JonBenét Ramsey

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JonBenét Patricia Ramsey (born August 6, 1990 in Atlanta , Georgia , United States - † December 25, 1996 in Boulder , Colorado , United States) was an American child beauty queen who became known when she was six years old was found murdered.

Beauty pageants

JonBenét Ramsey was the daughter of John Bennett Ramsey (* 1943) and Patricia "Patsy" Ann Paugh Ramsey (1956-2006). JonBenét's first name was derived from her father's first name, the second comes from her mother.

She has won numerous titles in children's beauty pageants. Among other things, she won the titles "Little Miss Christmas", "All Stars Kid Cover Girl", "Little Royale Miss", "Little Miss Colorado" and "Little Miss Sunburst". Her trademarks included her strumming with purple-painted eyelashes and the song I Wanna Be a Cowboy's Sweetheart , which she performed frequently.

The murder case

On the morning of December 26, 1996, Patsy Ramsey found a ransom note on the stairwell of her family home stating that JonBenét Ramsey had been kidnapped and would only be released for a ransom of $ 118,000, or otherwise murdered. The police should not be called. While the police, called despite the instructions in the letter, waited in the Ramseys' house for the announced call from the alleged kidnappers, the Ramseys searched the building. John Ramsey found his daughter murdered in the basement; the expected call did not materialize. The amount of the ransom was almost exactly the same as the allowance John had received the previous Christmas. But investigators also suspected that this could be a reference to Psalm 118 .

The official cause of her death was " asphyxia due to strangulation associated with traumatic brain injury ".

The American press accused JonBenét Ramsey's parents of the act of having only footprints in and no out of their house, as you could see thanks to the snow. Most newspapers did not mention that there was no snow at the back of the house and that the staff entrance was open when the police arrived. The DNA traces that were found on the body, as well as the specimens of the ransom note found in the house (JonBenét was possibly originally supposed to be kidnapped or a kidnapping afterwards faked) did not match any member of the Ramsey family, but Patsy Ramsey was the only one who could not follow Security can be excluded.

Grave of JonBenét Ramsey in Marietta, Georgia

On August 16, 2006, former teacher John Mark Karr, who came from near Atlanta and had several criminal records for possession of child pornography, was arrested in Bangkok and confessed to having committed the murder . This confession was soon questioned, however, as some details of his testimony did not appear to coincide with the results of the police examination or the forensic autopsy results. Karr's ex-wife also claimed in interviews that he was with her in Alabama and not in Colorado at the time of the crime. On August 28, 2006, charges against Karr were dropped because his DNA did not match DNA traces on the murder victim.

JonBenét Ramsey was buried next to her half-sister Elizabeth - who died in a car accident in 1992. JonBenét's mother, Patsy Ramsey, died of cancer on June 24, 2006 and was buried next to her daughter.

JonBenét's life has been filmed several times, including with Dyanne Iandoli and Julia Granstrom in the leading roles. Her assassination has served as the template for many novels and documentaries and is now considered one of the most discussed and mysterious unsolved murders in the United States. Numerous books have been written about the case, so that it entered American popular culture . The documentary Casting JonBenet (2017) by the Australian film director Kitty Green is distributed by Netflix.

On July 10, 2008, the US judiciary declared suspicions against the victim's family to be unfounded. In a published letter, Boulder County , Colorado state attorney Mary Lacy apologized to the family for the allegations. DNA tests would have shown the innocence of the girl's relatives. Independent DNA experts, however, have serious doubts about the significance of this DNA trace, especially as evidence of exculpation for family members.

On February 3, 2009, the case was reopened by the Boulder Police Department and closed again in 2015.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Police drop some potential suspects in Ramsey killing. In: CNN.com. January 21, 1997, accessed June 22, 2011 .
  2. ↑ Schiller, Lawrence (1999). Perfect Murder, Perfect Town , p. 323, p. 447. HarperCollins, New York. ISBN 0-06-109696-2
  3. ↑ Elizabeth Klaver: Sites of Autopsy in Contemporary Culture . SUNY Press, 2012, ISBN 0-7914-8342-8 , pp. 2 ( google.com ).
  4. ↑ John E. Meyer: Autopsy Report. In: forensicoutreach.com. Office of the Boulder County Coroner, December 25, 1996, accessed November 5, 2019 .
  5. ↑ Casting JonBenet. Retrieved March 12, 2020 .
personal data
SURNAME Ramsey, JonBenét
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ramsey, JonBenét Patricia (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American murder victim and child beauty queen
DATE OF BIRTH August 6, 1990
PLACE OF BIRTH Atlanta , Georgia , United States
DATE OF DEATH December 25, 1996
Place of death Boulder , Colorado , United States