Nearly 30 years after the murder of 6-year-old JonBenét Ramsey gripped the nation, investigators are pursuing new leads based on a detailed spreadsheet compiled by the late homicide detective Lou Smit, in conjunction with advancing DNA analysis. The development is raising hopes for a long-awaited breakthrough in one of America’s most haunting unsolved murder cases.
According to Cindy Marra, Smit’s daughter and current head of the private investigative team, roughly two dozen individuals have been eliminated from the suspect list using new DNA methods. “We decided the best thing we could do is work off the spreadsheet he developed,” Marra told Denver 7 News. “We have been able to eliminate from our list probably 25 people based on DNA.”
Smit, a veteran Colorado Springs detective, was pulled out of retirement by JonBenét’s father, John Ramsey, to help prove that the young pageant star was not killed by her family but by an unknown intruder. Before his death in 2010, Smit compiled a spreadsheet containing approximately 600 line items-suspect names, forensic notes, and investigative leads-many of which were derived from police files…