USA: John Mark Karr will not face charges in murder of child beauty queen but remains in jail on child pornography charges

John Mark Karr will not be charged over the murder of child beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey, although he is being held in jail on separate child pornography charges dating back several years. Colorado prosecutors said on Monday (August 28) they would not charge the schoolteacher with the murder of 6-year-old JonBenet Ramsey because tests showed his DNA did not match DNA found in her underwear. The decision by Colorado's Boulder County District Attorney Mary Lacy to drop her arrest warrant against the 41-year-old was made public about an hour before he had been due for his first court appearance in the state. That hearing was cancelled. The public attorney for John Mark Karr said he was distressed that his client had been held without forensic evidence. "The warrant on Mr Karr has been dropped by the district attorney. They are not proceeding with the case. We're deeply distressed by the fact that they took this man and dragged him here from Bangkok, Thailand, with no forensic evidence confirming the allegations against him and no independent factors leading to a presumption that he did anything wrong," attorney Seth Temin said. The county sheriff's office initially reported that Karr was freed from jail but later said he would remain in custody because authorities in northern California had asked that he be turned over to them to face child pornography charges. He is being held pending extradition to Sonoma County in California to face child pornography charges dating from 2001. "The warrant charging Mr Karr in the Ramsey affair was quashed this afternoon. Mr. Karr was released from our custody on those charges however he remains in our custody and will be return to the jail shortly based on the fact that Sonoma County has given us a teletype and does want to extradite him on on the five counts of child pornography he faces in California. So he'll remain in our custody for the officials in California. He's no longer in our custody on any Colorado warrant," Boulder County Sheriff Joe Pelle said. The DNA found on the underwear of JonBenet was identified as belonging to a white male but has never been matched to a suspect in the murder, which for 10 years has baffled police and fascinated Americans. Amid scepticism over Karr's claims to have been with the former Little Miss Colorado when she died, legal experts have said that it would be difficult to bring the case to trial without a DNA match. That conclusion was borne out in the five-page court filing issued by the district attorney.

ITN Source | August 29, 2006

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