A new documentary about the 1996 murder of JonBenet Ramsey points to new potential suspects, including a man known as the ‘Santa Clause suspect’.
In the two-part serious The Case Of JonBenet Ramsey, which aired earlier this week, investigators claimed her brother Burke was the likely killer.
Yet Who Killed JonBenet Ramsey?, a new TV special, will explore alternative theories. The two-part special on CNN subsidiary channel HLN will feature evidence suggesting housekeeper Linda Hoffman Pugh and “Santa Claus suspect” Bill McReynolds should have been further investigated.
McReynolds was a man with a long, white beard who visited homes around Boulder, Colorado dressed as Santa Claus.
“All children are special to Santa,” he is heard saying in archived footage.
“[Ramsey] just happened to be extra special to me. She was very thoughtful, a very caring little girl and she actually gave Santa a present. You can imagine how rare that is.”
While the Ramseys’ housekeeper Linda Hoffmann Pugh spoke about the odd things Burke had done with his faeces in The Case of JonBenet Ramsey, the fact she her husband Mervyn were among the first suspects wasn't revealed.
According to Boulder police, Linda Pugh had asked to borrow money from JonBenet's mother Patsy before Christmas.
“They had familiarity with the house, they knew JonBenet. It would have been possible to go to house and take JonBenet without having a disturbance," Fred Patterson from the Boulder police department says on the HLN program.
The TV special also puts forward an argument for why the Ramseys did not kill their daughter or cover up her death to spare their son from prosecution.
So could this TV special possibly lead to solving the 20-year-old case? Only time will tell.
Who Killed JonBenet Ramsey? airs on HLN (a CNN channel) in the US on September 30.
Top Comments
I'm curious, how are TV networks able to show things like this without being sued? If the crime has never been solved, does that mean that any theory can be talked about without repercussions? Or is there some sort of 'speculation' defense - as in 'we never said they did it, just that they could have'.
they showed a caveat before each episode saying it wasnt the opinion of the channel and for viewers to make up their own minds
'So could this TV special possibly lead to solving the 20-year-old case?' - No. Because you will not be able to overcome the discrepancies of:
1. The voices on the open line when Patsy thought she had hung up the phone (and which exposed the lies of the parents);
2. The matching wound to probable weapon SITTING RIGHT THERE, ODDLY, ON THE KITCHEN TABLE;
3. The unbelievably obvious but childish (because Burke was a child) attempt to obfuscate the truth by avoiding answering simple questions with a straight answer. Even to this day.
Frankly, anyone still looking to solve the case is looking for zebras.
Or Tasmanian Tigers