Mike Kane

Michael "Mike" Kane was the prosecutor hired in 1998 to present the case to the Grand Jury. After Alex Hunter's two prosecutors were removed from the case due to their alleged bias towards the Ramsey family, the governor of Colorado recommended the hiring of a new team of prosecutors from outside the Boulder District Attorney's office. Kane was hired alongside Bruce Levin and Mitch Morrissey.

Background
Mike Kane was a respected prosecutor who had worked on both family homicides and "lone wolf" killings. In the early 80s, Kane worked for 6 years as an assistant DA in Denver. In 1986 he left Colorado to work for the Pennsylvania Attorney General's Office, where he supervised numerous grand jury investigations. He remained there until 1995, when the governor of Pennsylvania appointed him as deputy secretary for tax enforcement. In June 1998 he returned to Colorado to work on the Ramsey case.

Work on the Case
Mike Kane participated in the DA's office's 1998 questioning of John Ramsey.

The Grand Jury
Little is known about Kane's investigatorial work on the Ramsey case, as he mainly worked with the Grand Jury, whose proceedings are confidential.

The Grand Jury voted to indict both John and Patsy Ramsey with child abuse resulting in death and accessory to first degree murder. District Attorney Alex Hunter declined to take the case to trial.

2000 Interviews
In 2000, interviews were arranged with the Ramsey family and a seven-member team consisting of Mark Beckner, Tom Trujillo, Jane Harmer, Tom Wickman, Mike Kane, Bruce Levin and Mitch Morrissey.

In an August 15 interview with the Denver Post, Ramsey lawyer Lin Wood claimed: The Ramseys are submitting to the interviews about the death of their daughter, JonBenet, against the advice of their attorney, Lin Wood, who views the meetings as "interrogations." "They're doing the equivalent of walking into the lion's den and putting their heads in the lion's mouth, knowing the lion wants to bite their heads off," Wood said.

During the interviews, Lin Wood set the condition that the Ramseys could not be asked about any topic they had been asked about previously. Lin Wood also interrupted to the majority of questions before his clients could answer and objected to them for various reasons.

The interviews deteriorated into a heated exchange between Mike Kane and Ramsey Lawyer Lin Wood:

MR. KANE: You know, Mr. Wood, this is a sham.

MR. WOOD: No, it's not.

MR. KANE: This is a big publicity stunt on your part. [...] You are obstructing. You are obstructing, Lin. You are asking me now to justify why I am asking the questions.

MR. WOOD: Mr. Kane, sit down. Sit down.

MR. KANE: Yes or no, can she [Patsy Ramsey] answer that question?

MR. WOOD: Mr. Kane, life does not always turn on what Michael Kane thinks is fair. Just give me a second.

[...]

MR. KANE: Mr. Wood, you are an obstructionist. [...] You go out there and you tell these press people that they cooperated, and I will go out and tell them what really happened in here. [...] Look, I don't need this. It is a game. You're playing a game.

[...]

MR. WOOD: Mr. Kane, we are both trying to do our jobs under very unusual and difficult circumstances.

MR. KANE: Right. And my job is not to stand in the way of the truth.

[...]

MR. WOOD: If you are implying my job is to obstruct the truth, I take that as a professional insult. And you will not be staying in my office. I pay the rent here. I will not be insulted by you.

MR. KANE: That's fine.

CHIEF BECKNER: Time out. Time out.

(A recess was taken.)

Later Comments
After the case, Kane returned to Pennsylvania and eventually began working for the Department of Revenue again. Kane was said to have had "virtually no contact" with Mary Lacy, the District Attorney who replaced Alex Hunter in January 2001.

"I worked that case intensely. I had my shot. I did everything with the information that I had at the time to try to come up with an answer. And it didn't happen."

Kane said that with more than half a dozen books published and two movies made about the case, people could assume they know everything there is to know about the murder - other than who did it, of course. But, he said, such an assumption would be wrong. There remain "dozens" of secrets, he said. "Absolutely. Dozens. And a lot of what the public thinks is fact is simply not fact."

(Dec 2001 interview)

Comments on John and Patsy Ramsey
"When I met with them, I never felt that they were genuine ... I always felt like I was talking to a press secretary who was giving responses with a spin."

"I always felt like their answers were very careful and, in some cases, scripted. And that caused me a lot of concern."

"I never felt like I was getting a spontaneous response ... John Ramsey always left me with the impression that he was a very smart man, and he is very careful at answering questions ... Whereas, Patsy struck me as somebody that just had an answer in advance of the question, and just kind of resorted to an 'I don't know' if she didn't have an answer in advance."

(Dec 2001 interview)

Comments on the theory that "Burke Did It"
In May, The Star tabloid ran a story saying sources in the D.A.'s office believed the boy, then 10, had killed his sister in a fit of jealousy. Days later, Boulder D.A. Alex Hunter's office made a rare comment about the investigation, declaring in a public statement that the boy, now 12, is not a suspect. Kane said prosecutors were outraged by the story.

"This was a little kid. We just thought it was terrible,'' Kane said.

As the story began to be picked up by more mainstream media, "When the New York Post picked it up, when MSNBC started to run with it, we just thought, "Shouldn't we put this to rest,?" Kane said.

Kane, the father of two, said, "I considered it to be child abuse, to profit that way" at the expense of a young boy.

And, he said, there was "no basis for the story."

In his review of evidence, Kane said, "I just didn't see anything to support that" theory.

(Dec 1999 Denver Post interview)