John Mark Karr Claims He Drugged JonBenet, But No Drugs in System

Will the John Mark Karr case fall apart before it even gets back to the United States?   Karr, 41, has confessed to killing JonBenet Ramsey, but according to broadcast reports his DNA has yet to be matched with the crime scene evidence.

John Mark Karr Claims He Drugged JonBenet

While that does take time, other statements by the former teacher are already giving pause among legal observers.

***

AP is reporting that Lt. Gen. Suwat Tumrongsiskul, head of Thailand's immigration police, said he was not present for the questioning, which was conducted by U.S. law enforcement officials. But according to what he was told of the interrogation, the suspect, John Mark Karr, "said he drugged the child," according to the Thai officer.

He added that Karr said he had then had sex with the child, and that she was still alive at that point. But he said the suspect said he then realized he had "accidentally" killed her.

***

But The Smoking Gun has the documents posted on their website that conclude that While a Thailand immigration official has said that John Karr, who was arrested yesterday in Bangkok for the child's murder, reportedly claimed to have drugged the child before raping her, the autopsy notes that a "blood drug screen" was negative.

***

An earlier report by Rob Hernandez detailed that Karr will be taken within the week to Colorado, where he will face charges of first-degree murder, kidnapping and child sexual assault.

Karr told The Associated Press: "I am so very sorry for what happened to Jon Benet. It's very important for me that everyone knows that I love her very much, that her death was unintentional, that it was an accident."

Hernandez also notes that there is a serious twist already in the confession from the alleged killer.  The suspect's ex-wife said she was with him in Alabama at the time of Jon Benet's 1996 death.

***

Karr's ex-wife, Lara Karr, told KGO-TV in California that she was with her former husband in Alabama at the time of JonBenet's killing and she does not believe her former husband was involved in the homicide.

She said her ex-husband spent a lot of time studying the cases of Ramsey and Polly Klaas, who was abducted from her Petaluma, Calif., home and slain in 1993.

--Jack Kramer with wire and broadcast reports

On the web: http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/jonbenet1.html