FIRST ON FOX: JonBenet Ramsey's father, John Ramsey, believes his daughter's unsolved 1996 murder case may have possible ties to a separate, unsolved 1997 assault case involving a victim who attended the same dance studio as JonBenet.
Twenty-eight years have passed since 6-year-old JonBenet was found strangled and bludgeoned to death in the basement of her family's Boulder, Colorado, home the day after Christmas in 1996, and authorities have yet to identify the person who killed her.
Since the release of a new Netflix documentary about her murder, "Cold Case: Who Killed JonBenét Ramsey," the other assault case involving a girl who attended JonBenet's dance studio has received renewed attention.
"Well, I think there's a very strong indication that there possibly is a connection," John Ramsey told Fox News Digital. "The police blew it off in the beginning, and to my knowledge, never looked at that as an option. The police chief at that time said, 'Well, it's not the same because that little girl in the second incident was not murdered.' That's absurd to say something like that."
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Ramsey added his belief that "there's a possibility it was the same person."
On Sept. 14, 1997, an unknown suspect broke into the girl's home — just two miles from the Ramsey home — that evening and attacked her in her bedroom, but the victim's mother heard whispering and confronted the attacker, who fled out her daughter's window, as 48 Hours reported in 2004.
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"My feeling is he got into the house while they were out and hid inside the house, so he would have been in there for perhaps four to six hours, hiding," the victim's father told 48 Hours at the time.
The victim's father himself noted similarities to the Ramsey case.
"The first thing that occurred to us was that it was the parallel to the Ramsey case, because it was exactly the same situation," the girl's father told "48 Hours." "I think someone, somewhere, drew a bead on her. Obviously had us under surveillance that we were not aware of."
John Ramsey said he thinks the "method of operation for this person was the same" in both incidents.
"I believe he was in our home when we got home from going out to friends for dinner with the kids," Ramsey said of his daughter's killer. "We went to bed, and he waited till we were asleep and attacked JonBenet. In the second case, the parents had gone out. They came home, and they set the burglar alarm on. And the mother heard a noise, eventually, and went into the child's bedroom, and there was a person standing over her bed. So the person was in the house when they came home because they set the burglar alarm. He couldn't have gotten in otherwise."
While some have pointed to similarities between the two cases, Boulder police previously said there was no connection between the two incidents.
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"A report published this morning in the Dallas Morning News raises the possibility that the murder of JonBenét Ramsey is related to the unsolved sexual assault on a 14-year-old Boulder girl that occurred nine months later, in September 1997. Chief Mark Beckner said Boulder Police have known about this case for two years and previously looked at the sexual assault in association with the Ramsey murder," Boulder police said in an Aug. 1, 2000, update. "While the two cases have some similarities, detectives found no definitive connection at the time."
Beckner said at the time that the two cases had more differences than similarities, according to the update.
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"However, in this line of work, you never rule anything out until you've answered all the questions," he said at the time. "I don't want to do anything that would potentially jeopardize this opportunity to talk with the parents."
Boulder police have not indicated since then that there could be a possible link between the two cases.
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BPD Chief Stephen Redfearn is the fifth police chief to take on the case since 1996, and he was officially appointed in September after serving as the interim chief for the Boulder Police Department starting in January. BPD detectives have followed up on more than 21,000 tips, emails and letters and traveled to 19 states to interview or speak with more than a thousand people in connection with the case.
"The killing of JonBenet was an unspeakable crime and this tragedy has never left our hearts," Redfearn said in a November statement reflecting on 28 years since JonBenet's murder. "We are committed to following up on every lead and we are continuing to work with DNA experts and our law enforcement partners around the country until this tragic case is solved. This investigation will always be a priority for the Boulder Police Department."
Local authorities have partnered with federal officials — including the FBI — and DNA experts from across the country, according to a November update from the Department.
Officials have sorted through 2,500 pieces of evidence and approximately 40,000 reports with more than a million pages documenting the investigation. The Colorado Cold Case Review team has also provided BPD with a list of tips for the department to pursue, according to Redfearn.
