JonBenet's family cleared

[Kahnee]

El Clicky

 

New DNA tests have cleared JonBenet Ramsey's family in the 1996 slaying of the 6-year-old beauty queen, prosecutors said Wednesday.

 

Boulder County District Attorney Mary Lacy said the tests point to an "unexplained third party" and that prosecutors don't consider any member of the Ramsey family a suspect.

 

It was the most definitive statement to date clearing JonBenet's parents, John and Patsy Ramsey.

 

Boulder police had said the couple were under an "umbrella of suspicion," but Lacy has previously expressed doubts that the parents were involved. In 2003, a federal judge handling a defamation lawsuit in Atlanta involving the Ramseys said evidence in the case was more consistent with the theory that an intruder killed JonBenet, not her parents, and Lacy said she agreed.

 

Lacy released a copy of a letter she sent to John Ramsey Wednesday that said: "To the extent that we may have contributed in any way to the public perception that you might have been involved in this crime, I am deeply sorry."

 

Patsy Ramsey died of cancer in 2006.

 

John Ramsey found his daughter's strangled and bludgeoned body in the basement of the family's home in Boulder on Dec. 26, 1996. Patsy Ramsey said she found a ransom note demanded $118,000 for her daughter.

 

L. Lin Wood, an attorney for the Ramsey family, called Wednesday's announcement "joyous news" tinged with sadness because of Patsy Ramsey's death.

 

"My first thought was obviously I wish Patsy Ramsey was here with us to be able to at least share vindication of her family," he said from his Atlanta-area office.

 

"There are many people in this country, if not around the world, that also owe John and Patsy Ramsey and Burke Ramsey (their son) an apology," he said.