JonBenet Ramsey. The name is most likely not familiar to the students of Delphi Community High School. We weren’t born when she was brutally murdered on Christmas and found hanging in her basement the next day. We weren’t alive to watch the news as the nation lamented the loss of the adorable little beauty queen, and the police investigated everyone from her parents to her then-nine-year old brother. We are, however, alive to watch as the Boulder, Colorado Police Department still attempt to find the six-year old’s murderer, because that person has never been found. This Christmas marks the twentieth anniversary since the little girl’s death.
Here are the facts. On the morning of Dec. 26, 1996, Patsy Ramsey found a ransom note on the staircase of their home demanding $118,000 for the safe return of her daughter. Despite instructions not to call the police and friends, Mrs. Ramsey phoned both at around 5:45 am. Later that day, as the police were searching the house for signs of a break-in (none were found), John Ramsey and his friend, Fleet White, were sent to search the house for “anything unusual.” They started in the basement and found the body of JonBenet Ramsey hanging from the ceiling of the wine cellar. Autopsy reports showed that she was killed by strangulation and a skull fracture.
Immediately, the police suspected the Ramseys. There were many things stacked against them: the paintbrush from the garrote used to strangle JonBenet came from her mother’s art supplies, there were no signs of a break-in whatsoever, and the handwriting of the ransom note matched that of Patricia Ramsey’s sister. Many people believed that the parents had done it, but in 2008, John and Patsy Ramsey were officially released from any suspicion.
Other evidence from the murder included a pineapple in JonBenet’s digestive system (her parents deny feeding her pineapple the night before her murder, though there was a bowl of pineapple on the table with a spoon in it), and a DNA sample from an unknown male found on JonBenet’s underwear (suggesting that JonBenet was sexually molested before or after she was killed).
The Boulder Colorado Police Department was initially under fire because they allowed family and friends to come in and out of the house even after the kidnapping had been reported. They also didn’t take sufficient evidence when they found JonBenet’s body because they were convinced that John and Patsy Ramsey had killed her.
There was a false confession in August 2006 from John Mark Karr, but he was quickly disputed due to the fact that he was being held in Sonoma County, California on child pornography charges.
Twenty years later and still no one has been charged with the murder of the six-year old girl. The case was reopened in 2010 in which new interviews were conducted, but so far, there are still no suspects, at least none that the police have released. And so, the question remains, who killed JonBenet Ramsey?