Geraldo Rivera is taking partial accountability for the role he played in bolstering public suspicion that John and Patsy Ramsey were responsible for the 1996 murder of their 6-year-old daughter, JonBenét.
John and Rivera appeared live together, via Zoom, on Monday night for a NewsNation segment facilitated by host Chris Cuomo (below) following the Nov. 25 release of the three-part Netflix docuseries Cold Case: Who Killed JonBenét Ramsey. Episode two of Joe Berlinger’s docuseries revisited the memorable mock trial that played out on The Geraldo Rivera Show in 1997, where Rivera asked a volunteer jury of six men and women to “rule” on the likelihood that John and/or Patsy allegedly murdered their daughter. Testimonies pointed to what were deemed to be sexually suggestive photos and videos of JonBenét as unsubstantiated proof that she was an abused child, resulting in a mock verdict that found Patsy liable for her death.
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Rivera, in the flashback played during the docuseries, stated to the camera at the time, “We understand anything is possible under the sun. To the best of our knowledge, however, there is no real evidence in this case that points in the direction other than straight into the faces of John and/or Patsy Ramsey.”
Now, when asked 27 years later by Cuomo for his perspective on the segment today, Rivera, correspondent-at-large for the cable news network, expressed regret for his role in feeding into the negative narrative surrounding the Ramseys and their assumed involvement in their daughter’s death.
“Mock trials and moot courts, as you know Chris, are not that unprecedented,” Rivera began. “They’re not that extraordinary, and I’ll get to the conclusion they reached in a second, but let me just say to John Ramsey that I deeply apologize to you for what you and your family have suffered. How you have lost your wife to cancer, one child to that terrible car crash and of course what happened to JonBenét, 6 years old, who would now be 34 years old, which is an incredible fact how long this case has been front-row center in the American consciousness.”
Rivera continued, “When I say I am sorry, I don’t apologize for my reporting. I believe that at least half the reporters and half the nation believe the shadow of suspicion, half the Boulder Police Department, or at least those who have retired because of this case, believe it, but I don’t know what happened. I just want you to know that I lament contributing to the hurt that you have endured. No one deserves to go through what you went through. That’s my bottom line.”
John replied to Rivera’s apology with a brief “thank you,” before relaying his hopes for JonBenét’s case to finally being solved, which is the crux of why Berlinger wanted to revisit the case with the Netflix docuseries.
“We’ve been critical of the police for 28 years for not accepting help,” stated JonBenét’s father (Patsy died from ovarian cancer in 2006). “This case could’ve been solved a long time ago, in my opinion, had the police not immediately focused on Patsy and I, and only focused on Patsy and I.”
John later told Rivera he accepted his apology as he outlined the measures he and his family are advocating to bring the JonBenét case to a close.
“We want the evidence that has been previously tested and never tested — we think there’s some that’s never been tested, we don’t know that for sure, but we think that’s the case — we want that resampled by one of the cutting-edge labs that’s out there,” John stated, referring to new advancements surrounding DNA testing. “That plays into the second thing we want done, which is to use this familial genealogy research approach to find the killer.”
Boulder Police Department Public Information Officer Dionne Waugh told The Hollywood Reporter in an email on Tuesday, “The assertion that there is viable evidence and leads we are not pursuing — to include DNA testing — is completely false.”
Waugh also provided a statement on behalf of Boulder Police Chief Steve Redfearn that read, “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.”
In an exclusive follow-up statement to THR, Cold Case: Who Killed JonBenét Ramsey director and executive producer Berlinger called on the police department to talk directly with the Ramsey family about the ongoing investigation, charging that they have yet to provide “any meaningful updates.”
“The Boulder District Attorney’s office has already long cleared the Ramsey family as suspects and formally apologized to them, so the team that has spent nearly two years researching and creating the Netflix documentary on this case begs you to please communicate with these victims more directly about what steps you are taking to solve this crime after almost three decades,” Berlinger stated.
An unidentified foreign male DNA sample was discovered in 1997, which is mixed with the DNA of JonBenét and therefore compromised. In his response to the Boulder Police Department, Berlinger urged, “New technological advances today can separate the unidentified male DNA from JonBenét’s DNA to create a much cleaner profile which can take advantage of today’s investigative genetic genealogy that has been so useful in solving recent cold cases such as the Golden State Killer and the Green River Killer.”
He added that the team that has spent nearly two years researching and creating the Netflix documentary on this case “begs you to please communicate with [the Ramsey family] more directly about what steps you are taking to solve this crime after almost three decades.”
