What to know about Kohberger's sentencing
- SENTENCE: Idaho District Judge Steven Hippler sentenced Bryan Kohberger, 30, to four consecutive life sentences for the 2022 fatal stabbings of four University of Idaho students.
- VICTIMS: The victims’ families and others involved in the case provided emotional impact statements in court, including the victims’ two surviving roommates.
- PLEA AGREEMENT: Kohberger, who would have faced trial next month, changed his plea to guilty to four counts of first-degree murder and burglary in the deaths of Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin at an off-campus house. As part of a deal, Kohberger admitted to the killings and waived his right to appeal in exchange for prosecutors' agreeing not to seek a death sentence.
- DECLINED TO SPEAK: Kohberger told the judge he "respectfully" declined to speak at the sentencing hearing.
- EVIDENCE: Hippler last week vacated a gag order that prevented certain figures, including lawyers and law enforcement officials, from speaking publicly. The judge will soon determine which documents may be unsealed, potentially disclosing new evidence in the case. After the sentencing, hundreds of Moscow Police Department records were released.
Kohberger looked like he’d been scratched around time of murders, friend told detectives
Kohberger had a large scratch on his face that looked like it was been done with fingernails around the time of the killings, a friend of his told detectives in 2023.
The friend said he noticed the scratch, as well as injuries to Kohberger’s knuckles, in October and November 2022, according to a police summary of an interview with the friend that was released today. The four University of Idaho students were killed that November.
In the interview, conducted in October 2023, the friend told detectives Kohberger chalked the injuries up to having been in a car crash but noted that Kohberger started to talk more than usual after the killings, characterizing his conversations “as those coming from someone who wanted to vent,” according to the summary.
The friend, a former teaching assistant with Kohberger at Washington State University, described him as “very intelligent but also selfish.”
He told detectives Kohberger tried to use his status as a TA to “inappropriately interact with female students.” The friend also told detectives that he thought Kohberger wanted a girlfriend and that they talked “on many occasions” about Kohberger’s wanting one.
Kohberger said he was aware of Idaho killing in 2022 interview with detectives
In an interview with detectives in late 2022, Kohberger said he got an alert on his phone about a killing in Moscow, Idaho — before the interview ended after he asked to speak to a lawyer, according to court documents released after the sentencing.
Kohberger was interviewed by a Moscow police detective, an Idaho State Police detective and an FBI special agent on Dec. 30, 2022, following his arrest. The summary of the interview written by the Moscow detective describes a lot of small talk before Kohberger acknowledged hearing about a killing and then invoking his Fifth Amendment rights.
According to the summary, Kohberger eventually asked why he was being questioned, to which the state police detective replied that it was “because of what happened in November just off the University of Idaho Campus.”
Asked whether he knew what that was about, Kohberger replied, “of course,” according to the document. Kohberger told the detectives he was aware of a homicide because of an alert he received sometime the previous month from Washington State University.
“Det. Gilberston confirmed that was why [we] were there and asked if Kohberger wanted to talk about that,” according to the document. Kohberger replied, “I think I would need a lawyer,” the document says.
Kohberger was a doctoral student in criminology at Washington State University. The university’s Pullman campus is less than 10 miles west of the University of Idaho.
According to the interview summary, the state police detective asked Kohberger whether he could “help us understand” as they investigated the killings of the four students. Kohberger reiterated his right to speak to a lawyer before he “reengaged and said the only thing he heard of from Moscow was an alert that came to his phone.”
Kohberger asked for specifics about what detectives wanted to talk to him about, according to the summary, before the detectives ended the interview following some back-and-forth over Kohberger’s right to legal counsel.
Kaylee Goncalves told a roommate that she thought she was being followed
Kaylee Goncalves told her roommates about a series of unnerving events near her home in the weeks before her murder, according to police reports released today.
One of her roommates told investigators that roughly a month before, Goncalves saw an “unknown male” above the off-campus home staring at her when she took her dog outside.
Another roommate recalled Goncalves’ saying that around the same time, she saw a shadow while she was outside with her dog, Murphy, according to a separate report.
According to the second roommate, two or three weeks before the stabbing, Goncalves mentioned that she believed someone was following her, according to the report.
The documents did not tie Kohberger to the events.
Xana Kernodle had more than 50 stab wounds, autopsy says
Xana Kernodle's body was found with more than 50 stab wounds, according to autopsies the Moscow Police Department released today after Kohberger's sentencing.
Many of her wounds were defensive, according to the report.
She and two other victims — Madison Mogen and Ethan Chapin — died from sharp force injuries, the document says.
Kaylee Goncalves was found with blunt force, asphyxial and sharp force injuries, according to her autopsy.
Kohberger gave one of his lawyers a note with a heart on it
Throughout Kohberger’s sentencing hearing, a note with a heart on it could be seen on camera sitting next to him on the defense table.
It isn’t clear what the note was. Something was handwritten on the back. Toward the end of the hearing, one of his attorneys picked it up and appeared to ask Kohberger about it.
When Kohberger said something, she smiled and took the note with her.
‘Our nation grieves with you’: White House comments on Kohberger sentence
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt began her briefing by addressing Kohberger’s being sentenced to life without parole for the killings of four college students in Idaho. Leavitt also said President Donald Trump would have wanted Kohberger to be forced to publicly explain his actions.
Kohberger wasn't a 'serial killer in waiting,' prosecutor says
Investigators uncovered no evidence that Kohberger was a “serial killer in waiting,” Latah County Prosecuting Attorney Bill Thompson told reporters.
“There is no evidence of any criminal history of any significant nature,” he said. “There was no evidence of a history of violence. There was no evidence of a history of a factual predisposition to do the crimes that he committed here.”
He added: “If there are any concerns among your listeners or readers that somehow he was a serial killer in waiting with all of these prior actions, we are not aware of any behaviors like that that preceded what happened here in Idaho.”
Police believe Kohberger would have been caught even without knife sheath
Kohberger left behind a key clue at the crime scene — a Ka-Bar knife sheath with DNA found on the button snap.
The sheath was crucial because the DNA was found to be a statistical match to what was found on a cotton swab collected from garbage left outside Kohberger's parents' home.
But police told reporters they believe that even if Kohberger had taken the sheath with him, other evidence would have led them to him, including his white Hyundai Elantra seen in security video in the King Road neighborhood.
"So we believe we would have got to it through that avenue," police said. "The time frame for that is uncertain. It could have been a week later. Could have been two months later. We just don't know."
Investigators found no link between Kohberger and the victims
Police investigators said they found no social media link, or any connection, between Kohberger and the four victims.
“We had every resource possible, and we worked that tirelessly,” Idaho State Police Lt. Darren Gilbertson told reporters.
He said investigators examined social media linked to Kohberger, the victims and their roommates.
“We have never, to this day, found a single connection between him and any of the four victims or the two surviving roommates,” he said.
Prosecutor explains why he didn't ask Kohberger to provide motive
After Kohberger declined to speak at his sentencing, Thompson told reporters that the law does not require a defendant to speak and that he also didn't think there would have been a benefit to asking him to give a motive as part of a plea deal.
"I don't believe that there's anything that would come out of his mouth that would be the truth," Thompson said. "I don't believe there's anything that would come out of his mouth that would be anything other than self-serving, and I don't believe there's anything that would come out of his mouth that would not further victimize the families, and so that just simply wasn't a factor."
He added that he was emotional during the sentencing, as was the judge.
"There's no easy way to remain stiff-lipped and dry-eyed in this kind of tragedy," Thompson said.
