In the wake of the explosive Netflix documentary about the decades-old case, JonBenet Ramsey’s father John has received a letter from a woman claiming her ex-husband is his daughter’s killer.
Speaking to Daily Mail, John Ramsey said he immediately followed up on the tip, but has yet to hear from the mysterious sender.
“Based on all this publicity, I recently got a letter from a lady who said, ‘My ex-husband is the killer, and I’ve been holding this in as long as I can – please, please call me,’” Ramsey said. Tuesday, nine days before the 28th anniversary of the murder.
“We contacted her but she didn’t answer the phone so I don’t know. We shared this point with a private investigator.”
Six-year-old JonBenet, whose beauty pageant photos would become almost instantly recognizable internationally, was found brutally beaten and sexually assaulted on December 26, 1996, in the basement of her family’s sprawling home in Tony Boulder, Colorado.
Ramsey’s late wife, Patsy, had called 911 that morning to report that she had found a ransom note and that her daughter was missing; Police responded quickly, but the child’s body was not found until hours later during a search led by John himself.
Suspicion quickly focused on the family, which quickly created a tense relationship with Boulder police.
A Netflix documentary released last month, Cold Case: Who Killed JonBenet Ramseyaddresses how misinformation about the case was widely spread by law enforcement agencies and the media.
Six-year-old JonBenet, whose beauty pageant photos would become almost instantly recognizable internationally, was found brutally beaten and sexually abused on December 26, 1996.
JonBenet’s father John (above with her mother, Patsy, who died in 2006), said he received the letter after the Netflix documentary aired
John Ramsey has been demanding answers from Boulder police for years, particularly pushing for the use of advanced DNA techniques and genealogical databases.
He is encouraged by success in other cold cases, such as the unmasking of the Golden State Killer in 2018.
John, his late wife Patsy – who died in 2006 at the age of 49 – and their son Burke, who was nine years old and home at the time of the murder, were largely convicted in the court of public opinion, despite the Boulder statement. DA officially approved them and apologized in 2008.
Ramsey told DailyMail.com that any hope of new leads was welcome after nearly 30 years of battling misconceptions and trying to prove his family’s innocence.
Solving the case, he said, “won’t change my life right now — I just turned 81 — but it will change the lives of my children and my grandchildren.”
‘They need to have this cloud removed, cleared up and given an answer. That’s why we’re trying so hard to get an answer.’
Despite the possibility of a new suspect emerging from the ex-wife’s recent letter, Ramsey says, he remains skeptical — having had his hopes dashed in the past.
One man, featured prominently in the Netflix docuseries, seemed more than a slam dunk as a perpetrator when he confessed to a college professor in lengthy phone conversations.
John Mark Karr was even extradited from Thailand to Colorado, but the DNA ultimately did not match – and his family insisted he had been in Georgia when JonBenet was murdered.
Other false confessions have also surfaced over the years, including in the early days after the murder – when a man claiming he had been hired to kill JonBenet called the Ramseys’ pastor to confess and later conversations with John had.
This man, who gave the alias “David Cooper,” first called the Ramseys’ pastor and “said he was JonBenet’s killer and wanted to turn himself in but wanted to talk to me first,” Ramsey told DailyMail.com.
JonBenet’s body was found in the basement of his family home in Boulder, Colorado
The explosive new Netflix documentary paints a picture of unfollowed leads and police misconduct
“I called him and talked to him for a while … and I asked him questions,” he said. “I was looking for information that he might have that no one else would have [from] read the newspaper or watch television.
He said the man seemed to mention items from the house that “weren’t in the news as far as I know,” so he thought the caller might be credible.
He informed the police, who – instead of investigating or making contact – ‘were not at all interested in further investigation: well, he wants to turn himself in? We will be here. Great.’
However, when he made another phone call to the self-confessed killer, “he said, ‘Well, I want to take my family, and it will cost me $3,000 in plane tickets, and I have no money.’ . Can you send me the money?”
“And I was going to do it because I thought, who knows, it might be worth a try,” Ramsey said. And I said it before I did it; I told our lawyers what was going on. They said, ‘Oh no, wait, wait a minute – don’t send him any money. This doesn’t smell good.’
“And I didn’t, and our investigators came back [and said]“Well, he’s a truck driver from Louisiana, and he’s just trying to get some money out of you. Forget it.”
“So that’s where it ended.”
Ramsey has been highly visible in recent decades, saying the media-friendly tactic was “to put pressure on the police, like, Hey, we’re not leaving.” You need to get your act together and do what you can do, what is possible, or we’ll keep bothering you.”
There has been significant staff turnover since JonBenet’s murder; including several police chiefs, with Chief Constable Stephen Redfearn taking on the role permanently in September after serving as interim chief since January.
One of JonBenet’s original lead detectives, who later led the investigative unit before being disciplined and reassigned to patrol in 2022, also retired earlier this year, Ramsey noted.
John Ramsey, now 81, says solving the case ‘won’t change his life’, but he’s hopeful of a resolution after all these years
The mystery of JonBenet’s death continues to haunt the town where she died
Coupled with advances in DNA testing and the resurgence of interest in the case, Ramsey said he remained hopeful the case could be solved — and he felt a new kind of energy was being put into the effort by the Netflix docuseries, which remained in the series. platform’s top 10 most-watched shows for weeks after its premiere.
“Bureaucrats and politicians are hugely influenced by public pressure, and we feel that is happening,” he said.
The Boulder Police Department released its annual update on the JonBenet investigation a month early “due to increased attention to this investigation.”
“The murder of JonBenet was an unspeakable crime and this tragedy has never left our hearts,” BPD Chief Steve Redfearn said in a statement the department posted to X in November.
“We are committed to following up on every lead and we will continue to work with DNA experts and our law enforcement partners across the country until this tragic case is solved.”
Highlighting the case would “always be a priority,” the report continued: “The claim that there is viable evidence and leads that we are not pursuing – including DNA testing – is completely false.”