In a televised press conference, Boulder prosecutor, Mary Lacy, is pummeled with questions as the fire alarm blared in the background. Mary Lacy defended her office and the investigation into John Mark Karr and took full responsibility.
Prosecutor Defends Choice to Pursue Karr
Aug 29 12:41 PM US/Eastern
By CHASE SQUIRES
Associated Press WriterBOULDER, Colo.
The district attorney who dropped charges against the man arrested in the JonBenet Ramsey murder case said Tuesday that there have been calls for her to be "tarred and feathered" and "run out of town," but she said the evidence wasn't there to convict John Mark Karr.
Karr confessed and described the 6-year-old girl's death in detail, but the prosecutors faced a major hurdle because so much physical evidence has been made public, Boulder County District Attorney Mary Lacy said. Authorities also couldn't confirm that Karr was in Boulder at the time of the slaying.
"It's been a very difficult few days for all of us," said Lacy, whose statement was briefly interrupted by a fire alarm at the courthouse.
She said investigators surreptitiously took DNA samples from Karr from multiple locations before he was detained.
"We couldn't get his consent because he didn't know he was under investigation and we couldn't alert him at that time," she said.
"The decisions were mine," Lacy said. "I should be held accountable."
Karr, a 41-year-old schoolteacher fascinated with JonBenet and Polly Klaas, a murdered California girl, said after his arrest in Thailand this month that he was with JonBenet at the time of her slaying, which he called an accident.
But DNA tests did not match Karr to material found on the girl's body. Prosecutors suggested in court papers that Karr was just a man with a twisted obsession who confessed to a crime he didn't commit.
The DNA mismatch between Karr and evidence in the Ramsey slaying was a setback for prosecutors, but they promised to continue searching for the six-year-old beauty queen's killer.
"This case is not closed," Lacy said before her news conference Tuesday. ... More
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