With a series of “yes” replies to a judge, a man accused of killing four Idaho college students pleaded guilty in exchange for life in prison and no death penalty. But left untold so far: What motivated Bryan Kohberger to commit the middle-of-the-night knife attacks and why those victims?
More details could emerge when Kohberger returns to court for his sentence on July 23. Some answers could also be in the hundreds of documents filed by prosecutors and defense lawyers that have been under seal and out of public view starting in 2022.
“It is important that a full record be available, as if the matter and the evidence was exposed at trial, if we’re going to have a complete understanding of what went on,” said David Leroy, former Idaho attorney general.
Kohberger’s hearing in a Boise, Idaho, courtroom was finished in less than an hour Wednesday. A trial where loads of details would have been revealed was expected to have lasted at least three months.
“We deserve to know when the beginning of the end was,” the family of victim Kaylee Goncalves said in a Facebook post.
Horror near the University of Idaho
Goncalves, Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle and Madison Mogen were stabbed multiple times after 4 a.m. at a rental home in Moscow, Idaho, on Nov. 13, 2022.
Kohberger first killed Mogen and Goncalves and then killed Kernodle, who was still awake at the time, and Chapin, who was asleep, said Bill Thompson, the Latah County prosecutor. Two other people in the house were not harmed.
The 30-year-old killer was pursuing an advanced degree in the criminology program at Washington State University in Pullman, 10 miles away. Thompson said there was no evidence that Kohberger had previous contact with the victims, but he noted that phone data showed him in the neighborhood nearly two dozen times.
A knife sheath left at the crime scene turned out to be crucial evidence for investigators. A search of trash at Kohberger’s parents’ home in Pennsylvania was critical, too: It produced a Q-tip that was used to match his genetic material on the sheath.
No sunshine on many court filings
Since 2022, there have been more than 200 orders to seal court filings in the Kohberger case, typically at the request of lawyers, including at least 103 this year alone, The Associated Press found.
Those documents included trial briefs filed by each side, witness lists, jury instructions, evidence exhibits and the defense team’s “alternate perpetrators” of the murders.
Idaho court rules allow a judge to seal or redact records to “preserve the right to a fair trial.”
On a separate issue, Wendy Olson, an attorney for news organizations, including the AP, asked a judge to lift a gag order that has greatly restricted what the prosecutor and defense lawyers can say to reporters.
“There is no need to preserve Mr. Kohberger’s ‘right to a fair trial’ because he has already admitted guilt,” Olson said in a court filing.
Leroy, the former attorney general, said he believes additional information about the crimes would be important to the victims’ families, law enforcement, experts and the general public.
“I’m very interested in knowing, to the extent we can, what combination of the attempt to commit the perfect crime or attempt to deal with his demons drove Mr. Kohberger to these acts,” Leroy said.
AP writer Rebecca Boone in Boise, Idaho, contributed to this story.