20/20 Recap for Forever Young Who Killed JonBenet Ramsey?

-20/20 is covering the JonBenet Ramsey case, interviewing her father John Ramsey nearly 30 years after her horrific murder.

-John describes JonBenet as a beautiful child of God in a never-before-seen interview with Barbara Walters. He and his late wife Patsy had sat with her after the murder.

-In a present-day interview, he talks about how he hopes new advances in DNA can help solve the case. He remembers her as a daddy’s girl and cannot let himself picture what it could have been had she lived.

-John has gotten together with documentary filmmaker John Berlinger, who made the Netflix docuseries, which brought new interest to the case.

-We get some history of the Ramsey family, including how John’s daughter Beth died in a car accident a few years before the murder. We also see some old pictures and home movies, including from the night before the murder.

-The old Barbara Walters interview has Patsy explain what happened that fateful morning, including discovering the note and what happened after the police arrived. It is discovered that the scene was contaminated by friends and people coming in and out of the house.

-The ransom note is analyzed, including the length and how it demanded the exact amount of ransom money that John got as a Christmas bonus. He says the number 118 means something to the killer and Patsy (via the 2000 interview) claims that she had no idea the amount of the bonus. There were also several movie references in the note as well.

-Detective Linda Arndt (in a past interview) talks about how John and Patsy didn’t seem to react when the kidnappers didn’t call at the promised time and that he would look at his mail while waiting. (He later claimed that he was trying to stay calm) She later had him look around the house for anything unusual, which is when he discovered JonBenet’s lifeless body.

-Detective Linda was terrified, not only because JonBenet’s body was found, but she also thought there was a chance that John was the one who killed her. She even recalled how many bullets she had in her gun because she was that afraid something could have happened.

-Details are given about the cause of death, including the blunt force trauma to her head, strangulation, sexual abuse and torture.

-Videos and photographs of JonBenet’s pageant days are shared, along with her parents talking about her love of the craft.

-Not long after the murder, the case is investigated, with the parents becoming the prime suspects. Several investigators wonder why clothing, fingerprints and the like weren’t taken from the Ramseys to clear them as suspects.

-The family is investigated, but not much was revealed to the media, causing a lot of speculation.

-It was also believed that Patsy had staged everything to cover up killing JonBenet herself due to JonBenet’s bedwetting. The Ramseys have always denied that this was the case and that they had anything to do with the murder.

-In the 2000 interview, Barbara asked the Ramseys if they killed their daughter. They both denied it and describe how hurtful it is for people to think they could do such a thing. John thinks that the killer has never been pursued, which is why they have never been found.

-There were 38-40 sex offenders in the area at the time of the murder, but it is unknown if any of them were questioned in the case.

-One of JonBenet’s friends remembers her competing in pageants and how she found them fun, not competitive. She finds it heartbreaking that she is frozen in time and never got the chance to grow up.

-Lou Smit is one of the main investigators in the case. He even came out of retirement to work on the case due to his reputation of hard work and not resting until his cases were solved.

-Lou’s granddaughters now have a podcast and are working on helping solve the case after his death.

-Lou was the first one to look into the intruder theory and pointed out the open window and the suitcase propped up. He even reenacted going through the window, proving it could have been a possibility. He also found a shoe print which did not belong to the Ramseys and stun gun marks on JonBenet’s body.

-DNA discovered on JonBenet’s panties was never identified and never matched to anyone on the family. This was never revealed, which Lou found strange. All the while, the Ramseys are being questioned in hopes that they will confess.

-Videos from the interrogation were shown, including Patsy denying that anyone in the family had anything to do with the murder, even when told there was allegedly evidence saying otherwise. John’s interrogation with Lou wasn’t as intense as Pasty’s interrogation (by a different investigator), but just as emotional. John also denied any involvement.

-Since there was not enough evidence to charge the Ramseys, no arrests were made.

-Lou held fast to the theory that there was an intruder involved and later resigned from the DA office in solidarity with the Ramseys. He stuck by them until the day he died.

-Lou went as far as to present the intruder theory to the grand jury, but they did not buy it, saying it made no sense. The grand jury continued their case against the Ramseys, but there was still not enough evidence to indict them or anyone else investigated in the case.

-Touch DNA is used on JonBenet’s pajama pants many years later. All the Ramseys are cleared, but the DNA is unmatched. DA Mary Lacy issued a statement and an apology to the family.

-Sadly, Lou would die from cancer and never see the case solved. When he died, John would talk at his funeral, thanking him.

-Lou’s daughter told him to write down a name as a starting point for her to work on the case. He told her that it would lead to the case finally being solved. He also gave her a spreadsheet of information and suspects that would help her.

-There were other suspects, including a local Santa (cleared as a suspect), an intruder who attacked another girl that danced with JonBenet (this man had never been identified, nor was a connection found) and a local transient named Gary Oliva. The latter had even confessed to killing JonBenet, but no connection was ever found.

-Michael Helgoth was a man who took his own life after word got out that the suspect list was narrowing. A stun gun and boots that were similar to the ones found at the scene were found at his home, but he was also cleared as a suspect.

-John Mark Karr famously claimed that he killed her but was also cleared as a suspect.

-To this day, John still has no idea who killed his daughter and hopes that new DNA technology can get him answers.

-The suspect list is narrowing, but the DNA is still being tested. Outside labs are being used to do further testing.