Karr Won't Be Charged In Death of JonBenet

When Karr was 19, he married a girl of 13 who filed for divorce a year later, saying she was "fearful for her life and safety." His second wife, to whom he was married for a dozen years, until 2001, was 16 and pregnant when they wed.

His family contains a history of mental illness; he was raised largely by grandparents after his mother was admitted to a psychiatric hospital, according to his mother's stepmother.

At the Sonoma County Sheriff's Department, Lt. Dave Edwards issued a statement last week saying that investigators had been aware of an "apparent fascination" Karr had with the 1996 Ramsey case -- as well as the murder of another child, Polly Klaas, who had been killed in Petaluma three years earlier -- and that he had "made certain uncertain allusions to placing himself in the killer's role" in JonBenet's death.

The day after Karr's arrest, Lacy sounded cautious about whether her office had found JonBenet's killer. At a news conference, she warned that the investigation was at an early stage.

Monday, some lawyers who have followed the case closely said Lacy mishandled Karr's arrest.

"It's hard to believe that the Boulder D.A. could be so dumb on a case this big," said Craig Silverman, a defense lawyer and former prosecutor in Denver. Larry Pozner, of Denver, a former president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, said: "Boulder is not Guantanamo. You don't arrest and then find out if you have reason to arrest."

Gov. Bill Owens (R), a longtime critic of Lacy who has speculated on the role of the girl's parents in her death, lambasted the prosecutor for what he called "the hysterics" surrounding Karr's arrest. "Mary Lacy should be held accountable for the most extravagant and expensive DNA test in Colorado history," Owens said.

But former Denver district attorney Norman Early said the prosecutor had little choice but to arrest Karr, rather than risk the possibility that he might harm a child in Thailand. Early speculated that Lacy had wanted to bring Karr to Boulder quietly to obtain DNA and handwriting samples -- but instead found herself in the midst of an international media spectacle when word of the arrest leaked.

Goldstein reported from Washington. Staff writer Anne Hull in Washington contributed to this report.