . . .
TT: Ellis gave us Jeff Merrick and Mike Glenn.
PR: Mike Glenn, yeah.
TT: Any other names that have come up that that you guys can think of?
PR: Uh, you know, I mean, you just, I mean we have done nothing but try to rack our brains over this . . .
TT: Um hum.
PR: . . .since this happened and uh, you know, John, I, John would probably know better about anybody at the office or anything, but just, I remember Merrick and uh, oh Jim Morino, I think we, we kind of, John kind of had him maybe at the top of the list. Um, and this Mike Glenn. And all three, I believe released or if I remember right.
TT: Okay. Now, mike and Jeff um, have they ever been to your home at all?
PR: Yes.
TT: Okay. When was the last time Mike was at your house?
PR: Oh, jeez, I can’t remember, you know, I, I mean they’d just been there. I know when we kind of first moved we were, it was when we, I remember we were remodeling the patio, so I don’t know when that was. A few years ago. I mean, sort of after we had moved, first moved in we, it was Fourth of July and we went with Mary and Mike and their little girl to Chautauqua Park over the Fourth of July . . .
TT: Um hum.
PR: That’s what I remembered and then they came down and had hamburgers and then we walked down to the stadium for the fireworks.
TT: Um hum.
PR: And he dropped by a couple of times and brought John, this is before I think he even worked at Access.
TT: Okay.
PR: He would bring, he was with the football program. He brought John Colorado sweater one time.
TT: Okay.
PR: You know, I, I can’t, they haven’t been there anytime recently.
TT: Okay. Since Mike uh, left Access, ahs he been there at all?
PR: Uh, not to my knowledge.
TT: Okay. Um, sounds like he’s kind of dropped in every once and awhile. He wasn’t. . .
PR: Yeah.
TT: . . .wasn’t a frequent visitor at all to the house.
PR: Um, no. Hum um.
TT: Okay. What about Jeff Merrick? How, how often did he come by the house?
PR: Not very often. I remember he and his wife came by when I was under chemotherapy treatment and they uh, you know, we sat in the sun room and talked (inaudible).
TT: Okay, um. . .
PR: I mean they weren’t um, you know, they, we didn’t socialize with them or anything, you know.
TT: Right. Do you know when the last time Jeff was in the house? Would it been kind of the same length as Mike, quite a while back?
PR: It would be quite a while ago.
TT: Okay.
PR: As far as I can remember.


(SNIP)

Quote:1997-09-16: Vanity Fair “Who Killed JonBenet?” by Ann Louise Bardach

"Jim Marino met Ramsey on a business trip to Syracuse in the late 70's. "We immediately became friends," says Marino. "He was going through a divorce at the time, but he'd always check in with the kids." However, in his own quiet way, John Ramsey also had an eye for the ladies. According to police reports, his former wife, Lucinda, said it was a romantic liaison with a co-worker that was the last straw for her. Although Marino and Ramsey caroused "and whored around together," Marino says Ramsey was notably discreet. "You never got much out of him," says Marino. "you wondered what he was all about."

Although Ramsey walked away from his first wife with little more than his clothes and a car, he slowly began to prosper as he worked his way through a series of computer companies. His success, says Marino, was part of his appeal to women. "He had money, he drove a Porsche, he dressed nice, but he was shy. However, you could say that whatever he went after he usually got." In 1978, Marino, after being injured in a motorcycle accident, was confined to a wheelchair for almost a year. "John came and visited me, and he gave me a job," says Marino. "He saved my life." Although the two went to work for different companies in 1980, they remained close friends.

In 1979, Ramsey caught a glimpse of a beautiful 22-yr old brunette in Atlanta and pursued her. Two years earlier, while a journalism major at West Virginia University, Patricia Ann Paugh had been crowned Miss West Virginia and had won a talent award for a dramatic reading at the Miss America pageant. Marino, who often double dated with Patsy and Ramsey said his friend was deeply smitten with her. "She was his Jackie Kennedy."

In 1980 they were married in Atlanta's Peachtree Presbyterian Church. At 37, Ramsey was 14 yr. older than Patsy. The couple settled into a modest Cape Cod house in the Dunwoody section of Atlanta. Ramsey ran his own company, Microsouth, from the house, and patsy worked along side him. After a series of business reversals, Patsy asked her father, Don Paugh, a retired Union Carbide engineer, to help her husband's struggling company. "The word is," says Merrick, "that John was going broke and Don bailed him out financially."

Although Don and Nedra Paugh were able to raise their three daughters- Patsy, Pam and Polly- in the middle -class town of Parkersburg, West Virginia, both had endured hardscrabble childhood. Rescued by the G.I. Bill, Don had obtained a college degree, which led to a career at Union Carbide. "Nedra saw Don as this great white knight," says Marino. In contrast to her laconic husband, the wiry Nedra was driven and relentless, determined to see that her daughters enjoyed more of the good things in life than she had. Nedra's vehicle for launching them into prosperity was beauty pageants.

"I did my first pageant when I was a junior in high school," Pam Paugh told me. "I won the national crown for that, and I won a local count-fair contest-at the Wood County fair-in 1977, which Patsy also won." In 1980, three years after Patsy held the crown, Pam was also Miss West Virginia and a Miss America contestant. Nedra had become a fixture on the pageant circuit. "She was involved in the whole Miss America Pageant organization when I met them," says Marino. "She was one of the coordinators."

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(SNIP)

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"In 1989, Ramsey merged his company with Boulder-based Access Graphics and another firm. He seized control of the new company and in 1991 relocated his family to Boulder. Among his new hires were his old friends Jeff Merrick and Jim Marino. Ramsey then hit the jackpot, selling Access to Lockheed Martin and continuing to run it as president and C.E.O. Judith Phillips, who had moved to Boulder three yr. earlier, wondered if Patsy would have a hard time making the transition from the antebellum capital of the South to a small town full of hippies, Buddhists, and mountain climbers. However, Patsy, now the mother of a four-year-old Burke and newborn JonBenet, assured her that she "was ready to have a different life." Don Paugh adapted easily and moved into a company condo on Pearl Street. Nedra Paugh, however, made no bones about her feelings concerning Boulder, referring to it as "that hellhole."

In Nov. 1991, the Ramseys purchased a 6,800-square foot Tudor style house in one of Boulder's choice neighborhoods for about $500,000. Over the next two years, Patsy remodeled and decorated her new home, spending, according to Jim Marino, $700,000. She was thrilled to have the house listed on the Boulder Christmas tour, as well as on the home tour. Visitors recall her greeting them at the door with JonBenet and Burke by her side, all of them in matching sweaters. Featured in JonBenet's room were her trophies, sashes, and medals. One visitor said that in the huge master-bedroom suite Patsy's Miss West Virginia dress and her Miss America competition sash were laid out on the bed.

Although the Ramsey's had been Presbyterians, they joined St. John's Episcopal Church. "Social climbing," says Marino sadly; "she wanted to be where the money was.' Friends were dropped as well, replaced by attractive, wealthy Boulderites. Marino says, "I was never invited to his house. John and I were 'Let's get a beer down at the local pub after work."

Patsy also redecorated their vacation home in Charlevoix, on Lake Michigan. "The only time I ever saw John really lose his temper was about Patsy and money," says Marino. "he would throw the credit cards on his desk and say, 'She's gonna spend every last penny I make.' "

1997-12-21: Rocky Mountain News: Legacy of JonBenet (Screen Capture by ACandyRose)

http://denver.rockymountainnews.com/extr...1jon1.html
(Transcript by ACandyRose)


(SNIP)


KOA radio reporter Carol McKinley found the story a wecome challenge, now it has lead to a new career. In mid-January, McKinley will become the Denver-based correspondent for Fox News network, a move that will quadruple her radio salary.

"I had a constant headache from this story," said McKinley. "I finally had to go see someone to calm me down a little bit. After a while, this story really takes a bite out of you."

Ramsey family friends who have spoken out have had the same exprience. In the months after JonBenet's death, Jim Marino grieved for John Ramsey, the man he had known for 20 years as a client, a boss and a friend.

"I was just devastated over it, just emotionally distraught," Marino said. "I was bothered by the possibility that my best friend in life was a murderer. That's what everyone was saying.

"And I just didn't belive it. And I was telling everyone, there's no way, no way. But I wasn't public."

In September, he decided to change that. He allowed his name to be used in a Vanity Fair article about the case, and he has come to regret it.

"At least half my day is spent talking to reporters, storybook tellers, spin doctors, TV personalities, radio-personalities, friends and acquantances who are curious," said Marino, who has appeared on Gerald and Hard Copy. He's done with that now.

"People are just not listening," he said. "Even though I've talked in John's favor, I feel I'm not doing much good.

"It's affected not oly personality, but emotionally I'm drained. I really don't sleep very well," Marino said. "It's just because, bottom line, my friend has been accused of someting he didn't do, and I'm damn made about it. And I'm damn mad I'm involved at all."


(SNIP)

Quote:1998-02-06: Ramseys' trip to Spain strictly business Friend (Jim Marino) says - February 6, 1998

Ramseys' trip to Spain strictly business, friend says
By Lisa Levitt Ryckman
Rocky Mountain News Staff Writer
February 6, 1998

John Ramsey went to Spain recently to investigate a possible business venture, not to scout locations for a new home, a longtime friend said Thursday.

Ramsey, now a consultant for Lockheed Martin Corp. in Atlanta, traveled to Spain with his wife, Patsy, to check out a software company that produces a video software package, Jim Marino said.

"He is not looking to move to Spain. He was looking at the possibility of buying the rights to distribute the software in the U.S.,'' said Marino, who has been a Ramsey friend and business associate for more than 20 years.

Speculation that the Ramseys were planning to move overseas began after a reporter for a supermarket weekly followed them on a recent trip to Spain. Rumors spread that the Ramseys wanted to flee to Spain to avoid extradition if they were ever charged in the murder of their 6-year-old daughter, JonBenet.

"That sounds like a ridiculous proposition, because we do have an extradition treaty with Spain,'' said Curt Bradley, a University of Colorado professor of international law.

"That treaty certainly covers murder.''

The Ramseys have insisted they are innocent in the Dec. 26, 1996, death of JonBenet, whose battered body was found in the basement of the family's Boulder mini-mansion by her father. Police have said the Ramseys remain under an "umbrella of suspicion.'' No arrests have been made and no charges brought in the 14-month-old investigation.

Ramsey attorneys have said the couple and their 11-year-old son, Burke, have no plans to leave Atlanta, where they moved last summer and are surrounded by family and close friends.

Ramsey became a Lockheed consultant after the company traded his Boulder-based Access Graphics to a division of General Electric Co. in a $2.8 billion stock swap in November. Ramsey, who built Access into a $1 billion company, also has been investigating other business opportunities, Marino said.

"John's a hands-on guy. He went out and looked at (the software company) on his own,'' Marino said.said of the Spain trip. "It's not a done deal. It's just something he's interested in.''

Quote:1998-07-01: “Who Killed Jonbenet Ramsey?” (Charles Bosworth, Cyril H. Wecht)

WKJR Page 135

"Jim Marino began selling computer printers to John Ramsey for his company about 1977, while the Ramseys were divorcing. Marino was impressed that the ex-spouses had managed to remain friends and were rearing their children together even though they lived apart. Marino marveled at John's dedication - calling his children every morning and every evening, no matter where he was; it was like a religion to this loving father, Marino thought.

He was impressed with his new friend, seeing in him a forthright, honest, capable man who seemed to define the phrase "What you see is what you get." Although Ramsey would later find himself at the center of a shocking mystery, Marino could find no mystery in this man who seemed to do everything right and for the right reasons. Marino had never seen anyone as cool under pressure as Ramsey. He was a quiet gentleman who chose his words carefully. Marino never heard Ramsey raise his voice on the job or with his family. Marino was impressed with Ramsey's management style in the workplace. He said he never gave anyone anything except an opportunity. After that it was up to them to run with it. His leadership abilities struck Marino as someone in the dramatic role of a General George Patton or an Andrew Carnegie or a Henry Ford.

Ramsey was shy, but in a way that Marino thought was good. He could find nothing artificial in Ramsey at work or at play. And the two men did play together. They toured the nightspots looking for women. In an observation that would seem important only years later, Marino found his friend's social and sexual interests "normal" with a capital N." Ramsey's quiet and reserve were not natural magnets for women, but they were drawn to his Porsche, expensive clothes, and gold credit cards. Ramsey was always descreet and a gentleman about his romantic relationships, and his generally respectful attitude toward women led him to reject Marino's occasional suggestion to take some clients to a topless bar. The most John would say about a woman he was with was that she was "cute." Marino chuckled, "I doubt he would read a Victoria's Secret catalogue."

While Jim Marino and John Ramsey were spending so much time together, John found the woman who would become his second wife. There were differing reports about how he met Patricia Ann "Patsy" Paugh. One said they met through mutual friends in Atlanta. Patsy's mother, Nedra Paugh, told a more romantic story to the Boulder Daily Camera. She said John had caught a glimpse of her stunning daughter entering an appartment complex, and had run up a flight of stairs to track her down, only to learn she had disappeared. He would find her later, of course. Marino said John was absolutely smitten with Patsy, whom Marino called John's "Jackie Kennedy." Marino did not know her well, but found her gregarious, open and friendly - and an obvious social climber. She seemed to be from what Marino thought of as the "Donna Reed era," and being in the social registry was an important issue for her.

John and Patsy were married at the Peachtree Presbyterian Church near Atlanta on November 15, 1980. He was thirty-seven; she was twenty-three.

By then he had formed his own company. Microsouth distributed computer software out of his basement, and Patsy helped by answering the phone. He soon added another entity, Advanced Products Group, which sold computer hardware and other materials. He struggled and even accepted a financial bailout from his father-in-law, Don Paugh, a retired engineer at Union Carbide. There was little evidence that John Ramsey was on the threshold of an impressive business breakthrough; he was driving an old pickup truck and spending off hours doing projects around the house.

Marino says it was during that period that he learned just what kind of man his friend really was. Marino was seriously injured in a motorcycle accident in 1978 and spent a year in a wheelchair and a walker. John Ramsey came to see him and then gave him a job. "He bailed me out when no one else would help me," Marino recalled affectionately. He took a different job in 1980, but the men stayed close."