Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Inside the Murder House: Eerie Details From Police Chief in Kohberger Case

Episode Date: July 29, 2025

Moscow Police Chief Anthony Dahlinger was a captain with the department in November 2022 when four University of Idaho students were found murdered on King Rd. His years of experience didn't prepare him for what he saw when he walked into the house where Maddie Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin had been murdered. Now that Bryan Kohberger has been sentenced to four consecutive life sentences for the murders, Dahlinger is talking about the case. Law&Crime's Angenette Levy spoke with Dahlinger about some theories and more in this episode of Crime Fix — a daily show covering the biggest stories in crime.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW:If you received Depo-Provera birth control shots and were later diagnosed with a brain or spinal tumor called meningioma, you may be eligible for a lawsuit. Visit https://forthepeople.com/lcdepo to start a claim now!Host:Angenette Levy  https://twitter.com/Angenette5Guest: Chief Anthony Dahlinger https://www.facebook.com/MoscowIDPDProducer: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. Even with my almost 18 years of law enforcement, you know, I've seen some, I've seen a lot of things and I was not prepared for that. Moscow's current police chief is talking about his role in the murder investigation on King Road, the mysteries that remain despite Brian Coburger's guilty plea and Coburger's odd behavior after the murders. He was seen wearing gloves, doing things like going out to the grocery store. Plus, we're learning new details about the investigation from hundreds of pages of Moscow police reports, including what that Doordash driver said she saw. MUSIC

Welcome to Crime Fix. I'm Anjana Levy. Current Moscow police chief Anthony Dollinger, he's been a cop for a very long time, but all of that training and experience in the world couldn't have prepared him for the horror of November 13th, 2022. That day, of course, forever changed the lives of four families who lost their children, their siblings, their nieces, and their nephews. It's the day that Maddie Mogan, Kaylee Gonsalves, Zana Cronodle, and Ethan Chapin were found stabbed to death in the house at 1122 King Road. That that

crime was so senseless. The victims could not have been more innocent. The murders also changed the small city of Moscow, Idaho. That college town is the home of the University of Idaho and it definitely changed the city's small police department. I spoke with Chief Dollinger about the case and we're going to get into that in a little bit. But first, I want to go through some of what we're learning from the police reports that the Moscow Police Department released hours after Brian Coburger was sentenced

to four consecutive life sentences for the murders. There are hundreds of pages of records. Coburger is now just a number at Idaho's Maximum Security Institution. He's inmate 163214. He's admitted to sneaking into the house at 1122 King Road just after 4 a.m. that morning and creeping up to Maddie Mogan's third floor bedroom and stabbing Maddie and Kaylee. Then Coburger stabbed Zanna Kernodel and Ethan Chapin in Zana's bedroom. Ethan was asleep in the bed.

Zana fought for her life. An officer described it as an intense struggle. But the intense fight didn't stop Coburger from taking the life of Ethan Chapin, who was asleep in Zana's bed. Zana had just received a door-dash order minutes before Coburger walked into the house through the sliding glass door.

That door- door dash driver spoke to police 10 days after the murders, but a body camera video of her from a September 2024 DUI stop caused a stir when she told police she saw Brian and that he parked right next to her. But that's not what she told police in 2022. The driver told police 10 days after the murders that she had trouble finding the house that night. The driver told police she saw a brunette woman popping up and down in the third floor window but couldn't identify her. She told police she saw a man in a tan sedan who looked zoned out, drive past her wearing a collared shirt, but police believe that that person actually drove an SUV

and left the area. Police wrote, during the time that M was in the area of the King Road residence, the white Elantra can be seen via the King Road camera driving back and forth on Wilenta Drive and then enter the King Road Queen Road loop at approximately 356 hours. At the point that M pulled into the front parking lot before she dropped the order off, the white Elantra pulled in behind M's vehicle, a gray Subaru Forester, and then exited the King Road at approximately 358 hours. M did not mention seeing the white Elantra behind her at any time. Corporal Payne said in his report that it did not appear that the DoorDash driver saw the white Elantra during her time near the house. The driver dropped off the food at 4 a.m. at the front door and left.

Surviving roommate Dylan Mortenson told police she thought she heard Kaylee scream at 4 a.m. and called out for her. She also thought that she heard Kaylee dancing with her dog Murphy and say, somebody is here, and then run down the stairs. Dylan also said she heard someone crying from a bathroom and she heard noises, and then she opened her door and saw the man in all black with bushy eyebrows holding a container as he walked past her.

And she said the man saw her. The 911 call was placed nearly eight hours later. Now while police say Coburger went to the third floor first, Chief Dollinger told me they don't know which room that Coburger went into first, Kaylee's or Maddie's. So which woman was possibly the target? They can't and won't say since Coburger used software to wipe his devices and they found no connection between him and the victims. But Coburger ended up in Maddie's room where he found two women, not just one.

Chief Dollinger said at some point, whether it was in the living room or on the stairs, Coburger encountered Zana, who likely ran to her room where that tremendous struggle with Coburger took place. The family of Kaylee Gonsalves has been reading through the police reports and posted on Facebook, We are slowly trying to process what we have been reading. Please understand we are all reading them at the same time as everyone else. Do you think this was a fair way to find out the absolute brutality that Kaylee had endured?

This was part of what we had been fighting for for years. Tell us what happened to Kaylee we deserve to know before the rest of the world. The family later posted, I just want to sleep. It's too painful to be awake. Hashtag Kaylee Jade forever. This is another law and crime legal alert. If you received DepoProvera birth control shots

and were later diagnosed with a brain or spinal tumor called meningioma, you may be eligible to take part in a lawsuit. Morgan & Morgan is investigating claims that patients were not properly warned about this risk. It's free to check, just takes a few minutes, and you don't pay unless they win. So scan that QR code that you see on your screen,

click the link below, or go to forthepeople.com slash LC depot to see if you qualify. I want to bring in Chief Anthony Dollinger. He is the head of the Moscow Police Department, but at the time that these homicides happened, he was a captain in the PD. Chief Dollinger, thank you so much for coming on. I appreciate it.

It's been a few days now, so how are you feeling now that this sentencing has concluded and Brian Coburger is now serving those four consecutive life sentences in the Idaho State Department of Corrections. Yeah, honestly it's still a bit surreal. I don't think it's really hit home with me personally yet that it's over. I mean this case has been an integral part of our agency in my life basically daily since 2022. So I think it's gonna take some time for that to set in

and really have reality hit me in the face and say, oh no, this is over. Yeah. Were you surprised when he changed his plea, when you got word that he was interested in pleading guilty You know these things I know these court cases are dynamic in this one in particular In the back of my mind. I always thought well, maybe this is a possibility and it always was so I guess I wasn't surprised but It's just one of those things that I wasn't quite thinking that that would occur, but it did.

And I was, I wouldn't say I wasn't taken aback by it, but kind of glad to hear it, honestly. During that sentencing hearing and even the plea hearing, you're sitting there and you're watching this unfold. You're watching him, I assume, in some respects, but also, I mean, you're there representing the investigation and in some respects, the victims. I mean, this was a heinous crime.

I mean, the public is now getting a look at the details from actual reports, but you have seen the photos. You actually know how horrific this was. So sitting there and looking at him during that sentencing hearing, what was going through your mind? You know, especially during the sentencing, my mind and my heart was with the families.

It's absolutely unimaginable what they have gone through and will continue to go through because this isn't over for them. It never will be. I cannot imagine losing someone, especially a child, and especially in that manner. I just, I can't fathom it. So that's all I could think about was I was a bit joyful that it was coming to a close and that we were able to accomplish the mission and hold accountable the person who did this

terrible, terrible crime, but my heart was out with the family members. And certainly if you watch that sentencing, you can understand the high level of emotion, rightly so, and the vast array of emotions that were shared. I just I felt a lot of that personally. I want to go back now to. November of 2022, where were you when you got the call that there were four kids murdered in a house off campus? I was actually at my home.

It was a Sunday, and, you know and I was one of my days off, and I was watching a bit of television on my couch, waiting, I had about an hour, I think, until I was due at a friend of mine's birthday celebration. And my phone rang, and I knew, typically when I get a phone call on a day off like that, it's usually something not good, or it could just even be a question

from one of the officers that needs something. And so when I picked up the phone, I certainly didn't expect to hear the news that we had not only a homicide, but a quadruple homicide. And my initial reaction was quite honestly disbelief. I thought, well, you've got to be kidding me, right? I mean, not only are homicides in Moscow very rare, but the idea that we had a quadruple homicide,

my brain just didn't comprehend it initially. But the folks on the other side of the line said, well, it's a thing, so get your stuff on and get into work. And that's just what I did. And that started off the next seven and a half plus weeks of our lives. Did you go directly to the house on King Road? I did. Okay. Did you go inside or did you stay on the outside? I didn't go in initially. We had a lot to do on the outside. We had our initial responding officers helping to lock down the scene

as they should and they did a great job of cordoning off the area. We had multiple people that were around that area, college-age folks that we needed to identify, we needed to talk to, we needed to start that investigation and start finding out, okay, you know, where do we go from here? So no, initially, I did not go in the house. Did you eventually go in the house? Yes, I did. When was that? I can't recall if it was the next day or several,

a couple of days after that. The first days were a bit of a blur. We were working tirelessly from dawn till late at night. And, but yes, I did eventually go in there on more than one occasion. Were you prepared for what you saw? No, not at all. I don't think anybody can prepare for that.

Even with my almost 18 years of law enforcement, you know, I've seen some, I've seen a lot of things and I was not prepared for that. Even with my almost 18 years of law enforcement, you know, I've seen a lot of things, and I was not prepared for that. What is described in these police reports is beyond comprehension, so imagine what it was like to see it up close. There was a lot of blood in Maddie and Zana's bedrooms. The four college students who'd enjoyed a night out after the big football game the day before were dead. One officer said in his report that Kaylee was unrecognizable because of what had been done to her. Zanna Cronodle was found in her second floor bedroom laying on her back wearing a sweatshirt and underwear. She was ready for bed and had more than 50 stab wounds. Many were defensive wounds on her hands and arms. Ethan had been killed in his sleep. He was in Zana's bed and had wounds on his legs.

What were your primary duties? You're a cap. At that time, you were a captain. So you're part of the command staff of the police department. So what were your roles and duties in the investigation? Yeah, I was the services division commander. So part of my area of supervision was actually our investigative investigation unit, I should say. And so I was trying my best to help the investigators get all of the resources and personnel that they needed in a timely manner so that we could continue this investigation. And that, I think, is going to be one of the biggest highlights of this case is the level of collaboration we had with our state, federal,

other state agencies across the country. I mean, the level of collaboration on this was absolutely immense. And it was something to behold. Yeah, I mean, let's talk about that. I mean because a lot of times, and I'm sorry I interrupted you there, but a lot of times egos can get involved in agencies, you know, want to come in and bigfoot something. You had Idaho State Police involved in this, you had the FBI, later Pennsylvania State Police.

So talk to me about that because obviously Moscow, you guys are 25,000 people live there, a little more than 25,000 people. You guys are a small PD. I mean, this is not a big city PD with a big homicide unit. So you needed some help and you knew it. Absolutely, yeah. And my predecessor, Chief Fry, did a phenomenal job of casting that net of resources wide and quickly after this kicked off. And so, yeah, and back to what

your comment about sometimes other agencies get involved, there could be egos. There was absolutely none of that. Absolutely none. Not one day did we see anybody have any kind of, any other attitude than we are a team, we are focused on the mission and we are going to do everything we can to get this mission completed. It was completely succinct and amazing, honestly, to be home. Mm-hmm. You know, you walk into that house.

I don't know exactly where you went. I mean, did you see the knife sheath that day? I don't recall if I saw it that day. I mean, that was something that had to have stood out, as you guys are thinking. That's a major piece of evidence. And it really is one of the things, if not the major thing, that broke this case

wide open for you guys. Yeah, certainly. It was an integral part. And we did, we had our initial, the Corporal Payne, when he did his first initial walkthrough of the residence, saw the sheath and recognized it immediately as something that we needed to take a look at and start processing. And then when the Idaho State Police came in, they processed the scene.

That sheath was immediately turned over, literally driven straight down to the Idaho State Police lab, forensics lab in Meridian and handed directly to the specialists down there to begin work on it and they started working on it immediately. When the results come back and they're like, hey, it's single source male DNA and it's not coming up in CODIS, you know, was the Idaho State Police Crime Lab, was the DNA, you know, head were they were they the ones that said you know maybe we should try Genetic genealogy or how did that come about? I mean all this stuff was team effort I know that the Idaho State Police has a contract with author and they were a wonderful partner in helping us with that and then the decision

To once which we had that profile created, pulled from that DNA sample, then the decision was made to involve our partners again in the FBI because of the level of resources that they had. And my understanding is that it's absolutely, it would have, we would have gotten the same result through authoring as well, but, and it could have been in the same timeframe.

But of course, when we're in the middle of an investigation like that, we're trying to get these leads and these ideas and these evidence figured out as quickly as possible. And so that's why it was handed off to the FBI to use their resources. And then we got our results relatively quickly after that. When they call you guys on December 19th and they say, you need to look at this guy, this Brian Koberger, kind of what goes through your mind? You know, it's, it was, it had been so long.

We had so many people that we had looked at, literally hundreds and hundreds of interviews and we had so many individuals brought up that, oh, maybe it's this person and we very quickly ruled them out. And then the next day, maybe it's this person who quickly ruled them out. So to get that return, to get that name was just fantastic. I mean, we had something now to really, we were digging our teeth into everything, I should say that,

but we really dug into that immediately. And that's when all of the puzzle pieces started coming together. Everything started to click into place and that picture of who he was and his involvement and that he was the person we were looking for became pretty clear pretty quickly. You know the surviving roommate one of the surviving roommates Dylan

Mortenson she had described the guy the build. I mean a pretty good description for somebody who is saying how intoxicated she was and she was sleepy tired all of this stuff but talked about the bushy eyebrows. And so I mean when when you guys pull up the picture and you see this guy, are you thinking to yourselves, whoa? Well, that was certainly one piece that definitely fit in the puzzle, for sure. But, you know, I can't fathom that being in Dylan's shoes

and the trauma that occurred at night and that she is dealing with. I mean, we saw that in the sentencing. Sure, yeah. She was so courageous and so brave to get up there and say what she needed to say. And my heart goes out to her. So you guys get to work on December 19th

and you're like, we to move into action. You start the investigation part of it and then I mean some of this stuff when we hear about it in court and read about it in the court documents about going to do the trash poll, he's being surveilled in Pennsylvania, he's running around with gloves on and all of this stuff. I mean, it literally sounds like something out of a television show. I mean, it's unbelievable. So talk to me about how all of that unfolded. Did the FBI and Moscow PD,

did you guys just reach out to Pennsylvania State Police and just kind of activate or how does that all unfold? Yeah, so if memory serves, that was one thing that a lot of people were saying early on that he was being surveilled from the time he left WSU on his travels back to Pennsylvania and that the two traffic stops that occurred were somehow orchestrated and a part of that. And that's just not true. When he made that trip back, we did not have his name

and we did not have him pinpointed as our primary suspect. Because of course, if that would have been the case, we wouldn't have let him leave the area. Once we got his name, we started putting the puzzle together, we realized he was already back in Pennsylvania and immediately called in resources, both FBI and the Pennsylvania

State Police and they jumped into action. They were very happy to help us. They began surveilling him and you're right, he was seen wearing gloves, doing things like going out to the grocery store with gloves on. He was seen walking around the neighborhood at very, very early morning hours, the pitch black, and some different behaviors for sure. I mean, it sounds like he's from everything we read and hear that he's practically nocturnal. Do you have any insight into what's up with that? I really don't. Certainly he's got a Certainly he had a different routine than some or most, but I don't know on that one.

Yeah. So he's running around Pennsylvania, around his parents' house. I mean, he's going out to the grocery wearing gloves. Apparently, allegedly, he's some kind of germaphobe. That's what his defense attorneys had said. I don't know whether or not that's actually true. I don't know. But he's throwing his own trash away into other people's trash cans. You guys go in, you do a trash poll with the assistance of the trash company, it seems, from everything that

came out in court. And you get the match to his dad, I guess. There's, that there's the Q tip and it shows that whoever the killer was, or whoever's DNA was on the sheath is the son of the Q tip DNA. So you guys swoop in and you get ready to take him in. How worried were you about possibly this leaking out? Well, as you noticed, everybody following this case, we kept our cards very close to our chest for a very good reason because we were not going to put this investigation at risk because we wanted justice for the victims and for the families and to hold

the person accountable who did this. And that was the mission. So as much as the public wanted information, wanted to know what was going on, what we were doing, we weren't going to share that because we weren't going to put that at risk. And so, yes, we did a trash poll. We matched the DNA on the Q-tip to his father, which then led to the search warrant

and arrest warrant for him in the home. And Pennsylvania State Police did an absolutely phenomenal job in executing that search warrant and arrest warrant and took him into custody without any issues. And we had both Lieutenant Gilbertson and Corporal Payne had flown out to be a part of that operation to be ready to attempt to interview the suspect when he was in custody. You know, we've read now about that interview. Sounds like he was very calm, worried about his parents and his dog,

wanted to know why he was there, you know, kind of played coy a little bit about the murders, well, of course he knew about them, you know, thinks it happened, oh, a few weeks back or whatever. What was kind of the feeling about that interaction with law enforcement? Well, certainly I wasn't there, but in my discussions with Lieutenant Gilbertson and Corporal Payne, they instigated that interview, as we commonly do, is just trying to have a conversation, just trying to get the person talking and see where that kind of leads them.

And it sounds like that at several different moments in the conversation, the suspect would stop and say something about, well, let's really talk about why we're here. And actually talking to Lieutenant Gilbertson earlier today, he said it was the third time that he brought that up. He was more stern and wanted to know why they were there. And of course, they explained that, well, we're detectives from Idaho and we had an incident in Moscow. That's why we're here. And that's when he invoked his right to counsel and ended the interview. Interesting. He's arrested, he says he's factually innocent. I mean, his attorneys are saying this in court. I mean, it's their job to defend him, defend his rights,

make sure his rights are, his constitutional rights are enforced. What was it like going through all of that? You all feel like you're confident in your case, and yet there's all of this going on leading up to trial. It was an immense amount of work and so much credit to prosecutor Bill Thompson and his office. They absolutely amaze me. and I've worked with them closely

for a lot of years now, especially on this case. From day one, they were on the ground. They were in the scene with investigators from day one throughout this entire case. And I would say that's probably a rarity in the world. So their efforts to assist us, not only in investigation, but of course, learning everything from day one so that they could build the best case possible in this

was a momentous amount of work. And it was really amping up here just over the last few weeks or a couple of months rather, because we were ready for trial. We were getting ready for trial. We had, I know that Bill and his cohorts up there were working literally seven days a week for the last couple of months getting ready for this trial.

So it was a lot. It was a lot moving up into this. But they were very prepared, very prepared to take him to trial and to see this through to the end. Are you able to give us any insight into what you found after the investigation? We know that there's been some things out there about he was monitoring the news. You found on his YouTube that he was watching the news about this leading up to his arrest,

doing Google searches about all kinds of things that he has had the creepy selfies with the black outfits and stuff like that. I mean, can you give us any insight into what you guys found on his devices? Well, first and foremost, they had found on his devices that he was routinely wiping them and utilizing systems to do that and so the amount of information on him was not a lot. I do know that they did locate a few news stories on the case soon after that were on there. I believe there were some searches of that nature but all in all most of his devices were relatively

Clean for lack of a better term because he had routinely gotten rid of and wipe those devices But was there anything on there, I mean, did you guys find anything on there that was incriminating? Well, certainly the fact that we were able to match his cell phone to all the data that we had already gathered through so many search warrants in, you know, putting that piece of the puzzle together. Yes, we had the data that this phone had been in the area of the home many, many times, put it in that whole timeline that's been put out there. But now we have the actual device. We actually have the phone and could

match that up. That was a big piece of it. Yeah. Do you have any final thoughts, Captain Dollinger? I mean, things can maybe start to get back to normal in Moscow. I mean, a new normal, I would assume, is what it is. Because this has probably forever changed that town. Yes, it has. It is a part of our history. It'll never go away. Is there anything else you'd like

to say about the investigation or the case? I'd just like to reiterate how absolutely blown away and proud I was of all of the law enforcement and investigators that were involved in this case. Their efforts truly got us to where we are today. And again, the mission was to bring some justice for the families and for the victims. And that person who did that horrible, horrible thing is now never gonna see the free light of day ever again. And that is, that's what's important. I think I'm hoping that that'll help start bring

some closure to a lot of folks, especially here in the community so that we can begin to move on and the healing can begin. But that is just my hope. And I understand completely. My heart still goes out to the families. This will never end for them. I hope I pray for their peace and healing

in the years to come. But I'm very happy with the outcome of this and the work that was done. Thank you, Anthony Dollinger, chief of the Moscow Police Department. I appreciate your time. Absolutely. And that's it for this episode of Crime Fix. I'm Ann Jeanette Levy.

Thanks so much for being with me. I'll see you back here next time.