National
Parents of JonBenet Ramsey Cleared in Daughter's Murder
By Ann Turner

Jul 10, 2008

John and Patsy Ramsey, parents of murdered child beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey, have finally been cleared in their daughter’s death. New DNA tests have exonerated the couple, along with their son Burke Ramsey, in the unsolved killing, according to a statement from prosecutors on Wednesday. Patsy Ramsey died of ovarian cancer in 2006 while still under the shadow of suspicion in six-year-old JonBenet’s murder.  

Although police followed thousands of leads and investigated several suspects in the murder of JonBenet Ramsey, no one has ever been charged in the child beauty queen’s death. John and Patsy Ramsey’s daughter was found strangled to death in the basement of her family’s home in Boulder, Colorado on December 26, 1996. She had also been severely beaten, suffering a skull fracture and other injuries.  

In a statement to JonBenet’s father on Monday, Boulder county District Attorney Mary Lacy said new DNA testing techniques on DNA found on JonBenet’s clothing had ruled out any family members as suspects, according to the Denver Post.   

“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…" Lacy said. "We intend in the future to treat you as the victims of this crime, with the sympathy due you because of the horrific loss you suffered.”  

Speaking of the case in a separate statement on Wednesday, Lacy apologized for any distress to the Ramsey family due to the ongoing investigation. “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 said.  

The DNA taken from JonBenet’s clothing after she was found murdered has so far not been matched to any suspect. Although the results from DNA tests on the recovered material has been entered into national crime databases, no matches have yet been found.  

In response to the statement from prosecuters declaring his family officially off the suspect list, John Ramsey said the "most significant thing to me was the fact that we now have pretty irrefutable DNA evidence according to the DA's office," according to 9News.com. Ramsey also said that it has "always been my hope... that that would lead us to the killer eventually as the DNA database grows..."  

During the years after JonBenet’s murder, the Ramseys filed a number of defamation suits against various media outlets for the portrayal of their family in the press, including suits against Fox News, Star, The Globe and The New York Post. John and Patsy Ramsey were themselves sued for defamation by two suspects investigated by Boulder police after their names were published in the Ramseys’ book, The Death of Innocence.