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- Caroline Mercer via fox - U.S.
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JonBenet Ramsey's father challenges DA over clearing of family
ReJonBenet Ramsey's father challenges DA over clearing of family
John Ramsey has pushed back on Boulder District Attorney Michael Dougherty's remarks that he would not have cleared the Ramsey family as his predecessor did, as the 1996 killing of six-year-old JonBenet Ramsey remains unsolved nearly three decades later.
John Ramsey, the father of six-year-old JonBenet Ramsey, has publicly responded to Boulder District Attorney Michael Dougherty, who said he would not have cleared the family the way his predecessor did in 2008. Ramsey argued that investigators cannot apply unidentified male DNA selectively, a point that goes to the heart of how the case has been handled for nearly three decades.
JonBenet was found dead in the basement of the family home in December 1996. The Boulder medical examiner determined that she died from strangulation and head trauma. The case has never been solved, and the family's status as suspects has been a central and long-running point of dispute. Dougherty has said he has never ruled out people in unsolved cases, and his position differs from that of former district attorney Mary Lacy, who cleared the Ramseys in 2008.
The disagreement reflects a broader debate over whether the family should have been ruled out much earlier. Investigators reviewed more than 20,000 tips and compared DNA evidence against more than 750 reference samples. Early DNA results did not match members of the immediate family, yet the parents remained under suspicion for years. Ramsey has said that the failure to rule them out sooner was a mistake that affected the family for decades.
Ramsey has urged authorities to use investigative genetic genealogy, a technique that has helped identify suspects in other cold cases by tracing relatives through DNA databases. Untested DNA collected from the crime scene still existed as of last year, according to the reporting, and Ramsey has pressed for it to be analyzed with modern methods. He said the family received a hopeful update from police in February 2026, and the evidence was reportedly sent to a lab late last year. No public confirmation of that testing has been released.
Half-brother John Andrew Ramsey has also spoken about the family's expectations. Ramsey said he anticipates major updates in the case, though the timing is uncertain, possibly within months or years. The family is hoping for progress before the 30-year mark of the killing in December.
The case has a long history of contested investigative decisions. Retired detective Lou Smit left the investigation in 1998 amid tension with Boulder police, and he later argued that an intruder was responsible. Experts continue to disagree about how the early suspicion of the family shaped the inquiry and whether it should have been lifted sooner. Dougherty's office has said it plans to post a video of a local interview with him, after he declined a request for an interview with Fox News.
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