JonBenet case reopened

[frogmarch]

http://www.star-telegram.com/238/story/1180286.html

Article excerpt:

BOULDER, Colo. — The slaying of JonBenet Ramsey will be investigated as a cold case with all evidence and actions taken 12 years ago reviewed anew, the police chief said Monday as the department resumed an investigation for which it has long been criticized.

Chief Mark Beckner said new technology gives investigators tools they didn’t have a decade ago when the 6-year-old beauty pageant contestant was found bludgeoned and strangled in the basement of her Boulder home in 1996.

Police had transferred the investigation to the district attorney’s office six years ago amid criticism of how the case was handled.

...

Beckner said that he and newly elected District Attorney Stan Garnett agreed that police should lead the investigation again. Beckner said he has invited a team of veteran investigators from state and federal agencies to join an advisory task force.

As an avid follower of this case from the very beginning, I'm glad it's being reopened, but I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for it to be solved.

[lavenderdiva]

1. I'm hoping some new eyes will be looking at whatever evidence

they have. Like you, I'm glad its being reopened. I think they have DNA evidence, but that I heard from the earlier investigation that it didn't match anyone in the system? was I right about that?

There were some odd things about this case, but I really don't think anyone in the family murdered JonBenet. I believe it was an outsider. It'll be interesting to hear about any new leads they may uncover....

[frogmarch]

2. The so-called "foreign" DNA

from a person or persons other than JonBenet, which was found under her fingernails and in her underwear, was scant and degraded and had to be amplified for testing using polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The "foreign" samples may actually be stutter (also called shadow bands), a common problem in PCR testing. Stutter can cause false positive test results. The Ramsey team made much of the fact that the DNA didn't match John or Burke Ramsey, but the fact is that even if the DNA was real and not the result of stutter, if it was a mixture from more than one person (there's no way to determine this one way or the other with present technology) then no one can be excluded as the donor.

Another thing: If the "foreign" samples in the Ramsey case are indeed foreign DNA, then the underwear DNA and the fingernail DNA must be from at least two separate donors, because the DNA markers in the fingernail sample and the underwear sample don't match each other.

Some investigators theorize that if the degraded DNA in the underwear sample is in fact actual DNA and not stutter from the amplification process, the DNA could have come from a worker sneezing on the underwear during its manufacture in southeast Asia. (This is sometimes called by Internet forum posters the "Sum Yung Gai" theory.) The degraded DNA under her fingernails, if it's actual DNA and not stutter, could have come from any of a variety of places she'd put her hands - plus, as investigator Steve Thomas wrote: "When Meyer (the coroner) clipped the nails of each finger, no blood or tissue was found that would indicate a struggle. He used the same clippers for all the fingers, although doing so created an issue of cross-contamination. For optimal DNA purposes, separate and sterile clippers should have been used for each finger. Furthermore, we later learned that the coroner's office sometimes used the same clippers on different autopsy subjects."

I believe JonBenet was killed by one of her family members, not by an intruder, but whatever the truth is, I only hope it's someday revealed.

[BlueIris]

3. Thank you. I personally think it's obvious a family member did it,

for a variety of reasons. Don't feel like getting into them now, but I've never believed anyone other than the parents committed the murder.