I've always thought that the writer might have brought a note with him, then saw the pad of paper there in the house and decided it would be brillant to use paper from the house rather than what he'd brought.

I think, like nz_guy, that someone light Oliva might have done just that!

A kid living nearby might not be able to obtain or to bring home a typewriter, but would have access to a computer.

A derelict would have neither the opportunity to avial himself of a writing pad nor the ability to lug it around with him.

Some early posters wondered about a homeless bum and if his sustained presence in the home would have left any sort of tell tale aroma, but homeless often do have access to showers and housing, they just may not have a permanent address.

Certainly Thomas Aquinas reveals he is living in a fantasy world in those tapes of his... and the note contains a 'fantasy world flavor' with his pseudo spy-talk stuff about 'tactics and countermeasures'.

WHY would a transient who wandered by on his way to the Aquinas Youth Ministry Hall suddenly decide that he wanted to 'make a detour'?

If it was a passing pedophile-pauper, he might have become suddenly interested in JonBenet from some alley-way encounter, but then I would expect solely a 'sex crime' without any sort of melodramatic overtones about foreign factions and ransoms and gentlemen with attache cases.

If it was a dumpster-diving passerby enroute to the Aquinas Hall, could he have learned of the 118,000 sum that way and thereby formed a hatred for John Ramsey based solely on a discarded rather than shredded pay stub?

I think even a homeless person can come up with a pad of paper somewhere if he really wanted to.

I think the killer was in the house and had time to kill before his chosen victim was brought home.

Of course he could. The more I think about it, the more I get the feeling that the intruder didn't decide on the kidnapping until after he was in the house. I think he was planning on grabbing JonBenet to molest her in her bed, in the basement, or who knows where, after the Mom and Dad went to sleep, but came up with his "brilliant" plan while hanging around waiting for them to come home.

One of the reasons I've found the "Midnight Burglar" so appealing as a suspect - as I've said ad nauseum - would be if there was a single person in Boulder one would have expected to find roaming around his house on the night of Dec. 25, 1996, he is the one. In one of the True Crime books I've read, I recall a cop saying something like every burglar has a rapist inside just waiting for the right moment to jump out and take over.

I think I'll do a theory along these lines and post it as soon as I get the time. It will tie together a lot of the points I have made over and over and over for the past five years, and I think they will come together nicely.

That is very scary - - and I hope not true.