Who Killed JonBenet?

Exposure - The JonBenet Ramsey Story

The first images of JonBenet Ramsey that were broadcast to the world showed a pretty little girl in heavy make-up and flamboyant costumes parading across a stage. At the time, the media described her as "a painted baby, a sexualized toddler beauty queen."

From the day in 1996 when JonBenet was found dead in the basement of her home in Boulder Colorado, the Boulder police and a large proportion of the world's media believed that her parents, John and Patsy Ramsey, were responsible for her death.

Prior to the murder of their daughter, John and Patsy Ramsey's life seemed almost ideal. Patsy, a former beauty queen, was married to a successful businessman. They had moved to Boulder in 1991 where John ran a computer company that he had started in his garage. The Ramseys readily adapted to their new life in Colorado and made many new friends. They built a large house in an elite suburb, and entertained often. Their last party in Boulder, just three days before the murder, was particularly happy. Over a hundred guests were present at a Christmas function. The Ramseys believed that they had good reason to celebrate. Patsy had warded off recurrance of ovarian cancer and John had been voted Boulder's "businessman of the year."

According to the Ramseys' testimony, they drove home the few blocks from a party at a friend's house on Christmas night. JonBenet had fallen asleep in the car so they carried her up the stairs to her room and put her to bed at 9:30 p.m. Shortly after, Patsy and John went to bed as they planned to get up early to prepare for a trip to their holiday home on Lake Michigan.

The next day, Patsy woke just after 5:00 a.m. and walked down the stairs to the kitchen. On the staircase, she found a two-and-a-half page note that said that JonBenet had been kidnapped by a "small foreign faction" and was being held for a ransom of $118,000. She was to be exchanged for the money the next day. The letter warned that if the money was not delivered, the child would be executed. Patsy yelled to John as she ran back up the stairs and opened the door to JonBenet's room. Finding she wasn't there, they made the decision to phone the police. The 911 dispatcher recorded Patsy's call at 5:25 a.m. The police arrived at the house seven minutes later.

The uniformed police officers that attended were openly suspicious from the start. The Ramseys, treating the ransom demand seriously, were already taking steps to raise the ransom money. The note said that the kidnappers would call John Ramsey but no call came.

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Searching For A Killer

Who Killed JonBenet?

Oct. 4, 2002

Their faces are instantly recognizable, but John and Patsy Ramsey are famous in a way no one would want.

Although they have never been publicly called suspects or charged with the 1996 death of their daughter JonBenet, they are resigned to a painful reality.

"We could find the killer tomorrow, he could be arrested, convicted and jailed, and there'd still be 20 per cent of the population would think that we had something to do with it," says John.

48 Hours Investigates is taking a fresh look at the Ramsey case: finding new evidence and new leads, and reporting on the Ramseys' personal story, and their thoughts on what happened in their Boulder, Colo., home on Christmas night in 1996. 48 Hours Investigates will also report on never-before-seen videotapes of the police interrogation of both John and Patsy Ramsey. Erin Moriarty reports.

In a rare interview, the Ramseys agreed to a completely unrestricted discussion of the case with Erin Moriarty.

"Did your daughter have a bed-wetting incident that night? Did you get up, did you get angry and did you hurt her?" Erin Moriarty asked them.

"No, I did not," Patsy responded.

"What is your reaction when you know many people think that's what you did?" Moriarty asked.

"They are wrong," said Patsy. "I don't know what else to say. How else do you say no except no. No means no.”

Over the last several months, 48 Hours Investigates has spent a great deal of time with the Ramseys. This summer, John and Patsy Ramsey sold their million-dollar home in Atlanta and moved to a smaller townhouse just down the road. "Life has never been the same," says Patsy. "And it has basically ruined us financially and emotionally and everything else. So, we're scaling back."

John Ramsey, once the head of a billion-dollar software company, hasn't worked for four years. In February, Patsy found out her cancer had returned. Nine years ago, she learned she had Stage Four ovarian cancer. She made what she hoped was a full recovery. But earlier this year, she had to again go through debilitating chemotherapy treatments. The most recent CT scan in July was negative. "I feel fabulous. I feel just marvelous," she says.

Almost from the moment the body of JonBenet was discovered, Boulder police believed John and Patsy killed their daughter and then staged a kidnapping, complete with a rambling two and a half page ransom note, to cover it up.

"They've never investigated this case, other than to investigate the family. They have never investigated this case," John says.

Even after a Boulder grand jury decided in 1999 not to indict the Ramseys, they were then, and remain to this day, the prime suspects.

While testifying under oath last November, Boulder police chief Mark Bechner admitted what he had never before said publicly: "Internally John and Patsy are considered suspects" in JonBenet’s death.

Why are they the prime suspects in the eyes of the Boulder Police? "I asked Mark Beckner that," Patsy says. "I said 'What is it? Tell me what it is, that makes you think I killed my beautiful, precious child?' And, he said, 'Well, well…it's just a lot of little things.' I think he really doesn't know."

Because police didn't have enough evidence, sources within the investigation tell 48 Hours, they tried to psychologically break the Ramseys, hoping one or both would confess.

That strategy, John Ramsay claims, included a relentless campaign of leaks by some in the department, fed mostly to the nation’s tabloids, that had a devastating effect on public opinion.

"They convinced the public of guilt," says Lin Wood, John and Patsy Ramsey's attorney. "Based on false information leaked by the Boulder Police Department."

It started in March of 1997, newspapers, quoting anonymous police sources said there were no footprints leading into the Ramsey’s home. The truth was, there wasn’t enough snow to leave footprints.

The Ramseys believe the Boulder Police continue to ignore evidence pointing to other suspects. John Ramsey says a killer or several killers remain free.

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Searching: The Interrogation Tapes

Questions For The Ramseys

Oct. 4, 2002

On June 23, 1998, 18 months after JonBenet was murdered, John and Patsy Ramsey, sitting in separate rooms at the same time, were questioned by Boulder authorities in a Colorado Police Station. The tapes have never been seen publicly - until 48 Hours Investigates aired them.

John's interrogator was Lou Smit, a homicide detective working for the Boulder DA’s office. Detective Tom Haney questioned Patsy, who at the time was taking medication for both anxiety and depression.

There isn't a lot of physical evidence against either John or Patsy Ramsey. So the investigators were looking for inconsistencies and focusing on minute details from the crime scene.

Smit asked Patsy questions about pineapple that her daughter ate before being murdered. Autopsy results found undigested pineapple in JonBenet's stomach. And police discovered fingerprints on a bowl of pineapple left in the family’s dining room on the morning of the murder.

"I didn't put the bowl there. OK? I didn't put the bowl there," Patsy told Smit.

"But now, I'm telling you they are not somebody else's. I'm telling that they belong to the one of two of you," Haney responded.

"Well, I don't know. I did not put that there. No," Patsy said.

It was Patsy's fingerprints on the bowl — according to police — suggesting that Patsy gave the fruit to her daughter. But if Patsy did give it to her, and was lying about it, the investigators wondered, could she be lying about everything?

"Sometimes, the simplest most obscure little thing could be so significant," Haney said.

"Right. I did not feed JonBenet pineapple. OK? So I don’t know how it got in her stomach. And where this bowl of pineapple came from. I can’t recall putting that there," Patsy said.

After three days of questioning, the 1998 interrogation ended. Even though the Ramseys were not indicted, Boulder investigators continued to believe they were guilty. In August of 2000, prosecutors flew to Atlanta where the Ramsey’s were then living, asking to see and hear new evidence. 48 Hours Investigates also acquired these tapes.

With John, the prosecutors mostly asked about leads he had uncovered on other suspects. But with Patsy, the interrogators were more accusatory, suggesting they had new evidence: clothing fibers that would tie her directly to the murder.

Patsy's attorney, Lin Wood, asked prosecutors to produce the evidence. When they wouldn't, he refused to let Patsy go on the record.

But she did go on the record with 48 Hours Investigates.

What does she think about these fibers? Says Patsy: "When I - after John discovering the body, and she was brought to the living room, when I laid eyes on her, I knelt down and hugged her. But I was, had my whole body on her body. My sweater fibers, or whatever I had on that morning, are going to transfer to her clothing, OK?"

Prosecutors focused on Patsy more than John, following their belief that she was the killer.

"JonBenet got up and somebody in that house - legally, lawfully, one of the three of you - also happens to be up, or gets up because she makes noise," Haney said during the questioning. "There is some discussion or something happens, there's an accident."

"You're going down the wrong path, Buddy,” said Patsy.

Haney continued: "OK. Somebody accidentally or somebody gets upset over bedwetting, that’s one of the things that’s been proposed."

"Didn't happen," said Patsy. "If she got up in the night and ran into somebody, it was somebody there that wasn't supposed to be there. I don't know what transpired after that, whether it was accident, intentional, premeditated or what not. It was not one of her three family members that were also in that house. Period. End of statement."

These tapes don't show the Ramseys at their best. But the Ramseys made these tapes available to us, saying they want all the information about this case out in the open. As for the Boulder police and prosecutors, they denied repeated requests from 48 Hours Investigates to discuss these tapes or any other issues. Their only comment on the Ramsey murder investigation is "No comment."

Patsy says she wants to work with the police. "I appreciate being here. I appreciate it. It's very hard to be here. But it is damn sight harder to be sitting at home in Atlanta, Ga., wondering every second of every day what are you guys doing out here. You know. Have you found anything? Are we any closer? Is the guy out there watching my house? You know, is my son safe? My life has been hell from that day forward. And I want nothing more than to find out who is responsible for this. OK? I mean I want to work with you, not against you."

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Searching: The Detective Smits Changes His Mind

Oct. 4, 2002

One hundred miles away from where JonBenet Ramsey was murdered, in a modest home in Colorado Springs, 67-year-old Lou Smit works every day, alone, trying to find her killer. He keeps a picture of her in his wallet.

Smit interrogated John Ramsey in 1998. He is a veteran detective who was hired by the Boulder District attorney to work on the Ramsey Murder case. At first, he thought it was the Ramseys who had killed their daughter.

But as Smit followed the evidence and questioned the Ramseys, he became convinced that the Boulder police were focusing on the wrong suspects.

"John Ramsey came through very, very sincere. When I left that I interview, there was no doubt in my mind that he had nothing to do with the death of his daughter," says Smit, who quit the investigation in disgust to work on his own to find the killer.

Says Smit: "They hired me as a detective to look at this case. They may not like what I say but I'm gonna say it. I don’t think the Ramseys did it. And I think they ought to start looking for people that did."

Smit says the answer is in the evidence: the autopsy report; the intricate garrotte used as a murder weapon; the strange marks on her back; a mysterious footprint; and, most important, the information found in the DNA report. "The person who did this was very brutal and very vicious," says Smit.

What convinced Smit that someone other than the Ramseys killed their daughter? First and foremost, it was the brutality of the crime. Nearly all of the medical experts who have seen the autopsy report agree that this was not an accidental death. JonBenet Ramsey was deliberately and cruelly murdered.

JonBenet was strangled, not once, says Smit, but twice, with an intricately-made device known as a garrote, which had to have been made by the killer during the murder. Why? Because the garrote had hair intertwined with it – JonBenet’s hair.

"It's a device, says Smit, that was not left there for show. Whoever killed JonBenet used the garrote to strangle her.

Smit believes that JonBenet was fighting for her life. There were marks that look a lot like scratches on her neck. "JonBenet was trying to take that off of her neck," says Smit. "She did have her own DNA under her fingernails. She was struggling with that garrote. Whoever was there with her knew that she was struggling. This is a very vicious strangulation."

At some point, the child was then hit over the head with such force it crushed her skull. But her nightmare wasn't over. Shortly before she died, investigators believe she was sexually assaulted with a piece of the paintbrush that was used to make the garrote.

The evidence, says Smit, imply does not support the popular theory that the Ramseys struck their daughter and then tried to cover it up.

"There is no motive for a parent to do this," he says. "It's not a mother waking up in the middle of the night saying, 'Oops, I think I hurt my child. Oops, I gotta bring her downstairs and fashion one of these things. Then I'm gonna put it around her neck and I'm gonna tighten it a couple times while she's struggling. And then I'm going to bury that thing so deeply in her neck that you can hardly see it.' And JonBenet at that time is struggling with the garrote. Now if you want to believe that, go ahead. I’m not gonna stop anybody. If you want to believe her mom did that, go ahead. I can't say this on the air but that’s bull___."

But what about fibers from Patsy Ramsey's jacket that police say were in the paint tray and on the sticky side of duct tape covering JonBenet's mouth?

It's incriminating, Smit says, but not the whole story: "You just can't rely on fiber evidence because fibers could come off the jacket or something similar to the jacket, another item of clothing. Don't have to be that particular jacket. Fibers are fibers."

What's more, says Smit, there were also dozens of fibers that didn't come from the Ramseys, and Smit is unaware of a single case in which a parent used a garrote like this to kill a child.

"This is one of the best clues left behind by the killer. This shows what's going on in his mind. This is a sexual device. It's a strangulation device. He's a sexual sadist. I'm looking for a pedophile that's a sexual sadist. That's what Lou Smit’s looking for," he says.

Smit is not the only one. Colorado private detective Ollie Gray and his partner John Sangustin were hired by the Ramseys two years ago. Even when the Ramseys ran out of money, Ollie and John stayed on the job.

They became convinced of the Ramseys' innocence after seeing a lab report. Days after JonBenet was murdered, her parents' were asked to give DNA samples to the Boulder police. Their DNA was compared to foreign DNA found under their daughter's fingernails and in her panties, which may have been left by the killer.

"This analysis eliminates the Ramseys," says Gray. "(The DNA) does not match John or Patsy Ramsey. According to the laboratories."

If not the Ramseys, then who killed JonBenet? Smit believes that an intruder could have come through an open window in the basement.

In crime scene photos taken the morning of the murder, Smit believes he sees a scuff mark on a wall by an open window, left by someone climbing in.

Then there is the partial footprint, left by someone wearing Hi-Tec shoes, on the floor of the room where JonBenet’s body was found.

"This is a very fresh print," says Smit. "It shows somebody was in that room with JonBenet. The logo on the bottom of the shoe, it says Hi-Tec. And it's quite distinctive."

This past August, the Rocky Mountain News reported that investigators believe the Hi Tec footprint was left, not by an intruder but by the Ramsey's own son, Burke.

Smit is not buying into any of it: "All of the shoes in that house were checked by the Boulder Police Department. None of those shoes match any of the prints there."

But why would an intruder who intended to kill JonBenet leave the bizarre two and a half page ransom note, written with paper and a pen belonging to Patsy? Boulder Police have always believed that Patsy used it to make the killing look like a kidnapping.

If someone was targeting JonBenet, wouldn't he bring the paper and the pencil to write the ransom note?

"Well if you want to look at it from a sophisticated criminal's mind, they probably wouldn't bring it in. Why would you bring in something that could be traced back to your house?" asks Smit.

But no expert could eliminate Patsy Ramsey as the writer of the ransom note. No problem, says Smit: "You're always going to have similarities in handwriting."

"Do you think Patsy could calmly write that ransom note after brutally murdering her daughter?" asks Smit. "I don't think so. To sit down and write a note like that with all of those details in there… after you brutally killed your daughter and you'd never done that before? Come on, give me a break."

Smit refuses to accept any money from the Ramseys. But his reputation has been tarnished by his unwavering support for them. A devout Christian, Smit was criticized for praying with the family when he still worked on the investigation.

Smit says he is only interested in finding the truth, wherever it takes him. "If the Ramseys did this and I found out I'd be the first one standing at line at the Boulder Police Department," he says.

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Searching: The Stun Gun Theory Key Evidence?

Oct. 4, 2002

More than any other evidence, detective Lou Smit believes that small marks left on JonBenet's face and back, prove that an intruder killed JonBenet.

"The killer had a stun gun. I am sure the killer had a stun gun," he says.

He thinks the marks were made by a stun gun, an electrical weapon, which was used to incapacitate the little girl in order to move her to the basement. Smit believes only an intruder would need to use one.

"There is no reason at all for the parents to have a stun gun to help stage the murder of their daughter," he says. "There's nothing to indicate the Ramseys ever owned a stun gun."

What's significant about the injuries, says Smit, is that those on the child's face and those on her back appear to be an equal distance apart: approximately 3.5 centimeters, much like the prongs of a stun gun.

Dr. Michael Dobersen, a stun gun expert and coroner for neighboring Arapahoe County, also believes the marks on JonBenet were left by a stun gun. To prove it, he used one on the skin of an anesthetized pig. "The marks are similar in size, shape and color and are a certain distance apart," he says.

While there are some minor differences, both Doberson and Smit believe the experiment confirms a stun gun was used.

But the Boulder police are relying on another opinion, that of Dr. Werner Spitz. He thinks that pebbles or rocks on the floor caused the marks. Spitz has worked as a forensic pathologist in Michigan for nearly 50 years.

"A stun gun. Stun gun injury is an electrical burn, and these do not look like electrical burns," he says. Spitz believes the large, dark mark on JonBenet's face was left by a snap on a piece of clothing.

Unfortunately, with only photographs to go by, no expert can be sure. The best way to determine the answer would have been to exhume the body to study the injuries. Smit admits that in the months following JonBenet's death, investigators considered going to court to have her body exhumed. They decided against it.

So did John Ramsey. "We had buried our child, she was at peace, she was safe. That was just an abhorrent thought to me," he says. "We've got people that know what they’re doing that say with 95 percent medical certainty that a stun gun was used, no question." Despite the uncertainty that leaves, he says he didn't want to disturb his child.

Smit believes a stun gun is the key to JonBenet’s murder. He’s searching for a killer or killers who own one.

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Searching: Other Suspects? A Man Obsessed?

Oct. 4, 2002

On the cold December night that marked the first anniversary of JonBenet's murder, dozens of mourners showed up for a candlelight vigil outside the Ramsey home. One man in particular caught the eye of detective Lou Smit.

"Many times, criminals do return to the scene. And that was on the anniversary. That puts him right there at the Ramsey house a year later," says Smit.

The man was Gary Oliva, 38, a convicted sex offender from Oregon who made frequent trips to Boulder. He has been classified as a paranoid schizophrenic. He was convicted of assaulting another 7-year-old girl in Oregon, and spent time in prison.

Smit is convinced that a pedophile came into the Ramsey home and killed their daughter. "I've probably got 25 good leads. And I probably have another 50 pages of other leads to follow," he says.

Among the files he’s keeping on sex offenders in Boulder, Gary Oliva's name stands out. Police said that in 1991, months after he sexually assaulted the little girl, Oliva tried to strangle his mother with a telephone cord. And in December 1996, Oliva, then a fugitive and a homeless drifter, may have been less than a block away from the Ramsey's house.

John Sanegustin and Ollie Gray, the Ramseys' private investigators, say Oliva frequented buildings owned by a local church, which fed homeless people. The buildings were 10 houses away from the Ramsey house.

According to Smit, Oliva called his friend right after the murder, crying, and said he would never be able to go to his house again, because the friend had children.

"The phone call started with him sobbing into the phone," said Michael, the man whom Oliva called. Michael is Oliva's best friend from high school. "He was sobbing on the phone. He related to me that he'd done something horrible." Oliva mentioned he was in Boulder.

The call, Michael says, came just days after the Ramsey murder. Gary told him he had hurt a child. "He was sobbing like you’ve never heard a grown man sob or cry before in your life. And I knew it was serious. I knew this very serious." So serious that Michael, who lived in a nearby state, called Boulder police.

What made Michael most worried was the cassette tapes the two had exchanged. After high school, Michael and Gary thought a fun way to keep in touch was through audio tapes.

"I'd go to Carl Jr.'s and interview someone, He'd go to the store and interview a macaroon cookie. Stupid stuff," says Michael.

But in 1989, Oliva's tapes, once amusing, changed dramatically. "The tapes started getting darker, more depraved, and sicker, it would turn my stomach," says Michael.

According to Michael, on one tape Oliva pretended he's been left alone to babysit a friend's daughter. According to Michael, Oliva talks about raping a little girl. As the tape continues, Oliva appears to be simulating a rape. On another tape, he talks about hurting a child.

"Some of the things I do like making bacon strips out of little girl, you see, I'm into it, you know," he claims Oliva said.

"These tapes are not a joke. These tapes are not a joke at all," says Michael.

Michael says he left all his information on the Boulder police tip line. "I told them about the cassette tapes. I told them about the phone call. I told them about what I knew."

No one from the police called him and asked to listen to any of those tapes. "I mentioned I had cassette tapes. I mentioned I had hand writing samples. I don't know what it's worth but I thought, here's a lead you might want to follow up on. I know this fellow was in Boulder, Colo., and I called up and told them that."

What did the Boulder police do with the tip? Nothing. According to Lou Smit, the Boulder Police didn’t follow up on 95 percent of the more than 3,000 phone tips that came in. In Oliva’s case, police didn’t investigate him until nearly four years after JonBenet’s death, when Oliva was caught with drugs - and a stun gun.

Oliva, who is wanted in Oregon for probation violations, turned himself in to the Boulder police two weeks ago. He claims he never used that stun gun on a child. He says he did not hurt or kill JonBenet.

When asked whether he told his friend he was attracted to little girls, he says: "I don't want to talk about that."

While Oliva says he doesn't remember making the disturbing audiotapes, what he will admit to is an obsession with JonBenet. "I believe that she came to me after she was killed and revealed herself to me. I'd like to see a memorial set up for her. I haven't seen that, anywhere," he says.

As it turns out, 48 Hours Investigates is not the only one interested in Oliva. A Boulder police officer assigned to the Ramsey case was in the room taking notes while Moriarty interviewed Oliva.

The Ramsey investigators had to physically take the evidence to the police before they would even evaluate it.

Why aren't the Boulder police taking these leads more seriously? Police have dismissed Oliva because his DNA doesn't match evidence at the scene. The Ramseys say police have a double standard: While some suspects have been cleared because their DNA doesn't match, they have not been cleared for the same reason.

Just this week, police said Oliva is not a suspect. Sources say his DNA doesn't match evidence at the scene.

JonBenet Ramsey would have been 12 years old this year and starting the sixth grade. Instead, she’s in a Georgia cemetery, while her brutal killer or killers go free.

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A Break in the JonBenet Ramsey Case: Too Easy?


John Mark Karr Confessed to Killing the 6-Year-Old Before the Entire World, but the Case May Not Be Closed Just Yet


Aug. 17, 2006 — In some ways, the long-awaited possible big break in the 10-year-old case of the murder of JonBenet Ramsey seemed a little too easy.

The arrest of 41-year-old former teacher John Mark Karr in Thailand on Thursday appeared to erase the cloud of suspicion that had hovered over John and Patsy Ramsey since their daughter was found strangled and beaten in the basement of their Boulder, Colo., home in 1996.


As cameras focused on him and lenses clicked, he confessed to the slaying.

"I was with JonBenet when she died," Karr said to reporters. "Her death was an accident."

When asked whether he was innocent of her slaying, Karr said, "No."

Karr didn't stop there. He told The Associated Press that he loved the 6-year-old and was sorry about what had happened to her.

"I am so very sorry for what happened to JonBenet," he said. "It's very important for me that everyone knows that I love her very much, that her death was unintentional, that it was an accident."

A Thailand police officer also told the AP that Karr had admitted to drugging and having sex with the beauty queen before accidentally killing her.

Karr's ex-wife, however, immediately came to his defense.

Lara Karr said to ABC News affiliate KGO-TV in San Francisco that she was with her former husband in Alabama, where they lived at the time of JonBenet's killing, and that she did not believe he was involved in the slaying.

Karr, she said, was fascinated with the Ramsey investigation long before his arrest and spent a lot of time studying her case, as well as the case of Polly Klaas, the 12-year-old girl who was abducted from her Petaluma, Calif., home and slain in 1993.

Could Karr have falsely confessed to JonBenet's killing?

It's possible, some experts say. Karr could have had such an obsession with JonBenet that he could have falsely confessed.

"Think about the 'BTK' Killer [Dennis Rader, who was arrested last year and is serving life in prison for serial killings in Wichita, Kan., between 1974 and 1991]. He wasn't caught killing anyone. He was caught trying to get attention, baiting law enforcement," said Jack Levin, professor and director of the Brudnick Center on Conflict and Violence at Northeastern University in Boston.

"This guy, John Karr, could have been trying to get attention, get publicity, and he got way more than he bargained for. However, I have to believe investigators have more on him than a confession."

Contradictions Between Karr's Statements and the Facts

Months before Karr's arrest — before Patsy Ramsey died of ovarian cancer in late June — investigators told John and Patsy Ramsey that they were focusing on the former schoolteacher.

It remains unclear what prior connection Karr had with the Ramseys. Karr told the AP that he had tried to communicate with Patsy Ramsey several times before her death. However, John Ramsey said he does not know Karr.

Authorities have not revealed the evidence they have gathered. Still, there seem to be contradictions between what Karr allegedly told Thai police and the circumstances surrounding JonBenet's death.

Though he allegedly told investigators he drugged and sexually assaulted the girl before accidentally killing her, JonBenet's autopsy report found no evidence of drugs. Her death, the report said, was caused by strangulation after a beating that included a fractured skull. The autopsy report describes vaginal injuries, but makes no conclusions about whether she was raped. Investigators in the case llater concluded there was no semen on JonBenet's body.

In addition, according to Thai police, Karr said he picked JonBenet up at school and took her to her home. But she was killed during Christmas break, when schools are in recess.

Linked to JonBenet by More Than Words?

The Ramsey case has generated monumental media attention in the last decade and is one of the most famous criminal investigations ever. Some observers say police should have gathered enough evidence to safeguard against possible allegations — and anticipated criminal defense arguments — of false confessions.

"You have to remember that they had been following Karr for months," Levin said. "They told Patsy Ramsey months ago that they were looking at him. I would imagine that they have gathered other pieces of evidence to protect against false confessions."

Still, there are many unanswered questions surrounding JonBenet's slaying.

One involves the ransom note found before JonBenet's body was discovered.

Patsy Ramsey first found a handwritten ransom note on the back staircase that demanded $118,000 — the exact amount John Ramsey had received as a corporate bonus — if the family ever wanted to see JonBenet again.

Levin has always wondered why JonBenet's killer left a ransom note.

If Karr killed JonBenet, he must have been obsessed with the little girl, Levin said, and would have had to have driven from Alabama to Colorado to kill her.

Levin suspects that Karr may have initially intended to abduct JonBenet, but that his plans went awry.

"Some things about this case have always bothered me, and one of them was why would someone rape and sexually torture someone and then leave," Levin said.

"It just doesn't make sense. That's why I believe that Karr — or whoever killed JonBenet — must have initially intended to kidnap her."

If Karr's confession is true, it is puzzling why he would talk so freely to investigators and reporters.

At the center of worldwide media spotlight, he may have been displaying some bravado, or he may have been driven by guilt, Levin said.

"There have been some killers who want to be the MVP — most valuable player — of killers and brag about the crimes they have committed and the list of victims they have," Levin said. "And there are some who have a conscience and are guilt-ridden, even 10 years later."

'Let The Justice System Take Its Course'

Karr is expected to be taken within the week to Colorado, where he will face charges of first-degree murder, kidnapping, and child sexual assault.

Prosecutors — and John Ramsey — have warned the media and the public not to jump to conclusions in the case.

"There are circumstances that exist in any case that mandate an arrest before an investigation is complete," said Mary Lacy, the Boulder County district attorney leading the investigation.

"I'm asking you this morning, 'Let us do our job thoroughly and carefully.' The analysis of the evidence in this case continues on a day-by-day, on an hour-by-hour basis as we speak. … There is much more work to be done now that the suspect is in custody."

"We should all heed the poignant advice of John Ramsey yesterday [Thursday]," Lacy said. "He said, 'Do not jump to conclusions. Do not rush to judgment. Do not speculate. Let the justice system take its course.'"

Lacy would not comment on whether she believed Karr was lying in his confession.

"This case will rely on more than a confession," Levin said. "It will rely on whether investigators can place him at the murder scene, tie him to JonBenet."

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So the question still is....Who Killed JonBenet?