JonBenét Ramsey’s face has appeared on numerous magazine covers for years as the nation has speculated who may have killed her 28 years ago. The 6-year-old, beauty pageant queen was reported missing the day after Christmas in 1996. Seven hours later, JonBenét Ramsey’s father found her body in the basement of her family’s home in Boulder, Colorado.
An autopsy later revealed that while there was no conventional rape, JonBenét’s body showed evidence of vaginal injury. For decades, the police have had a long list of suspects: the girl’s parents: John and Patsy Ramsey, her older brother Burke, who was 9 at the time, convicted pedophile Gary Oliva, and former teacher John Mark Kerr. Decades later, her father would like to add another name to the list.
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John Ramsey said another girl was violated 2 miles from their home.
In an interview with People, John Ramsey mentioned a masked intruder who snuck into the home of a 12-year-old girl in Boulder, nine months after JonBenét’s death. The man raped the girl before her mother scared him off.
“To me, it could easily have been the same person,” John Ramsey said. Instead of considering this person seriously, John Ramsey said the police dismissed the possibility. The police blew it off as, ‘No, it’s not the same.’”
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John Ramsey's comments come before the new Netflix series about JonBenét's death.
John Ramsey’s revelation comes just ahead of the new Netflix docuseries Cold Case: Who Killed JonBenét Ramsey? The series follows the chain of events that transpired after John found his daughter dead. She died from strangulation and a blow to the skull. Like John Ramsey’s claim, the series will include all of the missteps made by the authorities. These include the officer who failed to search the basement before John Ramsey discovered his daughter, the people who were allowed to enter the crime scene, and the loose thread of that strange ransom note.
Patsy Ramsey found a lengthy ransom note in the home demanding $118,000, the same amount of John’s Christmas bonus. The note was written on a notepad from the Ramsey home and only contained Patsy Ramsey’s fingerprints.
The series will also show how the media attention surrounding the girl’s death made the case that much harder to solve.
'I believe the killer was in the house when we came home,' he said.
John Ramsey said he’s speaking out today in an effort to encourage someone to come forward with new information that could “put pressure” on the police utilize new technology and genetic testing to finally catch the girl’s killer.
John Ramsey said he was shocked to learn that the unidentified girl, who was reportedly raped, lived just two miles from the Ramseys and attended the same dance studio as JonBenét. “I think the method of operation was exactly the same,” he tells People. “I believe the killer was in the house when we came home, waited till we went to sleep.”
John Ramsey said the police displayed 'boneheaded ignorance' in the handling of both cases.
John Ramsey says the same investigator who dismissed this suspect is the same one assigned to JonBenét’s case. “But even the father of the little girl said, ‘On a scale of one to 10, I rate the police minus five.’ They just … just bone-headed ignorance. But yes, I think that was very possibly the same person.”
Police never charged the Ramseys or Burke in JonBenét’s death and her mother Patsy Ramsey died of ovarian cancer in 2006. Cold Case: Who Killed JonBenét Ramsey? streams on Netflix on November 25.
