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| FILE - In this May 24, 2000 file photo, Patsy Ramsey and her husband, John, parents of JonBenet Ramsey, look on during a news conference in Atlanta regarding their lie-detector examinations for the murder of their daughter. A grand jury indictment issued in 1999 in the JonBenet Ramsey investigation is expected to be released Friday, Oct. 25, 2013, and should shed more light on why prosecutors decided against pursuing charges against the little girl's parents. |
BOULDER, Colo.
(AP) -- A grand jury found enough evidence to indict the parents of
JonBenet Ramsey for child abuse and accessory to first-degree murder in
the 6-year-old's death, newly unsealed documents revealed Friday, nearly
a decade after DNA evidence cleared the couple.
But
the 1999 documents shed no light on who was responsible for the child
beauty queen's death, and 14 years later, authorities are no closer to
finding her killer.
The documents confirmed
reports earlier this year that grand jurors had indeed recommended an
indictment in the case, contrary to the long-held perception that the
secret panel ended their work without deciding to charge anyone.
At
the time, then-District Attorney Alex Hunter didn't mention an
indictment, saying only that there wasn't enough evidence to warrant
charges against the Ramseys, who had long maintained their innocence.
The
grand jury met three years after JonBenet's body was found bludgeoned
and strangled in the basement of her family's home in Boulder, the day
after Christmas in 1996. Lurid details of the crime and striking video
footage of the child in adult makeup and suggestive pageant costumes
propelled the case into one of the highest-profile mysteries in the
U.S., unleashing a series of true-crime books and TV specials.
Many
tabloid headlines later, tests in 2008 on newly discovered DNA left
behind by someone who touched JonBenet's long underwear pointed to the
involvement of an "unexplained third party" in her slaying, and not the
Ramseys or their son, Burke.
The tests led
Hunter's successor, Mary Lacy, to clear the Ramseys, two years after
Patsy Ramsey died of cancer. In a letter to John Ramsey, she called the
couple "victims of this crime."
Finding a
match in the nation's growing DNA database could hold the best hope for
someday solving the killing of JonBenet, who would now be 23. Her
slaying is considered a cold case, open but not under active
investigation.
One of John Ramsey's attorneys,
L. Lin Wood, said the documents released Friday are "nonsensical" and
the grand jurors didn't have the benefit of having the DNA results.
"They
reveal nothing about the evidence reviewed by the grand jury and are
clearly the result of a confused and compromised process," he said.
While the killer's identity is still unknown, Wood said there's no mystery about the Ramseys' role.
"The Ramsey family is innocent," he said. "That part of the case, based on the DNA evidence, is a done deal."
Boulder
police, who were criticized for their handling of the investigation,
issued a statement saying the documents show the grand jury agreed with
investigators that probable cause existed to file charges.
However, the
statement acknowledged that the evidence would have to meet a higher
standard than probable cause for prosecutors to take the case to trial.
The
current district attorney, Stan Garnett, declined to comment but will
publish an op-ed piece on Sunday, given the complexity of the case, a
spokeswoman said.
David Lane, a defense
attorney not involved in the case, said prosecutors may have handed it
over to grand jurors because problems in the investigation could have
made it difficult to prosecute. But he said that could have backfired
with a "runaway grand jury" that reached its own conclusions.
He
said the indictments could have been an attempt to force the parents to
turn against each other, which he said was unlikely because both were
protected by laws that limit testimony of one spouse against another.
"Somebody
killed JonBenet Ramsey," Lane said. "It sounds like they were accused
of aiding and abetting each other, with the hope someone would crack and
break. That didn't happen, and prosecutors may have decided not to go
forward."
Although the grand jury foreman signed the 1999 indictments, prosecutors decided not to bring charges.
Christina
Habas, a retired judge who oversaw grand juries in Denver, said it's at
the discretion of the district attorney whether to file charges because
prosecutors have to consider whether they can convince a trial jury of
someone's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
The
indictments might have been a compromise among jurors who were divided
on what counts should be approved, said Nancy Leong, an assistant law
professor at the University of Denver. The release of only four of 18
charging pages, and the numbering of the charges, suggest other possible
charges were passed over.
The charge of accessory to a crime might have
been an attempt to "meet in the middle," Leong said.
"And
that would also explain why the prosecutor didn't want to continue with
the prosecution of the crime, because there might not have been enough
evidence to prove the parents helped someone else cover up the crime,"
she said.
Whatever the motivation behind them,
the documents add little or nothing to the public understanding of what
happened to JonBenet, Leong said.
"We don't know much more factually, if anything, than we did in 1996," she said.
The
Daily Camera newspaper in Boulder reported earlier this year that the
grand jury had issued indictments, and the documents were released in
response to a lawsuit filed by its reporter, Charlie Brennan, and the
Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.
