The breakthrough new DNA evidence that could find JonBenét Ramsey's killer | 60 Minutes Australia

His big blue eyes, even bigger blonde hair, and that perfect smile are instantly recognizable. It's Jonbenet Ramsay, the six-year-old beauty pageant princess murdered in her own home 25 years later, whoever did it is still free for her father John, that's unbearably painful, but he didn't. In fact, he didn't give up on the idea that the

killer

was found with advances in DNA technology. He says there's an incredibly good chance this mystery can finally be solved, although John faces an obstacle in his search for the truth: the same police who are investigating the crime. The contestant is that if Jonbenet Ramsay were still alive, she would be about to turn 32 years old.

On the other hand, the girl who loved to show off in youth beauty pageants only reached the age of six on Boxing Day 1996. She was found beaten and strangled in the basement of her house. until the death of john bernay

ramsey

the japanese murderer but a quarter of a century later the murderer remains unknown to john

ramsey

that is inconceivable and unforgivable we have lost a beautiful child and this is a creature that did this that is out there and

could

possibly do it to another child without knowing who killed his daughter it has consumed John but it hasn't broken him what you wanted ever changed no no we haven't wanted an answer it's not going to bring back Germany our losses are lost it's permanent um but it's need to answer and why this happened.

You would think that justice for

jonben

et would be everyone's goal, but in this very public and controversial case that may not be the case. John says that it is still possible to

find

the murderer and how he will do it. Look, he thinks he knows how to do it, but to succeed he says he has to overcome a substantial obstacle. Police accuse detectives of never properly investigating the murder; instead of drawing false and hurtful conclusions about the crime, they solved it in their heads. The first day it was the parents and we just had to

find

the

evidence

to prove it, but we know it was the parents because it's always the parents back in 1996, this sprawling house in the American city of Boulder, Colorado, was John's home. his wife patsy his son burke and the very happy john bernay this is john bernay she has four seven americans and we would like to welcome her to our home I wish you a very merry christmas she was she was a spark plug she was very outgoing you know we said that she came into life it was like ta-da, I'm here you know and uh that was her personality and I remember one day I came home from work and I guess she had a frown on her face and she said dad.

I don't like that look so I put on a fake smile and she said that's better and that's how she was small and quiet. The rock was the perfect place for the rams to raise their children, but what made it attractive was also its biggest disadvantage when the unthinkable happened at the crime scene Investigators are still searching the house Police have not identified any suspicious but, interestingly, they say the general public is in no danger That there is no random

killer

on the loose The local police had no experience in homicides and were not well equipped to handle the Jonbenet murder investigation.

The detectives were not prepared to admit it now. This is a police department that mainly deals with traffic tickets and college kids setting couches on fire during spring break. The same two. The detectives on the case today were there 25 years ago. It hadn't changed. One of them received an award for solving a bicycle theft ring. It doesn't make any sense, John, that they didn't bring in more seasoned and seasoned detectives. to try to solve this murder absolutely, that was unacceptable, but it's his big egos, his arrogance and his lack of knowledge, and you combine them, that's a pretty dangerous cocktail.

It was clear from the beginning that this was a crime like no other. The first John and Patsy Ramsey found out when they woke up early on boxing day and discovered that Jonbenet was not in his bed. Concern turned to panic when the couple found a note saying that her daughter had been kidnapped and demanding one hundred and eighteen thousand dollars for her return. there's a ransom note here, it's a ransom now, please, oh my god, please, Patsy Ramsay's 9-1-1 call certainly caught the attention of the police, but for the next six hours, with no signs of Jonbenet's confusion seemed to be driving the search, the crime scene was contaminated and early clues were overlooked or discarded.

The case was a catastrophe. There are so many things that don't make sense in this case, including and probably especially the behavior of the police. No one knows what

evidence

was lost because it was a huge mistake. Does your research focus on the interior? the ramsey family or outside the ramsey family when it comes to suspects paula woodward was a colorado television reporter when the story broke she still remembers the chaos of the day, as well as the biggest police mistake of all: how the

jonben

et's body in ramsay's basement. The body was found by her father six hours after the police were called when the only detective in the house said, "Hey, why don't you look around?

That was one of the things that was so unforgivable. Think about it." what would have happened if the police had found the The body, the body had stayed where it was instead of the father picking her up and carrying her upstairs. What was that moment like John, well, when I first found her. ?It was just a rush of you know, thank God, I found her and it was like a relief like an overwhelming relief that I found her and then I realized pretty quickly that she wasn't alive and um I just screamed and I found her like John.

Paula Woodward believed that the local police investigation was doomed to failure because the detectives instantly assumed one or both of Jonbenet's parents had killed the girl I didn't know my daughter you know stop messing around asking me things that are ridiculous and let's find the person who did this what difference would it have made if they had brought in experienced homicide detectives? From day one, I don't know, I do know that all this incompetence and ineptitude wouldn't exist if qualified homicide detectives had been on the scene, I just don't know. Nothing followed, it wasn't homicide protocol, nothing and then they started this deliberate campaign.

After leaking misinformation to what was a gullible press, some media and police focused on the sensational aspects of the case, but the gullible was also insatiable when it was revealed that Jonbenet was a child beauty queen, the media did not care. They got tired of the story that was the worst news for John and Patsy Ramsey four days after the murder the first photo of the child beauty pageant appeared and I was hooked, as well as the international national press just zoomed in, I think that was probably the most important factor. important thing in the case and what happened was that the fascination turned into a judgment and the judgment was that I would never let my daughter do that.

Do you think jonbenet's participation in beauty pageants was a factor here? She was outgoing, so it fit her personality, in fact, we used to joke, we said that Germany needs to lose one of these contests so that she understands that you don't always win in life, it has to be a life lesson. You know, Pasty has been accused of dragging Jonbenet into these contests and living vicariously through her. Not at all, John and I loved it, she had fun and they had fun together doing it. Photos of a perfectly drunk John Bernay as a beauty queen, combined with much rumor and gossip, seemed to sway most of the public.

John and Patsy were involved in something sinister. No amount of denial, not to mention lack of evidence,

could

convince them otherwise for years. The case sadly dragged on into 2006. Patsy Ramsey died of cancer, but two years later, a

breakthrough

of sorts, the Boulder district. The attorney announced that DNA from an unknown man had been found on the clothing Jonbenet was wearing when she was murdered when the DA apologized, she was very candid about it, we appreciate that step, but we consider it just a step, it was not a celebration here. we had not solved the problem but we removed one of the obstacles to solving the problem this is how I see it the discovery of dna was possible thanks to advances in technology it set john and patsy free once and for all but it was not like that reveal to the killer, the investigation stalled again, eventually a DNA match led to d'angelo now a break in the unsolved case for 44 years, but then in 2018, the best news yet for John was used technology Similar DNA to identify and catch America's most wanted. serial killer and rapist the golden state killer i had a crash course in one of the labs for about an hour it's like holy crap there's more to this than i thought learning a little about dna gave john a lot of hope he reasoned If the Golden State killer could be found, just like the Jonbenet killer and let's use the latest technology that we have that has come out in the last 10 years and see what we got then, so finally a big killer could be found , absolutely yes, Cece Moore is.

He's not a police officer, but his DNA detective work has helped solve more than 200 cold cases in the last four years. What she does is called DNA genealogy and was first developed to help people locate their long-lost relatives on ancestry websites, but these days she uses cc. It's hunting criminals, so it's like a big puzzle, we have to put all the pieces back together little by little, so what I'm doing all day is building the family trees of these individuals who share DNA with this stranger. I suspect that when I think I've identified that DNA contributor, it's a very strange feeling knowing that I'm probably the only person in the world, besides that killer, who knows what they did.

It's a very difficult time if given the chance for Cece to be I'm sure she could help find whoever she murdered Jonbenet Ramsey 25 years ago. The Jonbenet case is one of the world's longest-running unsolved cases. What would it mean to solve this case? There are people all over the world who want to see his killer arrested. justice who wants to know what happened and who wants answers if the DNA found on jonbenet is viable how long it could take to catch his killer it may only be a matter of hours before the DNA contributor is identified it is a substantial boast to do that All of these Years later, identifying John Bernay's killer could happen quickly and easily.

NCC colleague Dr Ellen Greytack of Paraben Nanolabs agrees, saying that DNA technology is now much more complex and therefore much more precise. The work we do is truly a new way of thinking. on how forensic DNA can be treated Traditional forensic DNA looks at DNA like a fingerprint, you can compare it to a database or to a suspect that has already been identified and it's great for that if the person you're looking for is in that database or it's one of the suspects you've already identified, but if it's not, I couldn't really tell you anything else and that's where we come in: it's using DNA in a different way to try to generate new leads. those cases to help discover who that person might have been and what makes the way DNA is analyzed different from a traditional forensic profile.

They're looking at between 13 and 20 different spots on the DNA that we're looking at. a million wow, so it's just a huge difference in scale and we're seeing a lot more data, which means we can do a lot more with that DNA. Now is the time to retest the DNA in Jonbenet's case, I think it might be now. At that moment, it's precisely what John Ramsey wants to hear: He sees this new DNA technology as the key to solving his daughter's murder, but he says that every time he asks Boulder police to investigate, he's met with a ambivalence: takes samples that have never been analyzed. from the crime scene use an outside lab to test the latest technology available and see what we can do, but continually doing nothing after 25 years, this is no longer acceptable, but this is where the story gets even more frustrating, John Ramsey never has.

He got along well with the detectives in charge of the investigation. He says that they always suspected that he was involved in the crime and that is why he now accuses them of not wanting to help. He believes that the police should hand over the DNA found on John Bernay's clothes so that he can To be properly tested by experts like Cece Moore, people write to me every day asking why I haven't figured it out. I can't solve it if I don't have access to the DNA and the agency invites me to do it. to be part of their team to think that in the files of the boulder police station there is the remaining DNA that was found in jonbenet and that today you have the ability to solve this case but they do not hand it over, that is heartbreaking, it is heartbreaking if your reasons areanything less than transparency than complete transparency is heartbreaking in desperation john ramsey is asking the governor of colorado to force local police to hand over the DNA samples they have collected is not too much to ask after all these years It's John, no, no, it really isn't and the comments that people left about why they were signing the petition were actually quite moving and overwhelming and basically said, look, a child was murdered and we have to solve it.

We need to make all our resources available and figure it out and that's not happening and that's our frustration. So do you have hope for this new technology? We want to do everything that can be done technically and in terms of resources to find our daughter's murderer. and if we do that and we can't, then we will have to live with it, but not doing so is criminal and just negligent and lazy. John appreciates all the help he can get and, as you'll see, some of the most unlikely places are releasing the recordings now because we want to find Jonbenet's killer, we believe he's still out there.

It's been a long, grueling 25 years for John Ramsey. As if the murder of his daughter were not enough torment, he also enjoyed death from cancer. From Jonbenet's mother, his wife Patsy has also faced constant scrutiny and often suspicion from the world's media, even when he remarried there were headlines about his new wife, Jan, I couldn't believe All the attention when we ended up after getting married on the cover of Globe Magazine and I was shocked, but throughout it all, Jon's fight to find the truth about Jonbenet's murder has not wavered and, although he has been very critical of local Boulder investigators, there has been one police officer who he says is a hero tonight.

It is one of the most sensational unsolved crimes in American history. It is my great pleasure to welcome uh Larry King live tonight blue smith retired detective Lou Smith an out-of-towner from nearby Colorado Springs worked until his death trying to find Jonbenet's killer I think this case can be solved because a detective always believes that the case can be solved, it's not a matter of solving it, it's just a matter of when it will be seen. Lou was kind of a legendary retired detective. He solved more than 200 homicides in his career, many of them unsolved cases.

Lou felt it was a kidnapping gone wrong lou smith died 12 years ago but video and audio recordings he made while still investigating the murder have now been broadcast in a more discovery documentary called jonbenet what really happened his daughter cindy mara says this is the case his father always wanted to solve that, you can see and then he disappeared. We are releasing the recordings now because we want to find Jonbenet's killer. We think he's still there when I walked to the DA's office on that first date. Just press oh. and it's good, i know, smith, i'm the investigator who will be working on the case.

It was three months after Jonbenet's violent death that the Boulder District Attorney asked Lou to join the murder task force, almost immediately bucking the thinking of local detectives by declaring that La The Ramsey family was not involved after reviewing evidence that Boulder police had ignored. Lou was convinced that the killer had broken into the family home and his new theory was not something his colleagues wanted to hear. I really think he is an intruder and he is looking for more and more. more like this all the time, yet every time I mention that we need to look at it more closely, I get shot down Journalist and author Paula Woodward, who has been covering the case since day one, says Lou's work was impressive but it made him enemies.

Lou Smith took all the reports, put them together, collated them and centralized them and in doing so said there is no evidence that the family did it, the evidence points to a stranger breaking into the house as soon as he said he was ridiculed. Spotted, simply savagely attacked by the Boulder Police Department after only 12 months on the team, Lou left frustrated but continued to investigate for the family thousands of leads during the initial investigation 98 for all the call tips every time closer to her over the years, he compiled a long list of suspects from undeveloped clues he gave his daughter just before he died in 2010.

Cindy Mara picked up where her father left off and began the difficult task of collect DNA samples from each suspect on the list. She is now hopeful that if John Ramsey wins his battle for access to the DNA of the unknown man found on Jonbenet's clothes. She will provide a match to someone on the suspect list. He gave me a name. She said: You know, this is who you should start with. We decided that we would try to do everything we could to continue with that and not let the case die. Do you still have hope, John, that your daughter's murderer will be found?

I have some hope, yes, I believe that DNA technology has advanced, continues to advance, and if used, may lead to a solution that I will continue to push for as long as I live, that the right things will be done, but they may not be resolve. Don't know. John Ramsey's request to the governor of Colorado for access to DNA has so far been met with silence. Without him, Johnny isn't sure how the murder will be solved or how he will be able to honor his little girl. It's a heartbreaking thought when you think of Jonbenet today.

What goes through your mind. Know? What you say? Your little girl, frankly, I'm sorry I didn't protect you, that's a father's job and that's my regret and I would tell her I guess, but she knew she was loved, no doubt, we miss her and we'll see her again. Hi, I'm Sarah Arbo, thanks for watching 60 Minutes Australia. Subscribe to our channel now for new stories and exclusive clips every week and don't miss our bonus minute segments and full 60 minute episodes on ninenow.com.eiu and the ninenow app