It’s been more than 20 years since JonBenét Ramsey was found murdered in her parents’ Boulder, CO, home, but now her father may allow authorities to open up the case once more. According to a new report, John is considering giving investigators permission to exhume his daughter’s body. A cold case unit has been created to solve the crime using modern techniques, which recently led authorities to the Golden State Killer.

“I am very pleased the new district attorney is setting up a cold case team,” John told Radar Online. “That is often the only way older cases are solved. I’m hoping JonBenét’s case is the first one they work on.”

The six-year-old beauty queen was found murdered in her parents’ upscale home on Dec. 26, 1996. The killer broke into their basement and snuck up to her bedroom where she was sleeping. Investigators said she was carried to the basement, bound, silenced with duct tape, and molested before being strangled and smashed in the head with a baseball bat.

CBS

In 1997, the Colorado Bureau of Investigation tested tissue and blood from under her fingernails, but it wasn’t enough to make an arrest. However, with today’s DNA database, cops hope that by repeating the process, the killer will finally be caught.

For years, John couldn’t bear the thought of digging up his little girl’s remains, even though several experts had identified multiple burn marks on her body, presumably from a stun gun. “At the time, I couldn’t stand the thought of disturbing JonBenét so I said no, even though it would have perhaps shown the police they were wrong,” he wrote in an email to the site on May 7. “Now, it would be difficult for me, but if it was a compelling argument, I would consider it.”

The new Boulder County district attorney, Michael Dougherty, told Radar that he’ll use the same ancestry sites that led to the shocking arrest of former cop, Joseph DeAngelo — aka the Golden State Killer — who was allegedly responsible for more than 50 rapes and a dozen murders.

“That’s good to hear that the DA is considering using the larger DNA pool,” John said. “As I’ve learned about it, I think it could yield results.”