The Ammunition

Let's assume that Ralph Thomas's rifle was the firearm used to murder Mary and Greg.   There are some challenges to making a compelling argument that someone other than Ralph Thomas killed Mary Gioia and Greg Kniffin.  It seems that the “Bo Did It” theory might need to demonstrate how following claims are true.

Someone stole the rifle from Ralph Thomas's vehicle.

It's quite plausible that someone stole the rifle from Thomas's vehicle.  Those in the Village who didn't already know he owned a firearm could have been alerted to this fact when International took a shot at Harry Shorman's Canadian flag.  During the time that Thomas accompanied Mary and the rest to go get beer and burritos, someone could have taken the rifle from the car without waking Tracy Scarborough, who was sleeping in the front seat of the blue Opel station wagon.  A broken window on the driver's side could have given them easy access.

Someone only stole some of the ammunition Thomas kept in a Tupperware container.

A Tupperware container containing ammunition was not stolen with the rifle.  After finding out that Mary had been murdered International asked Thomas Medlin to hide his gun cleaning kit and then later, the Tupperware container.  Medlin refused to hide the container. So, if the rifle was stolen, then the thief took only some of the ammunition but left the container.  One would assume that a thief would have taken the rifle and ammunition at the same time, but it's possible that they could have taken the one and then the other later.

This would seem to fit the "Bo Did It" theory backed by Vivian Cercy's testimony.  Bo steals the rifle from Thomas's car because he thinks he can sell it.  Mary finds out and says she wants no part of it.  Later Bo gets angry and/or jealous, fetches some ammunition from the car, and confronts Mary and Greg in a rage.  To be honest, the complexity of this story adds to its implausibility.  The "Thomas Did It" theory is far simpler and this makes it logically more plausible.

If they didn't steal any ammunition, then they must've had at least two rounds of the correct ammunition to use in Thomas's gun.

It would be a stretch to argue that they took none of ammunition, but had some of their own.  No need to waste time and effort on this claim.  So the challenge is to show why only some of the ammunition was stolen.

This person had knowledge of how to unload and hand-load the rifle, in the dark, without causing the weapon to jam.

Not only does the "Bo Did It" theory have to show why only some of the ammunition was taken from the Tupperware container, but it also has to show that Bo would have known how to hand-load the rifle twice, at least once in the dark, without causing the rifle to jam.  If it could be shown that Bo had a decent amount of knowledge of firearms, specifically hunting rifles, then this would show that it's plausible that he was the one who pulled the trigger and not Thomas.

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It seems to me that one of the challenges to making the "Bo Did It" argument more plausible than the "Thomas Did It" argument is to show Bo had knowledge of firearms and that this included knowledge of hunting rifles similar to the one that Ralph Thomas owned.  It's fairly easy to show that he could have known about the rifle and where it was kept.  And it's easy to show that he'd have had an opportunity to steal it during the time International went on the beer and burrito run.  But it’s not easy to show that Bo could've hand-loaded that Remington in the dark without jamming it.  And then there’s the question of why only some ammunition was stolen.