For nearly 10 years, she lived under “an umbrella of suspicion.”
Patsy Ramsey’s death Saturday probably won’t erase that suspicion – or alter the status of a mystery many close to the case doubt will ever be solved.
In the 9 1/2 years since 6-year-old JonBenét Ramsey was killed, her death has sparked endless tabloid coverage, books, TV movies, dozens of websites – and an ongoing murder probe capped by a 13-month grand jury investigation.
But no one has ever been arrested or charged in the killing.
And Bill Wise, who as assistant district attorney to Alex Hunter helped shepherd the initial investigation, said Saturday that he doesn’t think anyone ever will be.
The reasons offered by those involved in the case are many:
Boulder Police made profound mistakes in the initial investigation.
The Ramseys weren’t fully cooperative – refusing to be interviewed individually until the spring of 1997.
Endless bickering between the Boulder district attorney’s office and Boulder police sabotaged the investigation.
And, there is the complexity of the case itself.
“It was certainly the toughest investigation I was ever involved in,” said Michael Kane, the Pennsylvania prosecutor recruited by Hunter to head the grand jury investigation.
It was tough, Kane said, because it was so bizarre and so much of the evidence seemed to point in conflicting directions.
“The things that would normally say it was somebody on the inside were certainly very much there,” said Kane, who is now director of the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency.
Items like the broken paintbrush handle used to fashion a crude garrote found around JonBenét’s neck. Or the fact that the ransom note likely was written on one of the Ramseys’ own legal pads, with their pen.
“On the other hand, you had things that said there is no way it could have been somebody on the inside,” Kane said.
Things like the way in which JonBenét was killed – she had been beaten, strangled and sexually abused – although investigators could never be certain exactly how, partly because her body appeared to have been wiped clean.
“How can anyone who is not just a psychopathic child abuser do something like this to a child?” Kane said.
Then there was the ransom note itself – a rambling demand for $118,000, roughly the amount John Ramsey had received as a bonus that year, that mixed odd political statements with what appeared to be intimate knowledge of the family.
“The ransom note was just off the charts as far as fitting any kind of a profile of a killer,” Kane said.
Further confounding investigators was DNA evidence found in the panties JonBenét was wearing when she died.
The sample matched no one – not family members nor dozens of others who were tested.
The sample is tested against DNA from prisoners across the country, Kane pointed out. And in six years of attempts, no matches have ever been found, which means that if an intruder left that DNA, that intruder has not been sentenced for another crime, Kane said.
The investigation now is headed by Jim Kolar, chief investigator of the Boulder district attorney’s office.
In February, Kolar told The Denver Post that the office still gets e-mailed tips and even bits of “evidence” arriving through the mail, but only a small percentage is worth following up.
Saturday, the Ramseys’ attorney, L. Lin Wood, said he was saddened by the loss of a woman he considered a friend. Moreover, he said, “It’s sad that Patsy did not live to see the murderer of her daughter brought to justice.”
Saturday, Kane said the killer may never be found.
“Absent some startling breakthrough, it is not going to get solved,” Kane said.
Staff writer David Olinger contributed to this report.
