Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - KOHBERGER BEWARE: KAYLEE GONCALVES PARENTS FIGHT BACK

Episode Date: September 3, 2025

Kristi and Steve Goncalves outraged a plea deal was struck with four-time killer Bryan Kohberger. Kaylee's parents reveal they were kept in the dark on details of their daughter's brutal murder.  Steve and Kristi have been openly critical,  expressing their disappointment after Kohberger showed no remorse for the brutal killings and avoided the death penalty by pleading guilty. Both parents say the plea was mis-handled by prosecutors and felt it was a rush to avoid a lengthy trial.   The Goncalves family talks one on one with Nancy Grace. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Welcome to crime stories. Tonight is a very special night. And I'm speaking on behalf of not just myself, but our entire staff across the country, as they are, and all of our families. Because we are speaking one-on-one. with two very special people, people that you had never heard of just a few years ago. But now are icons in the crime victim community and across the world.

Christy and Steve Gonzalez are joining us tonight. I'm Nancy Grace. This is crime stories. I want to thank you for being with us. You want the truth? Here's the one you'll hate the most. If you hadn't attacked them in their sleep, in the middle of the night, like a pedophile, Kaylee would have kicked your f*** ass.

Thank you. I wanted to open with sound from your daughter, speaking out at Brian Coburger sentencing, I got to tell you something. You did something right. the way you have raised your children Mrs. Gonsalves weren't you so

proud of her and under the worst conditions she stood strong she has never ceased to amaze me throughout this whole entire process she has just been just amazingly strong and when we went to the sentencing

we actually did not know what each other was going to say because we did not want to influence each other's speeches. So we did not know. And it was all new. And she got up there and I was just astounded. I was just beside myself. And then when she was done, the audience or the courtroom clapped.

And it was like, is that normal? I don't think people normally clap. But it was very surreal. It was very, oh my gosh, what happened? And then, you know, we, I'm like, I have to hear that again. It was just so good. Just so proud of her of what she said. And the way she articulated it was, was perfect.

I am going to play some of your daughter speaking. But as I'm looking at the two of you sitting there so close together, connected, clearly connected, you know, when marriages face the slightest problem, like you don't have enough money or there's an. illness in the family or just any number of things, marriages break apart. But under the single worst thing that could happen to a mother and a father, the death of your child, which most of us can't even imagine, you two seem even stronger. You seem even closer. How is that happening, Christy? I honestly, it has brought us closer just because the pain and the anxiety that we have had,

or especially me, Steve has just been so amazing. He's been so gentle with me. He's given me grace. He's given me time to heal. You know, what do you need? Can I help you? And, you know, I try to be that person for him as well. and you know I sometimes I just need a hug when he gets home I'm like I just need a big hug and he just wraps his arms around me gives me this big all hug and I just feel better and I mean he's been

my husband for almost 30 years and you know five kids and he's the epitome of an amazing man an amazing father amazing husband all wrapped up in one I was blessed you know what's interesting so many things about you two are interesting and so many millions of people have been watching you at a distance and I'm just so honored that I get to actually talk to you not just watch you in a courtroom or on a camera Mr. Gonzalez you have been very outspoken very outspoken throughout this entire nightmare

and a lot of people have attacked you I don't get it. Do you even care what they say? I hope not. No, it just rolls right off my shoulders. I play support my whole life. I'm used to, like, constructive criticism, so that I'll take to heart. And, you know, sometimes I will misspeak or I'll say something that, you know, I'll take

back because I got my facts wrong. But I'm defending my children and my daughter and my wife, so I don't really take to heart them. I know that there's going to be some people who side with, you know, the other side, and I just keep it at that. I think they have more in harmony with evil than they do good, and their actions reflect that, so I don't waste my time on them. Well, Mr. Gonsalves, our family, the Grace family, has a very old saying,

screw them and the horse they rode in on. So that's my legal advice to you. I want to circle back to your daughter, who was absolutely amazing. And you know what? That doesn't just happen. She's amazing because you raised her to be amazing. She didn't just come out that way. She has had years of you as her example.

What am I talking about? Listen. You thought you were exceptional all because of a grade on a paper. You thought you were elite because your online IQ test from 2010 told you so. All of that effort just to seem important, it's desperate. There is a name for your condition, though. Your inflated ego just didn't allow you to see it. Wannaby.

You act like no one could ever understand your mind, but the truth is, you're basic. You're a textbook case of insecurity disguised as control. your patterns are predictable your motives are shallow you are not profound you're pathetic you aren't special or deep not mysterious or exceptional don't ever get it twisted again no one is scared of you today no one is intimidated by you no one is impressed by you no one thinks that you are important you orchestrated this like you thought you were god now look at you you, begging a courtroom for scraps. You spent months preparing, and still all it took was my sister and a sheath. You worked so hard to seem dangerous, but real control doesn't have to prove itself. I love her. Did you have any idea what she was going to say, Christy?

No. No, we didn't share our speeches with each other because we didn't want to influence them, and we were writing them up to the minute, literally, like, editing and adding and taking away. So, no, she got up there and she flipped the table. I mean, she flipped it all upside down. We were like, oh, my goodness, you know, and she did great. People love her, and, you know, we love her. She's our oldest girl, our oldest child, and she's been through law.

with us, you know, being the oldest. So she's very resilient. She's very brave. She's the best big sister to all the kids. And she's incredibly smart, incredibly smart. She blows my mind all the time, all the time. I just want to play one more time. I've got so many questions for you, but I just got to play one more tiny snippet of your daughter. The truth is the scariest part about you is how painfully average you turned out to be. The truth is, you're as dumb as they come. Stupid, clumsy, slow, sloppy, weak, dirty. Let me be very clear.

Don't ever try to convince yourself you mattered, just because someone finally said your name out loud. I see through you. You want the truth? Here's the one you'll hate the most. If you hadn't attacked them in their sleep, In the middle of the night, like a pedophile, Kaylee would have kicked your f***ing ass.

Thank you. Thank you. And all over the world, people joined in that applause. She's amazing. Steve, did you have any idea what she was going to say before she said it? I did know a little bit of details. We talked about topics, and she said she wanted to use his questions against him, and we all had, you know, that same idea.

We thought about that, but she earned it. She needed that, and I was glad to give that to her, and that was her talking point. So that was the kind of collaboration we did. But I think when you see here, you have a glimpse of who Kaylee was as well. And when you hear my son, he was speaking as well. When you see the two kids, you see who these kids, who Kaylee was. And that was our best way of showing the world what had been stolen from us.

he was very average, but his victims were exceptional, and that's what we wanted to convey. That's what we were missing, and we wanted the world to know about that, like, what we're missing and what kind of a person she was. Mr. Gonzalez, right now, seemingly every headline is about B.K., Brian Coburger, what he's going through, what his complaints are, where he's housed. I'm so overhearing about Brian Fing Koberger. I want to talk about the victims. Victims all over the world are watching you and getting strength from you. I remember the moment that I turned into a crime victim.

The moment I knew I knew my fiancé had been murdered. I was standing at a pay phone, and I could talk, but I couldn't dial the numbers. My hand was like a moth trying to get to the light. I couldn't punch the numbers. I remember it exactly. When Mrs. Gonzalves did you know without a doubt

something horrible had happened it was a Sunday November 13th we were all here watching the football game

and my niece called me and she told me that something terrible had happened to Kaylee her cousin or her husband's cousin went to you of I

and something was going on and she believed that Kaylee was dead and I I threw my phone across the room, and I started calling Haley, and her phone was going straight to voicemail, so I started calling Maddie and nothing. So I called Olivia and got Olivia on the phone and told her what was going on, but we were still trying to stay calm, saying it's going to be okay. It's going to be something just as wrong. Well, as the hours went by and we called police stations and hospitals, and we got nothing, no information.

but we see her house on TV and it's cordoned off with yellow tape. I knew, I knew in my heart that something terrible had happened, but for sure when the sheriff showed up around five and came to the door and told us there was four homicides. Mrs. Gonzalez, what do you mean? Because I knew Keith was dead before they said he's dead. I knew. When you said you knew in your heart,

How did you know in your heart? And what was that feeling? How did you know? And I've heard many, many other violent crime victims say the same thing. They knew before they were told. Well, I knew just because of my niece calling me. You know, she's a very responsible adult. She's a mother.

She's a nurse. I knew that Sabrina would not have made that call to me had she not knew had facts. so I knew even though like we didn't have confirmation but I kept telling Olivia and the kids she's gone she's gone guys I don't you know we don't know what happened but you know and we're running around the house frantic I'm crying everybody's crying we're trying to get in touch with somebody to get answers and I kept saying the sheriff will come if it's true the sheriff will come and it was that evening and I looked out my front window and I saw the sheriff sheriff pull up. And I said, the sheriff's here. And I took off to my bedroom. I ran to my

bedroom and everybody answered the door. And I came back out about a minute later and stood here at the front door and asked them what happened, you know, and he said it was a homicide. And I said, they were murdered. And I asked if one of them was Maddie because at that time things started clicking that could possibly Maddie because she hadn't answered me all day long and they said yes and we said how and they said we can't we don't know here's a card called this person in the morning

and we're like should we go down there said no I said what are we supposed to do what do we do and he said just call in the morning I'm trying to, I feel like I'm seeing it all play out right in front of me right now. I remember I was holding this big stack of school books. I had just come out of a statistic exam. And I remember dumping, just dropping everything. And it was so unreal.

You said you ran out into the yard. Do you remember that moment? Where did you think you were going? What were you going to do? Well, I actually ran to my bedroom, and I just, as soon as I saw that sheriff pull up, I just, I was, I don't know, I don't know what it was. I didn't want to hear it. I was running away. I just ran back to that room and, you know, I just, I was crying and it just all hit me. Like, this is not a weird situation. This isn't, and, you know, Kaylee's gone. even though I know like I knew all day but I didn't know it was just hard to explain but in my heart I felt it and it was just the finality like this officer is here and he's here for a reason you know and it just it was your whole body hurts like everything just aches like your fingertips your your toes your knees you get shaky like that really happens like the shaking and the knees and it's it's real um And I think at that point, I went into shock. And I think that shock lasted for quite a while for me.

I don't remember a whole lot after that. I have pretty big gaps in my memory. Steve, do you remember her running to the bathroom and hiding when the L.A. law enforcement came up, the driveway? Yeah, I remember her running that way. Aubrey went up the steps, and she went on her computer, and she started. we just at first we thought it was just like a rumor some drama some fake thing i mean it's college town parties happen kids do pranks we we thought there was something else going on at least i did that's why we're like if the cop shows up then you know that's not a prank that's this is

something serious and uh even then i still couldn't fully understand what you know you don't know what death is if you unless you're been familiar with it and we weren't the spank and he hadn't been struck like that. So, yeah, we missed that door right there behind us and opened that up. And there's a sheriff there. I've never seen before in my life. And Cootney County Car. And thankfully, he gave us a little bit more information than we had had at that point.

And he cleared up the fact that it was a homicide. And Maddie was involved as well. And we knew Maddie's mom was on the way down there. So we were like, do we call? Do we let her know that, that, you know, they weren't going to, they already told us that we couldn't go down there and see them. We couldn't go down there and pick her up or anything like that. So, I mean, it's an ongoing investigation. So we just sat in the house and just thought of how ways to get a hold of people that had been around the children in the last 20, 48 hours and figure out what's going on.

Was this some random act of violence? Was this, what was this? Was it just shooting from a party? Was it the night before? Yeah, I just, you know. Yeah. We just said, no. People were saying it was fentanyl and, you know, all the active ones that would go around.

So, and, you know, they wouldn't even tell us any details. I mean, it was months before we actually knew how they were killed. So it was very frustrating. We got the vandal alert that told us that there was four homicides before we even knew what was going on. So they knew before we knew. Just trying to imagine everything that you're saying. And the officer gives you a card when you go, well, what do we do? He goes, well, just call them in the morning.

It's almost like a bank with bankers hours. You can get back to them in the morning. So what do you do all night long when you have this knowledge? And you can't go there. There's nothing you can do there. What did you do that night? I did not sleep at all that night. after what we were, you know, going through, I also called Olivia and she lives down in L.A.

And she threw her kids in the car and her husband jumped in the car and they drove up here. So they drove through the night. That was about five, six o'clock at night when they left L.A. It's a 20-hour drive. So, you know, I was worried about them driving all night, you know, as well. And I just couldn't sleep. And I just, my mind just, it went crazy. I went crazy.

Yeah, we knew that Kaylee had mentioned being stalked even right up until the weeks that this had came up to that. So I felt like we, I kind of wanted my family to be focused on something other than just the devastation. So I was like, you're finding out information, get a hold of a neighbor. And the more information that we found, it just felt like that was at least something to grab. something we could control, go away from just being victims to being investigators of what happened to our child. And we did find out a bunch of things that those 48 hours from people that were just reaching out and saying, hey, you know, this is what I know. I was right across the street. This is what's going on. You know, I don't like just went from there.

I remember what you said, Steve. Listen. Within hours. Within hours. We had your white car on a camera. We knew. We knew from the very beginning we had you. Police officers tell us, within minutes, they had your DNA, like a calling card. You were that careless, that foolish, that stupid. Master degree, you're a joke. Complete joke.

Nancy Grace. So at the very beginning, Steve and Christy, you were already focusing or trying to focus off the pain and focus on what happened and finding the truth. Yes, because Jack actually wound up coming here because he loved Moscow and he came here. And obviously he was there at the scene and stuff. So he had heard what Dylan was saying. So once he told us that, because like I said, the officer said that it was a homicide. They were murdered. But then Dylan was saying there was a masked man in our house.

And, you know, there was somebody in the tree and all this stuff. And it quickly was clear that this sounded like a stranger murder, you know, not like somebody they knew or whatnot. So it really changed things. It felt like a huge, I mean, just a huge violation. And we just were like, we've got a murder that. And at that time before, I just kind of thought they were going to get him. You know, it was some kid, he went and he shot up the house or something.

And they got him. You know, he's walking down the street. And I just kept waiting for the news to say they've wrested somebody. They've wrested somebody. And when Jack told us that, I was kind of like. Like, you know, this sounds a little different than what we're thinking type of murder. Well, I mean, you're right, because we were all led to believe Steve and Christy that, oh, they died in their sleep. That is not what happened at all, Steve.

You don't expect the prosecutor to lie to you, and we were lied to. All the parents were lied to. We weren't given the details. they're asking us to make a decision on life or death, and they're not even giving us the details of our own children, let alone the whole circumstance of what happened to them. I know for a fact that when one of the mothers heard what happened to Kaylee, she said this would have changed everything.

So it was disgusting, you know, and they kept saying stuff like crime of passion and a house or a party house, and we're like, what's going on here? I'm literally watching the surveillance of this road, and this car keeps flying around this house over and over again. and they were clearly stalked. I don't care with the prosecutor. Maybe he can't prove it because he can't,

he's just not that good, but they were clearly stalked. He was there multiple times. The officers were distracted with given minors in possessions when they really, when they're literally filming the house that these kids get murdered in. I mean, bad town has to clear up some priorities

and realize that, you know, noise complaints and alcohol is only a part of their job. And they need to make sure that they're, protecting these kids if they want to keep doing business i was stunned when i heard there was going to be a plea i remember the moment i'm like what a plea i want to circle back to something you said okay kelly and we heard dribbles about this at the beginning had stated that she was being stalked okay but then the prosecution says there was no stalking we have no evidence of stalking

I mean, how many times can we place that Elantra stalking the King Road address? And Keeley knew she was being stalked. So that is a lie. You stated the DA lied to you. I believe that. Because there is no way the parent, all the parents would have acted like they were going along with this plea. If they had known what we're learning now with all these videos and body cam and crime scene photos coming out.

That is not what everybody was told happened. Yeah, 13 incidents in WSU before this individual was let go or defunded, whatever that, whatever spin these universities want to put on it. This guy was a nightmare throwing up red flags everywhere. And those are the type of details that we got to, we got to force our courtrooms to be more honest and we shouldn't be sealing things up in a case like this. I mean, it's not national security. It's getting abused. They're abusing these rules that they say, oh, we got to protect. They didn't have anyone to protect. They didn't even have the guy until almost seven weeks,

and they were still hiding everything. So it was just a lie. And, you know, when you call them, what were they hiding? Just telling us our child was stabbed. Brutely, you know. How many times? how many times. We just learned the day of the, or the day before the sentencing, how many times Kaylee had been stabbed. Wait a minute. I am stunned because she was stabbed so many times. They could not identify her.

And you just learned about that when the plea was set to go down? We learned about it after the plea the day before the sentencing because they lifted the gag order. So the detectives said that they would talk to us. So we talked to them briefly, and we had questions about Kaylee. You know, how many times was she stabbed? I mean, that's not on her death certificate. The coroner never told us.

She just said around 20 is what she said. So we really didn't know and we didn't know where. So we asked them that and they told us. They told us 38 times. And then we were like, okay. and they said Kaylee had really bad damage to her mouth. And I asked them if her teeth were intact, and they told me no. And then the day of the sentencing, the docks were dropped, the Moscow docs were dropped,

and the next day we were driving home, and I was reading some of them. And I read that Kaylee was, they couldn't, yeah, unrecognizable. and that was a that word will forever like trauma traumatize me I didn't expect that and then to read another report that said the same thing unrecognizable and then to read a third report that said he wasn't sure what he was really looking at because the facial structure had been so badly damaged so that that's why we're disgusted with this prosecution team I mean I mean, we did not know any of that for two years and nine months. We did not know that because of the gag order. And they're telling us, are you okay with us giving them life in prison? We're like, no, we're not. And the people who are, they don't know what we know.

And we don't know what they know. I don't know what happened to their child. They don't know what happened to mine. It was a protective business over the victims, over justice. We're still fighting with it. I mean, we're still fighting with it to this day because we're hearing details that he was phone girls out to their car and one of the professors said this guy's going to be a problem. If he gets his PhD, he's going to harass students, he's going to freaking abuse his power.

All the things that we suspected that we're going on, we find this out afterwards. Why are they going to media tour? They only told us so they could go do a media tour and tell all you guys. So they're like, well, we have to tell them before we tell the world. So basically 12 hours earlier, they tell us and then they grab a microphone and tell the world. That's what happened. I'm just so stunned at how this was how this went down on you. And there's something about the victim's face because I know I'm projecting. Keith was shot five times in the neck, the face, the back. And I try not to think about.

about it because it throws me into a horrible depression because I think about the bullets tearing through his face and he had these beautiful blue eyes and I wonder were they shot what happened did he feel it what when you learned how many times she had been stabbed in the face were you full of rage were you you full of tears? What went through your mind when you learned the truth? Too late? So we actually learned all the truth from her autopsy report, and we were given her autopsy report on a thumb drive during the sentencing. The investigator walked into the courtroom that day and said, and we had arranged that, and he said, here's the autopsy report. So in reading

that autopsy report, we found out that Kaylee had been stabbed. 24 times to her face and head. She had 11 to her chest, neck, and, like, torso area, and three to her upper extremities. So I thought about her eyes, too. I was like, was her eyes stabbed? But somehow or another, Kaylee's eyes had not been stabbed. Kaylee did have really bad facial damage.

She or some of her teeth were missing. Several were broken. And she had two subdural hematomas to her head. So her nose was broken badly. Yeah. So that, for me it was outrage because my daughter was fighting up to her very last breath. over and over she kept trying to get out of that bed and he was just drilling her

and she's fighting for her last breath and I got this old Santa Claus who's just thrown out a white towel just saying oh let's just make it all go away and I want these type of killings to stop and you don't do that with weak prosecutors and this man is extremely bad at his job and just yesterday we asked AI

what are the safest countries in the world And out of the top 10, every single one of them have the death penalty. Well, eight of them have the capital. So for somebody to think that capital murder doesn't work, well, the safest countries in the world use it. And they don't use it like how we are in America. Yeah. It's just a bargaining chip. Yeah, Idaho has it.

But our guys have been there for a long time. And we knew this wasn't going to happen fast. But he was going to be on death row. It's the principle. He deserves to ultimately die. Now, maybe he's going to die of natural causes or just because he gets old in there. But we were hoping because they just brought back to the firing squad that here in Idaho things were going to pick back up and they were going to start, you know, executing these murderers and these criminals that are on death row. But we knew it wasn't going to be any time soon.

We didn't think they were just going to take him out back and shoot him. I mean, that would be great. But even if it was exactly how they told us they were just sleeping in their beds, they probably never even woke up and they were just stabbed to death. little package of bow on it. We still would have wanted the death penalty. You know, we still would. We wanted it from the very beginning as soon as we found out that they were... Is that what you were led to believe, Christy?

Because that's what I was led to believe, that they were attacked in their sleep and they were basically dead before they could even wake up. Yes. And then they went to those parents and said, this is what it is. Do you want to make a deal? I mean, that's what it is. No, they didn't know. No, she was punched.

Her face was crushed in or teeth are knocked out. They didn't give those details because they knew it was. would be enraging, and then they would have a problem. So the truth was a problem. Truth was a problem for the prosecutor, and I don't like it. I don't like it one bit. You stated that you are still fighting about it. Number one, God bless you and give you strength, because you're going to need it for the

rest of your life. You were going to be scrutinized. You were going to be followed. You were going to be photographed. Everything you say is going to be. be parsed and analyzed and attacked but you said you're still fighting how trying to get we're still trying to get them to release documentation they told us that when as soon as we were out of court they were going to give us all of the discovery just two days ago they sent us an email and said no

that we have to go through it as the the freedom of information and we are in a meeting with you are kidding me they're making you file a FOIA request for the documents yeah yeah these people don't do a good job because we kept saying where is our because they told us they would give it to us they said they will give you all a discovery and chanin said they're not going to have to go dig for it and get in line with everybody else and they said no no no no no we'll give it to them and we keep on asking and then two days ago we on an email and said you're just going to here's the links you need to get on here and you need to file these uh forms and these requests and there you know which which i did and then uh it came back and said we can't find any records on kaley and i was like all right guys

tell me what department the FBI has like let's just say over 10 and it's probably closer to 20 and I didn't know what department I went for criminology justice I believe is where I did for you and they said this is the wrong department so I went back to them and said can you at least tell me what department I'm getting a freedom of information act on and they're like uh we don't have anyone to even talk to to know so they don't even know and I'm like you guys are clowns You guys are clowns. You should be embarrassed to be this bad at your job. And I'll hold you accountable.

And I think every family, when you lose your child, you have to expect the most. When you're talking about life and death, you have to take charge in the situation. They're going to be a time for you to struggle and be a victim. But if you can rally up and then go into that system and demand justice, demand that your child is treated as fair as possible. and uh you'll feel better when it's all said done you know it's never going to bring them back and i literally had a judge scream at me you're not we're not going to bring her back and i was like i don't that's not what this is about this is about you guys doing everything by the book this is

the judge told you you're not going to bring her back yeah yeah yelling at me telling me he didn't want me to talk to the media anymore and i said well that's that's not going to happen i'm going to talk to the media every single time i want he basically said well then we'll never have a trial yeah he he uh in a closed hearing I can't believe a judge told you how you're supposed to behave and you can't bring her back. That is not appropriate for a judge to tell a grieving parent, you can't bring her back. Let's just let it go. It's not going to bring her back.

It's not about bringing her back. It is about justice. Yeah, he actually said he was talking. We all were in the courtroom or on Zoom, all the families. And he actually said, and the Gonzalez family, especially the dad needs to shut his mouth. And he said, I don't agree with that. And he said, I don't care if you don't agree with that. And Steve said, well, I mean, you know, me, I'm fighting for justice for my daughter.

And he says, do you think that you're going to bring her back doing this all? Talking to the media is going to bring her back? And Steve goes, no, I mean, I know that that's not going to bring her back. but you know I still have that's what you have a whole people you know the whole people accountable how in the hell does he get off saying it's not going to bring her back to you

who have lost your precious pearl and he is telling you to speak or not speak I mean I still had a son at that college there was another victim sister that went to WSU we had a we had lives still on the line making sure that that place was was

protected. And when we're sitting there saying, hey, we need to know the facts. We need to know where they stock. What's going? We have kids still going to school here. And they're just like, no, you don't have the right to know anything. And it was, yeah. Yeah. Did you say the other parents were duped? You think the other parents were duped? They didn't understand the facts when they agree to that plea. So the plea, they set up a meeting with us via Zoom, our whole family on a Friday afternoon. It was like an hour and a half long. And we talked about logistics of trial because it was coming up. Security where we're going to park. How we were going to have to phone in every day and tell them who's coming and yada, yada, yada. Our car had already been vandalized in their

parking lot. From a previous here. Ada County. So we're like, how do we make sure this doesn't happen anymore, guys? And ironically, that day that we went to court, there was a bunch of Pro Burgers on the other side, sitting behind Brian doing this and on the camera and or with vandalized. We're like, so, um, speaking of the Pro Burgers, you know what happened in my hand. All of Coburgers complaints. I know it's kind of irrelevant. All that matters is Kelly is gone and her friends are gone and he murdered them.

And we're, we're paying for his three hots and a coffee. That's what matters. And is there any way under God's son that it can be fixed? But I find it ironic that he is filing complaints, that he is being threatened sex harassment through the air vent. Like he was the one looking up online, attacking and raping women in their sleep when they were drugged, when they were passed out, when they were comment. that's his fantasy. That's why he broke in that night when he assumed the girls would be asleep. He's whining that mommy, they're threatening me through the air vent. And there he's actually, I love this one, that he's complaining about the food on his tray

and his nutritional value of his food. You didn't get his banana. And he refers to bringing the food like a butler the service just hasn't been that hasn't been that good he's going to get all worse he's the property of idaho now and it's going to get worse i guarantee you that i like you said i think it's very ironic i'm like um you know for him to get there and so quickly start complaining and even thrown out other inmates names and c o names it's like you're in prison i mean do you like this is not his foretay I mean, his forte is to kill, but not to be killed. You know, his forte is to, you know, possibly, I mean, he didn't rape any of our kids,

but possibly rape, but not get raped. I mean, you know, what's good for the goose is not good for the gander here, you know. And I think it's just so ironic that he is complaining with written complaints and saying this inmate so-and-so-so is doing this to me and saying this to me and this. and he expects them to come and save him. Yeah, yeah. Well, they've been babying him, and we baby our prisoners. And when you become the property of a state, you should lose your constitutional rights.

You shouldn't have all these rights as if you are a tax-paying citizen doing your best job going to work every single day. We've got to fix some of these things. And we have been talking to legislators. You're asking about things that we've done. We're not going to take this lightly. We're going to do everything from a victim's perspective. We've become advocates and witnesses for our kids. And we're trying to change it.

And I think you guys can see that. That went all the way down to, you know, my daughter in the courtroom going after him and letting them know that we're not just going to be victims that you can keep down and keep trying to hurt, you know. I do also think that they really up the ante, taking him to prison, which what we were hopeful for because I think that Laetal County jail was a cakewalk. It's a joke. And then, and then Ada maybe got a little tighter.

It was hurdle Mayberry. It was Herdle Mayberry. I couldn't believe it. This guy's going to have a tablet. He can watch movies. He can communicate with the outside world. I guarantee you just give it a minute until people think this has died down. He is going to zoom at some symposium.

He's going to be, have this weird cult following, like you mentioned, the pro burghers. He can write a book. There's no son of Sam laws in Idaho. I don't believe. He can even get married. I mean, it's trying to transfer. I feel like running out the street screaming. I think I just read somewhere the other day, which I know I did that.

Does one of the menendez brothers have a child? Yes. He has a daughter. He had children. And even Yorne Vandersloot. You know, Yorne Van der Sloot that murdered two young girls? Murdered Natalie Holloway and Stephanie Tassiana Flores under similar circumstances. His judge daddy protected him.

He's had not one but two babies behind bars. He drinks. He does drugs. He smokes. He gambles. It's like insane. But again, screw them and the horse they rode in on. I want to talk about what, if anything, can be done now.

Starting with, do you believe the other families were due? if they had known the truth, would they have gone along with the plea? I can't say 100% and but the thing is, um, I don't want to speak on behalf of them by any means, but I, I don't think that the other families necessarily wanted the truth. They didn't want to be lied to, but they didn't want details. Yeah. And we did. We weren't just like, okay, she was stabbed to death around 20.

We're like, how many? You know, where? and because I do talk to Maddie's mom and Maddie's mom is like please please please I don't you know so I don't say anything to her when I speak to her about you know what happened she's like I don't read that stuff I don't watch it our thing is we have kids you know we have two

that are older we have two that are younger and you can't tell them to stay off social media for the rest of their lives and I don't want one of them open up TikTok and seeing crimsy photos of their sister or body cam so we're like we're trying to stay one ahead and as a mother even if i didn't have children i would still as much as it has traumatized me i would still want to know what happened i want i want to know what happened from top to bottom christie isn't it true you basically got an email saying hey we got a deal

yes on a sunday sunday afternoon they sent it at 453 p.m we happened to be see what happened to be checking his email a little later around six or so and he said what and we lost our minds we immediately emailed them and said we need to talk like now like what has this been sent yet um have you offered it yet what is going on they sent us an email the next morning and said we can meet at three today and we said you didn't answer has this been sent already and they said yes it was sent yesterday evening to the uh defense and um so we met with them that three that day on Monday and the plea had already been accepted. And we lost our minds. We were in that meet. I mean, we were screaming. We were cussing. We were yelling. We were saying,

why did you do this? How did you do this? You know, what happened? You just talked to us on Friday and told us that, you know, you had every anticipation of taking this all the way. We talked about court. I mean, we talked about a plea deal for like a, like a second, and he just said, oh, I think that they might be wanting one, but we have no reason to give them one. You know, why would we? And we're like, yeah, right? Why would we?

And he said, well, how do you guys feel about a plea deal? And we're like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Boom, moved on. Yeah, he accepted the plea deal within the same hour that he got it. This man never wanted to fight for our children. Literally, I mean it. They fought for their lives, for their very last breath. and this man had no fighting it.

They fought hard all the way to the end, and he gave up within an hour of being given an opportunity to quit on these kids. And that's the kind of prosecutor that you got to get. You got to get them out. You got to get real prosecutors. And Idaho, we got some jobs to do. We got some work to do there. Yeah.

You have to have a prosecutor that if you're in death penalty state, we'll use in capital punishment. Yeah, it's not your will. It's the victim's will. If they don't want it, then fine. but we had four people and and bill thompson has never talked to us since that phone that zoom meeting that we had and we were just like oh my gosh i can't believe that you did that you wait a minute he's never talked to you since he's been all over the media but he hasn't talked to

you nope nope no when we did get a briefing it was from the investigator uh the two investigators and and ashley jennings so the deputy but bill tom because i mean we were we were going after him I mean, our whole family was in different windows, and we were all just coming at him. We were just like, Bill, like, how could you do this? So this guy did not have the balls to talk to you after the deal, because he knew he had done the wrong thing. Yeah. I said, did you at least get some details? Did you at least find out about the kill kit, the knife, anything?

You go, Steve, we'll never get those details. You're never going to get those details. It's not important. He's just going to lie to us. And I said, you are. absolute idiot. You have no idea who this person is. He is going to write a book, and I'm going to learn about the sickest details through his prophet book, through its sister, or through some professor, whatever way he does it, I'm going to hear about him, and you're an idiot for not

even knowing who you're dealing with. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. What do you believe Coburger's motive? was. Not that the state needs to prove it. I don't know why they kept talking about we can't prove motive. It doesn't matter. He don't have to prove motive in a murder case. But what do you believe was his motive? I think that he had been watching either Kaylee or Maddie and I don't think the others were involved. And that's why he went straight up to that room. That house is so confusing. It's just a they're just a build on from hell. They just built on.

and built on and built on throughout the years. So it is a very confusing floor plan. And we know that he went in there very quickly. He wasn't, you know, he went in and he went out. And he may have tried to walk into Kaylee's room first. We don't know. And Kaylee's bed was empty. So he's like, I'm going into Zanas or Maddies.

And maybe he went into Maddies and then got mad because Kaylee woke up and was like, oh, there's two in here. But I think it was some sort of an obsession. some sick, twisted, you know, stalking. Maybe he hated one of them. Maybe it was both. I think it was hate.

There was no blood on Kaylee's door. So that would lead us to believe he went there first, opened the door, seeing the dog or seen something, and then said, okay, there's nobody here. Then I'm thinking he went to Maddie's room. And you don't see blood on that door, but the other door downstairs, they do see blood on it. So I think that was, we're just going through this reverse engineering it.

We've talked to detectives and things like that now. And we believe that that explains who he was going for. And he definitely stopped them. He's stopped multiple girls on that hillside. He's a copycat killer. And he just was really poor at it. And, I mean, you can look at his handwriting. He might be a PhD student in Pennsylvania, but he would have had.

way harder time out here. I mean, he looked like a little kid, like a little fifth grader, right in that paper. So I can't believe that that's... Guys, why do you think everybody is attacking Dylan and Bethany, acting like they did something wrong or even part of the murders? It's insane. I hate it. We absolutely hate it.

And it just, I fear, and these girls are so young and for them to have to deal with this forever. ever and I mean I'm not going to say that the events that occurred that night were strange do we think they were involved in any way no could they have saved the kids if they were to call 911 right then and there no but I mean but you you you know when you go into fear you go into that fight or fight mode and maybe that was they they they flew you know and they cut them together um it is very clear you know it's interesting About what you said, when you were talking about, you saw LA law enforcement come up in your driver, you ran to the bedroom.

Mm-hmm. That, I mean, it's hard to explain in the heat of the moment, the fog of war, why anybody does anything that they do. Why did I throw all my books down? I don't know why I did that. Why did you run to the bedroom? I don't know. Why does anybody do anything? And attacking those girls is just like more victim.

organization. Another thing, I know you've got to go. I find it really interesting that Washington State had this long history of his anti-woman misogynist stalking behavior and did nothing. That's really interesting. If he had been thrown out, he wouldn't have even been there. Exactly. Yep. He should have been thrown out before I ever killed these kids. That's the truth. If they should have set a standard and said, look, we don't put up with this in our university. You cross the line. You're done.

It's not even our decision. It's just your behavior. We're holding you accountable. You should behave like this. That's the expectations in Washington State University. And you either do it or you don't. I mean, he had 13 in the first semester. The first one came in August.

That's the first month that you come to school. And then 12 after. and November had a huge Thanksgiving break and then he didn't even go the whole month of December he took off like December 9th or 10th and there's 13 formal complaints what were they doing? Following them, stalking them?

Just being, would kind of act aggressive and stand in doorways from what we've read and the girls would have to like walk past them and like, uh-huh, yeah. Guys should have been punched in the face. He was a creep. man, he's a disgusting creep, the kind of guy. We even heard about it from the Seven Sirens Bar where those girls put a little note and say, hey, if you get this credit card, watch out for this guy.

I mean, he's been doing this his whole life. And we didn't stand up to him. We need to start standing up to these type of bullies. And, you know, hopefully Idaho will get it right. Hopefully those prisoners in there, they'll do the real justice. They'll act like real men in there and they'll handle it the way that it should be handled in the first place. Is there any way in your mind?

that this plea can be reversed or any way that the feds may seek the federal death penalty. We've heard that and we've seen that. A lot of people have reached out to us and said that, you know, this can happen. But we don't understand why it wasn't federal in the first place. I mean, he crossed state lines to kill. We drove from Washington to Idaho. We never understood why it wasn't a federal case in the first place. But I think they're just like.

um it's don i've got another question because a lot of crime victims are watching you right now do you ever feel kelly's presence with you i do i i do um not as much as i would like um but once in a great while i do and it's funny because uh you know like you're outside and a little ladybug will you know a ladybug will land on you and you're like oh you know it's and then you're like ladybug you know so lady bugs really get me because it's not that common that a ladybug will land on you um but uh kely was a bug she was our bug um she bug her bug and we all just recently got ladybug tattoos but uh lady bugs are very special and i feel like you know and then here's another thing is Kaylee was uh she loved Stitch when she was little when she was born Stitch just came out

the cartoon Stitch the Disney and so we bought her everything Stitch, Stitch, Stitch, Stitch, Stitch. And it's very ironic that since Kaylee passed away, Stitch has been kind of brought back. They've done a new movie with Stitcher. There's stitch stuff everywhere. So we'll be in the store of this and that and we'll be like, do, do, do, do. And you'll see the most

ironic little stitch figure or stitched stuffed animal in this whole mess of other stuffed animals or something, in this little stitch face. And we'll be like, oh my gosh, it's Kaylee. It's Kaylee. You know, just in the strangest places, you'll find a stitch.

small or big or big one or something and it's just like Kaylee so stitching lady bugs guys how do you speak with a straight face how do you keep being so strong I'm looking at Steve Gonzalez and his face is like granite how do you stay so strong because it's so important and I love our country I love the state of Idaho I want things to get better I don't want these kind of sickos to prosper and for us to win we need real leaders we need real men and real strong women who can stand up to these people i'm making them i'm raising them i got some of the strongest girls in the freaking world and he killed one of them hold them accountable i feel like we got a job to do and um i think if if parents get a little more proactive and be a little bit more vocal towards that prosecution

they can force the media to help hold them accountable. And I really believe that the government works for us. I believe that government is servitude. You go into serve. You don't go in there for your own opinion. You might not believe in the death penalty. We don't care. It's the victims and their families.

That's what you should be negotiating for. You're proxying their will through into the courtroom. And I think the court's lost that. And we're going to try to bring that back. I mean, there's a reason why we took our daughter to Texas. She had a full scholarship. We said, you're going to Texas because they honor their victims. They do everything in their power.

Florida is another one. Not that we're going to have another victim. No, no. Not happening. I don't know if you know this. And these are not just empty words, but I want you to know from the beginning, the very beginning, you are the focus of so many prayers for you,

for your children, for Kelly, not just for what you have endured, but what you will endure. And I want to thank you so much for being with us. Thank you. Thank you to your audience. Thank you. Nancy Grace signing off.

Goodbye, friend. This is an I-Heart podcast. Thank you.