Table of Contents
JonBenét Ramsey’s family believes there are seven key pieces of evidence that could solve the decades-long mystery of her murder.
The child beauty queen was brutally murdered at her family’s home in Boulder, Colorado on December 26, 1996.
Her stricken parents initially reported her missing after discovering a rogue ransom note and their daughter disappearing.
Her father, John Ramsey, later found the six-year-old girl abused and strangled in their basement.
Her killer has since escaped police, but her grieving father, now in his 80s, still holds out hope that advanced DNA testing on several items found at the crime scene could be the key to tracking them down .
“Finding the killer won’t change my life right now,” he said CBS. ‘But it will change the lives of my children and grandchildren. This cloud must be removed from the minds of our family.”
John, his late wife Patsy – who died in 2006 at the age of 49 – and their son, Burke, who was nine years old and home at the time of the murder, were largely convicted in the court of public opinion after the death of JonBenét. despite the Boulder DA officially sanctioning them and apologizing in 2008.
Ramsey is confident that DNA from an unknown man left at the scene will lead to the identification of a suspect. Here, DailyMail.com provides an overview of the evidence that can be used for testing.
John, Ramsey, father of JonBenét Ramsey, believes there are seven key pieces of evidence that could solve the decades-long mystery of her murder
The child beauty queen was brutally murdered at her family’s home in Boulder, Colorado on December 26, 1996
Ransom note
Patsy’s first clue that something was wrong came when she woke up early after Christmas Day: a note left on her stairs.
The message was scrawled on her personal stationery demanding $118,000 for her daughter’s safe return.
‘Listen carefully! We are a group of individuals representing a small foreign faction,” the note said.
“We respect your company (sic) but not the country it serves. We currently have your daughter in our possession (sic).
“She is safe and unharmed and if you want her to see 1997, you must follow our instructions carefully.”
The note, addressed to JonBenét’s father, went into detail and warned him not to contact police.
A handwriting expert later claimed to have noticed similarities between Pasty’s cursive and the script in the note, but this could not be conclusively proven.
This ransom note was found by JonBenét’s mother Patsy, shortly before her daughter was found dead in the basement
Garotte
An autopsy report concluded that JonBenét’s cause of death was “asphyxia due to strangulation associated with craniocerebral trauma,” meaning she was strangled and hit in the head.
The Young Miss Colorado’s killer left her on a pile of clothes with an 8-inch skull fracture and a fragmented paintbrush stabbed into her neck by garrote.
The crude device was constructed by hand and was found at the scene with tangled pieces of JonBenét’s hair.
Male DNA was also found on the object, but Ramsey says this was never tested.
“I don’t know why they didn’t test it to begin with,” she told True Crime News.
‘As far as I know it still hasn’t been tested. If they test it and just don’t tell me, that’s great, but I have no reason to believe that.”
Ramsey would like to see the garotte used to kill his daughter retested for DNA evidence
Blanket
JonBenét’s broken body was discovered by her father, swaddled in a white blanket in the basement of her home.
The little girl had a piece of duct tape over her mouth, which Ramsey removed and threw on the blanket before carrying his daughter upstairs.
“She had tape over her mouth and her hands were tied behind her back,” Ramsey told Cold Case. “And I immediately pulled off the tape and tried to loosen her hands, but the knot was so tight I couldn’t get it loose.”
Ramsey believes the blanket may also contain vital DNA evidence and wants it retested.
Rope
During a search after JonBenét’s death, a piece of rope was discovered by Detective Lou Smit in the family’s guest room next to the youngster’s room.
According to Smit, none of the Ramseys could identify its origins, which raised his suspicions.
“No one in the Ramsey family can identify it,” he said in a video interview on Cold Case.
“It’s possible the intruder also took that to use as a binding agent and just left it there.”
The grieving father believes developments in DNA testing could unlock the mystery of his daughter’s murder. In the photo: JonBenét Ramsey with family, top left-right: stepsister Melinda (stepsister), her father and stepbrother John. Center front: mother Patsy and brother Burke
Suitcase
One of the biggest mysteries, aside from who killed JonBenét, is how the murdered man was able to get in and out of the Ramsey home.
Investigators noted that there was a trunk area under the basement window, with a scuff mark on the wall that could indicate someone had slipped in and out through the same window.
Smit conducted his own tests and easily proved that it was possible to fit through the opening of the window, noting that it was easier if you had something to stand on.
His theory was that someone used the suitcase to get in or out of the basement.
DNA under fingernails
Detectives believe JonBenét tried to fight off her attacker, noting that she had her own DNA under her fingernails, as well as that of an unknown man.
Smit stated that the presence of JonBenét’s DNA was the result of her desperate attempts to claw at the garotte around her neck.
The sample was tested a year after the murder and did not match any profile in the FBI database.
Sources also told the Denver Post that authorities had been unable to link a metal fragment under JonBenét’s fingernails to another object.
DNA in underwear
But Boulder police insist they don’t rely on evidence and the “claim that there is viable evidence and leads that we are not pursuing – including DNA testing – is completely false.”
Tests on foreign DNA found in JonBenét’s underwear have also led to no clues.
The DNA didn’t match anyone in her family, but police continued to float the idea that one or more of the Ramseys might have been responsible — despite never formally charging them.
Ramsey’s backed an online petition in 2022 asking Colorado’s governor to intervene in the investigation into her death more than 25 years ago by putting an outside agency in charge of DNA testing in the case.
However, Boulder police have since pushed back on claims they tampered with evidence.
“The claim that there is viable evidence and leads that we are not pursuing – including DNA testing – is completely false,” a statement said.
However, Police Chief Stephen Redfearn admitted: ‘There were things that people have pointed out over the years that could have been better and we recognize that to be true.’