Cold Case: Who Killed JonBenet Ramsey (2024) s01e03 Episode Script

The Truth Is Going to Prevail

1
[Larry King Live theme song plays]
[Larry King] Tonight, a first
in the JonBenét Ramsey homicide case.
Her parents, John and Patsy, square off
against former Boulder Police detective,
Steve Thomas.
[John Ramsey] We did
this Larry King interview.
Some people said, "You shouldn't have."
But we did. We were trying to
put some sense into the discussion.
When did you come
to the conclusion you came to?
And that conclusion is what?
My theory is that Patsy,
uh, in a violent confrontation
with her daughter
- [Larry King] Accidentally killed her?
- No, not
A Accidental, I hypothesize,
uh, in the sense that it lacked motive.
[Patsy Ramsey] What? Tell me exactly,
step by step, how you envisioned
I wasn't there. You were in the home.
You must have conjured
something in your head
for you to come out
and call me a murderer of my child.
- Now I wanna hear, one through ten.
- I think you wrote the ransom note.
[Patsy Ramsey] When did I write this?
- You tell me.
- Before or after I killed her?
You're the one theorizing here.
You tell me.
You were in the house that night.
Put together what you think
happened that night.
[Steve Thomas] I think
there was a toileting issue
that has been dismissed.
- [Larry King] Okay. Explain.
- A bed-wetting or a toileting issue
[Larry King] That caused Patsy
to get mad at her daughter.
Absolutely.
Our child wet her bed,
and we slaughtered her.
That is so preposterous.
[Steve Thomas] You weren't there, John.
I was there. I know Patsy.
I've lived with her for 20 years.
I know that she loved that child
more than anything in the world.
[Larry King] Well, would you agree, Patsy,
that almost none of it makes sense?
- What was the guy doing?
- It was an evil
[Larry King] Why did the intruder do this?
- [John Ramsey] Evil, evil person.
- [Patsy Ramsey] I don't know.
God knows.
And the truth is going to prevail.
[theme music playing]
[theme music fades]
[tense music playing]
[reporter 1] Grand jurors were escorted
into the Boulder County Justice Center
by sheriff's deputies.
They had an audience of media
from around the world
who have descended on Boulder.
[reporter 2] After a year
of looking over evidence
and hearing testimony,
the grand jury has now made its decision.
[man] Down in front.
Down in front, please.
Down in front.
[chatter]
[man 2] Speak up!
[woman] Shout, please!
The grand jurors have done their work
extraordinarily well,
bringing to bear
all of their legal powers,
life experiences, and shrewdness.
Yet I must report to you
that I and my prosecution task force
believe we do not have sufficient evidence
to warrant the filing of charges
against anyone
who has been investigated at this time.
Thank you very much.
[intriguing music playing]
[Carol McKinley] The case
was not gonna move forward.
The Ramseys would indeed not be arrested,
despite 13 months of investigation.
After it was announced that
no charges would be filed in the case,
the parents of JonBenét Ramsey
issued a statement.
They said they take
no satisfaction in this result
because a child killer
remains free and undetected.
[Michael Tracey] The reason
it didn't happen is
not only is it that there is no case
against these two people,
they didn't kill JonBenét.
The only thing they ever did was love her.
And that is what has been revealed today.
[Larry King] Lou Smit,
I spoke with him today,
he's never appeared on,
he said to me today,
"This was a great day in legal history."
"Those people didn't do it."
Alex Hunter said that
the Ramseys weren't going to be indicted
and that no charges would be filed.
Now, I was in my truck,
and I started crying.
And, uh, it was,
uh, it was really amazing.
[Carol McKinley] I told my photographer,
key in on Michael Kane's face
when the announcement's made.
And you could see
Michael Kane's lower lip was quivering.
It looked like he was really upset.
There was a lot of disappointment, but it
wasn't because of what the grand jury did
or didn't do or whatever.
It was a disappointment that I'd spent
close to two years working on this thing
and couldn't come to a resolution.
I looked up at the justice center
on the second floor,
and three of the lead police detectives
were staring at us.
And I learned later that
when Alex Hunter told them face-to-face
that he wasn't going to take this case on,
that they pounded the table
and there was screaming and door slamming.
They were really, really upset.
[Steve Thomas] There was a general mixture
of disappointment and despair,
a feeling of disgrace, and that America
had seen government at its worst.
Well, they had taken these huge steps
in this investigation,
did their damnedest to bring charges
against John and Patsy Ramsey,
and there was nothing there.
They absolutely wasted the resources
of the state of Colorado.
They blew an opportunity
to use grand jury investigative powers
to find the killer.
They They missed it,
just absolutely missed.
Do we even know if the grand jury voted?
Uh, we don't, I certainly don't, uh
And I was trying to read between the lines
as he spoke yesterday,
and I think he chose
his words very carefully.
Alex Hunter could have announced
that afternoon
that the grand jury has
elected not to indict anybody.
He could have said the grand jury
indicted somebody,
but we're not going to prosecute it.
He didn't say either of those things.
We were left not knowing,
well, what did they do?
A number of years down the road,
two sources of mine told me,
"You can't report this, but they indicted
both John and Patsy Ramsey."
So I set out
to contact grand jurors directly.
And multiple grand jurors confirmed for me
that's what happened.
[dramatic music playing]
[reporter] In the end,
the grand jury indicted,
not for murder, but for child abuse,
finding the Ramseys allowed JonBenét
to be placed in a situation
which resulted in death.
As I understand it, the grand jurors
didn't know who might have done what,
but felt that there was something
that happened there.
[reporter 2] The grand jury
found John and Patsy Ramsey
had intent to hinder, delay,
and prevent their daughter's killer
from being prosecuted.
What they believed was that
the parents knew what had happened,
or should've known what happened,
or should have got her help
and failed to do so.
That's what one grand juror said to me.
Was there evidence to indict
John and Patsy Ramsey of a crime?
[voice modified] Based upon the evidence
presented, I believe that's correct.
What the grand jury was telling us
was they found there was probable cause
for these people to be indicted.
But there's a long, long step
between probable cause,
which is the lowest standard
in the criminal justice system,
and proof beyond a reasonable doubt,
that is the highest.
There's no way that I would have been
able to say, beyond a reasonable doubt,
"This is the person."
And if you don't have
reasonable likelihood of conviction,
you have a moral obligation.
You have a ethical obligation
as a prosecutor
to not prosecute that case.
[clicks]
It would have been easy to bring charges.
But to have brought charges
when you didn't feel
you could make your case,
would have been a horrible thing to do.
I feel at peace,
and, to some extent proud of the fact
that I weathered the storm
and did the right thing
based on the evidence.
[dramatic music continues]
[John Ramsey] After the grand jury,
we went back to Atlanta.
And by that time, we'd pretty much
exhausted our life savings.
[pensive music playing]
We sold our house, we sold assets
to try to pay attorneys and investigators.
All we wanted was to find the killer.
As long as there is a killer at large
who has murdered our child,
our lives will never go on.
Someone killed this six-year-old child.
We know that, and we want them captured.
We knew that the police
were not investigating the crime.
They'd already decided
that it was Patsy or I,
and so we knew the police
were not gonna follow up.
[Lou Smit] The grand jury has stopped.
No indictments, no charges,
the case is dropped.
Nothing is being done on the case.
The Boulder Police Department has it,
but they are so convinced
that the Ramseys did this
that it's just not being worked.
[John Ramsey] We were told
by a person in the police department,
"Well, we're just waiting
for John Ramsey to die,
so this thing will go away."
Quote.
A killer walks the streets
of this country,
and we need to be looking for that person.
[John Ramsey] The whole purpose
of engaging with the media
was to put pressure on the police.
We're not going away.
I'm gonna be hammering on you till I die
if you don't find this creature
that did this to our daughter.
- Lou Smit tells us that we can
- [Larry King] That's a detective, right?
Lou Smit is the only homicide investigator
that's ever looked at this case.
[Patsy Ramsey] And he says, definitively,
that there is enough evidence
to find this man.
[suspenseful music playing]
[Lou Smit] I don't know if I could
solve it without the police,
and I'm sure I'm not gonna get that.
But I know that God has a plan,
and, uh, I'm part of it,
and I'm just going to continue
to work in it, as long as He needs me.
[John San Agustin] Lou Smit
wanted that case solved.
And so he, on his own,
continued to work the case.
[pageant announcer] JonBenét Ramsey.
[lively music plays]
[Lou Smit] Well, I think we're looking
definitely at a pedophile,
a very specific one.
I'm pretty sure he's seen her
at one of these pageants.
I want to hear those coyotes howlin' ♪
As the sun sinks in the west ♪
[Lou Smit] JonBenét Ramsey
was a beautiful girl.
I can see where a pedophile
would focus on her,
and I think that's kinda
what we're looking at.
[intriguing music playing]
When you see the footage of her
in her little cowboy suit going,
uh, "I want to be a cowboy's sweetheart,"
and all that,
I I've never seen anything like it.
[intriguing music continues]
[Kurt Pillard] Very early on
in this investigation,
police received information about
an individual by the name of Gary Oliva.
He had sexually assaulted
one of his neighbor's girls
while he lived in Oregon, and fled.
He ended up, uh, in Boulder, Colorado,
and, uh, was a transient.
One of Gary Oliva's friends
indicated that Gary called him
and was distraught,
said that he had just hurt a little girl.
As a result of all that,
the Boulder Police Department
took a hard look.
When police went
to go find him in his tent,
uh, he had pictures of JonBenét.
Did you hurt or kill JonBenét Ramsey?
[Gary Oliva] No.
No, I didn't.
I believe that she came to me
after she was killed
and revealed herself to me.
[Kurt Pillard] He later confessed, uh,
basically indicating
that he would take credit
for the JonBenét Ramsey homicide
if the police would just guarantee
that he could have
three square meals a day
and a roof over his head.
But his DNA did not match
the evidence at the scene.
Uh, they could not confirm
that he, in fact,
was the person that committed the crime.
[music fades]
[pageant announcer] JonBenét Ramsey
is the Ziegfeld Follies!
[Joyce Singular] When you dress
your child up
and put that much makeup on her
and you have that kind of clothing,
like Las Vegas showgirl clothing costumes,
you might inadvertently and innocently
attract someone, a sexual predator.
My name is Joyce Singular.
I've co-authored two books
with my husband,
investigative journalist,
Stephen Singular.
[Stephen Singular] In the last week
of 1996,
I heard about the JonBenét Ramsey case,
mostly through my wife.
She was interested in it very quickly.
[Joyce Singular] We lived in Denver,
which was only 30 miles from Boulder.
We had a son
who was three years old at the time.
And, of course, it was such a brutal crime
that we couldn't believe
that a child could be murdered like that.
[Stephen Singular] We thought that
if the Ramseys are guilty of something,
and it's hardly a crime,
I think they were guilty of being naive.
I think dressing her up the way they did
was capable of getting the attention of
and stimulating the wrong people.
[Joyce Singular] When JonBenét
was first killed,
my husband and I decided to start
interviewing child beauty pageant mothers
who had been in the same circuit
with JonBenét.
Some of the pageant mothers suspected
that some of the spectators
that were coming to the pageants
weren't there because they had children
that were in the pageant.
They were just there observing.
[intriguing music playing]
They also told us about photographers,
particularly one photographer.
[Stephen Singular] They told us
the same story,
that the primary photographer for JonBenét
and for many of the little girls
in this area, is a man named Randy Simons.
[Joyce Singular] Simons sold some of
his photos of JonBenét to a photo agency
which ended up
being splashed all over the tabloids.
And a lot of the child beauty pageant
mothers were angered over this.
This particular pageant mother said
that in Simons' studio,
he had some borderline inappropriate
photos on the wall.
Maybe not child pornography,
but, you know,
young girls without tops on or
you know, seemingly innocent,
but kind of sketchy or questionable.
And they were suspect of him.
You have a whole pattern of behavior
in which, at least to me,
the questions scream out at you.
[Joyce Singular] Pageant mothers told us,
shortly after the crime,
he called some of them up,
saying, "I did not kill JonBenét,
I did not kill JonBenét."
He was hysterical.
Well, nobody said he did.
It it it raised some red flags.
I called Randy Simons several times.
He only picked up once.
And he was skittish.
And he said, "I know more about this case,
but I'm not gonna tell you."
And he didn't.
[Joyce Singular] A year later,
he was walking down the street naked,
and the police were called.
Again, he said to the police,
"I did not kill JonBenét."
I mean, that's pretty strange.
We lost contact with Randy Simons,
until 2019 when we got a tip
that he had been arrested
in Lane County, Oregon,
and he had been downloading
child pornography
at a restaurant
through their public Wi-Fi.
He was subsequently charged and indicted
on 15 charges of child pornography,
and he was sentenced to ten years in jail.
But Randy Simons' DNA
was not found at the crime scene.
[clicks]
[Lou Smit] Our killer
could still be out there.
This killer could still be
murdering even today,
and I think he's a very experienced guy.
You just don't graduate
into killing a beauty queen on Christmas.
He made a garrote. He's got fantasies.
He knew how to get into a house.
He wasn't afraid of being in the house.
He's a high-risk criminal.
[music fades]
[Stephen Singular] In March of 1997,
the Boulder Police got a call
from North Carolina
about a man named John Brewer Eustace.
Boulder Police end up searching for clues
halfway across the country
in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Investigators went south
to review evidence against this man,
John Brewer Eustace.
He's charged with the rape and kidnap
of a Charlotte child last month.
[Carol McKinley] He was a drifter who had
confessed to kidnapping a two-year-old.
And this was someone who actually broke
into the house.
[reporter] The Charlotte two-year-old
was taken from this bedroom.
The window screen,
pried open and tossed on the ground.
So when they went to his home,
they found a shrine to JonBenét.
[reporter 2] Police in possibly
four other cities
are looking at the Eustace
confession and crime,
but the most famous case of all
is JonBenét Ramsey.
[Stephen Singular] The Boulder police
came out, and,
unfortunately for them,
he had a rock-solid alibi for that night.
He worked in a factory,
and he had clocked in,
and it covered the time period
in which JonBenét had died.
But it just shows you.
There are people out there
who are capable of this kind of crime.
Look at child predators.
Look at people who would be attracted
to JonBenét Ramsey.
[music swells, then fades]
[Michael Tracey] In 2002,
I was contacted by someone
who knew my work on the Ramsey case
and wanted to talk.
His email name was Daxis.
He was using the word Daxis.
No idea what that means.
[keyboard keys clacking]
[eerie music playing]
He started to email me on a regular basis,
where he slowly started to say
that he had killed JonBenét.
[eerie music continues]
It was always a little unclear,
but it was kind of implied
it was all part of a love affair.
That it was an accident.
[music continues]
[John Ramsey] I met Michael Tracey
and talked about it,
and I was still skeptical,
because there was so much information
just released,
uh, casually by the police.
It's another interesting twist
with this case
that people decide that they want
the notoriety, so they confess.
However, you still have to look
into each and every one of those.
[unsettling music playing]
I said, "How come I don't know
you're pulling this from the Internet
and feeding me what is out there already?"
And he said, "Ask John Ramsey
what JonBenét's nickname was for Nedra,
her grandmother. And it will be this."
So I emailed John.
"What was the nickname?"
It comes back, "Neddy."
It was right. It was correct.
Because John searched
there was nowhere that that nickname
was known in the public domain.
How did this person know that name?
[music continues]
I would share some emails with Lou Smit.
I said, "I've got this from this guy."
"I've no idea who this guy is,
where he is."
"He could be next door. I have no idea."
And I always said to Lou, "Just tell me
he's a nutcase, and we can end it."
And Lou said, "Can't.
No can do, Michael. Got to keep at it."
[keyboard keys clacking]
[music swells, then fades]
[John Ramsey] During that period, Patsy
was in remission from ovarian cancer.
But she'd go back every year
to be checked.
Well, the eighth year, she went back
and, uh, there's a little cancer here.
Yeah, it was it was devastating,
because we thought it was behind us.
- You lost your hair?
- [Patsy Ramsey] Yes. It's growing back.
My eyebrows are growing back. [inhales]
It all comes out, but you know what?
That's a very little thing to worry about.
[John Ramsey] When it comes back,
it's more resistant to treatment,
and that's kind of
where Patsy was at that point.
But eventually, it just overwhelmed her,
and, uh, it got to a point
where one doctor
recommended palliative care.
Just, let's just make
her life comfortable, and, um
we weren't ready f ready to do that. We
I wanted to keep fighting.
She wanted to keep fighting.
And then it got to a point where
I was convinced it was hopeless.
And I made the decision to stop,
at the doctor's recommendation,
to stop treatment,
but I didn't tell Patsy.
The cancer had migrated to her brain,
so she was not her normal self.
So she didn't know that we'd given up.
She would ask me,
"When's my next treatment?"
And I'd say And I knew in my heart
there was no next treatment.
That was hard.
[somber music playing]
[intriguing music playing]
[keyboard keys clacking]
[Michael Tracey] The emails with Daxis
went on for four years.
It was still a mystery as to who he was.
He apparently disguised
his email chain very well.
[unsettling music playing]
[Michael Tracey] And then in 2006,
he started asking me
to get him in touch with Patsy
to apologize for killing her daughter.
He was asking for contact information.
And I was stalling.
He said in an email,
"Michael, I'll be in the house
before you give me
that contact information, won't I?"
But I take this to be a possible threat.
[John Ramsey] There was now a new district
attorney who had taken over the case.
Michael took it to her, and said,
"Look, here's what's been going on."
"This person needs to be investigated."
So Mary launches the investigation
to try and find this person,
which involved not just her office,
it involved Homeland Security, ICE.
[intriguing music playing]
And then he asked,
"Do you want to hear my voice?"
And so I said, "Sure."
[phone line rings]
This is Mike Tracey.
[Daxis] Hello, hey, Michael.
[Michael Tracey] We taped, I believe,
about 11 hours of conversation,
all of which were being listened in on
by various intelligence agencies.
And that was a very, very dark experience.
[Daxis] So it's great
to finally to finally talk to you.
[Michael Tracey] Yes. I must admit,
I was a bit surprised
when you sent the phone number, you know?
- [Daxis] Yes.
- [Michael Tracey] Why did you do that?
[Daxis] I don't know.
I've lost I've lost my senses.
[Michael Tracey] At what point did you
decide you had to tell me you killed her?
- [Daxis] I never have said that I have.
- [Michael Tracey] It's heavily implied.
[Daxis] I know, and I can't say that.
I just can't say that word, "kill."
What he was trying to do was to say
it was part of some
kind of strange relationship.
And he's into erotic asphyxiation.
[Daxis] JonBenét and I had had
a special experience
using what I call a special necklace.
And I'm always gonna use that term.
I'm not gonna use any other term.
I hate to use the term asphyxia,
and I won't use it.
The reasons people get off on watching it
is because it looks
like someone who's dying,
because they lose consciousness,
and then they start to convulse.
So it is a little erotic to watch.
Like, I watched her eyes close,
then her body starts convulsing.
Her legs start to convulse,
like she's dying.
She stays in this sleep slumber
for just a few seconds,
and she's, like, groggy.
She said, "What happened?"
And then I just tell her she went
into a dream state, and that it was okay.
And I started to kiss her on her thighs,
and that was
a a real turning point for me,
because I was very close
to what I'll call her "sex."
And that was the turning point, because
it just made me a little bit crazy.
[Michael Tracey] The worst part for me
was I had to pretend it was all okay.
I couldn't be judgmental.
[Daxis] I just kind of knelt down
in front of her,
and I said, "JonBenét, I want to make
another necklace for you."
And it had some interesting knots in it.
So I slowly apply the pressure on her neck
with that second necklace.
And I just said, "Yes, sweetheart,
go into the sweet dream."
At that point, her little body started
to convulse and twitch a little bit.
And that's when I should've stopped,
and I just kept holding pressure.
Because I was in a trance.
I just couldn't stop looking at her face,
I couldn't stop kissing her,
and I just I was just in the
in the throes of ecstasy with her.
And then all of a sudden,
my gaze just was suddenly broken.
And I just thought, "Oh, my God.
JonBenét, are you okay?"
And
[inhales deeply, exhales]
I knew she wasn't okay.
[voice breaking] Because I knew
that she wasn't breathing and
I just And I just was terrified.
I I said, "Oh God,
I'm I'm gonna have to finish this."
"I know what I have to do
because I can't take the chance
that she could still be alive."
[unsettling music playing]
[crying] I thought to myself,
"God, what if her brain is just dying
and her body's still alive?"
I just didn't want to leave her
in that state.
I just couldn't leave her like that.
[voice breaking] And for some
strange reason, I can't explain why,
I just said to myself, "Oh my God,
what if what if blood comes out
of her mouth when I when I do this?"
[normal voice] I turn my flashlight off.
There was tape
wrapped around the flashlight.
And I took a piece of that tape
off that flashlight,
and I covered her mouth with it.
I just kinda [inhales]
put the blanket over her,
and I just kinda held it in place.
[crying] I just
threw that flashlight back,
and I said, "Forgive me, JonBenét."
And then I did it.
[crying]
[sobbing]
[sobbing continues]
Sorry. [sobs]
- [Michael Tracey] Okay. Okay.
- [Daxis sobs uncontrollably]
[Michael Tracey] After one
of the conversations, I went back home,
and I just started to sob.
[voice breaking] Even now, it's rough.
[Daxis] I had enough mind left to know
that I had to gather all my stuff.
And I in my mind I don't know
if I gathered everything up.
I don't know if I left something.
But I I had to go back to that window.
That's where I came in.
That's where I had to go out.
[soft music playing]
I lifted the grate,
I got out of the grate,
and I was just, like, "Oh God, I've left
my little girl in that horrible state."
"She's in that little, tiny room,
and worse than that, she's dead."
And, "God, what have I done?"
[music fades]
[Michael Tracey] When
the investigation began,
we had no idea who this guy was,
where he was.
[Daxis] I'm Interpol's biggest nightmare
because I know how to evade.
And law enforcement will run
into the biggest brick wall
when they try to trace this phone number.
It leads to nobody.
[enunciating] I am not a fool.
It leads to nobody.
[Michael Tracey] The question was,
how do you find him?
[John Ramsey] The DA's office people said,
"Look, this person was fascinated
with Patsy, wanted to talk to Patsy."
[Daxis] I don't think that Patricia
would deny a phone call with me.
[John Ramsey] They said,
"Let's milk that."
[somber music playing]
Patsy was in bed with cancer.
She was in not-good shape.
So they set up a phone by Patsy's bed
with a tap on it,
and she was prepared to talk to him.
[Daxis] Since she's dying, a phone call
would be better than nothing.
[John Ramsey] But he never called.
[somber music continues]
Patsy was very sick.
She was in pain, very much in pain,
and we knew the end was near,
and I was, like, "God, please take her.
Just take get her home, get her
relieve her pain."
I told Patsy, "It's okay,
you know, if you go home."
[breath shudders, sighs]
[softly] And she did.
And I went outside and just
I don't know,
I realized I needed to tell Burke.
And here, poor Burke.
He'd graduated from high school,
he was in college,
and to lose his mother,
who loved him dearly.
He was, you know, a typical kid.
He loved his mom.
So I woke him up.
He said, "It's Mom." And I said, "Yeah."
[sighs] "She's gone."
[softly] That was hard.
[somber music playing]
[reporter] Patsy Ramsey, the mother
of little JonBenét Ramsey, has died.
She was 49 years old.
[Patsy Ramsey] I don't know
how long I'll live,
but I know that
when I'm absent from the body,
I will be at home with the Lord.
And JonBenét and Beth and my mother,
who has since passed away and
The fun people are starting to be there.
[Patsy and audience laugh]
[Patsy Ramsey] So it's gonna be
a glorious reunion.
[John Ramsey] We've been asked,
it's really too bad
that Patsy passed away
without knowing who killed her child.
And she knows now, I believe.
I will see Patsy again, I have no doubt.
I don't know how that's gonna work
or how it's gonna happen or what
It's It's too
be beyond my little brain to comprehend,
but I believe that that's a reality
for us as humans.
[somber music continues]
[Lou Smit] I was there
just before Patsy died.
I got to go to the hospital.
I held her hand in the hospital.
And the the last words
that Patsy said to me
were, "Lou, I don't have much time left.
Please catch this guy before I die."
[music swells]
[tape clicks]
[music fades]
[line rings]
[Mike Tracey] Daxis, this is Mike Tracey.
[Daxis] Hey, Michael.
[Michael Tracey] There's some
really bad news. Patsy died.
[Daxis sighs]
- Oh my God. Oh, my.
- [Michael Tracey] I know it's horrible.
[Daxis, crying] I can never hear her say
that she forgives me.
I can never hear her say she forgives me.
[tense music plays]
Can someone please give me
just the satisfaction to know
that she at least wanted
to have a connection with me?
- But it wasn't possible.
- [Michael Tracey] That was the case!
Daxis knew that I had
the last photo of JonBenét.
He emailed me and said, could I
scan it for him and send it to him.
And it was suggested by an investigator
that I should offer him the original.
So I suggested it, and he gave us
a drop box, a UPS box in Bangkok.
[tense music playing]
[Daxis] Providing you with an address,
even though I know that the address
is very far from me,
is scaring the hell out of me.
[Michael Tracey] Yeah.
The UPS store was put under surveillance,
and he told me about a mountain bike
he'd bought, and described it.
[Daxis] I'm a bicyclist.
[Michael Tracey] So why
did you buy the bike?
[Daxis] Because I'm gonna take it
to work with me.
[Michael Tracey] You're gonna
ride it to the school?
[Daxis] Yeah.
He turns up on his bike, picks it up,
and then he's under surveillance
for about a week.
I now know that person
to be John Mark Karr.
[tense music continues]
[John Ramsey] By then,
the Bangkok authorities found out
he was a child predator,
and he was teaching elementary school.
[Michael Tracey] In one
of our conversations,
Karr described his classroom
as one wall is all glass,
sort of looking in through the glass.
And there's a moment when he's got
this little girl, young girl on his lap,
and a teacher comes in,
and he pushes her away.
And that's when the Thai police said
"We've gotta go in."
[music swells, then fades]
[chatter]
[reporter] The murder of the six-year-old
beauty pageant contestant JonBenét Ramsey
has captivated America for a decade.
Now, ten years on,
a man has been arrested in Thailand.
[chatter]
[speaking Thai]
[reporter 2] 41-year-old John Mark Karr,
brought into custody by Bangkok police
on suspicion of premeditated murder.
I loved JonBenét,
and she died accidentally.
- [reporter 3] Are you an innocent man?
- No.
[chatter in Thai]
I was I was with, uh,
I was with JonBenét when she died.
[reporter 3] Were there other people
with you than her?
No.
Her death was an accident.
[unsettling music playing]
[reporter 4] Who is John Mark Karr?
What was he doing in Thailand?
Since Karr was arrested,
new details have come to light.
[reporter 5] He had been
an elementary school teacher
in a suburb of Atlanta for some time,
but is no longer working there.
[reporter 6] Karr worked
as a substitute teacher
at Hamilton Elementary for a few months,
just before JonBenét's murder.
But he was taken off the substitute list
after complaints from parents.
Inappropriate, uh, language,
and I won't say necessarily sexual,
just things that were not normal.
He is fixated on young girls.
I think there's no question about that.
In 2001,
he was arrested in Petaluma, California.
He'd been working there as a teacher,
and he was found with child pornography.
[music continues]
He was charged, was heading for trial,
and he left the country
and disappeared.
[John Mark Karr] I've been running
for ten fucking years,
and I'll be damned
if anyone's gonna catch me now.
[reporter 7] Since then, the 41-year-old
seems to have found plenty of work abroad.
In resumes posted on the Internet,
Karr claims to have taught
in Asia, Europe, and Latin America.
More chilling, Karr worked briefly
as an elementary school teacher
in at least two international schools
in Bangkok, including an all-girls school.
[reporter 8] Some legal observers
are skeptical of Karr's story.
They have questions like,
why John Karr would even leave
a ransom note
at the scene of JonBenét's murder.
[John Mark Karr] It had been my plan
all along to just take her.
And when I first arrived,
I was very, um, confident and smug.
But when you walk
into the bedroom of the parents,
you just get this feeling.
It's almost like someone's watching you.
The gravity of the situation
starts to hit,
and you're, like, well,
how do I deal with these parents?
I wanted to give enough information
that will allow them
to know I'll bring her back.
The way I would like
to have written that note,
which would have been
very polite and kind.
"Dear Mr. and Mrs. Ramsey,
I have your lovely daughter,
and I'll bring her back,
but not right now."
And I couldn't do that.
It would have led straight to me.
If I'd written it that way,
it would have led the authorities
straight to my door.
I couldn't address that note to
and in any way to her mother.
I I could have thought of doing it
in the beginning, but I'd changed my mind.
[unsettling music playing]
[reporter] A law enforcement source
tells CNN
that John Mark Karr
was heard saying, while he was in custody,
that he doesn't understand
how people could question
how he got into the Ramseys' home
the night JonBenét Ramsey was murdered.
[reporter 2] Karr blurted out,
"Everybody says I couldn't know
my way around the house,
but I got in the house around five
o'clock, and I stayed there all night."
"They," meaning the Ramseys,
"didn't come back until ten o'clock."
[chatter]
[reporter 3] Karr will be deported
from Bangkok
and then ultimately moved
to Boulder, Colorado.
[tense music playing]
[John Ramsey] When his picture
was published in the media,
we had a little cottage
up in northern Michigan,
and we had a housekeeper who'd come in
and clean it periodically and check on it.
And she saw that picture
and called us and said,
"That guy was in your garage
last summer."
"100% certain."
"The summer before JonBenét was killed,
he wandered into your garage,
kind of a strange guy, asking questions."
And so I began to think, yeah,
we were being stalked.
[reporter 4] Did the Ramsey's know Karr?
Did JonBenét know him?
We do know he was living in Atlanta,
where the Ramseys were
when JonBenét was born,
but after that,
the Ramseys moved out here to Boulder.
We don't know what happened to Mr. Karr.
[Michael Tracey] When did you first relate
to JonBenét, then?
When did you get that sense that
- [John Mark Karr] I can't tell you that.
- [Michael Tracey] Okay.
[John Mark Karr] I can't tell you that,
I'm sorry.
But I'm not a stalker.
I can tell you that.
[reporter 5] Once back in the US,
investigators are expected to take
more DNA samples from the murder suspect.
[reporter 6] Investigators in Boulder
should know the answer to a key question.
Is there a DNA match?
A match between DNA samples
Karr has reportedly surrendered
and the DNA taken
from under the victim's fingernails
and one article of clothing.
[John Ramsey] Of course, the media,
"They've made an arrest. This is amazing."
And for me,
it was a sobering experience in a way,
because now where the media was,
we had 40 cameras out in our front yard
wanting comments, and
I was still skeptical, 'cause the DNA,
we had to see if there was a match.
[intriguing music playing]
And, of course, there wasn't.
Breaking news tonight.
Confessed killer of JonBenét Ramsey walks
after no DNA match.
Just in the last
We found out that the DNA didn't match
a couple of days later.
[reporter] Insiders said he knew
certain details about the brutal crime
only the killer could know,
but officials at the Denver Crime Lab
say DNA proves he was not at the scene
that dreadful December night.
[Carol McKinley] And Karr was released.
[John Ramsey] John Mark Karr
is a very strange guy,
but until we have a DNA match,
we don't know who the killer is.
[intriguing music continues]
[Michael Tracey] The DNA didn't match.
Allegedly.
- Um
- [director] Why do you say allegedly?
Well, I've got a I think
there's a problem with the DNA.
The DNA in this case
has been problematic from the beginning,
many experts have told me,
and this goes back
to the contamination of the crime scene.
[Mitch Morrissey] The Boulder police made
a lot of mistakes early on in this case.
I was always convinced that that
may have made an important difference
in issues of contamination.
[Charlie Brennan] And in a crime scene,
particularly one as contaminated as this,
it's problematic, I think,
to take too much to the bank
based on any one DNA result.
What does that mean in terms of everyone
who's given a DNA sample?
If the DNA is faulty,
a lot of people could still be a suspect.
[unsettling music playing]
[John Andrew Ramsey] We've been
in the practice of ruling people out
based on DNA.
And if we take
what the police have said at face value,
and, you know, the reporting done
by guys like Charlie Brennan,
who say that the DNA in the case
isn't as valuable
or significant as we think,
then we've been ruling people out
for the wrong reasons.
Everybody should be back on the table.
[intriguing music playing]
The police have never ruled out
John and Patsy based solely on this DNA.
So how do you rule anybody out
based solely on this DNA?
You have to go deeper.
You have to sort the DNA we have today
and make more sense of it.
[music fades]
[reporter] The family of JonBenét Ramsey
is petitioning Governor Jared Polis
to take new action to help find answers
in the case that has gone unsolved
for more than 25 years.
[soft music playing]
[John Ramsey] What we're advocating for,
and we have been doing so
for the last year or so, aggressively,
is we know there's five or six items
that were taken from the crime scene,
sent into a lab for DNA sampling,
and were not sampled.
So we want those items sampled.
We want the items that have been sampled,
and tested, to be retested.
And then use the public genealogy database
to look for not only a match,
but a similar, uh, relative.
And that's been used very successfully
in the last, gosh, I don't know,
three or four years
by police departments to find the killer
of very old cold cases.
But we don't know what's being done.
[soft music continues]
[music fades]
[tense music playing]
[Lou Smit] I know that this investigation
someday will be solved.
I'm gonna do everything that I can
still in this case to help solve it.
[click]
[Kurt Pillard] Lou had cancer,
and while he was involved
with chemotherapy,
he was still meeting
with some of his closest friends
and, uh, passing on information,
uh, about this case.
I visited him in hospice, and he was still
talking about the JonBenét Ramsey case.
I mean, this was somebody
who literally took it to his grave.
He wanted that case solved.
[Kurt Pillard] He wanted to make sure
that his legacy would live on.
That's why the Smit family
continues to look into this case.
[music continues]
[music fades]
We could have the killer arrested,
convicted, in prison,
and there'd still be five to 10%
of the population
that thinks we're guilty.
And that's not surprising,
based on what they were told.
I'd get letters from people for years
that say, "Oh, I'm so sorry."
"I thought you were guilty,
and I was wrong, and I'm so sorry."
And I wrote back and said,
"How could you believe anything else?"
"That's what you were told
by the media, by the police."
[intriguing music playing]
[reporter] A former lead detective in
the JonBenét Ramsey murder investigation
says he thinks Patsy Ramsey
killed her daughter.
- Hello, and welcome to you, Steve.
- Thank you.
Police officers shouldn't be
writing books about an ongoing case.
It's just totally unprofessional.
[music continues]
What we need to do
is a complete reinvestigation,
starting right from scratch.
We thought it would be good
if we actually brought in
a child who was about ten years old
to actually do the demonstration with him.
[music continues]
[man 2] He probably woulda
been upset about her trying to
snag a piece of pineapple.
Out of anger, he may have struck her
with that flashlight.
[music continues]
[John Andrew Ramsey] Burke did sue CBS,
and that was was settled.
Um, but, you know, damage was done.
And unfortunately, this delusional idea
has has really caught fire.
The true crime world has really subscribed
to this absurd theory
that Burke killed JonBenét.
It's incredibly hurtful and wrong.
[Michael Kane] We did write a letter for
Burke because the press was going wild.
You know, "Burke's the killer."
We thought, this is crazy.
He didn't write that note.
We know he didn't use the garrote.
This is nuts. So we did write all that
saying, "We cleared him."
[soft music playing]
[sighs] Hmm.
[John Ramsey] These are some little boots
that JonBenét used to wear, cowboy boots.
- [producer] These were pageant boots.
- Pageant boots.
[Jan Rousseaux] She wore those for
"Cowboy's Sweetheart." She sang that.
[John Ramsey] I remarried
five years after Patsy died.
JonBenét feels like
one of our little grandchildren.
She's like frozen at age six.
Cannot even imagine her as an adult.
So we just remember her
as one of the little kids. And
[John Ramsey] This is kind of a collection
of our grandkids.
[Jan Rousseaux] Yeah, all the grandkids.
This is her little Bible.
[John Ramsey] She's been very supportive,
loves my children dearly,
treats them like they were hers.
[Jan Rousseaux] We met
at a wedding in Denver.
I was fairly familiar with the case,
but I hadn't studied it in depth
and did not know
that it was still very big.
So that made me seriously reconsider
when we were dating. [inhales]
Is this a cloud
that I wanted to live under?
And, um, because I love John,
I am up for it.
JonBenét took tap dancing lessons.
She took piano lessons.
She loved to perform.
She was always putting on little skits
with her friends, you know, at home.
They'd dress up and,
"We got a play for you."
"Pay attention."
[Jan Rousseaux] John has been
through hell and high water.
He is stalwart and strong.
He's unflappable.
A friend of Beth, my oldest daughter,
who was killed in a car accident,
one afternoon,
in Chicago, at Beth's funeral,
came up to me and said, "Mr. Ramsey,
if I died, I would not want
my parents to be sad."
That was a real meaningful comment to me,
that I know Beth
wouldn't want us to be sad.
JonBenét wouldn't want us to be sad.
You know, the insanity,
it was just it was wrong.
And I'm sure she would be upset
that her parents were accused of this.
Uh, she knew she was loved.
I told her this almost every day.
I do still do with my adult children.
I talk to them. They know they're loved.
And, um, JonBenét was very proud
to be named after her dad.
She used to tell kids,
"JonBenét, well, that's"
"That came from my dad's name.
I'm named after my dad."
And she Yeah
That was just, I don't know, just
[inhales, exhales]
I don't know.
I know she'd be sad for her family,
because she cared about her family.
JonBenét colored that.
It's signed up on top, JonBenét.
Our minister in Atlanta said, "Look,
at first, memories are gonna bring pain."
"But eventually, they'll bring joy."
And I found that to be true.
[pensive music playing]
It takes a while, it takes a long while
for the pain to go away.
But then the memory of JonBenét is joyful.
And, uh
- [producer] That's where you're at now.
- That's where I'm at.
[JonBenét Ramsey] Yoo-hoo. Hello.
[pensive music continues]
[Patsy Ramsey] JonBenét.
[John Ramsey] You always fall back to
sadness and what you've lost.
But, uh
I'm glad she was in my life for six years.
[engine revs]
[Patsy Ramsey] Ooh! [laughs]
That's great. Tell Dad what you got.
[John Ramsey] What'd you get there?
[pensive music swells, then fades]
[soft music playing]
[music fades]
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