John Ramsey, the father of JonBenet Ramsey, asked President Donald Trump to pressure Colorado authorities to take a more aggressive approach to the decades-old unsolved murder of his 6-year-old daughter, saying he is prepared to raise funds for modern investigative tools including genetic genealogy.
Ramsey, who has long criticized the Boulder Police Department’s handling of the 1996 slaying, made the appeal during an interview at CrimeCon in Denver and announced a petition seeking to align Colorado law with a federal statute that allows victims’ families to request cold-case reviews. He also said he has offered to fundraise to pay for investigative genetic genealogy, a technique credited with resolving several high-profile cold cases.
"I told the DA that money should not be a restrictor here," Ramsey said in the interview, adding that he wanted Trump to "stir things up one way or the other." Ramsey said he asked the state to allow an independent agency to conduct modern DNA testing rather than rely solely on the Boulder Police Department.
Ramsey has previously criticized the department’s past conduct, calling it beset by "arrogance," "pride" and inexperience. He said meetings with new leadership have made him believe the department is moving in a constructive direction but that genetic genealogy remains "the gold standard" for cold-case investigations.
"To me, it's a no brainer that it would be done, but I don't know how to make it happen," Ramsey said. He also said he has started petitions asking Gov. Jared Polis to permit an independent review and asking state lawmakers to bring Colorado law into alignment with the Homicide Victim’s Families’ Rights Act, which allows family-requested cold-case reviews in federally handled investigations.
The JonBenet Ramsey case dates to Dec. 26, 1996, when JonBenet's mother reported her missing after finding a ransom note demanding $118,000. John Ramsey found JonBenet's body later that day in the basement of the family’s Boulder home. An autopsy concluded JonBenet died of strangulation and a blow to the head.
Boulder police have disputed assertions that the case has been neglected, saying investigators have followed up on more than 21,016 tips, letters and emails, traveled to 19 states and interviewed or spoken with more than 1,000 individuals. In a November 2024 video message, Boulder Police Chief Steve Redfearn said the killing "was an unspeakable crime" and pledged continued work with DNA experts and law enforcement partners until the case is solved.
The White House referred requests for comment on Ramsey’s appeal to the Justice Department. Trump has a track record of weighing in on criminal cases, including comments last year about the plea deal in the Bryan Kohberger case and calls in 2019 for the release of rapper A$AP Rocky during a legal dispute in Sweden.
Ramsey has framed his appeals both as a search for new evidence and as a critique of the fragmented nature of U.S. law enforcement. He said the nation’s roughly 18,000 police jurisdictions can act as "little islands of authority," preventing outside help unless it is formally invited.
At an earlier CrimeCon in Las Vegas, Ramsey announced the start of a petition pressing the governor to allow outside agencies to perform modern DNA testing. He reiterated those requests at CrimeCon in Denver and said he was increasingly focused on fundraising to secure the testing he believes could break the case.
Investigators have not publicly named a suspect in the 1996 killing and the case remains unsolved. Ramsey’s public appeals underscore continuing public interest in the case and ongoing debate over whether new forensic techniques and changes in state policy could prompt a new phase of investigation.
