Marie Claire News

Monday 8 September

 


JonBenet parents cleared of murder

JonBenet Ramsey

The parents of JonBenet Ramsey – the 6-year-old child beauty queen who was brutally slain 12 years ago – have finally been cleared of their daughter's murder by new DNA tests.

Suspicion has blighted the lives of JonBenet's parents, John and Pasty Ramsey, since she was found beaten and strangled in the basement of their home in Boulder, Colorado, on 26 December, 1996.

Patsy was still fighting to clear her name when she died of ovarian cancer in 2006.

But now, prosecutors say, new testing techniques on male DNA found on JonBenet's clothes did not match any family members.

'This new scientific evidence convinces us that it is appropriate ... to state that we do not consider your immediate family, including you, your wife Patsy, and your son Burke, to be under any suspicion in the commission of this crime,' Boulder County District Attorney Mary Lacy said in a letter to JonBenet's father, John.

In a separate statement released yesterday, Lacy said: 'The suspicions about the Ramseys in this case created an ongoing living hell for the Ramsey family and their friends, which added to their suffering from the unexplained and devastating loss of JonBenet.'

Lacy went on to apologise for the distress caused to the Ramseys and said she wished her office could have cleared them before Patsy Ramsey died.

The new tests were done on DNA samples taken from long johns and underwear worn by JonBenet at the time of her death.

Lacy added that prosecutors now believe the DNA profile belongs to the unknown perpetrator of the crime.

The DNA profile has been entered into a national crime database but no matches have turned up.

The murder made headlines again two years ago when an American teacher living in Thailand, John Mark Karr, claimed he was involved in JonBenet's death.

DNA tests proved he was not at the scene of the crime.

The murder remains unsolved.

Thursday 10 July 2008


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That's such a sad story...poor little girl and parents had to go through this, being suspects when their precious girl was murdered!!! And its really sad that the mother passed away before being cleared!!! God bless the family.
Comment by Maya on July 10 21:18

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