Yvonne “Missy” Woods, the former Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI) forensic DNA analyst whose manipulation of evidence has forced prosecutors across the state to reopen closed cases, was sentenced to 10 years in prison on September 8, 2026 — the biggest development yet in a scandal that has trailed the unsolved 1996 killing of six-year-old JonBenét Ramsey.
Woods, 66, had faced eight to 16 years under the plea agreement she reached in June, when she admitted to four felonies: cybercrime, perjury, forgery and attempting to influence a public servant. Her sentences on the other three counts will run concurrently, and the judge added three years of mandatory parole. The deal dismissed 100 additional charges.
She spent nearly three decades at the CBI before resigning in 2023. Prosecutors say she falsified DNA results and stripped forensic records out of criminal cases going back to 2008, and her conduct was alleged to have touched as many as 1,045 cases. Authorities estimate she handled more than 10,000 cases over her career and say records were deleted in about 10 percent of them. According to District Attorney Alexis King, Woods has taken ownership of wrongdoing that stretched across decades.
Fallout Across Colorado Cases
In September, Denver authorities said they had reopened 13 closed sexual-assault cases after DNA evidence tied to Woods’ work was retested. Eleven of those retests produced profiles eligible for CODIS, and six turned up possible investigative leads.
One conviction has already come undone. Adam Frank, the defense attorney for Michael Clark in the 1994 killing of Marty Grisham in Boulder, alleged investigative mistakes in the Ramsey case and asked to review police files from the first 48 hours of that investigation. The records request was denied. But a judge vacated Clark’s conviction in Grisham’s fatal shooting in April 2026 — 12 years into his time behind bars — because Woods had played a role in his 2012 trial.
What the Boulder Review Found
Boulder police and the Boulder County District Attorney’s Office say their review turned up no effect on evidence in the Ramsey investigation. Woods’ documented criminal conduct runs from 2008 to 2023; JonBenét was killed in 1996. Woods worked at the CBI at the time of that original investigation, but authorities have not said she personally handled evidence in the case.
Investigators also found that the key DNA evidence in the Ramsey case went to an outside laboratory rather than the state agency, which gives it some insulation from the fallout now reshaping other Colorado prosecutions.
New Technology, Old Evidence
Boulder authorities say they are working back through the evidence to see what might yield results under newer forensic methods, and are exploring advanced DNA testing at independent outside laboratories. The Boulder Police Department says detectives have conducted new interviews and reinterviewed people based on tips, gathered new evidence, and tested and retested other items to generate leads. The department is also consulting with the Colorado Cold Case Review team.
Police have acknowledged critical mistakes in the initial response — the crime scene was not secured, and formal interviews with JonBenét’s parents were delayed — while insisting the case can still be solved. Boulder police, not the CBI, convened the Cold Case Review Panel, and the department works with the FBI, the district attorney’s office, Colorado’s Department of Public Safety, the CBI and several outside forensic labs.
A Father Still Pressing for Answers
For John Ramsey, JonBenét’s 82-year-old father, the sentencing landed in the middle of an argument he has pressed for years. He told RadarOnline, “The police are not going to solve this the way they are doing it.” He added, “I believe getting the crime scene evidence into the hand of an outside DNA lab is step one.”
As Ramsey sees it, his daughter’s killer is no mystery — the man has simply never been named, though his DNA turned up on the garrote used to kill her. That profile has never been matched to a suspect. He has pushed investigators to use forensic genetic genealogy, which traces biological relatives through genealogical databases, and has offered to help raise money for the testing. He wants Boulder to hire a specialized private laboratory rather than rely on conventional state resources.
Ramsey has said some physical evidence from the scene was sent for laboratory analysis while other items were left untested, and that the family questioned that selective approach. He has said the Boulder police chief told him more items from the scene would go out for testing, and that the family had received no update on the results. On June 19, days before Woods entered her guilty plea, he appeared at a crime event in Royal Oak, Michigan.
On December 26, 1996, six-year-old JonBenét Ramsey was reported missing from the family’s Boulder house on the 700 block of 15th Street. Her body was found in the basement of the house, and an autopsy gave the cause of death as strangulation. Detectives have since chased more than 21,016 tips, letters and emails and traveled to 19 states to interview more than 1,000 people. Nearly 30 years on, the case remains unsolved. Boulder police ask anyone with information to call the tipline at 303-441-1974 or email BouldersMostWanted@bouldercolorado.gov.
