Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Bryan Kohberger Prosecutors Spill Shocking Secrets on Murder Case

Episode Date: September 19, 2025

Latah County Prosecutor Bill Thompson and his chief deputy, Ashley Jennings, led the prosecution of Bryan Kohberger, who has now admitted to murdering four University of Idaho students. Thompson and Jennings have worked in Moscow for years and recall the horrific scene inside 1122 King Rd. where Maddie Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin were stabbed to death on November 13, 2022. Law&Crime's Angenette Levy talks with Thompson and Jennings about the case, the terms of the controversial plea agreement with Kohberger and more in this episode of Crime Fix — a daily show covering the biggest stories in crime.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW:Take your personal data back with Incogni! Use code CRIMEFIX at the link below and get 60% off an annual plan: http://incogni.com/crimefixHost:Angenette Levy  https://twitter.com/Angenette5Guest:Bill Thompson https://www.facebook.com/LatahCountyIDAshley JenningsProducer:Jordan ChaconCRIME FIX PRODUCTION:Head of Social Media, YouTube - Bobby SzokeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinVideo Editing - Daniel CamachoGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. It certainly makes sense that he went there with a specific target in mind. Two prosecutors in the murders of four University of Idaho students were on the case from day one and now they're talking about what it took to put Brian Koberger behind bars for life. So what was your working theory here about why Brian Coburger went to King Road that night? I talk with Bill Thompson and Ashley Jennings about the case that changed everything in their small town and how they felt about that big leak to date line and why they didn't get Coburger to talk before making a deal. Welcome to Crime Fix.

I'm Ann Jeanette Levy. On November 13th, 2022, Laitaugh County prosecutor Bill Thompson and his chief deputy, Ashley Jennings, got a call that no one could have ever expected. There was a quadruple homicide. Four University of Idaho students had been murdered in a house off campus. A savage murderer was on the loose. The students were completely innocent victims. Maddie Mogan, Kelly Gonzalez, Zana Cernodal, and Ethan Chapin, they had all been hanging out at different. places the night before, and someone had broken into their home and stabbed all of them to death, many of them, as they slept. Two roommates survived, and one saw the killer. Bill Thompson, the longtime prosecutor with a Santa-like beard nearing the end of his career, had the biggest case he'd ever handled thrown into his lap, and the world would soon be watching. And going to Moscow, I can tell you that there were people in that city who feared the crime may never be solved. That was a legitimate fear among people who lived in town, although they would not say it on camera. But we now know, the murderer, Brian Coburger, he was sloppy.

Although he did take a lot of steps to hide his identity, he left his DNA behind on a K-bar knife sheath. And it was actually a good amount of DNA, despite what people said on social media. That, along with driving his white Hyundai Allantra to the scene, would be his undoing, among other things. it led to the FBI identifying him as the killer. And in a surprise on the eve of jury selection, Brian Koberger pleaded guilty. The terms of that deal did not sit well with two of the victim's families. Kaley Gonzalez's parents wanted a trial, and so did Zana Kurnodl's father. But the families of Maddie Mogan and Ethan Chapin, they supported this plea agreement.

We'll get into why Thompson so readily accepted the guilty plea from Kovberger shortly and why he didn't request that Koberger disclosed details of the crime in exchange for taking the death penalty off the table. It's called a proffer, and prosecutors can request that as part of a plea agreement. Instead, Brian Coburger walked into prison holding onto his story with the knowledge of how he committed this crime and where he hid the evidence. Now, some on social media still believe that Coburger is innocent despite his guilty plea. Their minds may never be changed, but Coburger admitted in court that he committed these murders. heard the plea agreement that I talked about today do you agree with that play

agreement yes and do you understand the nature of the charges that are that you've been charged with that I understand you're going to plead guilty today to yes as you indicate I'm not bound by the plea agreement but the play agreement is for the maximum on each count do you understand that I'm not bound by the play agreement? Yes. Has anyone promised you that I would be lenient or easy on you if you pled guilty? No. Has anyone threatened you or anyone close to you to get you to plead guilty? No. Is anyone, other than the state's agreements with respect to the play agreement, has anyone promised you anything in exchange for your plea agreement? No.

Has anyone told you to be untruthful in answering my questions today? No. No. Has anyone offered you a reward of any kind other than the plea agreement in order to get you to plead guilty today? No. Are you pleading guilty because you are guilty? Yes. I cover a lot of really scary crime stories here on Crime Fix, and if it's taught me anything, it's that privacy and personal safety absolutely cannot be compromised, especially when it comes to your. personal data online. You would be shocked at how much of your information, like your name, phone number, and even home address is just floating around the internet for data brokers to find and

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and a team of privacy specialists will take care of the rest of it. The new Incogni Unlimited feature even allows users to customize their data removals and tackle the toughest of breaches with the help of a team of privacy specialists. So if you care about your online safety, and you should, take your personal data back with Incogni. Use the code crime fix below on the screen and get 60% off an annual plan. A case like this will take a toll on anyone involved, especially the family's of the victims whose lives were shattered by the actions of one man for no reason at all. There's zero evidence that Coburger knew any of these victims, but there was cell phone

evidence that showed that Coburger had been to Moscow 23 times late at night between July 2022 and the week leading up to the murders. Also on Coburger's cell phone, more than 150 selfies. He was obsessed with himself and won. He appears to be taking a selfie, but really, it's probably all a ruse. Because in the background, sits a beautiful young woman on a baseball field with blonde hair. She has a very similar look to Maddie and Kaylee. Was he really scoping out that woman? I think so. And also, Coburger appeared to have an obsession with serial killers. That went beyond what a criminology student would research, particularly Ted Bundy, who sexually assaulted and murdered dozens of young women from Washington to Florida. In Tallahassee, he murdered two sorority

sisters at the Kai Omega House in 1978 and attacked others in the house who survived. Koberger's guilty plea means he won't leave prison until he dies. So I want to bring in the two people who led this prosecution. Bill Thompson is the Lataw County prosecutor and his chief deputy is Ashley Jennings. I want to thank you both for coming on. Bill, I'll start with you. How are you feeling? You know, it's, it's, we've had some time now.

Some time has passed after this, this guilty plea. Well, we are certainly pleased with getting a final, inclusive resolution to the case. That's a relief for most of the victims as well as for the investigators and for us. We realize that there's some folks who would prefer we had made a different decision. I respect that. But we feel like. we did the right thing. Everything considered. And having people have the opportunity now and move forward is important. I know you've addressed this, but I do want to drill down on this

a little bit about this plea agreement. Were you surprised when Ann Taylor came to you just weeks before jury selection is set to begin? And she says, I guess, make us an offer. Tell me how it unfolded and were you surprised. I think we certainly were not expecting that to happen. The defense all along had maintained that their client was factually innocent. And so Ashley and Josh Hurwitt and I were all on trial track. We'd been working for months preparing for trial and we were on track to be ready to go as scheduled. You'll remember back in June, I think June 18th, we had a.

hearings with Judge Hipler on the request from the defense for another continuance and also a request for them to be able to offer alternative perpetrator theories, point the fingers at somebody else. And Judge made it really clear that wasn't going to happen. And it was the week after that when the defense approached us and inquired about the possibility of a plea. So we spoke among ourselves. We reached out to all the families and spoke with the families by Zoom, much as the same as we're talking here or teams on Thursday and Friday of that week, as you would expect. There were a broad range of feelings from the families, and that's what we wanted. We wanted to ask them, what do you think about a possible plea offer?

We've been asked about a possible plea offer, and we want your input. We took that and met with the attorney team over the course of the weekend and decided to respond to the defense and simply say that if the defendant wants to avoid trial, he only as one option. And that's to plead guilty as charged to all five felonies, wave appeal. So it's final and conclusive and it won't go on for years as capital cases are wont to do and know that he was going to be spending the rest of his life in prison. And the following Monday morning, the defense reached out to us and the court and said the defendant was prepared to plead guilty. That's how it happened what changed Ashley do you know what changed possibly on on their side because as bill

just said he said they said for years he was factually innocent you know that that verbiage changed a little bit I remember Ann Taylor saying at a hearing earlier this year you know your honor our client maintains his innocence you know she was no longer using those exact terms anymore what what changed you guys listened to the jail calls were his parents kind of saying to him like, hey, maybe you did this? I don't know. I'm not sure. And only they truly will know what was the deciding factor.

But I guess on our side to back up what Bill was saying, you know, we were at a point in the case where we had gone through several motions to suppress, several pretrial motions. they had exhausted really all of their pre-trial avenues and came up short for the most part. So I do think that that weighed heavily in their decision about whether or not they truly wanted to go to trial or not. You know, Bill, you know, I asked you this at the press conference. You said under the law you can't be compelled to force him to allocute. but but why not get a proffer from him you know hey anne like we'll let him plead but we need to know where he put the knife

and how he got through the house and everything like that answer a few questions why didn't you ask for a proffer well we talked about that among the attorney team and we made a decision that we wanted to make sure that the guilty plea itself was solid if he was going to plead guilty our experience and judge hipler talked about this as well is that frequently when defendants are being asked to explain, they start to minimize what occurred. They can't be trusted for the truthfulness of what they say. And we elected in order to ensure a solid, sustainable, guilty plea to all the counts that we would not press for more than what the court was going to require as far as the defendant admitting to the truth

the charges. But a proffer, I mean, you could have then rejected it and said, okay, we're going to trial. If you thought he was minimizing and lying, if you thought he was being dishonest. And he could have led you to the murder weapon. I hear what you're saying, Ingenet, and he could have. We don't know if he would have or not. I don't think it would have changed the ultimate outcome. And our interest really is if we were going to be able to lock down a guaranteed result for

the families and for the public. that that was the focus. And we also reflected back to early on, I don't know if you're aware of this, but early on when the FBI first came on board with this case, they sent agents from their behavioral analysis unit, their profilers to work with this. And they told us that based on what they were seeing

about the nature of the crime scene, the crimes themselves, that even if we were to, get the person who committed these crimes to try to explain why it happened, that it wouldn't make sense to normal people like us, and that they really can't be trusted to tell the truth because people like this live in their own different world, which is completely foreign to what we as normal people understand and can process.

So that was a factor as well in our thoughts. This was probably one of the most bizarre cases, I think that we've ever seen. And that sentiment was shared by experienced investigators who were working on the case from the very beginning. Yeah, it's horrific. I've been known this long time. I've covered some awful, awful cases

and they're all awful in their own right. But these were truly innocent victims. They didn't know this guy. And he goes across the country intent on committing murder. I mean, it's sick. You know, Ashley, you guys live in Moscow. Your job is to prosecute cases. Take me back to November 13th of 2022 when you guys get the call that you have a quadruple homicide in a house off campus.

Yeah, I received a call about an hour after the 911 call from the then chief of police, James Fry. And he informed me that there was a quadruple mars. or near campus and was kind of informing me of that, letting me know that we would need to do a search warrant. Yeah, I can go right back to that moment of getting that call. And then I then started working on a search warrant and then responded to the scene shortly thereafter. And you and Bill went through the house.

It's my understanding. There's like in the logs it says you guys did a walkthrough. yes tell me about that i mean i just i can't even imagine i mean this is like a crime it wouldn't matter if it happened in a big city it would be horrific but i mean you guys aren't this is not what you see a lot i mean you hadn't had a homicide in years there yeah um so yeah i think horrific is the appropriate word it was tragic and immediately horrific um many of the officers i overheard say that it was, you know, one of the worst crimes scenes they had seen. I've heard Bill say that as well.

Moscow's had our fair share, you know, of homicides in the past. However, I think this one with there being four individuals present and just the nature of it, definitely, it stays with you. So, Bill, you've been the prosecutor there a really long time. You get this call. You guys go over there. the FBI has been called in Idaho State Police have been called in to you this has to just be unfathomable and unbelievable as the county prosecutor that this has occurred in your community I think my reaction when I first got the call was more of this is really bad and we need to make sure that we have everybody lined out and doing their best efforts on protecting the crime scene and gas information. I think perhaps one of the advantages of being older and having done this for a while is

I realized the importance of everybody being disciplined right from the beginning. This is the kind of thing, particularly with young officers, and there were young officers who responded to this who had never been to a crime scene like this before, that we had to work hard to make sure that emotions didn't cloud, good judgment and good police work. So it was really a heads up, being tuned in, in an attentive mode, being there to work with our officers to make sure that everything was done the way it was supposed to and that we collected the information in a legal and credible fashion. Did you have any concerns about the handling of the crime scene at all? You know, obviously, you learn things from every case.

Did you think the crime scene was handled well or what are your thoughts on that? When I arrived on the scene, I was actually in Spokane that day, which is about 80 miles away. And when I got back later that afternoon, got on scene, the crime scene had been secured. The state police detectives were there and they are the folks that we used to process major crime scenes. They were prepared to do their processing of the scene, including documenting the scene. Everything appeared to be in good order, good control at that point. I'm aware now after the fact that the police department had already done some comprehensive photographs of the scene to make sure it was documented in an undisturbed fashion, which is good police practice. We had

everybody stepped up and did their jobs here. I don't have concerns looking back. Talk to me about how important that sheath was and when you learned of it. Well, we learned of the sheath on the 13th. When the scene was being processed, the sheath was found in the bed by next to Maddie's body. And we knew immediately, given what appeared to be multiple stab wounds is the cause. of death for all four victims, know that this was likely a crucial piece of evidence. So it was handled with priority. In fact, it was driven. It wasn't shipped to the state

lab. It was driven and hand delivered to the Idaho State Crime Lab. And they put at the top of their priority. It was just a matter of, I don't remember, a day or so. And we heard back from them that they had located single source male DNA on the sheath. which was very powerful it wasn't a mixture it wasn't something that would have been inadvertent so now the trick was trying to figure out whose DNA that was and that's where the investigation started off from there obviously this this leads to brian coberger and when you guys find out the name brian coberger i mean ashley what's your what's your thought i mean obviously it's like okay he's over he's a washington state university criminology student he's at home in pa for the

holiday or whatever but i mean just no connection that you guys could determine whatsoever to these kids yes when we heard the name on december 19th um at that point that's really all we had was a name and it was a new name it was a name i'd never heard before no one on our team had ever heard before but we knew that he was a Washington State University student, and we knew that he drove a white Honda-A-Landra. And from there, the investigation, really, we were able to, it was able to take off from there. But the name, you know, meant nothing to me in the very beginning, because I had never heard it before.

It had not been someone that we had been focused on. We had never heard it before. But after that, the investigation really took off. We were able to do multiple search warrants looking into the defendant, getting his financials, getting his cell phone records. So we did multiple search warrants, got a lot of information back. And that's really when the pieces started falling into place. What is your working theory, Bill, about this, about this.

this crime and why he did this. I mean, you have to have some type of working theory. I mean, juries like to hear stories. You have to tell the jury of stories. So what was your working theory here about why Brian Coburger went to King Road that night? And who specifically he was targeting? engine at going into trial we really weren't going to be proposing a working theory like you just discussed our focus was on the evidence showing that we have these horribly murdered young people and the evidence that proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is the one who was responsible for it the lack of the backstory is something that we have to factor in it's not an element

of the crime. It's not something the jury will be asked to decide on. But human nature is such that if they get distracted by that, they could start creating questions in their own mind that had nothing to do with whether or not the defendant was guilty. So our approach at trial really was going to be much like what what we did when we were in court on July 2nd when the guilty plea entered and the factual summary of our evidence, that was going to be the trial and focus the jury on the elements under the law and what the proof was of those elements. So very clinical, circumstantial evidence. We have the DNA. We have the cell phone stuff. We have the white allantra.

Exactly. Yeah. Yep. You know, I guess I just look at it as, you know, I guess in my mind, when I, you know, just looking at the case, I kind of think he probably went in there targeting one person. I think this is somebody who lived in his own head, as you kind of mentioned earlier. I think that, you know, the cell phone stuff kind of shows that. He wanted to, you know, I think he went in there targeting one person and this spun out of control. Have you ever kind of thought about that?

And, Jeanette, that's certainly a very reasonable hypothesis. And I know that's something that we've talked about, the investigators have talked about, whether it's 100% accurate. I don't know that we will ever know for sure, but it certainly makes sense that he went there with a specific target in mind. And it makes sense under the circumstances of what happened escalated beyond what he'd planned. And I think, unfortunately, that's why at least two of the other victims ended up being killed. Whether we can know that for sure, I don't think so. But your thought analyzing the evidence certainly makes sense. It's a viable theory.

Do you believe, I've seen Lieutenant Gilbertson quoted as saying that maybe Zana overheard something, and went up the stairs and sadly encountered this monster and then ran down the stairs and that's how things unfolded from there. Do you believe that's what likely happened? Well, we certainly know from the evidence that Zana was up at the time that this was going on. She had received a door dash delivery just shortly before the defendant showed up for the last time around the residence. And so it appears likely to us that she was awake, that she heard something and responded to that and encountered the defendant. And that's what escalated the homicides to include her and Ethan as well.

We think that's a very likely explanation of how they became victims. I want to talk now about the phone. You know, he had wiped it. I've talked to the Barnhart's, you know, about what they were able to find and not find on his devices. You know, I know there was all this pornography on there. I mean, do you believe he had a sexual motivation here based on all of this nasty stuff on his phone? I don't know that we can say for sure. The medical examiner specifically looked for any evidence of sexual assault and found none.

So we really don't know if that was a motivator for him. It certainly could have been, or it could have been part of what motivated him or what connected him to this particular house and these particular young people. How frustrating. I'll start with you, Ashley, and then I want to hear from you, Bill, was the Dateline special airing pre-trial. just weeks and weeks before jury selection and kind of airing out a lot of things that you may have presented at trial. It was incredibly frustrating.

It was a big distraction. We were in full trial mode, preparing, and that was just another thing that kind of got added on for our office. It's unfortunate. We were disappointed. Bill, do you think that leak came from your side from the and when I say not the state side I mean like law enforcement what

have you we know there's an investigation underway or at least we believe there is um we don't know for sure the information that was contained in the dateline show that was accurate and there was some inaccurate information as well that they included the accurate information was known not just to members of the state's investigation team, but also members of the defense team. We have, I think, a hard time wanting to accept that one of the state, one or more of the state's investigators,

I leak this, but the bottom line is, if they did, then I want to know that. And I want to make sure that appropriate consequences come into place. And that person will never be a law enforcement officer. again. Likewise, if it didn't originate from somebody on the state's side, I think we need to know that as well, and that person or those persons need to be held to account. What happened was outrageously reckless. And I think words disappointed and frustrated, probably understate quite how I felt at the time. I probably used some shorter, more direct.

words about how I felt and how I still feel about it. And we've committed ourselves to cooperate in every possible way that we can to assist in identifying who's responsible if that happens. I truly hope it does. It was horrible. It was just completely inexcusable. It should have never happened completely irresponsible. That's the kind of saying that can derail the entire

the entire criminal justice system. Judge Hibler was rightfully very, very mad. What did Dateline get wrong? You said they got some stuff wrong. Well, I prefer not to say that right now because I don't want there'd be generally publicly known what was right and wrong from our perspective. I think that's information that's going to be important to the investigation. So as much as Ashley and I would love to sit down and just say,

well, we went through it and here's what's correct and what's isn't. That's something we can't do right now. Sorry. Would you have been able to charge him? Even if you had found him through the white Alantra, you know, Lindle and the Haystack search, would you have been able to charge him without the sheath DNA? You know, we've talked about it and we haven't had to make that decision. Fortunately, we had the sheath DNA, which really was kind of the icing on the cake, so to speak.

You'll notice that we did not file charges, though. until we had at least a preliminary DNA match with the paternal DNA from the trash pull that the FBI conducted and the cotton swab that came back from the lab as having the DNA of the father of the person whose DNA was on the sheath. That was what put us over the top for feeling comfortable filing charges back in December of 2022. And then, of course, once we had the defendant in custody and we obtained a direct DNA sample from him and had the positive match. We knew we knew we had our person. Now that Brian Coburger has admitted to committing the murders and waived his appeals, the focus can now shift back to the victims when it comes to discussing this case

rather than future court dates and trials, evidence, and potential appeals. When it comes down to it, this case really now is all about the victims moving forward. Not only the direct family members and the loved ones of Maddie and Kaylee and Xana and Ethan, but also friends and the extended community, the university community who stepped up to support each other throughout this. We're glad that we have a resolution that it's final, that's conclusive, and then we aren't looking at decades of appeals, just reopening the wounds every time a new court document is filed. We hope that those who have suffered from this can find some peace and move forward. There's no way we can undo what happened. Like I said during the sentencing, our former district

judge up here who became an Idaho Supreme Court Justice John Stegner used to say regularly that not even God can undo the past. We can't change the past, but we can move forward from it. And that's our hope, where we go from here. I have to say that reflecting back on this, you look at that first week of the investigation and the investigators had two pieces of evidence. They had an unknown male DNA on the knife sheath, and they had the white allantra. And that was it. Right.

And it is just absolutely amazing the work that they did to bring this person to justice and to gather the evidence that. proved beyond a reasonable doubt that he committed these horrible crimes. That is truly impressive, something I'll never forget. Were you ever worried, though, about going to trial, like, that maybe there would be somebody on the jury that would, I don't know, were you concerned at all because maybe somebody would see it that way? I mean, I don't know.

They were going to go the planted evidence route, I think. There's always a gamble going to trial. That said, and Ashley can attest to this as well, we were and we are very confident in our evidence. There's no question in our mind that the evidence that we had to present proved that defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Now, that doesn't rule out that we could have one juror who went off the rails and compromised to the trial. And that's a risk in any trial no matter how strong evidence is. but we tried not to worry about that. That's just a fact of life in the law profession.

That's the inherent risks of trial. The beauty of the guilty plea is we avoid that risk entirely. There is that advantage, but that wasn't part of the decision for offering the plea and accepting the guilty pleas. Ashley? Yeah, I could just echo what Bill said. I think he said that perfectly. Bill Thompson, Ashley Jennings.

Thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate your time. It's been really interesting talking to both of you. Thank you. You're very welcome. Brian Koberger is serving his four consecutive life sentences in Idaho's maximum security institution. The families of Maddie, Kaley, Zana, and Ethan

are doing the best they can to still grieve and memorialize and remember their loved ones who are forever 21 and 20 years old. And that's it for this episode of Crime Fix. I'm Janette Levy. Thanks so much for being with me. I'll see you back here next time.