What ‘Cold Case’ Revealed About JonBenét’s Mother Patsy Ramsey

A new Netflix documentary has reignited interest in the murder of JonBenét Ramsey.

JonBenét Ramsey, 6, was found dead of murder on December 26, 1996, in the basement of her home in Boulder, Colorado. Her killer is still unidentified.

The case has generated widespread excitement over the years and is the latest series to air on Netflix Cold Case: Who Killed JonBenét Ramsey? The film is directed by Oscar nominee Joe Berlinger.

While the documentary begins with a little background on the case, it quickly moves on to the Ramseys as a family, including the story of JonBenét’s mother Patsy, a journalism graduate.

She met John Ramsey – JonBenét’s father – when she was 23 and he was 35. Despite the age difference, they fell in love and got married. The couple moved to Boulder from Atlanta, Georgia to expand John’s lucrative business.

They had son Burke in 1987 and JonBenét three years later, but tragedy soon struck the family when one of John’s older daughters from a previous marriage died in a car accident.

But the bad news didn’t stop there, as soon after Patsy was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and had to undergo intensive chemotherapy for a year.

Archival footage of Patsy showed her describing how JonBenét inherently understood that her mother was going through a difficult time and offered her care.

“She just knew she was a very sensitive child,” Patsy said.

The three-part documentary showed how Patsy found a long ransom note on her stoop the morning after Christmas saying her daughter had been kidnapped. Patsy’s panicked 911 call was played in the first episode, before JonBenét’s body was found in the basement.

As media interest in the murdered children’s pageant star’s case increased, police attention quickly turned to John and Patsy as potential suspects.

They were eventually charged with child abuse resulting in death and aiding and abetting the murder of JonBenét in 1999, but those charges were ultimately dropped due to lack of evidence.

Patsy died of ovarian cancer in 2006 after suffering a relapse in 2002, and the documentary’s director believes she had nothing to do with her daughter’s death.

“It defies logic to think that Patsy could have done this,” Berlinger told Today.com.

“Does anyone really believe that Patsy Ramsey had the presence of mind and ability to torture her daughter in this way with a device that was somehow difficult to manufacture?” he said.

“The autopsy itself shows that there is no way this could have been done by anyone other than a knowledgeable, deeply disturbed person who knew how to do it.”

Patsy and John both passed a lie detector test administered after hiring a private firm to do it in 2000 and were asked if they had murdered JonBenét, according to CBS.

“Neither John nor Patsy attempted to deceive when they gave the answers,” polygraph examiner Ed Gelb told CBS at the time.