Clues with Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore - MURDERED: Idaho Murders

Episode Date: October 1, 2025

In November 2022, four University of Idaho students were brutally murdered inside their off-campus home. The killer left behind a trail of evidence: from DNA on a knife sheath to cell phone records and chilling witness accounts. Morgan and Kaelyn unravel the case that shocked a college town, exposing the investigation, the trial that never was, and the unanswered questions that linger after Bryan Kohberger’s guilty plea.Show notes: Trigger Warning: This episode contains descriptions of graphic violence (21:55-26:51). Clues is a Crime House Original Podcast, powered by PAVE Studios. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. Don’t Miss out on all things Clues! YouTube: @CluesPod | @crimehousestudios Instagram: @cluespodcast | @Crimehouse TikTok: @Crimehouse Facebook: @crimehousestudios X: @crimehousemedia Clues is hosted by Morgan Absher & Kaelyn Moore  Instagram: @morgsyabsher | @itskaelynmoore TikTok: @twohottakes | @heartstartspounding To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I'm Dr. Hrini-Bot, host of Hidden History. Every Monday, I go where history gets uncomfortable, banished civilizations, doomsday prophecies, and events that science still can't fully explain. Listen to and follow Hidden History, available now wherever you get your podcasts. This is Crime House. Today, we're going to talk about a recent case that has drawn a huge amount of interest. The Idaho student murders, a horrific quadruple homicide with seemingly no known motive and no direct connections that we know of yet between the victims and the perpetrator.

It wasn't before long that evidence left behind by the killer is what led investigators directly to him. But now that gag orders are lifted, new information is coming out about the case, the victims, and the killer almost every single day, which is why today we'll be telling you the story with up-to-date details and new revelations you may not have heard yet. And corrections to information that some of the victim's family want to ensure get out there. Hi guys, welcome back to Clues, where we sneak past the crime scene tape to explore the key evidence behind some of the most gripping true crime cases. I'm Kaila Moore, and I'm going to be the one diving deeper into the timelines, the backstories, and the court files released on these cases. And I'm your internet sleuth, Morgan Abshur.

I'm the one who's diving into all the Reddit forums and anything obscure online that I can find to see what is and isn't adding up. At Crime House, we value your support. So please share your thoughts on social media. And remember to rate review and follow clues to help others discover the show. bonus episodes, early access, and ad-free listening, join our Crimehouse Plus community on Apple podcasts. More on the case and the clues that defined it after this quick break. One of this week's partners is Peloton. There's a specific kind of joy and freedom that comes from a truly great workout, that feeling where everything just clicks. Peloton is helping you unlock

that feeling with the new Peloton Cross-Training Tread Plus, powered by Peloton IQ. It's cross-training reimagined. Peloton IQ actually personalizes your journey by planning your workouts, tracking your progress and even correcting your form in real time to help you unlock new versions of yourself. So let yourself run, lift, fail, try, and go. Explore the new Peloton cross-training tread plus at OnePeloton.com. I remember this case breaking on TikTok. I think social media took this one like wildfire very quickly. Yeah, definitely. I still remember the first thing I ever heard about it was when they put out that report that four people were murdered, but it looked like a crime of passion,

and there was no greater threat to the community. And so everyone just started thinking it was a jealous partner or a roommate issue. No one had any idea how out of control this whole thing would spiral. No, no idea. And the things that have been said on social media about some of the victims themselves and just everything we're going to get into today. It is a wild case. and I'm ready to get into it.

Yeah. I'm ready to get into it. So a quick reminder for anyone who's watching this episode on YouTube, you're going to see some photos, some map, some images that will help you kind of piece the story together as we're telling it. And if you're listening, you can find those same exact photos on our social media channels. That's at Clues Podcast on Instagram. And a quick content warning. This episode does contain detailed descriptions of the victim's injuries and other potentially disturbing details.

So please listen with care. and out of respect for the family that has come forward pretty recently and doesn't want to get additional crime scene photos leaked, we might not be showing as much because that is what the family wants. So if you don't see it, that is probably why. So at 1156 a.m. on November 13, 22, 9-1-1 dispatcher Carolina Calvin gets a call from Moscow, Idaho. It's from a group of students over at the nearby University of Idaho who live off campus reporting that one of their friends is. quote, not waking up after a night of drinking. Calvin dispatches first responders to the address. 1122 King Road.

The Moscow Police Department arrives so fast the callers are still on the phone with Calvin when they get there. More than five students outside the home greet the cops. 19-year-old Dylan Mortensen and 19-year-old Bethany Funk, both of whom live at the address, as well as their friend's 22-year-old Hunter Johnson, his girlfriend, 21-year-old Emily Allant, and 20-year-old Josie Loderin, who all live down the street. Among the first officers on the scene is 22-year-old Officer Mitch Nunez, who's been on the force for only about a year. Officer Nunez asks Hunter where the person that needs help is,

and he's expecting to see someone passed out, possibly in need of CPR, or a defibrillator. Remember, he is an officer near a college campus. He's kind of thinking he's going to see something that he's seen before. Hunter takes Officer Nunez up to the second floor of the house, to the bedroom where 20-year-old Zana Kurnodal is lying on her back on the floor. And Nunez can tell right away that this is not just an overdose.

It's not just a medical event because there's a lot of blood on the scene. He can tell just from looking at her that Zana has been stabbed repeatedly. And he can also tell that there is a second body in the room. Her boyfriend, 20-year-old Ethan Chapin, is lying on her bed, still partially covered by a blanket. But he seems to be also stabbed to death, potentially while he was still sleeping. Officer Nunez realizes that this is beyond anything he's ever seen before. It is way beyond his level of experience. So he radios back to the station with news of a suspected homicide. And then he goes up one more flight of stairs to the third floor. And that's when he finds that there's two more bodies in the house. Madison Mogan and Kaley Gonzalez, both 21 years old, are laying in bed together covered in a pink blanket.

And they've also been stabbed to death. Madison has a large gash on the right side of her face and visible knife wounds on her forearms and her hands. The damage done to Kaylee's face does make her unrecognizable. And not only has Officer Nunez truly never seen anything like this, but he's pretty sure that nothing like this has ever happened in the town of Moscow before. But before we get into exactly how this investigation played out, let's talk a little bit about the kids that were involved, the university students. So Kaylee Gonzalez and Madison Mogan were both seniors and 21 years old.

They had been inseparable ever since the sixth grade. I remember watching the documentary that just came out on Apple about them. Like, I had no idea how close they were. Sisters. It's really sweet. I have never had a best friend that close just throughout my entire life. It's so special to watch. They both grew up in the Cordillane area of Idaho about 85 miles away from Moscow.

And like you said, Morgan, they were basically sisters. It was only natural that they not only decided to go to the same university and continue their friendship and stay together for four more years, but also move in together and be roommates too. Kaylee majored in general studies. She was a member of the Alpha Fee sorority. She was set to graduate early, actually. She was going to graduate in December of 2022. And after graduation, she planned to move to Texas because she already had an IT job lined up. Meanwhile, Madison, or Maddie, as her friends called her, was a marketing major and a member of a member of a business. the Pi Beta Phi sorority. She was on the dean's list. She was set to graduate next spring with plans to move to Boise. But for now, she worked as a part-time server in the Mad Greek Restaurant and downtown Moscow while she also managed the restaurant's social media pages. By that November, though, the girls knew that life was going to take them in separate directions. They were

going to go different places after they graduated. Kaylee had already moved out of the house at 112-2-King Road, and she was staying somewhere else at the time. In fact, during the weekend of the 13th, Kaylee was just visiting the shared house to attend a party that weekend and show her friends her new car. She figured that she would just crash in Madison's bed with her like she so often did. As for 20-year-old Zana Kurnodal, she also shared the home at 1122 King Road and her boyfriend, 20-year-old Ethan Chapin, slept over a lot. Zana's housemate, Bethany, said at the victim's memorial service that Zana and Ethan's relationship actually, quote, made her believe in love.

It's really cute, which is so sweet. Zana, a junior, also majored in marketing and was also in the Pai Beta Phi Sorority with Madison. She had allegedly overcome a tough childhood and she was raised by her aunt and her uncle. But Zana didn't let any of those tough circumstances keep her down for very long. She was known by her friends and her family as an uplifting, positive thinker who took any bad situation and turned it into a good one. She became a multi-sport athlete and a competitive gymnast in middle and a high school. In college, she focused on making progress towards her professional goals. Like Madison, she also worked part-time at this Mad Greek restaurant in Moscow. And after graduation, she planned to start a marketing company with her older sister, Jasmine, who was now a senior at Washington State University, which was only 15 minutes away from Moscow. But at least for while she was in school, one of the things that she really focused on was her boyfriend, Ethan. Ethan was the same age, but he was only a freshman. He majored in sports management after playing basketball in high school.

where his coach remembered him as a student who just lit up dark days. He was the firstborn in a set of triplets. He had a brother and a sister who all attended the University of Idaho together. Ethan was Zana's first ever boyfriend, and he had already brought her home to meet his entire family. By November, the two had been dating for around six months. They seemed like they were very much in love. And they spent their last evening alive together at a party thrown by Ethan's fraternity, Sigma Kai before going back to Zana's house.

Ethan, that night, seems to have just fallen asleep. Zana, we know, stayed up to order DoorDash and scroll TikTok a little bit longer. Her DoorDash order arrived at around 4 in the morning, but then her TikTok activity abruptly stopped at 412 in the morning. And the next person to use her phone was a police officer that was investigating the crime scene. So back at the crime scene, the day that the crime happened, one of the first things that the detectives do is they speak with the surviving witnesses, which brings us really to our first clue that we have in this entire thing, what their surviving roommate Dylan Mortensen saw and

heard. So this brings us to our first clue in this case, Dylan's statement. Now, there were six people in the house that night, and you're going to need to check out the floor plan to kind of really understand how this house is laid out because there's actually three different levels. Yeah, it was hard to visualize when I was just reading about it. I had to look at an actual 3D model to understand where everyone was. It's really complicated. So be sure to look at the YouTube and the Instagram to see kind of the floor plan. But I'll try to explain it best I can. So you have the ground floor. It's also the parking level where you drive in. That's where Bethany lives. There's also another vacant room on this floor. From the ground floor, you go upstairs to the second floor. This is the

kitchen area. There's also another entrance off the kitchen, a sliding patio door. That's the floor where Dylan and Zana's rooms are. Then on the third floor, you have Maddie and Kaylee's rooms. Since Kaylee had already moved out, she was sleeping in Maddie's bed. Her room was currently vacant. It hadn't been filled with another student or person yet. Knowing that, let me share you what an in-shock Dylan told Officer Nunez about the night before. She said that she was woken up by a noise at around 4 a.m. which she initially thought was Kaylee playing with her golden doodle Murphy upstairs. Now, I'm not sure if Murphy came back with Kaylee for the night or if he was still living with the roommates when she moved out. But I do know that everyone was super familiar with the dog.

After a few moments, Dylan said she heard a scream, which she believed to be Kaylee, followed by a voice she identified as Kayle's, saying, quote, someone's here. Dylan opened her door and looked out, but she didn't see anything. Then she heard crying coming from Zana's room, followed by a male voice saying, quote, It's okay, I'm going to help you. A few minutes after 4 a.m., Dylan peeks out of her bedroom door again and sees a slim figure, about six feet tall, dressed in all black, which one would assume is our suspect. Dylan says they were wearing something like a black ski mask holding what she thought at the time

was maybe a handheld vacuum cleaner. and they were headed in the direction of the sliding glass door off the kitchen, seemingly trying to go out that way. Something she specifically remembered, though, were his bushy eyebrows peeking out under the mask. Afterwards, Dylan, too afraid to move. I mean, she thought this person could have seen her, and she didn't know if they were in the house, so she ends up staying in her room. Yeah, it seems like shortly after this sighting, Dylan calls Bethany, who is downstairs on the first level and she tells her what was happening. Bethany then calls Zana, Ethan, and Madison,

all between 421 and 422 in the morning, but they don't get any answer. Between 422 and 426, Dylan called and texted with Bethany again and she mentioned the man with something covering his head. And Dylan wondered if this was maybe one of Ethan's frat brothers playing a prank on him, but still they were pretty scared. But it also just goes to show how much they were second-guessing themselves. Yeah. Talking themselves out of it because at the end of the day, when you're a college kid and you're in a big house that a lot of people come in and out of, the last thing on your mind is that something like this is going to happen. Never in a million years. Never in a million years. No, and these, they were also out all day. They were, you know, partying. Exactly. What state of

mind they could have been in. It's, it's just, it's insane. Like, you would never go here. I know. Eventually, Bethany did tell Dylan to run down to her room so they could at least be together because they were pretty freaked out. But while running past Zana's room, Dylan saw that Zana was lying on the floor on her back. And Zana and Ethan, again, it goes back to your second guessing yourself. You're not thinking that this is in the realm of possibilities at all because they had all been partying the night before. So Dylan thought that Zana was just passed out. And once they were in the same room, Dylan and Bethany tried again to contact their roommates from Bethany's phone. They called Madison at 4.30. They called Kaylee at 431. And again, they don't get any answers.

So they just fall asleep together in Bethany's bed that night, hoping that they'll wake up in the morning and maybe this will all make sense. Instead, we know that it got a lot worse. The next morning, Dylan and Bethany woke up around 11 a.m. at which point they try again to contact their roommates. They tried texting Kaylee and Madison. They also checked Zana and Ethan's locations using Snapchat's snap map feature, except Zana's location was off, which was weird to them. I guess usually her location would have been on. And that's when they start getting this really bad feeling. It's like everything kind of starts coming together for them here.

No one else was awake. No one was answering their phones. they were too scared to even go check their rooms. So they ended up rushing outside and Dylan called their friends, Hunter and Emily, and asked them to come over. Hunter, Emily, and their friend Josie walked over to the house and the women just explain what's been going on and like the weird feelings they were having about the whole situation. Hunter went in with Dylan and Bethany to go check on Zana and Ethan first.

And as soon as he saw the door ajar and he got a glimpse inside, He told the girls that they had to leave right away. I can't even imagine being the person to go in there first. He protected them in that moment. Yeah. Absolutely did. And just he knew what he saw and wanted to make sure he could prevent them from any more trauma. I know.

When I first read this, my mom, when she was probably a little bit older than these girls, also experienced like a really gruesome tragedy, I would say, at her friend's house. Her friend believed that something happened to her husband down in the basement. And that was the first thing they did was they called one of their male friends to be like, we're too scared to go look. Can you please check for us? Like they're all, it seems like there's just like one person that they think is brave enough to go do it. And it's just. And I totally understand that. When you're scared, especially as women, like we've been trained to be more cautious and vigilant and scared. Like it really is conditioned into us. Like I, I understand why they waited and called a friend over. I absolutely. Absolutely. Even though Hunter tells them that they have to get away, Dylan. and Bethany get a brief glance at Zana's body. And from what we've read in court documents, Dylan said that she, quote, saw Zana again for a split second, and I just started bawling because I thought she had just like, I don't even know. I thought maybe she was just drunk and asleep on the floor. Hunter, though, appeared pale, white, and shaken as he exited the house moments later. And to spare the

girls from the realization of how bad the situation was inside, he told them to call 911 for an unconscious person. Like, even in this moment, he didn't really want to scare them that bad. But Hunter pretty much knew what was going on at that point. And he stayed there long enough to check Zana and Ethan's pulses during his time that he was alone in the house. And that's how he basically confirmed that they were already dead. This episode is brought to you by Instacart. I have a four-month-old at home, which means I don't leave the house unless I absolutely have to. Going to the grocery store is a really big deal for me these days, which is why I love Instacart so much. I hate grocery shopping. I always forget things. I get overwhelmed. I have

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Now available in Canada too. That's QINCE.com slash clues for free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com slash clues. Around 1222 p.m. on November 13th, about a half hour after the initial 911 call, Sergeant John Lawrence of the Moscow Police Department contacts the Idaho State Police for help. And just to make things easier for everyone listening, we're going to use the abbreviations, MPD and ISP to refer to those agencies moving forward. ISP, Idaho State Police, MPD, Moscow Police Department. Both the ISP and MPD recently released, hundreds of records related to the case. I'm sure those of you who are interested in the case have probably been reading those. So with all the information we have now, we can tell a little bit more of a complete story about what happened next within the investigation. But when this initially happened, we had almost no information on what was going on. Yeah. It was radio silence. They were very, very, very tight-lipped. And people really criticized them heavily for this. I mean, there were

gag orders basically for everyone involved. But now in hindsight, it was probably a pretty good decision. So one of the first things that Sergeant John Lawrence with the MPD did was he rounded up all of the witnesses, as well as a couple of the friends who had been with the victims the night before. And he starts interviewing all of them. Sergeant Lawrence then had other officers notify the four victims' families, although Kaylee's family had already heard the news from an unofficial source, which is the worst thing in the world I can imagine. is so, so, so sad hearing that. But even the girls outside didn't really know what was happening officially until an alert from the school went out. So the police, like apparently, like in a lot of the sources I saw, like the police hadn't confirmed yet what was going on in there. Obviously,

no ambulances are showing up. So they're kind of assuming the worst. Well, I know you can't, you can't say anything publicly until the next of kin have been notified that their loved ones deceased. Yeah. So I don't even know how her family would have heard from an unofficial source. So one thing that I saw is that the school actually sent out an alert. They called them like a vandal alert. And so the school at about 1 p.m. reported a homicide near Kings Road and for everyone to shelter in place. So then everyone starts like speculating. They all know what's going on. They've heard, you know, through the grapevine. This is what's happening. And then there's a lot of rumors that another alert went out about for homicide. So the school is sending out all these alerts. And then there's another one that kind of comes from 517, that police continue to investigate the death of four people near campus. So it's kind of coming out through these school alerts, which like isn't necessarily how this maybe should be coming out. In the 517 text alert, they indicate there is no ongoing threat, which is really audacious to say at that point because you have no idea. You have no idea.

You don't know who this is. And now that we know that they were targeted potentially at random, them. It was not someone they were close to. This was not a crime of passion that happened during an argument. Yeah. It was not just a, you know, so to tell all of the other students like, hey, I know four of you just got murdered, but don't worry, it's not going to happen to anyone else. They just had no idea. You have no idea. That is so scary to get that tense. So meanwhile, other investigators are tasked with canvassing the neighborhood. They knock on doors and question neighbors. They start gathering footage from all of the security cameras in the neighborhood. And back at the crime scene, Sergeant Shane Gunderson with the MPD starts taking charge.

He quickly evaluated the victims. He begins cordoning off the area, establishing a crime scene log, and he set security at every entry point. They don't want the scene to be contaminated anymore than it already had been. They were on it. He confirmed EMS had not tampered with the scene prior to their arrival and noticing that the patio door was ajar. He starts questioning. if any arriving officers had opened it, but all of them say that they had not. And then he took a moment to deal with a potential source of crime scene contamination. And that is Kaylee's golden doodle Murphy. Murphy was not injured, which is very important to know. It's really sad hearing about Murphy being at the scene. But police were worried that he could move or damage

evidence or contaminate something. So an MPED officer ends up taking MurphiD officer. to the local humane society just temporarily before he ends up getting handed over to his second owner, which is Kaylee's ex-boyfriend, JD. And with that, Sergeant Gunderson and his team just really go to town on assessing victims and the crime scene more closely. Which brings us to our second clue, the victim's injuries. Again, this next part is going to be pretty graphic. So if you feel that you cannot handle it today, please check for markers in the description and just skip ahead. And this is all stuff that we've only learned recently, correct? Yeah, I actually ended up downloading quite a few of the MPD reports, and there are so many supplemental documents.

And the official, like official autopsies don't seem to be released, but there is the summary that is in some of these documents that's provided. And that's where we're getting a lot of our information from. So when Sergeant Gunderson went through the house, he went to Zana first, who was in her bedroom on the northwest side of that second floor. And this is a quote from his initial report. Quote, Zana was on her back on the floor in the center of the room with her head towards the west. Zana was in her underwear and a long-sleeved gray t-shirt. Both her shirt and underwear were covered in blood. Zana's face and body was covered in dried blood.

I could see what appeared to be defensive wounds on Zana's hands. There was a deep gash on Zana's left hand between her pointer finger and thumb. The medical examiner later determined that Zana had over 50 stab wounds, mostly defensive wounds to her hands, arms, and face, with the fatal blow being two lacerations to her heart and one to her right lung. Ethan, her boyfriend, was found in bed in the same room. He was lying on the bed with his midsection covered, and initially his face was out of sight. He had been stabbed under his left clavicle, severing the subclavian vein. His juggler vein was also severed, according to the medical examiner's report.

Ethan's wounds were so severe and there's pictures of it that again his family is like openly like don't like search the pictures out like some things you don't need to see but you can see like evidence of the crime scene from outside of the house you can see evidence of the crime scene from outside

and it seems like it was coming from Zana's room yeah the blood loss was horrible I mean it's it's horrendous after viewing Ethan and Zana's bodies Sergeant Gunnerson went up to the third floor where the other two victims were found in bed together he wrote that, quote, Madison appeared to be lying up against Kaylee and had wounds to her forearm and hands, as well as a gash from her right eye to her nose. The medical examiner later determined that Madison's fatal injuries were lacerations to her left lung and her liver.

Kaylee's injuries are probably the worst and most disturbing. Sergeant Gunderson describes her as, quote, unrecognizable as her facial structure was extremely damaged. Her fatal wounds included lacerations to her liver and left lung and a stab behind the clavicle. She also had two subdural bleeds. In other words, she had bleeding on her brain, but you don't get these subdurobleeds from being stabbed. While Kaylee had over 20 stab wounds, she was the only victim that was injured through blunt force trauma, and she was the only victim to also show signs of strangulation.

I know her family has come out and talked quite a bit about her injuries and about the fact that she likely fought back and was just really going at this person. We still don't know, however, like how these injuries were caused, these blunt force trauma injuries and whether they were from the killer's fists or a secondary weapon. But what the medical examiner did determine from the sharp force injuries was that the weapon was, quote, not serrated, single-edged, very sharp, and said a lot of force was used by the suspect. So everyone's like trying to gather these injuries. I mean, everyone assumes crime of passion, but this person seemingly has no connection.

They can't figure out who would do this. So a lot of criminologists kind of just look to stabbing being a method that indicates a sexually motivated killer. And this is something that is kind of new for me is this thing called pickerism. Yeah, which has been brought up in a couple cases. Yeah, and it's noted here that none of these victims were sexually assaulted, but pickerism can be a sexual fetish where someone is aroused by penetrating the skin with a long, sharp object, such as a knife. And it's often in place of someone committing sexual assault, according to criminology professor, Dr. Mark Pedigrew. It's really this, it's, I don't know, it's this interesting thing. Yeah, sometimes I wonder if that's going to be one of the things we look back on in 50 years and think, like, the same way we used to think fornology was real feeling people's skulls.

If it's just going to be kind of like bunk psychology or if there like really is something to it because it does come up a lot. I know. It has come up a lot. And this is just something I, I'm just, I don't know. It really disturbs me. Because I'm like, in a lot of these cases, they speculate that the perpetrator looks at the knife as their own sexual organ and it, which replaces it. It's really, I don't know how I feel about this one. But back on the scene, we end up getting clue number three pretty soon. At around 2 p.m. that day, MPD. Corporal Brett Payne arrives, and he sees something that nobody has spotted yet. And that brings us to clue number three. In the third floor bedroom where Kaylee and Madison were killed, there's a leather knife sheath on the bed. The sheath belonged to a special type of knife called a K-bar knife. And this is pretty synonymous with World War II. It was kind of like

the official fighting knife of the U.S. Marine Corps. Very specific knife. Very specific knife. And there are various versions of this, but the sheath found at the scene was actually a Marine Corps version, which has a stamped USMC emblem on the leather sheaths outside. As it happened, ISP Lieutenant Darren Gilbertson, who was among the first ISP officers to arrive, is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran. Oh, my God, so he's going to recognize it right away. He's super familiar with the knife and, you know, knows exactly what he's looking at. He also knew that Kbar knives had this reputation for breaking at the tip during combat, so he's even hopeful that there might be some piece of it left behind, maybe in the house,

maybe buried in one of the victim's injuries. Right. And that could maybe tell them more, like what specific model the knife was. However, the tip was not found in any of the wounds after the medical examiner finished their analysis. So their next plan is to track down all the K-bar knives that have been purchased in the area. And he kind of knows that even though the sheath belonged to a Marine Corps model, you don't necessarily have to be a Marine to get one.

And based on the appearance of the sheath, the officers on the scene thought it was more likely to have been recently purchased than issued to an actual Marine. It just looked fresh. It looked new. Almost like a novelty purchase. Yeah. So like a military issued item. It's so it's just amazing that the, yeah, the officer on the scene just knew that immediately. Like that is too new. That was not like issued to a Marine. Someone probably bought that. So they go and they visit basically. every business in town that would sell these knives. Unfortunately, not a single one of them sold K-bar knives, which means the murder weapon was bought somewhere else, most likely online,

which makes that lead kind of a dead end for them now. But they're still the sheath. So they tested for fingerprints and DNA. Seven days later, the Idaho State Crime Lab says that they obtained a male DNA profile from the button of the sheath. Unfortunately, when investigators run that profile through the law enforcement genetic database that we're all familiar with at this point called CODIS. There are no matches. They're not giving up that easily, though, which I really credit them for because this is a point in this case where it could have gone cold, but they are vigilant and they have already worked with a private forensic lab in Texas called Othrum on other cases requiring genetic genealogy. So on November 22nd, MPD, Sergeant Dustin Blaker travels to the

Othrum Labs in Texas to hand deliver the evidence. Othrum's awesome, by the way. We talked about it on heartsworth pounding before, but they do a lot of volunteer work as well, just kind of going state by state saying, hey, if you have a cold case, you think we should look at, you can send it to us. I really want to talk about this organization in our wrap up for this case today because I think we are going to be hearing a lot more about them in cases very soon. I agree. I definitely agree. So while detectives wait for the results, they start focusing on other details that they can. Now, I do just want to chime in here with a little bit of a side note. There is an aspect of the case that Ethan's mom, Stacey, is a little frustrated by. And this is partly because of

rumors and how social media ran away with this. But there were a lot of rumors online that there was only trace DNA found on this knife sheath. They found a lot of DNA on this. A lot. Enough for DNA tests to be ran several times over, actually. So I just wanted to clear the air for Stacey here. I like that she cleared up that rumor, though, because I remember hearing that too, like, because if there was only a little bit of DNA on the sheath, it kind of makes it sound like this was some genius who only slipped up a little bit and there was just happened to be a trace. Like, no, this person left a lot of DNA on this knife. Yeah. And I will say, you know, Kaylee's family has openly talked about how, like, they think that those girls were fighting

and that they were able to get that sheath off him, too. Like, they speculate that, like, that whole thing. I mean, it was found on the bed where they were fighting him. I know. So, like, one aspect of this case is, like, they, it's just tragic, but they appreciate that their daughters, like, they, you know, they were so close, kind of helped lead them to their killer. Absolutely.

Yeah. Yeah. If that's what happened, then, yeah. It was really them that got the big piece of evidence. Hey, before we jump back into the show, let's take a quick break. But not just any break. This is a refreshing break with Snapple. We all know about Snapple's iconic, real facts,

so let's take a minute to go over some of my favorites. Snapple Real Fact, 964, it is illegal in the United Kingdom to handle salmon in suspicious circumstances. Snapple Real Fact 1013, it is illegal to sing off-key in North Carolina. Snapple Real Fact 2033, Americans consume 150 million hot dogs on July 4th. Snapple Real Fact 705.

Every ton of recycled paper saves about 17 trees. So grab a Snapple, take a second, and enjoy the moment. Because let's be honest, this might be the most refreshing part of your day. Snapple. Make your break more interesting. All right, now let's get back to Clues. You're listening to this podcast, so I know you've got a curious mind. Here's a helpful fact you might not know yet.

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And you've had enough of shopping from your couch. Done hoping it looks anything like the picture when you tear up on that envelope. It's time for a little in-person spring treat. It's time for a trip to Ross. Work your magic. So detectives start searching high and low for a suspect, and they get plenty of tips from the public, mostly related to people who went to University of Idaho with the Vicarious.

At first, it kind of seemed like the murders, maybe had something to do with Greek life. That's where a lot of the tips were pointing them towards, given that, I mean, the victims were all in sororities or fraternities. And interestingly, at the time of the murders, the victims, two sororities were the only chapters at the University of Idaho that were currently suspended. So police were kind of considering that because both of them were suspended for, quote, violations or concerns regarding risk management, alcohol slash drugs. or hazing. The police that I'm spending a decent amount of time looking into the possibility that the murders might be alcohol or drug related, but ultimately all of those leads come up empty and they stop looking at Greek life entirely.

Everyone seemed to like the victims. I cannot stress that enough. Everyone, the police because they have to do their due diligence and be like would they have any enemies. And like, you listen to the kids at the school, talk about these four. Everyone has the nicest things to say.

about them. Like they made everyone feel welcome. Everyone was like in love with Ethan because he was beautiful. Like just everyone loved all these kids. And so there's not any specific lead within the university that they can really chase. And I know at this point too, a lot of people were online. There were some TikTok mediums that thought it was a professor at the school that was maybe in a relationship with one of the students. I don't even want to give it that much credit to talk about it. But like other people who were not familiar with the case were starting to suspect people at the school and look through the security footage and try to blame other students. Absolutely.

I mean, TikTok went insane. TikTok really thought that they were going to solve it and they just kind of ended up hindering. They did. Yeah. Like social media really stifled the investigation. We might get into it a little bit more. But like the way that social media terrorized the two surviving roommates is horrendous. The documentary.

They did it. I mean, these girls, people were showing up on their front steps, putting cameras in their faces, YouTubers, TikTokers, marching around. After. Like, I mean, this was insane. Cyber sleuths on, I think it's Peacock or Paramount Plus is a good documentary that kind of breaks down specifically with the Idaho case, the cyber sleuths, the TikTokers that kind of

thought that they could solve it. Yeah. The point being that the police department pretty much immediately start looking away from anyone involved at the university. So the next thing that they're doing is going through all of the security footage that they collected in the entire neighborhood. And that's when they find something that's kind of interesting. That brings us to our fourth clue in this case, a suspicious vehicle. There was actually a white sedan with no front license plate on it that was seen on multiple security videos taken from a few

sources in the neighborhood. And it appeared to be circling the house at 112-2-King Road on the night of the murders. It actually passed by the house three times before showing up a fourth time at 404 a.m. right around when Dylan was awakened by noises from the third floor. Then it was seen fleeing the area at an insane high speed at 4.20 a.m. Right after Dylan reported seeing an intruder leaving their house, it sped off so fast that the lead prosecutor in the case says the driver almost lost control of the vehicle. And we're going to play that video for you guys. This car is flying.

Yeah, imagine seeing this on the security footage from that night. Flying. So there's no video footage of exactly where the car went, but investigators were able to come up with a working theory using the process of elimination based on where the car didn't show up on security camera footage in the area. And so their theory was that the sedan left Idaho State entirely. It was heading in the direction of Pullman, Washington, another college town about 10 miles away from Moscow, which is right on the Washington, Idaho border. an FBI agent with special training in identifying vehicles gave MPD, his best guess on what the car was, and he thought it was a 2011-2013 Hyundai-Alantra. So MPD got in touch with the Pullman-Washington PD, who did a little video canvassing of their own,

and the Pullman PD found security footage of what appeared to be a 2014-2016 white Hyundai-Alantra with no front license plate, driving around Pullman, including on the Washington State University campus there, at around 5.25 a.m. on November 13th, just an hour after the murders. On November 29th, 16 days after the murders, two separate Washington State University campus police officers told MPD they spotted a car that seemed similar to what they might be looking for. a 2015 white Hyundai Alontera with a Pennsylvania license plate LFZ 8649. Pennsylvania, by the way, does not require a front license plate. Both Washington and Idaho do, though. So the car being registered in Pennsylvania was the reason it didn't have that front plate. Now that they had the plate, they also had the name of the driver.

A 28-year-old white male student studying for a Ph.D. in criminology at WSU. His name was Brian Koberger. He was six feet tall and 185 pounds. They also got his photo from his driver's license. And this was a huge deal because Brian clearly had bushy eyebrows, just like Dylan had described. And to reiterate, this was what, 16 days after the murder? 16 days. Just over two weeks later, they had. this guy's name and all this information on him. In hindsight, this feels like a huge moment in the case and it happened so quickly. Except when MPD received this tip, their department initially dismissed it. And that was for a couple of reasons. First, they still thought that the vehicle on their security footage from Moscow was a 2011 to 2013 Alandra.

The one that they found was 2015. I don't know why they were. so hung up on the fact that it was a two year earlier model. The models year to year looks so similar anyways. It's just on the grainy footage. Grainy. The fact that it didn't have the front license plate is like so obvious to me. I mean, that's binging, me, me, bing. That easily could have been a mark on our botched board here.

I know. Well, later on, the FBI expert reviewed the same footage again and decided that the car's model could be anywhere from 2011 to 2016. So then it falls into that boat. So then it falls into that. Exactly. Plus, Brian had no known connection to any of the victims, which made him seem like this really long shot suspect. I feel like officers at this point were probably in their heads like, this is too good to be true. Like, there's no way we catch this horrific guy. So fast. 16 days after. I know, as a suspect, he kind of fell into their lap a little bit because we see the car. We know that he has bushy eyebrows from the roommate. That lines up. It maybe is too good to be true.

That's what I'm like, they're probably convincing themselves. Like, there's no way. He's also a criminology student. Exactly. So actually, let's talk a little bit more about who Brian is. So before he was a PhD criminology student, he grew up in Pennsylvania. As a teenager, he was from at least the research we've done severely depressed. Apparently, at one point he was addicted to heroin.

In high school, he expressed an interest in law enforcement work and he entered a vocational training program for law enforcement careers. But he got kicked. doubt due to a complaint from a group of female students. The details on this are unclear, but just interesting to make a note of. Yeah. In 2011 at age 16, Brian wrote a post on an online forum saying he felt like a, quote, organic sack of meat with no self-worth. And this is coming from an online forum that sources were able to authenticate as being from him because they were able to check the email address that was used, birthday, and some other identifying details about

it. He posted that he constantly considered taking his own life. He felt guilty for treating his father, quote, like dirt. On the same forum, he said he felt no remorse and could do whatever he wanted. And there's another quote that we found too that he wrote. He said, quote, I am blank. I have no opinion. I have no emotion. I have nothing. Can you relate? Yeah, there's a lot on these forums. And there's some that have been able to be authenticated, some others that people think are really him. and like the Reddit detectives have gone down that rabbit hole. But like Brian potentially has this thing called visual snow. Yes.

Oh, yeah. And so. And we know that because he was potentially posting on the subreddit for visual snow. Yes. And he was trying to like sort, you know, what this was and how to get help and how to feel better and like all this stuff. Like some of the quotes I pulled out on the visual snow are like they're really honestly kind of hard to read. I'm curious if anyone watching has visual snow. I told you about the time I had.

it for two weeks and thought that I was just going to have it forever. Yeah. I ended up having a migraine that really affected my vision and I didn't know what was going on at the time, but I couldn't see straight and I had all these spots in my vision. Yeah. And I found the visual snow subreddit. And it is a dark place. It is really dark. When your vision is that messed up, it kind of messes with your will to live at times. It seems just from the post that I read. But absolutely. It's, yeah, it's bleak. And like, for those that don't know what visual snow is, it's super uncommon neurological condition in which the primary symptom is persistent, flickering, white, black, transparent, or colored, like, dots. And it goes across your whole visual field.

So we'll put some pictures up on the YouTube video of like normal vision versus what someone sees with visual snow is. They don't know what causes it and there's no cure. No cure. And a lot of people like they describe it as it feels like they're in a video game where nothing looks real. Like everything looks fake and intangible and just it's really the way people describe it is really interesting. So there is a quote coming from January 2011 that Brian allegedly wrote saying, quote, I have had visual snow since September 21st of 2009. Since then I've changed, mainly from the anxiety and sense of derealization and hopelessness. He allegedly wrote this.

I've had this terrible, horrible depersonalization go on in my life for almost two years. years. I often find myself faking simple human interactions, but it is as if I am playing a role-playing game. As I hug my family, I look it in their faces. I see nothing. It is like I'm looking at a video game, but less, I am blank. I have no opinion. I have no emotion. I have nothing. So he is dark, very, really dark. Really dark place. But honestly, on a subreddit like that, I could see how that post would blend in because a lot of the posts are kind of similar to that. I know. It's a really, it's a tough thing to deal with. It also seems like at one point, Brian developed an eating disorder that was really severe.

He had to be hospitalized, according to a couple sources. He also was arrested for theft in 2014. Apparently, he stole his sister's iPhone. But by 2018, at least on paper from what we know in our research, it seems like he's kind of cleaned up his act. Didn't have to go to DeSales University in Pennsylvania. And there, he studied psychology. And talking about Reddit usage, there's some. read a post during his time into sales that have people on the internet a little bit shocked.

So under the username Criminology underscore student, he surveyed criminals about topics, like how they prepared for their crimes and what their emotions were while they left their homes with the intent to go commit a crime. And he was posting on Reddit asking people to take this survey, which for a criminology student is not that strange, but in hindsight, it's very strange. And some people suspect that he was using this information for his own personal gain. Yeah. A lot of people speculate that his whole reason for even pursuing psychology and criminology was to like understand himself and how like twisted he felt. Or how to commit the perfect crime.

I've seen that. But yeah, also just to understand yourself. I know. If you don't know what's going on. That's another one of our crime house shows that you'll see an episode on him, I'm sure. Oh, absolutely. Either way, Brian stayed at that university long enough to earn his master. and he graduated in 2022. And that same fall, at 28 years old, he started at the Washington

State University PhD criminology program and he even landed a job as a teaching assistant. But in just a couple of months on campus, he had already gotten a reputation for being rude, sexist, lazy, and arrogant. And what's even more interesting, the Pullman Police knew who he was already at that point, but not. Not because he had committed any crime and landed on their radar that way. It was because he applied for an internship doing research with them, which someone else just said this to be recently, but we were talking about the Golden State Killer. Like, the best job to have if you want to commit a lot of crimes is probably a police officer. I know.

It's like it's almost, it reminds me of the saying keep your friends close, but keep your enemies closer. It's like if you can get a job like on the inside. So you can get ahead of it. you can know where they look and know they're... You could tamper with things. You could tamper with things. But get this. The police department actually turned him down because they felt like he was awkward.

He had also been pulled over in Moscow, Idaho, just a month before the murders. That was in October of 2022. Detectives were able to find body cam footage of the stop. And Brian tries pretty hard to talk his way out of a ticket, but he doesn't act in any way that stands out to detectives during that confrontation. So within a few. months, Brian's life starts looking a lot different than it had looked when he had that Moscow traffic stop. Around mid-December, he ends up getting fired from his TA position and his funding for his PhD was pulled. And I have some of the termination letter that he was given. So part of it reads,

on September 23, 2022, you had an altercation with the faculty you support as a TA, Professor Snyder. I met with you on October 3rd to discuss norms of professional behavior. On October 23, first, Professor Snyder emailed you about the ways in which you had failed to meet your expectations as a TA thus far in the semester. As a result, on November 2nd, the graduate director and I met with you to discuss an improvement plan, which you agreed to, and I shared with you in an email dated November 3rd. And then we met again on December 7th, this time with Professor Snyder as well as the graduate director and I to discuss your progress on the improvement plan. And while not perfect, we agreed that there was progress. But on December 9th, there was another altercation with Professor Snyder.

What? In which it became apparent that you had not made progress regarding professionalism and about which I wrote to you on December 11th requesting a meeting. We met on December 19th when I informed you of your termination as a TA for the spring semester. Wow. Alterations, yeah. I mean, to start the school year around end of August, early September and have a first altercation September already, like very, very concerning behavior. Absolutely. So at that point, his dad has to fly out to Washington to help his son move back to Pennsylvania. They end up driving cross-country together in the same white Hyundai Alantra. And they happened to get pulled over twice in Indiana, just 10 minutes apart.

I kind of say happened in quotes because we know that those were probably a little bit more planned than just happenstance. And Brian officially arrived home in Pennsylvania on December 16th. And maybe just maybe, he thought that he had fully got. gotten away from what he had done. He was back in Pennsylvania with his parents. He was no longer near the crime scene. Maybe there was part of him that kind of exhaled and thought that this was all over for him and who's going to be able to live the rest of his life doing whatever he wanted. But then on December 19th, just three days later, the FBI sends an alert to MPD and it includes Brian Coburger's name. So just as police, we're kind of considering dismissing Coburger as a suspect.

clue number five comes around DNA. Remember that DNA profile that was hand delivered to Authrum in Texas, the one that came from the knife sheath? Well, thanks to the police's careful collection of the DNA, it allowed Authum's investigators to hone in on Coburgers family tree almost immediately. Using the same forensic DNA evidence that had previously been used to generate the STR profile, authoram scientists applied forensic grade genome sequencing to develop a high-resolution SNP profile in just a matter of days. And just because DNA is so complicated, just like an easy way

to explain this is you can think of STRs as a precise snapshot of one person, while SNPs are a panoramic view of their entire family history. So given the DNA from the knife sheath, like they don't know who it is, but they have a complete. profile, but they're almost reverse engineering the family tree from that because of this technology. Yeah, wow. To then be able to go to the family tree and hunt down to get the exact match. Crazy. So the DNA showed that the sample came from a quote, multi-generational American family mixed with Italian ancestry. The genetic genealogy pointed to a multi-generational Pennsylvania family that intersected with Italian heritage only twice. Like it gave them a very

very specific family tree. So specific. And the fact, Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania car license plate. He's from Pennsylvania. Of course. Went back to Pennsylvania. We got him.

So on December 19th, the FBI said that they had DNA results and a possible suspect they could tie to the murders. Brian Koberger. But to the public, the FBI can only really say, quote, this is a name of a person who, based on their heritage, cannot be excluded as a match for the DNA found at the crime scene, which is not by itself enough to get an arrest warrant. For that, they're going to need that direct match. On December 20th, five weeks after the murders, FBI agents arrived in the gated Pocono Mountains community where Brian's family lived. They placed his house under 24-7 surveillance to make sure he couldn't get away or commit another crime. and meanwhile, back in Idaho,

police were requesting search warrants for even more evidence. Which brings us to our six clue, cell phone data. On December 23rd, they get a search warrant for Brian's cell phone records from November 12th to the 14th, the period just before, during, and right after the murders. Those records include which cell towers Brian's phone connected to during this time, and to investigators, it was pretty damning. At 2.47 a.m. on the night of the murders, the phone connected to a tower that would have provided service to Pullman, Washington, where Brian lived.

But then, there's a gap until 4.48 a.m. where the phone doesn't connect to any towers. According to digital forensic experts, that meant that Brian physically turned his phone off. And upon further forensic analysis, they were able to determine that the phone was manually powered off by the button and the battery was at 100%. I just don't understand how you're a criminology student getting a PhD. Like you've been a criminology student for a long time. And you didn't know that when you drive your cell phone to the crime scene with it on, they can see that. And just because you turned it off once you got there doesn't absolve you of anything. Every time I read that piece, it's so shocking to me.

I mean, it's baffling. But he turns his phone back on. And at 4.48 a.m., it connected to a.m. it connected to a series of towers consistent with driving south from Moscow, Idaho on this highway, highway 95, and then across the state border to the area of Union Town, Washington, and then north to Pullman, Washington, which is a little bit of a mystery in this case, because this route isn't the most direct way to get from Moscow where the murders were to Pullman where he lives. The towns are only about 10 miles apart. Taking this path that he did basically quadruples both the distance and the time.

It also doesn't really make sense as an attempt to evade law enforcement. Unless you're dumping stuff along the way. I mean, that's what a lot of Redditors speculate. Which I wouldn't be surprised if like the sluice out there start putting search parties together to evaluate this path and find potentially what he disposed of if he did. There's a river by there. Maybe don't quote me on that. But I believe there's a river around there. So I don't know. It feels suss. It's very suss. Which is enough for police to get another warrant. This time for historical cell phone data going back to June of 2022, five months before the murders when Brian moved to Pullman. This leads to another chilling revelation. There were at least 12 different occasions when Brian's cell phone. phone connected to towers that covered 112-2-King Road between June 22nd and November 13th. And practically all of them

were in the early morning or evening, which means he was likely watching the house for a long time, starting pretty quickly after he moved to Pullman. Then looking at all the data, they see something they missed the first time they sifted through. Brian's phone went back to Idaho, on November 13th. And this is coming directly from a police report that I found.

Less than five hours later, between 912 and 921 a.m., phone data shows Brian allegedly drove back to the scene at 1-1-2-2-King Road and stayed for about 10 minutes. What do you think he was doing? Seeing if police were there yet. Yeah, I mean, we've talked about it a lot, but returning to the... the scene of the crime to watch the police figure things out. Which we had known, I remember early on we figured out that, or they had released that it seemed like he returned back to the crime scene. But the information about how much he was showing up to the house.

That was very surprising. It was really surprising. And we're going to. June of 2022. Like right as he moved there. Yeah. Which I'm like, how did he like? He targeted it right away.

How did he find them? Like, was it dating? So Tinder? Like, is that how he saw? And then, like, targeted someone in the house? I know. At the time of this recording, we don't know. I know a lot more stuff has been coming out. But it seems like that's like the big piece that's missing. Yeah. And in a lot of the documents I've gone through, like I know they did obtain warrants for his TikToks and dating app profiles. So, you know, they haven't had a lot of time to sift through. There's a lot of data I'm sure they're getting. So I think we will find out eventually. But at 1249, almost exactly an hour after the surviving roommates 911 call, Brian and his Alontra both appear on security footage at an Albertsons in Clarkston, Washington, which is right by the Idaho border and very close to the route that the phone traveled earlier that morning. So it's very likely he returned to the crime scene. Then his phone goes dark again from 536 until 8.30 p.m. that day in the area of Johnson, which is about 25 minutes north of his house. We may never know what he was doing during this time,

but obviously with all of these holes and phones shutting off in his timeline, like disposing of evidence, nothing normal and good is what I'm thinking. And something to note going through all of this data, a lot of these Coburger investigation documents as they're called are public now. You can actually find them on the city of Moscow, Idaho's website. And I mean, there are report after report after report. So people are really starting to sleuth through all of these. And something that a lot of Redditors point out is that allegedly after November 13th, after these final pings in the area, Ryan's phone doesn't ping at all near Moscow. So seemingly showing up a lot in this area to after the murders, nothing.

Yeah. They find that really irregular. Of course. And it's just something to note in this case. Now, police in Idaho are filing search warrants for everything related to Brian. But on December 27th, they get good news from Pennsylvania. Agents waited for the Coburger family to put their trash out, and then they swooped in and grabbed it, hoping to get some of Brian's DNA, which brings us to our seventh clue, the Q-Tip. The Pennsylvania agents immediately put the evidence on a plane back to the Idaho state. crime lab, a day after it was found on December 28, 2022, they had a match. The DNA from the knife sheath was not an exact match for the DNA on the discarded Q-tip, but the Q-tip DNA was a strong potential match for the biological father of the person whose DNA is on the knife sheath.

Corporal Payne, who actually discovered the sheath, wrote in his probable cause affidavit that 99.99.998% of the male population could be excluded as the suspect's biological father based on DNA. And that is finally enough for them to get an arrest warrant on December 29th. At 1 a.m. on December 30th, a little more than six weeks after the murders, the FBI and Pennsylvania State Police raided the Coburger family home and arrested Brian. And Brian did not seem to put up a fight. But he did ask a weird question. He asked them, who else did you arrest? And that has sparked some theories on the internet that he either had an accomplice

or maybe he was trying to psych the police out like he wanted them to think that he had an accomplice. Which I could see. Maybe he had learned something in criminology that was like sometimes they arrest a bunch of people just to ask them more questions about the crime. Who knows? But the men of the police brought up the Idaho murders, though he told them that he had, be quote, utmost respect for law enforcement. And then he invoked his right to counsel. While preparing for a trial, Brian Coburger was held without bail. This gave the prosecution a chance to test his own DNA against the DNA on the knife sheath, and it was a match.

They also got a warrant to search his Amazon purchase records for any activity related to knives or knife accessories. And they discovered that Brian had bought a K-bar knife and a sharpener in March of 2022, eight months before the murders. Not a good look for Amazon. On the same day that Brian was arrested, police also searched his apartment in Pullman, Washington. And it had been cleared out almost completely. The trash was empty. Even the shower curtain was removed.

I mean, that makes sense he was leaving school permanently. They did, though, find two small stains that were tested for and found to be possibly blood. and that was on a pillowcase and a mattress, but we don't know whose blood they were. Either DNA tests weren't done on this or the results haven't been released as of this recording. His car, that white Hyundai Alandra, was also found to be spotless. It was cleaned so thoroughly that, at least according to lead prosecutor Bill Thompson, it was, quote, like it had been disassembled inside. I could see that. I could see him taking all those seats out and just scrubbing it. Well, think about it. I mean, with the descriptions we've heard of the crime scene,

it would be impossible to leave without a lot of blood on you. So we must have been bringing blood other places. Yeah. I've gone through some of the documents and hearing the ways in which the blood spatter evidence was all about. Like, there's no way. Absolutely. So he would have had to clean his car thoroughly in theory. At his first arraignment, Brian refused to verbally enter a plea, which is allowed in the state of Idaho.

But because of that, the judge entered a formal not guilty plea on his behalf. Meanwhile, the defense would go on to spend two and a half years trying to get prosecution evidence excluded while they built their case. For example, like one of the things this looks like is there was unidentified male blood on a handrail outside of the crime scene, which the defense hoped would point to an alternate suspect. The team also points to a three-person mixture of DNA that was found under Madison Mogan's left finger. nail. As for an alibi, though, the defense claimed Brian was just out for a drive between Pullman and Moscow on the night of the murders at the exact time of the murders, as one does. Brian never answered any of the police's questions about the murders, and in all of his recorded conversations with family members, he never said anything about the crimes, the murder's nothing. And even with all of this,

we're never really going to know what would have been presented in the courtroom because, as everyone knows at this point, this case is not going to trial. On June 30th, 2025, just weeks before jury selection would begin, Brian changed his plea to guilty on all four murders. And it really seems like it was to avoid the death penalty. On July 23rd, he was sentenced to four consecutive life sentences without parole. He was then transferred to a maximum security prison in Kuna, Idaho, which is about 20 minutes south of Boise, where he's been in solitary confinement ever since. Kaylee and Zana's families did object to this plea deal. They wanted to see Brian tried in court. They wanted him to face the death penalty, which would have been on the table for a crime like this.

Maddie and Ethan's families, however, did say that they were okay with the deal. And accepting the deal, Brian was not forced to offer. offer up a motive or really any other details on this crime. And that has been, honestly, for a lot of the people involved, one of the hardest parts in all of this. After Brian's plea agreement was announced on July 18, 2025, the judge, though, did lift a gag order, one that had previously restricted how much information could be shared with the public. And because of that, ISP and MPD has since released hundreds of pages. of files each. They also released hundreds of crime scene photos. They've released more body cam

footage. And this is important to note here. Like we wanted to look at what the families were saying a lot in all of this and just keep them in mind as to just what they thought as all of this information was coming out. And Ethan and Maddie's families have sued seeking to prevent any more images of the victim's bedrooms. So we're not going to share any of those images that came out. Yeah, the families are very split on this, I would say. And even, you know, sharing details, you have Kaylee's family who has kind of openly been like, no, like people need to know what this monster did. And like they've shared quite a bit. But everyone is handling this so differently. And that's really up to each family how they want to proceed forward. Absolutely. Absolutely. But I understand wanting your kids to be remembered by all like the beautiful fun photos they took in college and not ultimately what this crime scene looked like. Yeah. But on top of these files, a lot of witnesses. have also made public statements that do include a lot of new details about Brian. So we kind of wanted to take this moment to go over some of the most telling new reveals that have come out after Brian was sentenced. Starting with honestly some really shocking details about his abnormal behavior that led up to the murders.

Yeah, because there's a lot. There's a lot. Let's start with the secret phone files. Get into him. This always is such a weird fact for me. But by the time he appeared in court, Brian had actually groomed his eyebrows. So they didn't look as bushy, I guess, as everyone was saying that they were. Like that's going to help you. Your DNA is on what?

I know. Well, the prosecution got a hold of a selfie that he took. And it's particularly disturbing because it was taken at 10.31 a.m. in his apartment bathroom. And that would have been just six hours after the murders. In that picture, his eyebrows are definitely very bushy. And he's also giving this thumbs up and smiling. Smiling. Thumbs up.

What the f***? Like he's maybe proud of himself in that moment. Or I don't know why that is exactly what he wanted to capture. His hands are really red. Like he was recently scrubbing his hands. But that selfie was not the only thing that was found on his phone when they were going through it. According to forensics expert, Heather Barnhart, he was searching for information on serial killers and he was downloading entire case files, which by itself could have been, obviously

he was studying for a PhD in criminology, but when you combine it with all the other evidence that we've been finding in this case, it seems like he was looking for information on how to carry out these crimes or inspiration or something. He was reading a lot about serial killers. On top of that, he apparently listened to a Pullman Police Department scanner to hear radio calls in the hours leading up to the murders. And after hearing the news that the police were looking for a white Hyundai Alantra, just like his, he began frantically searching on his devices for a new vehicle to buy. Very incriminating. We're talking 10 minutes after he saw a news article on December 29, 2022, just a day before he was arrested.

He also somehow got access to a PDF of all the car. make some models on campus so that he could see how many others there were like his. That's terrifying. I know. I know. How did he get access to that? Yeah, I don't even know why they have that. I guess whatever for parking purposes. When you buy a parking pass, I could see, you know, everyone, like the college keeping a record, but like the fact he was able to get access to it. And search through and be like, okay, does anyone else have a 2015 Hyundai Allantra that I can pin this on? Yeah. He also was searching that day for phrases like wiretap. And, psychopaths paranoid, which, yeah, take that for what you will. He also visited the Moscow

Police Department websites for their latest press releases on the case to read more about them. Newly released information also suggests that he and his mother had, and this was a big one for us, Morgan, that we were talking about earlier. Yeah. It came out that he and his mother had phone conversations after the murders and, like, leading up to his arrest. And there were a lot of phone calls. There were so many phone calls. I'm just going to break down some of the phone calls that he made because they were shocking to hear about. So cell phone records show that he called his mother at 6.13 a.m. the morning of the murders, but she did not answer. And remember, they're on the East Coast, so it's 9.13. He then called his father. At 617 in the morning, his mother, Marianne Coburger,

returned his call and they spoke for 36 minutes. This was approximately two hours after he turned his phone back on after being powered off during the time of the murders. At 8.03 a.m., he called his mother again, and they spoke for 54 minutes. At 9 a.m. while he was on his way to revisit the crime scene in Moscow, Coburger spoke with his mother for an additional nine minutes. So it looks like 8.03 a.m., he called his mom. They spoke for 54 minutes. And then he calls her back just a few minutes later, and they talk for another nine minutes.

At 4.05 p.m., the two had another brief two. minute conversation. At 5.53 p.m., Coburger called his mother for a final 96-minute conversation, hour and a half. So what's that? I... It's like half the day. Quick math. It's like well over... It's like over three hours. I love my parents, but like I would never... In one day... In one day. That many phone calls? According to some news outlets, his mom actually sent him an article about Zana and the injuries that she sustained some time later. That's absurd. It really makes me wonder what they were talking about.

What were you talking about? First of all, if I called my parents and they knew it was six in the morning, their first thing is going to be like, are you okay? Yeah. Having a two-minute conversation at four in the afternoon, unless it's like, oh, I'm around at six, call me then. And then he calls her later and they talk for 96 minutes. He talked to his mom so much that day. experts said that the article that she sent him about Zana came through via text while they were on a call together. And since there was no context surrounding the article, it implied that maybe the two of them were talking about the crimes on the phone.

And then she was like, I saw this article and sent it. We don't know exactly what they were saying about the crimes, but they were talking about them, it seems. Yeah. However, there's nothing really that indicates Brian confessed anything to her or that she had any knowledge of his involvement during these phone calls. And I'm so curious, you guys out there listening, what is your take on these phone calls? Because I'm, this is a rabbit hole I go down. And to send that article, what do you think on it? You know, was she totally unaware and was sending the article as like, oh, this is in your area.

Watch out. Like, I want to see your comments on this one because I'm really hung up on this part of it. I know. I just wish I knew what they talked about. However, I would say you don't need to know anything about the content. of the phone calls to be severely creeped out by Brian Koeberger because we have so many accounts of people having everyday interactions with him that were very concerning. So just three months in his time at WSU in November 2022, Brian had made a terrible impression.

I mean, you kind of read his dismissal letter and how many altercations he had with professors and lack of professional behavior. They were also saying that he was like sexist towards women and a whole bunch of bad stuff. Yeah, and that's what a lot of these people get into. WSU's TA assignment system was pretty random, which led Brian to be assigned to Professor John Snyder, who was teaching in WSU's criminal justice and criminology department. That's the one that he was having the altercations. Yes, and it's clear that from the very beginning, Professor Snyder thought Brian was kind of an asshole. He wouldn't show up to class to actually do his TA job, but he would show up later once the professor had already done. all of the work himself, and would just follow his boss around asking what is described as annoying questions. Brian's behavior was irritating enough that Professor Snyder complained

to all of his personal friends about this, quote, douche of a TA he had. Now, Professor Snyder never thought of Brian as a danger, but women on campus did. One female student emailed another after Professor Snyder's class to say, quote, my class's TA looks like a murderer. Oh, my God. Which, it's just like insane that like people's instincts and like, I don't know, their fight or flight were just like they were, they were pinging from this behavior. Yeah, gut feeling.

And apparently there were others who said Brian was rude and sexist to female students throughout all of his classes, which did eventually lead to him being fired. He asked people out in very inappropriate ways. he was seeing mansplaining or talking over women constantly. Students complained that he appeared to be really biased against everyone who wasn't his same demographic. He even openly told a female student that he would require any romantic partner of his to be, quote, physically perfect and that she could not have a disability. Oh my God. He also enjoyed talking to his professors about sexually motivated burglaries and the emotion suspects must feel when committing crimes, which is just,

super interesting in all of this because there was no sexual assault in this case. A bunch of the documents I read mentioned how much like money was left out, purses, things like that. So it wasn't a burglary. I think a lot of people felt like there was supposed to be a sexual nature of the crime and that his plans maybe changed. And maybe we'll get into that a little bit. Yeah. And again, like that Reddit survey he put out trying to get criminals to respond about their motions with committing crimes. Like, It's just so interesting how much it all came up. There's also one female student that went to a professor with her suspicions that Brian had stolen an intimate item from her apartment.

A female faculty member issued a chilling warning once saying, quote, mark my word, I work with predators. If we give him a Ph.D., that's the guy that in that many years when he is a professor, we will hear is harassing, stalking, and sexually abusing of his. I thought would be his, you know, his students at wherever university he ended, end quote. It's a little in-cell-e, don't you think? It's giving that. Yeah. Brian's behavior was apparently similar off-campus to an exotic dancer contacted MPD after the crimes to say Brian had been a customer of hers from 2018 to 2019. She claimed that on multiple occasions, she heard him talking to himself about wanting to kill people.

When asked who he wanted to kill, he allegedly replied, quote, anyone I want, causing the dancer to alert security. It was also just released that Brian had a run-in with a female hotel clerk in Pullman, Washington back in June of 2022. Initially, he flipped out at the woman who was training for overcharging him, but when she corrected her mistake, she said Brian became super flirtatious and overly nice. The next day, he continued a conversation with her about, quote, sheaths and collecting knives, end quote, as well as, quote, self-defense weapons and knife collections. There was another tip from a woman who said she matched with Brian on Tinder. He later asked her what she thought would be the worst way to die. When she replied that she thought it would be a knife, Brian allegedly responded, quote, like a K-bar. The truth was, Brian was a predator that showed a lot of warning signs long before committing this horrendous, horrendous quadruple murder.

In fact, when Professor Snyder drove to Moscow for an interview, the police told him that they had actually found a list of women's names in Brian's possession. One of them was a woman Professor Snyder knew through the WSU criminology department. Well, we also learned only after Brian's plea deal about some of the other terrifying things that happened around 112 King Road in the weeks and months leading up to the murders. So in the month before her death, Keeley told her roommate Dylan that she felt like someone was following her and watching her. It began one night when she went out to walk her dog Murphy. She thought she saw someone staring at her from the apartments near the house. Then, a week or two later, a man followed her around a local grocery store all the way out to her car. And around the same time, about two weeks before the murders, the roommates made a Starbucks run together during this winter storm.

And they returned to find that their front door was wide open. And the washing machine inside the house was running, even though none of them could remember turning it on. They were so concerned with this, they went and armed themselves with Ethan's golf clubs, before they went inside. And it was notable enough that they had Zana's father stopped by later to tighten the hinges on the front door. It really freaked them all out. A former unnamed roommate moved out of the house in part because she got a, quote, uneasy, weird feeling there. She later told police that the doors in the house were often left unlocked or had been broken in ways that made them really easy to unlock, which, I mean, is so common in a lot of these

college houses. Plus, there were other creepy details that suggested Brian had been targeting some of the girls in the house. Kaylee, Madison, maybe even Zana. Brian's phone had been in the area of the Wi-Fi network belonging to the Mad Greek. Remember, that's the restaurant where Madison and Zana both worked. And Dylan told police that during the murders, she thought she heard the intruder address Kaylee by name, saying, it's okay, Kaylee. I'm here for you. you. There was also evidence to suggest that he was following Kaylee and Maddie on Instagram. He had liked several of Maddie's photos. He actually maybe DM'd the victims repeatedly saying, quote, hey, how are you? And I mean, this is something we were talking about earlier, Morgan,

but one of the really disturbing things that came out about the case is that there's some evidence that Brian befriended Kaylee's dog Murphy in the weeks, maybe the months leading up to the murder, all without her knowing about this. An unnamed friend of the roommate said that there were several times before the murders where Murphy would just disappear out into the bushes behind the house for long periods of time. And he would not come back to the house even when he was called. She told police that this happened at a Halloween party shortly before the murders while the group was, quote, on the back patio once again.

And Murphy began to run into the wood line behind the house and not come back. The group also, quote, heard noises too that time, similar to what it would sound like if someone was moving through the woods on foot. That's all the things that this friend said in their interview. Another friend said that there was a time that Kaylee came home to find that the rear side door to the house was open and Murphy was missing. He eventually did return home, but the roommates did not know where he disappeared to during that entire time. And that to me sounds like it's that kitchen sliding door, that patio door. that Brian used to get in and out. Yeah, the one that they believe he entered the house through.

Clearly familiar with getting into that house. Knew his way around the house. Around the same time, a neighbor actually saw a person walking through their yard, and they said that they were specifically 92% certain that that was Brian Koberger. I mean, we've seen it before with dogs and crimes where people either will bring something to befriend the dog to keep it quiet. But I've never heard of someone spending months befriending the dog so that they can go into the house. Yeah. It's just very scary.

I mean, it could line up. I'd be interested to see if it lines up with when his phone was pinging around that area. Yeah. I mean, the way this house was set up, there was like another parking lot kind of up top that overlooked it. And there were woods then on the side. So it would have been easy for someone to go park up there and then coax the dog in the woods. Where they thought he parked to commit the crimes too, right? Is up in the back and then came down through the woods.

So let's talk a bit more about Brian's life in jail. After his plea deal, Brian's life within the jail system did change quite a bit. He was already behind bars, but he was in county lockup. So he had these privileges like hour long showers, vegan meals, frequent video calls to his mother. Now he's just going to spend the rest of his life in a maximum security prison where he's only going to get a shower. every other day and one hour of recreation time per day. That's too much. In a recent leaked video from his maximum security prison cell, Brian doesn't look all that

thrilled with his situation. He also has been vocal about things that he doesn't like about prison. He has complained of harassment from fellow inmates. He submitted a handwritten request to transfer away from his current cell block, J2, to escape verbal threats that he claims to be receiving. I mean, you don't kill four innocent college students and get treated kindly in prison, I imagine. What the fuck did you think was going to happen? His transfer ultimately was denied.

It seems really like in all the time that he spent planning these crimes and casing the scene and whatever he was doing, he never actually stopped to think about the consequences of getting caught and what that might look like for him afterwards. And now he has four consecutive life sentences that he has to serve. most of which he's likely to spend in solitary confinement. And maybe just maybe he is going to end up wishing that the death penalty was still an option. I could see that. And that kind of takes us to today. I mean, there are a lot of loose ends and theories on this case.

I mean, the internet is still kind of running rampant that like even after Brian's conviction, there's a lot of blame still being put on the surviving roommates, which I want to be clear. these women went through horrendous trauma. Like, you cannot imagine how you're going to respond in a circumstance like that after a night of partying. Some of them underage, maybe worried about getting in trouble. Previous circumstances where people were too drunk and everything worked out fine the next morning. I know. And you're really just not thinking that that's a possibility.

You're also living in a house where people come in and out. I could see being freaked out but not thinking. anything to that degree had happened. Yeah. There is an interesting part of this case that I do want to point out and like very kind of gingerly talk about it. But, you know, Dylan's testimony really did help with this case. She was an eyewitness. She saw Brian the bushy eyebrows.

And she also describes hearing things. And in a couple of the reports I read, they mentioned watching vampire diaries earlier in the evening. And so this is something that is kind of. of an innocuous detail at this point. It doesn't really change the outcome, but a lot of people speculate that some of the things that might have been heard that night actually were coming from a Vampire Diary episode. And there's a post on Reddit, and it just says this, Dylan was watching Vampire Diaries with Bethany around 2 a.m. So it's just something that Reddit has kind of gone down a rabbit hole over. And again, we'll never really, we'll never really, we'll never really

know. And so as we're coming to the end of the story, I wanted to mention that this case has really been huge in the true crime community. There's some people that have not really handled it well. So law enforcement complained that rumors on social media were making their investigation more difficult and were costing officers' time and resources. There were a lot of unsubstantiated attacks on the surviving roommates, especially before Brian was arrested, just like questioning how they handled the events of the day, which we talked about. And there's theories that are still floating around the internet that are completely unfounded and ultimately not helpful for the investigation or the closure of the families. And so we always like to end with a call to action to advocacy.

In this case, the call to action, I think is pretty simple. If you're a true crime fan, whether you choose to talk about the case online, just remember that there's always real people involved. I think this is a case where a lot of people were confronted with the fact that there are real people involved, especially when it comes to recent cases, survivors, even detectives, working on the case, maybe reading your comments. Yeah. I mean, we just got to, you sent me last night when we covered the Martin family disappearance, we heard from Archer Mayo, who was the diver that found them. Like, he's one of the top comments right now. People are going through the comments and seeing what people are saying and they're reading the Reddit threads. So a lot of times conspiracy theories can delay a case

and being solved and it can create a lot of extra trauma for the surviving victims. Yeah. And I think probably a good rule of thumb is to comment on cases the way that you would want people to comment if it was your loved one that passed away. And that being said, we know that there's a ton of new information coming out on this case every single day, basically. Of course, we couldn't pack every detail into this episode. So if there's something that we missed that you find particularly interesting, let us know.

Yeah, there's a lot. I mean, I could talk about the victim impact statements all day. I know. The Gonzalez family. The sister. Oh, my God. And like, it was incredible. She went into his Reddit history, that survey he put. I mean, she really, and she just kept her composure and really just hammered at home. And I mean, those impact statements really, really are important to watch if you want to, you know, see how this really has impacted. Yeah. Because, again, how would you respond if this was your loved one? And that's how you should be responding. That's how you should be treating everyone involved in this case. And so I recommend watching some of those because they are very, very impactful. Absolutely. And we also wanted to flag that if you wanted to do something tangible to help remember at least one of the victims,

in this case, you can buy tulip bulbs from the Ethan's Smile Foundation, established by Ethan's parents to raise money for a scholarship in his name. I did see an interview from his mom that so far at the time of the interview, they had already helped provide scholarships of $105,000. Oh, my gosh. So this foundation is doing amazing things. And the stuff they sell is absolutely beautiful. So I highly recommend checking it out, you guys. There's also the Made with Kindness Foundation honoring the memory of the victims in this case.

And that can be found at www.madewitivenessfoundation.com. And with that, we're going to transition into the missing person of the week. This week we wanted to highlight the case of Kevin Collins Jr. He was last seen on February 27th, 2025 in Salem, New Jersey. He's described as 21-year-old black male, 5-foot-5, weighing around 115 pounds. He has brown eyes and black hair. Now, Kevin Collins, Jr. was last seen on February 27th, 2025 at approximately 4 p.m. when he left in Spira Medical Center on State Highway 45 in Mannington Township, Salem, County. He was last seen wearing a hospital gown, which was later found near the hospital. On February 27th, at approximately 457 p.m., surveillance footage captured Kevin walking, unclothed in a wooded area near Griscombe Drive in Mannington Township. If you have any information on this case, you can call NJSP Troop A in Woodstown Station at 856-769-775, or the New Jersey State Police Missing Persons Unit at 609, 882, 2000, and that's extension

2554. And there's a note here that he's believed to be experiencing a mental health crisis at this time. That is all that we have for this episode of Clues. This was a really tough case. Yeah. A lot of families impacted forever. And if there's anything you feel we didn't touch on again, put it in the comments. And, you know, like we mentioned, there's new information coming out all the time. So if there's anything that's come out since, you know, we recorded this episode a while before it's going to get posted. So if there's anything that's come out, like let us know in the comments or let other people, you know, who are also watching this know in the comments. Yeah. What else has been shared? Absolutely. We go through the comments. We respond to a lot of you.

So we really appreciate having those conversations and making this community really what it is, coming together to help bring justice. That's like what I feel it is these days. Absolutely. Absolutely. And at Crime House, we value your support. So you can also share your thoughts on social media. Remember to rate, review, and follow clues to help others discover the show. And we will be back next week.

Next week. Another episode for you guys. Until then. Bye, guys. Bye. Capture your favorite summer feeling with Pandora jewelry. Discover a collection inspired by the sunshine, freedom, and moments that make the season unforgettable, from sun-kissed metals to personalized pieces, ready to be engraved with your summer

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