U of I killings: Everything to know with suspect arrested, awaiting extradition to Idaho
On Dec. 30, a 28-year-old Pennsylvania man was arrested in connection to the quadruple homicide that took place on Nov. 13 in Moscow.
Bryan Christopher Kohberger, a Washington State University graduate student, was taken into custody in eastern Pennsylvania on a “fugitive from justice warrant” from Idaho and has waived extradition in the case.
Kohberger faces four counts of felony first-degree murder and a felony burglary charge in the stabbings that took the lives of University of Idaho seniors Madison Mogen, 21, of Coeur d’Alene, and Kaylee Goncalves, 21, of Rathdrum; junior Xana Kernodle, 20, of Post Falls; and freshman Ethan Chapin, 20, of Mount Vernon, Washington.
Here’s what we know and what has happened since the weekend of Nov. 12-13.
What are the latest developments?
Kohberger was arrested by Pennsylvania State Police early Friday at his parents’ house in Monroe County, Pennsylvania. A law enforcement officer, on condition of anonymity, told The Associated Press that genetic material recovered during the investigation matched Kohberger’s DNA, and that authorities tracked him from Idaho to Pennsylvania.
Kohberger waived his right to extradition at a hearing on Tuesday, Pennsylvania State Police Maj. Christopher Paris said during a news conference. Kohberger will remain at Monroe County Correctional Facility until he’s brought to Idaho, which has to happen within the next 10 days, according to a court order.
Jason LaBar, the Monroe County public defender representing Kohberger in Pennsylvania, told the Idaho Statesman that Kohberger is “eager to be exonerated of these charges.”
LaBar said Kohberger will ask the court in Idaho for a public defender.
‘Arrangements ... being made’ — but not shared — to transport homicide suspect to Idaho
Who is Bryan Kohberger?
Kohberger is a 28-year-old Ph.D. student studying criminal justice and criminology at Washington State University, the university confirmed to the Statesman on Friday. He finished his first semester in December. Police said in a press conference on Friday that Kohberger lived near the university in Pullman, about a 9-mile drive from Moscow and the University of Idaho.
Washington State University’s fall course catalog listed Kohberger as an assistant instructor for three undergraduate criminal justice courses. All three courses finished on Dec. 9, according to the catalog, almost a month after the killings.
Prior to his arrival in Pullman, Kohberger graduated from Northampton Community College in Pennsylvania with an associate of arts degree in psychology in 2018, a college spokesperson told The Associated Press. Court records show Kohberger is originally from Albrightsville, a small hamlet in the Pocono Mountains near Chestnuthill Township.
Who is Bryan Kohberger? What we know about suspect in the University of Idaho homicides
Kohberger next attended DeSales University in Allentown, Pennsylvania, where he received a bachelor’s degree in 2020 and a master’s in criminal justice in May 2022. A now-deleted Reddit post indicates that Kohberger may have conducted a survey as part of a research project while at DeSales requesting information from people who had committed crimes.
Among the questions in the survey were “Did you prepare for the crime before leaving your home?” and “How did you leave the scene?”
A review of court records in Washington, Idaho and Pennsylvania showed no criminal history for Kohberger, aside from an August 2022 infraction for failing to wear a seat belt in Latah County.
Kohberger’s father flew to Washington state and accompanied his son on a drive back to Pennsylvania for the holidays, something that had been planned all along, LaBar said on Saturday. While on the cross-country road trip, the pair were twice pulled over by police in Indiana, each time for following too closely. They were issued warnings in both traffic stops, according to Indiana State Police and the Hancock County Sheriff’s Office.
Police this week released the body-camera footage from both stops, each showing Bryan Kohberger driving a white Hyundai Elantra with Washington plates.
What happened the weekend of the killings?
Shortly before noon Pacific time on Sunday, Nov. 13, Moscow police officers responded to a 911 call about an unconscious person in a house near campus. They walked in to find the four victims’ bodies. Latah County Coroner Cathy Mabbutt reported that the students had been stabbed to death with a large, fixed-blade knife in the early morning hours.
The coroner’s report did not include times of death, and police told the Statesman that they have yet to settle on a more exact time frame for the attack other than between 2:30 a.m. and 5 a.m.
Autopsies confirmed that all four students died from multiple stab wounds and were likely asleep when the attacks started. Some victims showed defensive wounds, however. None of the victims showed signs of sexual assault, according to the coroner.
There was no sign of forced entry, Moscow Police Chief James Fry said at a press conference on Nov. 16. Police are still trying to determine the actual entry point the killer likely used, a spokesperson told the Statesman.
Goncalves’ father, Steve Goncalves, revealed at a memorial vigil on Nov. 30 that his daughter and Mogen died together. The two victims had been close friends since sixth grade.
“They went to high school together,” he said in a speech at the University of Idaho’s Kibbie Dome. “Then they started looking at colleges. They came here together. They eventually get into the same apartment together. And in the end, they died together, in the same room, in the same bed.”
The three female victims — Kernodle, Mogen and Goncalves — lived at the King Road home with at least two other roommates, both of whom went unharmed. Letters from those two roommates, Dylan Mortensen and Bethany Funke, were read at a memorial in Post Falls on Dec. 2.
Chapin was staying the night with Kernodle, whom he was dating, according to family.
Where did the 911 call come from?
Police revealed that the 911 call was made from inside the house and from one of the surviving roommates’ cellphones. They summoned friends to the house because they believed one of the victims on the second floor had passed out and was not waking up. Multiple people talked with the 911 dispatcher before officers arrived, the Moscow Police Department said.
The two surviving roommates had been out the night of Nov. 12, but not together. Police have said both were home by about 1 a.m. and “did not wake up until later that morning.”
Police said they were aware of a sixth person listed on the lease in the six-bedroom home, but that person was not present on the night of the stabbings and police “do not believe this person has any involvement.” That person moved out of the home prior to the start of the school year, police said.
Mortensen and Funke had bedrooms on the first floor, police said. The victims were found on the second and third floors — two on each. Police have not specified which victims were where.
Shelter-in-place order the day of the killings
U of I told people to “stay away from the area and shelter in place” at 2:07 p.m. Pacific time on Nov. 13 as the police department investigated a homicide. Nearly 90 minutes later, the university tweeted that the shelter-in-place order was lifted, but called for Moscow residents to “remain vigilant.”
According to the university website, a shelter-in-place order can be issued by the University Office of Public Safety and Security in response to a hazardous spill, hostile intruder or weather emergency. An order is sent out using the Vandal Alert system. It requires students, faculty and visitors to take refuge in an interior room with no or few windows.
You can sign up for the Vandal Alert System online to receive future alerts.
Do police know why this happened?
Police have given little information about a possible motive for the killings, but have repeatedly said they believe it to be a “targeted attack.” They have declined to provide further information about that.
“To be honest, you’re going to have to trust us on that at this point because we’re not going to release why we think that,” Moscow Police Capt. Roger Lanier said at a press conference after the killings.
Following Kohberger’s arrest, Fry told ABC News that police believe Kohberger to be the sole perpetrator. Fry said in a press conference prior to Kohberger’s arrest that he could not say whether one of the victims was explicitly targeted.
Stacy Chapin, Ethan’s mother, told the Statesman that she does not know of any connection between her son and Kohberger. A former U of I sorority member who used to live in the King Road neighborhood also told the Statesman that the suspect was not known to several friends of the victims.
Police asked for the public’s help on Dec. 7 in locating a white Hyundai Elantra, and such a car was seized at the Kohberger home when the arrest was made, Pennsylvania State Police said Tuesday at a news conference.
What were the victims doing before the attack?
Kernodle and Chapin were at a party at the Sigma Chi fraternity house — less than a 600-foot walk from the house on King Road — and returned home at about 1:45 a.m. that Sunday, police said.
Goncalves and Mogen spent the evening at the Corner Club bar before stopping at a food truck parked downtown on the way home. They used the “private party” for a ride home from the food truck, police said. Both women were home at around 1:56 a.m., police said.
The ride-share driver who took Goncalves and Mogen home the morning of the killings also spoke to two media outlets. NewsNation and The Daily Mail each reported that the man, referred to by police as a “private party” in shuttling the two young women home, agreed to speak with them on the condition of anonymity.
He said that he was familiar with both Goncalves and Mogen, as well as Kernodle, from prior ride-share trips, and that he noticed “nothing out of the ordinary about that night” of Nov. 13, according to The Daily Mail.
Multiple calls were made from Goncalves’ and Mogen’s cellphones between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m. to a male who did not answer. Goncalves’ sister, Alivea Goncalves, said the calls were made to her sister’s ex-boyfriend. Her sister was known for frequently making late-night phone calls, she told The New York Times.
A nearby neighbor told the Statesman that it was unusually quiet on the night of the killings. Anna C., who declined to provide her last name, said she and her boyfriend would oftentimes wear earplugs to bed because of nearby parties from the local college students.
But on the night of the killings, she said she woke up at 2 a.m. because her dog began heaving. Anna told the Statesman that she couldn’t fall back asleep until about 5 a.m., and noticed that she did not hear anything overnight.
Whom did police clear during the investigation?
Prior to Kohberger’s arrest, detectives said they did not believe that the two surviving roommates, the sixth roommate on the lease, or any individuals summoned to the household on the morning of the deaths were involved.
The police also cleared a male singled out in surveillance footage of the Grub Truck food truck, the ride-share driver who took Goncalves and Mogen home early that morning, and the male called by Goncalves and Mogen several times.
The Latah County Sheriff’s Office and Moscow police then addressed numerous rumors and questions surrounding the homicides. This included a reported incident involving a dog attacked with a knife elsewhere in Moscow that the sheriff’s office said was unrelated.
Moscow police also said that the Moscow stabbings were not tied to a 1999 double stabbing in Pullman, Washington, or a 2021 double stabbing in Salem, Oregon.
On Nov. 23, Lanier first acknowledged that police had been unable to validate reports that Goncalves had a stalker. Police later elaborated on what could have led to the reports.
“In mid-October, two males were seen inside a local business; they parted ways, and one male appeared to follow Kaylee inside the business and as she exited to walk toward her car,” they said in a press release. “The male turned away, and it did not appear he made any contact with her.”
Reports that a red Mustang on South Deakin Street was being processed as part of the investigation were not true; the vehicle “is not connected to this incident,” police said.
Moscow police also said that an incident at Taylor Avenue and Band Field in the early hours of Nov. 13 was unrelated. That incident was an alcohol-related offense and was addressed by an on-scene officer, they said.
What is the school doing?
U of I President Scott Green told students in a memo ahead of Thanksgiving break that the school would “remain flexible” through the end of the semester, and that was what happened.
Drop-in counseling for students through the Counseling and Testing Center remains in place. Students can also make an appointment at (208) 885-6716. The phone line provides 24-hour-a-day access to counselors.
The university’s Safe Walk program is always available. The service allows students, faculty and guests to call (208) 885-7233 and have a campus security officer meet them anywhere on campus and walk them to their destination.
U of I held a candlelight vigil on Nov. 30 inside the university’s Kibbie Dome. More than 1,000 people attended. The families of Chapin, Mogen and Goncalves attended the vigil.
The university has promised extra security personnel for the return of in-person classes in January. Green thanked the Idaho State Police for its “highly visible security presence” and said Kohberger’s arrest was a relief for the small community.
U of I: Limited remote learning options, additional campus security for spring semester
