Nearly 30 Years After Jonbenet Ramsey Died In Her Basement, Her Father Is Still Fighting To Test Her DNA With Modern Tools.
Helen H. Richardson / Denver Post
By Jerome London
Yvonne “Missy” Woods, 65, a former analyst for the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, pleaded guilty Tuesday to four counts: cybercrime, perjury, attempting to influence a public servant and forgery. The agreement dismissed approximately 100 other lawsuits. The CBI’s internal review found that he omitted facts, tampered with results, retested samples until he got the result he wanted, and falsified or deleted data in all 1,045 cases.
His documented misconduct spanned from 2008 to 2023. He started at the CBI in 1994, meaning he was on the job when six-year-old JonBenet Ramsey was found dead in his family’s basement in Boulder on Dec. 26, 1996, but authorities have not said he ever handled evidence in that case.
John Ramsey told NewsNation that the family looked into it about a year ago when the rumors started. “It seemed like Ms. Woods had nothing to do with our case, so we just let it go,” he said. The DNA evidence central to the JonBenet case, he noted, was never with the CBI in the first place. It went to Bode Technology, a private lab, which in 2008 tested touch-DNA on the waist and sides of his long johns and matched it to a previous profile from his underwear. That unknown male’s DNA, known as “Unknown Male No. 1,” does not match any Ramsey and has never hit CODIS.
What bothers him is everything else from the scene. “I mean things that should have been sampled but they weren’t, I don’t know if it was a cost issue or if they just found the DNA of an unknown male, why is it going forward,” he said.
Nearly a year has forced investigators to use forensic genetic genealogy, a method that identified the Golden State Killer by comparing crime scene DNA against consumer genealogy data. He calls it the “gold standard today” and says it should be done in a specialized foreign lab, not the CBI. He called on Colorado Gov. Jared Polis to help release the remaining evidence.
Boulder Police Chief Stephen Redfearn told Ramsey last fall that more items would be sent for testing, and that the work was supposed to be done in December. Ramsey says no one has told him what was tested or what came back. “They won’t tell us what the results, if any, are of the latest human-made tests,” he said. “And it doesn’t use the latest technology.”
Woods faces eight to 16 years when he is sentenced in September. No one has ever been charged with JonBenet’s death. Ramsey, now 82, met with five Boulder police chiefs throughout the case.
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