JonBenet Ramsey Murder Case Was Botched, Killer Never Faced Grand Jury Indictment

The JonBenet Ramsey murder case was part of a reddit “ask me anything” session this past weekend, and former Boulder, Colorado, police Chief Mark Beckner revealed that he felt the case had been botched from the outset.

As previously reported by the Inquisitr, JonBenet Ramsey’s killer is still at large 18 years after the crime. Some say Patsy Ramsey, the mother of the slain child, is completely innocent.

The dead body of JonBenet Ramsey was discovered in the basement of her family’s home on December 26, 1996. Beckner led the police investigation into the slaying of the six-year-old beauty queen, but now claims the murder case mishandled due to a “perfect storm type scenario.”

“It was the Christmas holiday and we were short staffed, we faced a situation as I said earlier that no one in the country had ever seen before or since, and there was confusion at the scene as people were arriving before we had enough personnel on the scene.”

In 2013, court documents were released that showed a grand jury for the JonBenet Ramsey murder case recommended indictments against the Ramseys. The family has long maintained their innocence. Police also claimed DNA evidence cleared the parents and the statute of limitations has passed. Patsy Ramsey died of cancer in 2006 and John Ramsey has since remarried and moved out of the state.

The former police chief also speculated openly about JonBenet Ramsey’s killer. He believes it’s unlikely there was an intruder since “investigators do not believe there was a legitimate point of entry. It is unknown how an intruder may have gotten in.” He believes the unknown DNA found on JonBenet’s clothing should be the focus of the investigation, and claimed it was likely left by sweat or saliva.

Beckner admitted the police made mistakes in how the parents were handled.

“I wish we would have done a much better job of securing and controlling the crime scene on day one. We also should have separated John and Patsy and gotten full statements from them that day. Letting them go was a big mistake, as they soon lawyered up and we did not get to formally interview them again until May of 1997, five months after their daughter was murdered.”

When Becker answered the questions on reddit, he apparently was under the impression the comments would be kept private instead of being published all over the world.

“I talked to the organizer and my impression was that this was a members-only type group that talked about unsolved mysteries all around the world,” Becker said, according to the Boulder Daily Camera. “I didn’t know it was an open-architecture type thing, or I wouldn’t have done it. It was a misunderstanding and naivete on my part.”