Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - We Are Live, Late Night @ Murder House: Idaho Student Murders

Episode Date: January 11, 2023

Nancy Grace travels to Idaho, to the home where students Ethan Chapin, 20; Madison Mogen, 21; Xana Kernodle, 20; and Kaylee Goncalves, 21, were killed. Listen as Nancy describes for you the places in Moscow important to this investigation and the eerie atmosphere surrounding the neighborhood and the murder house.  As investigators gather the details of this case, the search for the murder weapon continues.  Joining Nancy Grace today Sheryl McCollum - Forensic Expert, Founder: Cold Case Investigative Research Institute in Atlanta, GA; Twitter:@ColdCaseTips; Host of 'Zone 7' Podcast  Chris McDonough - Director At the Cold Case Foundation, Former Homicide Detective, coldcasefoundation.org, Host of YouTube Show, 'The Interview Room' Dr. Angela Arnold- Psychiatrist, Atlanta GA; Expert in the Treatment of Pregnant/Postpartum Women, Former Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Obstetrics and Gynecology: Emory University, Former Medical Director of The Psychiatric Ob-Gyn Clinic at Grady Memorial Hospital,  Josh Fiallo - Breaking News Reporter for The Daily Beast; Twitter: @ByJoshFiallo See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Hi guys, we are here in Idaho, camped out right in front of the murder scene. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. I want to thank you for being with us here at Fox Nation and Sirius XM 111. We specifically wanted to come here at night to see what the killer saw. And I've just got to tell you, I'm completely blown away. It's so different than anything you see in the photos or the murder scene, behind the murder house. And I took a video on my phone. And Jackie, could you play the video?

I just took a few moments ago. I'm here behind the murder scene right now. And you can see straight into the girl's place this is the parking lot we've been hearing about right behind their home I mean it's right here it's a lot a lot tighter and a lot smaller than you think and just looking up here i feel like you can see straight into their home these girls never had a chance against a predator they really did not guys again thanks for being with us i want to go straight out to a special guest joining us joining me is chris mcdon, director of the Cold Case Foundation. I found him on the

interview room on YouTube. Chris, it's exactly like you were trying to tell me. I mean, this guy would have to know exactly where he was going. And the driving here is really tight. I'm surprised people don't wreck just trying to pass each other going two different ways. The driveway up past the murder scene and circling around the murder scene to the back parking lot that I'm talking about, it's very hard to imagine two big SUVs passing each other. The streets are very narrow. There's snow banks all around us. The pavement is slick with frozen ice. But the thing is, Chris McDonough, you can look straight into their bedrooms. You can see everything. uh you know as we've been discussing on your your show for weeks now this to to think about

the 12 times uh his alleged phone was going off in that environment and then kind of process a process that with what is he doing i mean there's got to be a fantasy process going on here, a voyeurism of some point. I mean, it's that close, isn't it? Yeah, it really is. And I thought that there was a copse of trees right behind their home. Well, it's not really that much. I would say there's maybe seven or eight spindly trees. I mean, that is no impediment whatsoever to a predator trying to look at the girls in that home. We have been out walking the streets of Moscow today, and we went to the Mad Greek. When we first walked up, I wouldn't say it was a somber atmosphere, but it was really quiet and low-key, almost peaceful. And when we walked up, there is a, let me just say, a remembrance of the four victims out front with candles and people are adding flowers. And inside, I just sat there and listened to the music they were playing and took it

all in. And I could just see the girls working there. I saw their co-workers. And I wonder how much their murders have torn the fabric of this community. Also joining me is Cheryl McCollum, founder and director of the Cold Case Research Institute and star of Zone 7, a new hit podcast. Cheryl, it's very eerie actually walking around this college town. Everybody's so peaceful and friendly. And to imagine that is the backdrop for just incredible violence right behind me.

I mean, Cheryl, you must have seen the video of the cleaners taking out bloody mattresses right behind me. Yes. And I've seen your videos today. And Nancy, what is so important about what you are doing? Nothing takes the place of boots on the ground. And when you were a prosecutor, that was one of the things you were the best at. You would meet us on scene. You would talk to us about this is the crime scene. But what's just over the other side in those trees what's to the left and to the right and behind it and what you're able to determine where was his watch area

and that's something you and I talked about week one he watched he studied he stalked and now you're tracing his steps and that is powerful well I keep looking off to the side, and right here is the incline leading up to the back of the house. And what's so, how can I say this, probative about what I'm seeing is when you go to the front of the house, you could be spotted. But when you start walking up this incline to my right, nobody can see you. We've been walking up and down in the dark, and there are apartments all around us. I guarantee you nobody noticed us. Nobody could see us. It's not lit up at all.

There are no streetlights up there. And behind them, it's like a predator's dream platform. You know, to Dr. Angela Arnold joining me, she is a renowned psychiatrist joining us out of the Atlanta jurisdiction at AngelaArnoldMD.com Angie, I couldn't help when I was up there

on that parking lot right behind this home. I thought about a deer stand. I'm not a hunter, but I've seen a lot of deer stands growing up in the country. It's the perfect vantage point to look down on an innocent prey that has no idea you're there. I mean, you can watch them from a deer stand as long as you want, and they'll have no idea. And that's all I can think about up there in that parking lot.

And he did it at least 12 times, Nancy. I mean, he was stalking these girls. It's so creepy and so scary for all young girls going to college everywhere, if you ask me. Well, the mind of a predator that would go up there and stare at them, and I'm glad you said at least 12 times. I caught that in the PC probable cause warrant affidavit at least 12 times. And this is really interesting. And everybody jump in when you have a thought. Cheryl, you know, at the very get-go, I said, listen, this is going to be an exhaustive task. It will take meticulous working.

But what they really need to do is a cell tower data dump, which means you get all of the cells that are around the area, hold on, my papers are flying away, within a certain couple of hours. And I now found out, I now find out they did that, but they didn't see Koberger's phone. And now we know it's because he turned his phone off when he was leaving his home, his apartment in Pullman. And that has been verified by the cell phone records. So he had this thing planned down to a T. He did, but Nancy, that's

going to come back to bite him because you and I always talk about patterns, patterns, patterns. How often did he shut his phone off or put it on airplane mode i bet not very often so why that night during that time frame that's a bad look all day for him yeah i've been thinking about a lot of other defendants that turn their phone on airplane mode just coincidentally at the time of the murder and we're seeing that more and more and more. Now, is that Chris McDonough or is that our friend Josh Fiallo jumping in? Yeah, that's Chris, Nancy. Go ahead, Chris.

And to think, is it possible that his intent was to methodically monitor these poor victims? I wouldn't be surprised if he took notes. Yeah, exactly. I would not be surprised if Brian Koberger took notes, sat up there in his car or on foot, and took notes about this one goes to sleep at this time and this one turns off the light at this time. He probably watched them changing clothes, making out with their boyfriends, cooking dinner. I mean, I just wish you guys could be here and see what I'm seeing right behind me.

I look straight in their windows. It's very voyeuristic, but it's a crime scene. I feel very odd about looking in their windows, even at a distance. A Fox Nation exclusive. An international pop star stripped of human rights. How does that happen? Easier than you think. Join us for a deep dive into Britney Spears' conservatorship.

Trapped, streaming now on Fox Nation. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace It looks like across the street I'm looking right at the Sigma Chi House. It's still lit up for Christmas. And it looks like they're having a lawn party, which means they drag all the sofas out onto the front yard and drink and party. I just, it's like life is just going on. And this crime scene is right in the middle of it all. Now, joining me, guys, is a new guest, our new friend, Josh Fialo. He is a breaking news reporter at the Daily Beast, and he has been investigating

Koberger's background. What, if anything, Josh, have you learned? Yeah, we've learned a lot by talking to people who are close to Koberger at different phases in his life. And what I can tell you, it seems he really took on his current personality during his senior year of high school in Pennsylvania. Now, two of his friends back home told us that he was overweight and really down to earth in his first few years of high school. But then once senior year came around around he really thinned out and then his personality went over the summer josh yeah i guess so i guess he was you know he was overweight and kind of this weird kid the first three years and then senior year came hey josh you know what else i read i read that because he was overweight that people would bully him and don't get tuned up dr

angela arnold that somehow that excuses crimes in the future because you were bullied as a teen in high school don't even because i know where you're going to come from so i heard that josh that he would be bullied about his weight and then over the summer leading into his senior year he got thin as a rail rail. R-A-I-L was the quote I read. Yes, ma'am, he did. He was thin as a rail when he came back, and it wasn't only his weight that was different, it was his entire personality.

His friends told us that he now, you know, started taking boxing classes, and now he was kind of the bully, not just with strangers, but even within his own friend group. And he would talk down to people, including his friends and saying that they weren't intelligent enough to be his friend. And he would basically

push his friends to shun him from the friend group because he had just became a completely different person from his senior year. Josh, guys, Josh Fialo is joining us from the Daily Beast. You know, Dr. Angie, what do you think of that? The bullied turns into the bully. Nancy, wasn't there also a history of some heroin abuse in him? Yeah, I've read that. I don't know how much stock to put in it. But I have read that he got on heroin in high school. And then he got off of heroin in a quick turnaround.

And I find that hard to believe that you can just stop cold turkey. Well, you can't really. Yeah. Because, Nancy, people that have some mental illness will turn to drugs. Heroin specifically will help you decrease your anxiety. Okay. drugs heroin specifically will help you decrease your anxiety okay you know i know i'm out here freezing my rear end off and moscow in front of this house but i can cut your mic even from here so don't start up about mental illness the man is getting a phd in criminal studies they asked

in point blank in court do you understand what's going on do you have any mental incapacity he's like i'm fine i understand so you said mental illness you said mental illness being a bully it's not oh dear lord in heaven guys can you look over there look i can see right in that guys i can see what he's cooking for dinner that That's how close all of this is. I mean, I'm just thinking of him, Dr. Angela, looking right into these girls' kitchen and seeing everything they were doing, keeping notes about what time they would come home and this will be in bed by this time. Although I'm starting to wonder. Go ahead. Go ahead.

You know, worse than that too, Nancy. I mean, he wasn't just taking notes. He may have every time he did that, he was getting off on that somehow. Just the voyeurism was bringing him some sort of pleasure. Okay. It was stimulating him. Okay. I believe he is a psychopath. psychopath okay that's a far cry from

what you said mental illness but i want to get back to what we are seeing here and what is happening right now there are guards outside the house and we just saw them change shifts the house is still being protected going back to what josh fiala was saying from the daily beast about his personality jackie we learned a little bit more about his past specifically from a woman that claims she met him on a dating app let's start with um c c is in cat jackie um we matched on tinder um we talked for a couple hours and then he was like hey you want to go to the movies with me tonight and i was like sure so um we went to the movies um honestly i don't even remember what movie we saw um we ended up going back to my dorm um and he kind of invited himself inside I thought he was just gonna drop me off but that was not the case he kind of invited himself inside and I was just

like okay I went along with it um so he wanted to watch another movie on Netflix and I said sure um you can try to touch me um not like inappropriately just like trying to tickle me and like rub my shoulders and stuff and I was like why are you touching me or what are you doing and he would just like get super serious and he's like I'm not and I'm like you are though and he's like I'm not touching you kind of like trying to gaslight me into thinking that he didn't touch me, which was weird. But then I was like, I'm just going to run to the bathroom quick. And he was like, okay. And then he followed me to the bathroom, which I thought was kind of weird.

And I believe, Jackie, he mentioned something about she had breeder's hips. Could you play that part? Like, in the dorm, there was, like, a shared bathroom. He didn't go in with me, but, like, he stood outside the door and, like, I don't know. I just thought that was weird. And I was like, I need to get this dude to leave. Like, just not into it um so i proceeded to pretend to throw up um to get him to leave um it wasn't because i was scared of him or like thought

he would hurt me if i asked him to leave it was just mostly because I'm socially awkward. Didn't know how to ask him to leave. So, but I did. He ended up messaging me on Tinder that he was going to go and I was like, awesome. My plan worked. And then about an hour later, he texted me and said I had good birthing hips. So, I never talked to him. Okay, Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Research Institute and star of Zone 7. That's pretty bad when the girl has to go in the bathroom and pretend to throw up to get the guy to leave. I mean, something was telling her to get away from this guy. Yeah, it's that gut feeling. It's that, you know, the hair on the back of your neck stands

up kind of feeling. She can say she wasn't afraid, but she certainly wanted him out of there to the point that she was going to pretend to be physically sick. So, I mean, I'm glad she listened to her gut because again, this guy shows persistence. He's not going to give up. Even when you basically throw him out, he's going to take you back and say something like you've got you know good birth and hips so again you know it kind of shows where he sees women and how he thinks of them I guess but you know Nancy again I want to go back to where you are and how crucial it is that you are there because people are saying he had no connection to these people. He never crossed paths with them. And I want to be very clear. There is no way

the families or the family attorney can know that yet. They could have crossed paths, not electronically. He could have found a way to go into the restaurant or to force them to meet and make it look like it was, you know, happenstance. But you know from being there, there's one way in and one way out. You don't just happen upon the 1122 King Road. No, you don't. Once you're in these tight little streets and once you go up that hill, you should have seen our producer trying to back out of that a few moments ago on the ice. You know, when I was sitting in the Mad Greek today, I was actually looking at the menu and they had something called, Sydney, wasn't it? Kiera's Amazing Vegan pizza, something like that. I would bet you anything

because, you know, he was a very staunch vegan. He was, you know, crazy about it. I could just see him sitting there. It was a very chill, laid-back place. It was not what I thought it was going to be like, a loud and boisterous pizza parlor. It wasn't like that at all. It was actually almost serene in there. They had music playing gently. Everybody was very low key. I could just see him in one of those booths having his vegan pizza and checking out the two victims that worked there maybe even following them home it's not that far at all from the scene back to josh fialo josh again thanks for being with us

what more did you learn about his background yeah so kind of going back to that that tiktok video so that would have been shortly after he graduated high school right that's whenever he was in community college studying i believe it was psychology. So, you know, we didn't learn a lot about that from that period and our own reporting. So it's interesting that that TikTok video kind of shines some light on who he was at that point in his life. I mean, think about it, Josh. The woman had to go to the bathroom and pretend to puke to get him to leave. And then she stayed in there until he finally just

left on his own and he he texted her i think that he was leaving that's bad can we talk about that nancy for a second yeah go ahead chris so uh you know to your point a minute ago and to cheryl it's just a dovetail into that think about him as know, ego driven because everything is done in the dark with this guy. And he, this guy, thank goodness that young woman followed her gut to Cheryl's point. And that should be a lesson to all young women today that you're not wrong. You're never wrong. Follow that gut because this guy sits back and he was enjoying striking the fear in that young lady. That goes towards his personality that I'm sure the doctor could get into and break down. But I didn't mean to interrupt Josh. I apologize, but that was my point on that.

Josh, feel free to interrupt him whenever you feel like it. So Josh Fiala, what else did you learn? Real quick on that point, how, you know, she just saw right away after just one date, like how she saw the red flags, right? She knew she needed to get out of there in the middle of the first date. And I found it telling that, you know, all these years later, um, she said today, the moment she saw his mugshot, she recognized him right away. I mean, how many people do you, you know, recognize immediately who you saw one time

years ago? Um, he obviously left an impression on her, um, which is kind of a scary thought. That kind of goes back to we see that stare in his eyes, even in the clips that we've seen since his arrest. And, you know, people in his past have commented on that. Oh, hey, hey, Josh, I want to talk to you about what you just said. You said we've seen pictures and clips of him. When you look into his eyes. I've got to tell you, just before we went to air, I pulled up a picture of him,

and he was looking at the camera, and I went, look at his eyes, that look. There's just something. You're not the only one that noticed it, Josh. Go ahead. Yeah, and it's not just you and I. It's been other people we've talked to from throughout his life. Whenever he was in grad school in Pennsylvania, people commented in interviews to us that he always has had this stare, and we see it even to this day. And just going back to a little bit that we've learned about him is he obviously thought that he was the master criminal who could, if he was the one who did this crime, as cops believe, and it seems more and more apparent each day, that he

thought he could do this perfect crime and get away with it. And he studied criminology, you know, he was studying under professors who written books about the psychology of a killer. He thought he could get away with this. And, you know, he was, we learned from his classmates at Washington State, where he was in the PhD program, that he was always talkative in class. And he was, just like everybody has said, he was a really smart guy. But when it came time to talk about the Idaho murders, you know, the murders in Moscow, Idaho, right down the road, this suddenly talkative, really bright guy in class, you know, started to become quiet. He didn't want to talk about that in person. And I found that really interesting and telling.

You know, another thing, I want to go back to the shoe print. And that's where you're going to come in again, Cheryl. But to Dr. Angie joining us, I read a lot about people that knew him, what they had to say. I was reading the comments of his downstairs neighbor, one of them. And the neighbor said that he would often come up and try to create conversations. And he would become very loquacious, very gregarious. To the point, the friend, I guess you could call him the neighbor, would think it was going to be late where he was going. So he started avoiding Koberger.

And they kept trying to get together. And I'm hearing more and more that people just innately just avoided him. You know, Nancy, psychopaths are very empty inside, okay? And so that means that they're always trying to excite themselves or stimulate themselves. And they can be okay socially, but this guy was going out of his way to make conversation with people because he doesn't he lacks good boundaries that's the same reason he was trying to touch this girl that he went on this tender date with he lacks all kinds of boundaries he's trying to fit in in society but he knows deep down inside of himself that he does not fit in. And so that's why the loquacious talking to other people and trying to engage them and asking them to go have coffee with him and whatnot.

He's trying very hard to be like other people, but people find his actions weird because he is weird. He really doesn't have that sense that normal people do of how to interact on a normal basis. Jackie, could you get our cut 256 ready? It's Brian Flores from Fox 13. But I want to lead up to Cheryl McCollum. Cheryl, joining me from the Cold Case Research Institute. Cheryl, the shoe print. I've been studying the shoe print a lot, and of course,

we need to know more about it before I can be 100% sure, but it seems to me that the shoe print corroborates or confirms what DM, one of the two roommates that lived stated, we believe it is a van sneaker, sheet print, because of the diamond print on the bottom of it. Now, Koberger was seen entering and leaving court one day in a pair of vans. I don't see how those could be the same ones, but don't you know they tore his apartment up looking for those sneakers because you know there'd be blood on them if he kept them but um i'm just thinking about what we can learn we don't know if the shoe print was bloody in fact but i don't really see how it could be anything else but blood for them to have noticed it. Well, there's a couple of things.

The footprint is near the home. The critical thing is. It's in the home. It is in the home. But the direction that it's heading. And that's what verifies what she said, the direction he was going. Same thing. So now you have a shoe that he obviously liked that type of shoe.

It wasn't an Air Jordan. Wasn't a work boot. Wasn't a flip-flop. So if he's got more than one pair of those type of shoes, but if I'm the crime scene investigator and I cannot find a bloody pair of Vans, I'm going to take every one to show again this pattern. This is a shoe that he likes I've also at that scene got the size so now I've got excuse me the same size shoe you wear

the direction of the shoe heading out of the house which is what DM said and I've got a pair that should be bloody you're giving me a horrible flashback of the OJ Simpson trial in the Bruno Mollies. I just want to get that out of my head. Where he swore he would never wear those ugly ASS shoes, and then there were pictures from the Enquirer showing him on the side of a football field that he was covering the game wearing Bruno Mollies. So, bad flashback. Thanks for conjuring up that image,eryl mccollum go ahead

but the soul of that shoe is going to tell you which van it is so for example if i've got you know the diamonds going one direction or they're in a different pattern than other shoes i can tell you exactly what van that is because the fbi's got the whole database where i can go and tell you precisely what shoe it is so now if i can go back through his debit cards and credit cards and he has purchased that. And get the receipt to find out if he bought that van. And I do wonder, are these vans he was wearing his own shoes? I mean, they very well could be. It's the same style.

It's the same size, we think. And obviously they were his shoes. So they very well could be. It's the same style. It's the same size, we think. And obviously they were his shoes, so they very well could be. I would get those shoes off his feet in a minute and get them tested. Take a listen to Brian Flores in our cut 256. Now, in terms of timeline, we are learning a lot more about that as well. We understand two of the victims, Kaylee Gengalvez and Madison Mogan, they went to get food at a place called the Grub Truck in the early morning hours of November 13th, roughly around one o'clock in the morning.

They came back to the home and around four in the morning, Gengalvez apparently was heard saying the phrase, there's someone here. It goes on to describe a person in there described as a skinny build, a man who was masked in there as well. Investigators also discovered a latent shoe print eventually that had a diamond shape similar to a van shoes. Have you ever seen shoes like that? Another issue beside the van shoes, two things spring to mind. In addition to the cell phone data that police obviously have put together, have retrieved.

Also emerging now is video from various homes. I guess it's their surveillance video. And oh, speaking of surveillance video, I'll circle back to that. But Chris McDonough, you told me about a home that was 50 feet away from the house, the murder house. And I believe it was that home that may have picked up sounds coming from the house. You're right. It may not even be 50 feet, Chris McDonough. And when we talked about that, Nancy, wasn't it interesting that immediately that video camera was taken down and collected right away by the police? And I agree with you 100%. I think that's going to be the piece of evidence that puts the vehicle coming in, making that three-point turn.

And now that you're there and you feel it and you see it. I've got to tell you, it's a feeling now that I'm here of immense heartbreak. There's just, when I was sitting in the Mad Greek, thinking about two of the girls working there. It just, it's heartbreaking. And when you see the campus, I just think of all the things they had to live for, Chris. You know, their studies and the dances and the parties and the whole future before them. And I look back at this house and it's just like a bloodbath. It's just such a stark dichotomy, Chris. You know, and I'll go back to your comment about the hunter.

You know, this individual, if he is the individual, and allegedly at this point, you know, he's innocent until proven guilty. But he is so, again, I keep saying this, he's so methodical. It's almost as if this was a mission for him, like a daily event in our lives. Let me throw a question to everybody on the panel. Chris, something you just said, I want to jump off of that. You know, he would send out these questionnaires to felons, rapists, murderers, and say, what were you feeling at the time of your crime? How did you pick your victim? Then we find out that he had tried to get on with the local police department, and you

know that would have made him privy to crime scenes and violent crimes. I'm just wondering if all of his interviews and his experiments and his attempt to get onto crime scenes just wasn't fulfilling him. And so he set out to do the murder himself. Because there's no rape that we've heard. Nothing was stolen. So what more motive could there be other than the desire to hunt and murder to see what it really feels like? There's basically four reasons people are killed. Money, sex, revenge, and crazy. What about thrill? Killing. Well, that falls into this.

Does that fit under crazy? Sometimes, or it could fall into sexual. It depends on what you see at the scene. But again, just because there's no sexual assault doesn't mean he wasn't self-gratifying. And I'll tell you something else. You look at Ted Bundy, worked at the Rape Crisis Center. This is a need that he was filling for himself. There was nowhere online where he could get what he wanted, and that's to hear from the people that actually did it. This guy didn't want to hear from the victims. This guy wanted to hear from the killers, and that is critical for us to understand. He wanted to know, how did you feel before, during, and after.

And at some point, he wants to experience them himself. This is not new to us. We see people all the time. They can't fulfill their own fantasy in their mind, so they turn to porn. Porn's not enough. They go to a prostitute. A prostitute's not enough. They go to another victim that is completely unsuspecting

and has no idea this guy's around this is what i see in this guy okay dr angela arnold uh renowned psychiatrist we're trying to explain it in layman's terms but the questionnaires and the desire to go to crime scenes just it just wasn't cutting it, if in fact this is the killer. So he set out to find out what it really did feel like to commit a murder. Well, sure, Nancy, because again, he is empty inside, okay? He's completely empty. So as Cheryl just said, none of these things were fulfilling him enough. It's also very interesting to me nancy and i

think we should point this out on the show that you know he chose to study with a woman named he he picked out who he studied with he studied with dr katherine ramsland and she's written like 60 books on different killers and stuff he wanted to get in there and study with this particular person and be very close to the murders. I happen to think that he wants some sort of notoriety from this. I think he wanted to connect with some of these different killers that have been written about, and he wants some notoriety out of this. To Josh Fiala, joining us in the Daily Beast, how does what we're spinning out right now, this theory, fit with what you've learned?

You know, everybody's kind of commented that he was a real smart guy, but there was always something about him that was different. Like I said prior, you could see it in his eyes. So for me, what I can tell from what we've learned about how he repeatedly went to the crime scene with his phone thinking that you know cops would never even think it's him to that one night where he thought to turn off his phone he went to the crime scene you know or left it at home or put it on airplane mode he thought that he was you know the killer expert who was going to go in.

Cops were going to check, you know, the phone data and we're not going to see his phone anywhere in sight. And he thought he took all the other precautions. He did everything he needed to do in order to make sure it never got back to him. So, you know, for me, I think that all these years of studying criminology and studying under professors who wrote you know tons of books about you know the art of killing or what goes on in the mind of a killer i think this all kind of turned into him you know killing in november and quite frankly i'm not sure that had he not been caught this would have been his only his only instances from what we've learned since his arrest you know your words are very chilling to me josh but i I can't say that I don't agree with you. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace.

We also learned that at his extradition hearing, defendant Brian Koberger did something very extraordinary. He actually spoke to some of the law enforcement at the extradition hearing. And one thing he said, and I quote, it's really sad what happened to them. I mean, just let that sink in for a moment. This guy who we believe, cops believe, murdered four people said that's so sad what happened to them. Back to Dr. Angela Arnold's theory that he's just imitating life because there's nothing inside he's saying or

doing anything he thinks a normal person would do so chris mcdonough what i was trying to get back to with you is in addition to the cell phone data placing him in various locations at the time of the killings and that morning later on video surveillance has emerged of a white elantra speeding by. You can see it through bushes and trees. And I believe that's why cops are still begging for information, as they should be, to help shore up their case. Yes, and it's going to be really interesting to find out what else they have

in relationship to that behavior. Remember, every behavior has a purpose. And for him to be methodical through this, I really feel that he's forgotten the idea of that the crime scene is going to show just how disorganized, though, he really was. And that all of this rejection that he feels, you know, potentially from society, women, the grudge, the resentment, all of that, I think is built up to this quality where he felt that he was going to be the deliverer of justice, as we've talked about in the past, Nancy. And that's going to be his undoing here, because those pieces of evidence like the car, like him returning, are going to start surfacing. I don't know if you guys could hear it, but just in the background, right across the way, there is a steeple of some sort on campus, just right across the street from campus.

And it was chiming the time. And I was just thinking about as that night went on, and those chimes were going every hour after the girls were murdered. And he had gotten away seemingly scot-free. I wish you could feel the feeling here. How would you describe it, guys? It's kind of eerie and very, very quiet. It's almost like when you walk through a graveyard or you go into an empty church.

Frozen in time. Yeah, like it is frozen in time. Everything is still out. People still have that Christmas decorations. It's like everybody just left the moment these murders happened. I want to go back to you, Cheryl. I really believe police have to shore up their case.

They've got to shore it up. You know, you think you've got DNA. They could easily, the defense could easily argue, hey, I went to a gun and knife convention, and I looked at a lot of knives and a lot of guns. That was obviously one of them. That's not mine. I mean, we've got to find the murder weapon.

We've got to find more D8 right behind me in this home or in his Elantra. What do they need to shore up the case, Cheryl? Well, let's talk about some really good police work we've already seen. They had his number by November 25th. Then the campus police officer spotted it, said, yep, it's here. They had his name before Thanksgiving. So they were already in full swing, even though they were telling the general public, hey, we need your help. We need your help. Once they went into his apartment, I guarantee you there was a plethora of evidence. I bet he had maps.

I bet he had writings. I bet he had journals. I bet on his computer he had done all kinds of searches. He was not going to be able to hide this, Nancy, just like his online questionnaire. Can you imagine his topics from when he got his bachelor's and master's to his PhD program? He's done nothing but write about this. And one thing that I bet they're doing is they're collecting all those papers from all those teachers and they're talking to all of them. And the topics that he chose are going to be powerful.

But one thing I'm going to be real interested in are the topics that were rejected. You know, another thing about his meticulous nature. I wonder if he would get rid of all the notes, all the writings, all the computer searches. Of course, anything on computer is going to be in the cloud forever. You can't get rid of that. But I'm just wondering how much they'll actually be able to retrieve what they found in his apartment. You know, he was also a TA, teaching assistant. Did he have an office at work?

I would come through that with a fine-tooth comb. And do you believe, Chris McDonough, that he could actually get rid of all traces of blood? Now, you heard DM say he was dressed all in dark clothing with a mask over his nose and mouth. Do you think he got rid of that clothing? Do you think he got rid of that clothing? Do you think he got rid of those van sneakers? Even the socks? Remember the blood that was on OJ Simpson's socks? Could he?

Would he think to get rid of every scintilla of evidence, Chris? You know, he certainly would think about it. The probability of some type of transfer, of some type of blood, you know blood or any type of trace evidence that you cannot get away with. And you've seen thousands of cases like that in your court time. I just don't see how he could get rid of all of it. Because if he wore those clothes into the car, I don't care if he got rid of the clothes. How could he get rid of everything in the car? Isn't it correct? Joining me, guys, is our friend from the Daily Beast, Josh Fialo.

Josh, it's my understanding that surveillance on the family home in the Poconos, the Koberger family home, they were out there 24-7. They had to be because they spot him at 4 a.m. dumping the family trash, his trash, into the neighbor's receptacle. I think it was there that they observed him meticulously cleaning his Elantra over and over, inside and out. Yeah, that's absolutely correct. And, you know, I think this is one of the reasons why it took so long to take him into custody. Who cleans their car outside in the Poconos when it's snowing and freezing, kind of like it is right here?

Who would do that? Somebody who has something to hide. And, you know, another detail that was picked up while they were surveilling him, you know, in Pennsylvania was who takes their trash out in the middle of the night. First of all, who takes their trash out in the middle of the night? Second of all, who takes their trash out in the middle of the night and then takes it to their neighbor's yard and puts it in their bin? That's somebody that tells me you're trying to hide something. And I think that the reason they were surveilling him so much in pennsylvania was maybe once they got into his apartment

or what they weren't getting the dna and the evidence they needed back in pullman back in moscow and they were able to whenever uh back in pennsylvania because he had no clue eyes were on him i'm just wondering i'm right in front of the murder house, and I'm just wondering, Cheryl, Chris, Dr. Angie, Josh, jump in if you have any ideas. Where else could they retrieve DNA or hair, one hair of his at the scene? Because, Cheryl, you and I have been on a lot of homicide scenes. Have you ever noticed that there's always hair in the blood at a murder scene? Always.

Nancy, there's going to be evidence a whole lot of places that I'm sure we're not thinking about. They got evidence off the sheets. They got evidence off the floor. They got evidence off the victim's clothing. There's going to be a transfer to, you know, the Lockhart principle. He left his own hair possibly at that scene. When the victims were fighting, we know some had defensive wounds. They could have his skin under their nail. You know, you just never know. But I know this, the amount that has already been in the arrest affidavit was just enough to get him arrested.

They have so much more. You know, one more thing before we close out for tonight. I'm not so sure. You've got to think about in the probable cause affidavit and anything we have heard from police. I don't know how it ever got started that the victims were actually asleep in their beds. Now, we saw the bloody beds being carried out right behind me. So we do know that the murders took place on the bed, but I just don't see how you You can be looking at a TikTok at 4.02, I think it was. 4.12. 4.12. Thank you, Kelly.

And then he's leaving. Was he leaving at 4.26? 4.25. 4.25. I don't think that they were all asleep, Cheryl. Well, the arrest affidavit says that Zanna was on the floor. So we know that. But upstairs on the floor, so we know that. But upstairs on the third floor, if they were in the bed asleep and under the covers,

you remember the Jeffrey McDonald crime scene photograph? You could tell several of them were asleep. You can tell, even if they're murdered, that they were asleep prior to that. But I do believe that Ethan and Zanna were awake. I do believe that. One thing that is really hard for me, I was just going to go to you, Chris McDonough, is when I see how close these apartments are to the murder scene right behind me. And one of them seemingly picked up whimpering.

Just imagining those girls whimpering in that house behind me as they were stabbed dead. I'm telling you, if this is not a death penalty case, then we should just abolish the death penalty because we might as well not even have it. To think what these girls and Ethan went through. And don't you know, they are trying to enhance that sound right now. So one day, they're going to play it for a jury. We'll be back here again tomorrow. I hope you can join us here at Crime Stories. I wish you could be with us right now

and see what we're seeing and hear what we're hearing. But I'll try my best, my very best, to relate it to you as best as I can. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.