JonBenét Ramsey Murder Suspect Has Shocking Link to Cold Case: Source

A man who claimed to be responsible for the murder of JonBenét Ramsey has a surprising link to the cold case that has become one of the most well-known criminal investigations in United States history.

Gary Oliva — who is currently serving a seven-year sentence at Limon Correctional Facility in Colorado for possession of child abuse materials and was previously discovered to have had over 300 photographs of Ramsey in his phone — allegedly told a former high school classmate, Michael Vail, that he'd killed the late 6-year-old.

Following the confessions, Vail connected the dots between the horrific 1997 slaying of the beauty queen and certain behaviors Oliva — who was once known as "Scary Gary" — exhibited while they were schoolmates.

Vail described Oliva as a "creeper" who reportedly had a habit of breaking into schools and homes to steal art supplies.

"He was getting his mail 13 houses away from the Ramseys, and I think he broke into that home more than once," the former classmate explained to a news outlet. "What was down in the basement room, where JonBenét was found? That's where Patsy [Ramsey] kept all her art supplies."

Oliva also allegedly had an obsession with learning about knots when he was young, a detail which stuck out to Vail when he learned that the little girl had been strangled to death with a garrote fashioned out of a paintbrush and knotted rope.

"I said to myself, 'Holy crap — that's a paintbrush and there's a knot on the f**king string,'" he continued. "When I look at some of Gary's art collages he did at high school, he was fascinated with knots — complicated knots."

"It blew my mind when I saw the knots and when I saw the garrote my heart just sank," he claimed. "What an awful thing to do to a person, a sadistic and cruel thing."

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Vail spoke with The Sun about Oliva's strange school behavior and his interest in knots.