Looks like charges have been dropped against Karr. The DNA was not his.
Report: Karr's DNA doesn't match; No charges to be filed
BOULDER, Colorado (CNN) -- The DNA sample taken from suspect John Mark Karr does not match DNA found on JonBenet Ramsey's body and no charges will be filed against the schoolteacher who claimed he was with the child when she died, CNN affiliate KUSA reported.
KUSA, based in Denver, Colorado, quoted two sources in a bulletin on its Web site:
"9NEWS has confirmed from two sources that the DNA sample taken from John Mark Karr is not a match with the foreign DNA found on JonBenet Ramsey's body when she was murdered in 1996. 9NEWS has also learned the Boulder County District Attorney's office will not file charges against Karr in connection with the Ramsey case."
KUSA says other sources also confirm that no charges will be filed against Karr in connection with the Ramsey case by the Boulder County District Attorney's office.
CNN is working to independently confirm the report as Karr awaits his first court appearance in Colorado later Monday afternoon. Karr will appear before Judge Roxanne Bailin at 4:30 p.m. (6:30 p.m. ET).
The Denver station reported that samples of Karr's saliva and hair were taken in Boulder after his arrival Thursday evening. Those samples were tested over the weekend by the Denver Police Department's crime lab.
The Colorado television station says those tests ruled out Karr's DNA is as the foreign DNA left on JonBenet's body when she was slain in December 1996.
JonBenet was covered in a blanket when her body was found. Foreign hair fibers were found on that blanket and they did not match any of the Ramsey family or approximately 100 people that were tested.
Karr still faces charges of child pornography in California.
Earlier Monday, Karr's defense team requested that prosecutors hand over DNA evidence in the Ramsey case.
Public disclosure of any DNA evidence was specifically barred by a gag order issued Friday. The order applies to all attorneys and law enforcement officials involved in the case.
The 41-year-old suspect is being held in Boulder County Jail on suspicion of first-degree murder, first- and second-degree kidnapping, and sexual assault. No formal charges have been filed yet by Boulder prosecutors.
Documents list Karr's birthplace as Conyers, Georgia, and his occupation as "teacher."
Karr was brought back to the United States from Bangkok, Thailand. He arrived in Colorado Thursday evening from California, where he skipped bail in 2001 after being charged in Sonoma County with five misdemeanor counts of possessing child pornography.
Karr appeared at a brief hearing in Los Angeles and waived extradition to Colorado.
He told reporters in Thailand he was with JonBenet the night she died, and that her death was an accident. The child's beaten and strangled body was found December 26, 1996, in the basement of her family's Boulder home.
Autopsy results showed she had suffered a blow to the head and been strangled with a garrote tightened with a paintbrush handle.
After Karr's statements in Thailand, questions have surfaced as to whether the slight, soft-spoken man could have been involved in the grisly killing.
Earlier this year, Michael Tracey, a journalism professor at the University of Colorado, alerted authorities to e-mails he had been receiving from a person now believed to be Karr.
Tracey, who has produced a documentary about the Ramsey case, said there was something in the e-mails "that made me decide I had to try and do something." But he would not say just what prompted him to contact prosecutors.
A law enforcement official told CNN that Karr's e-mails to Tracey were initially innocuous but that the professor contacted authorities when they became "weird." The communications were eventually tracked to Thailand.
Tracey told CNN Thursday he also learned Karr's name five days before the arrest.
http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/08/28/ramsey.arrest/index.html
