Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Wife of Neighbor: SIXTH SENSE SCREAMS "KEEP KOHBERGER AWAY"

Episode Date: January 13, 2023

All this week, Nancy Grace is in Moscow, Idaho, learning more about accused killer Bryan Kohberger.  Listen to what Nancy learns from Kohberger's neighbors.  Kohberger appeared in court for a status hearing. During the conference, Kohberger waived his right to a speedy preliminary probable cause hearing. The judge scheduled a hearing to begin June 26, with the entire week blocked out for the case.  Kohberger remains in state custody with no bond.  Joining Nancy Grace today:  Dale Carson - High Profile Attorney (Jacksonville), Former FBI Agent, Former Police Officer (Miami-Dade County), Author: "Arrest-Proof Yourself"  Caryn Stark- Psychologist- Trauma and Crime expert; Twitter: @carnpsych  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 channel, The Interview Room Laura Ingle-Senior Correspondent, Fox News Channel, Twitter: @laurraingle, Instagram:@lauraingletv  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. We are outside the crime scene behind us, the home where these four beautiful college students were murdered. All around us here at the crime scene in Idaho, People are coming even in the rain, in the freezing temperatures behind me to lay more flowers at the home where four beautiful University of Idaho students were murdered. Right behind me, the parking lot,

we're out here really early in the morning. Typically, there are throngs of newscasters and reporters all camped out. But I think the rain has scared them away. But not the people who are coming to pay their respects to those four students behind me. The morning shift of a 24-hour guard service that is protecting the home. And I'm telling you, from what I've seen of a lot of reporters and, oh gosh, crime aficionados, I believe that they would get right up on the house and try to get in the house if they could. So it's a good thing that that guard is there. Don't worry,

we've been bringing them coffee throughout because it's freezing here. Last night, again, we drove the route that Coburger drove leaving here. We followed his escape route, determined by when he turned on his phone when he left the crime scene. It's really hard driving. We took a video of it. The roads are so bad. No one would take that route in their right mind. It's pitch dark.

It was raining at the time. Nobody would take that hour-plus route home when they could get home in just about 10 minutes. Not only that, we go to his apartment and end up meeting and interviewing several of his neighbors who, as of this moment, had not spoken before. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us here at Fox Nation and Sirius XM 111. First of all, take a listen to our friends at NBC. Brian Koberger again in court. The families of his victims are still looking for answers about a motive. The lawyer for Kaylee Gonzalez's family saying Koberger didn't know Kaylee or Maddie Mogan as far as they know.

I don't know of anybody that did know him. All those girls were social. They were involved in the college. They were working hard, waitressing and doing different things. So the idea that he may have ran across their paths, I don't think is uncommon. The attorney saying the Gonzalez family has been in frequent contact with investigators as they look to build their case against Koberger. Well, anything that we have, we can send over to the Moscow Police Department.

In court for a, as it is called, status hearing is a typical hearing. We are just now waiting for that warrant to be unsealed. You know how long it took to get the probable cause warrant for arrest unsealed? Well, now it may be up to two months or longer before we get the warrant to search his apartment. With me, an all-star panel to make sense of what we're learning out here in Moscow, Idaho.

First, I want to go to Cheryl McCollum, forensic expert and founder of the Cold Case Research Institute. She's also the star of Zone 7, a new hit podcast. Cheryl, I've got to tell you and everybody else what we learned from multiple neighbors last night. All right, listen to this.

First of all, none of them want to be identified or connected to Koberger. They don't want to be called his friend, his acquaintance, anything. We learned that Koberger. They don't want to be called his friend, his acquaintance, anything. We learned that Koberger's father came all the way to Moscow earlier and helped Koberger move into his apartment there at Steptoe Village. We also learned that his father, who seemed like a really nice guy, according to the neighbor, asked the neighbor to be friends with Koberger. It's like me arranging a play date for my twins when they're three years old.

He asked him to be friends with Koberger and said, it's really hard for his son to meet people or to make friends. We learned that the feds took loads of stuff out of Koberger's apartment. We learned that inside Koberger's apartment, it was very, very sparse. Not a lot of stuff in there at all. We also learned that Koberger's apartment is right on top of a little child's apartment. There were a lot of children there in the apartment complex, Cheryl. And it was kind of quite a dichotomy to know an alleged mass killer was sharing a wall with a child. There were a lot of children in the apartment. We also learned something very unusual.

I'll get Karen Stark to weigh in on this. So while the neighbor was making friends with Coburger, as Coburger's father had asked him to do, at one point he was going to invite him over to dinner, and his wife said, don't. There's just something about him. I don't know what it is. I don't like it. I don't want him around.

I find that and so much more of what the neighbor told me to be very, very interesting, maybe even probative as it comes to proving the case. Okay, Cheryl McCollum, jump in. This should surprise nobody. Number one, we watched his dad answer questions for him to a police officer. The fact that his dad would say, hey, make friends with my son, be his buddy. When his son is nearly 30, tells you that his dad absolutely knows his son is not somebody that can navigate socially in this world by himself.

He's proven it over and over and over. This is going to, again, be a shock to nobody that this guy in social settings is awkward and doesn't know how to, you know, move about as a grown man. He also shares an office with two people that are also in the PhD program. I think they are going to be critical. I think his students are going to be critical. I think fellow classmates are going to be critical. We also heard from the woman that went on the date with him that said, again, she couldn't put her finger on it. She just wanted him away from her everybody that

spends any amount of time with this man gets that gut feeling you know another interesting thing the neighbor said was the father was super nice and he the neighbor believes the father and mother had no idea that coberger could be a killer that they only see him through the lens of being their son. But it's very clear to me, Karen Stark joining me, renowned psychologist joining us out of Manhattan. She's at karenstark.com. Karen is spelled with a C, by the way.

Karen, what do you make? Daddy trying to set up play dates for Koberger. Well, that's an arrested development, Nancy. I mean, as you said, it was something you did with your three-year-old son or daughter. And that makes sense to me. He's an introverted guy. And so many people interviewed talked about the fact that it was strange that they could pick up something. And people do you do when you're

around somebody it's very weird that you hear he was outgoing people say oh he's a good neighbor but you don't hear when it comes to killers this kind of a killer that I mean think about he was stalking he was able to just be there over and over again. He would drive at night. He's very much to himself, as it is when you're in a Ph.D. program. And, you know, when you're in graduate school, you've got to spend so much time reading and studying. And that's perfect for him. Well, another thing that I found out, guys, and I'm going to go to a special guest joining us.

Laura Engel is with us, senior correspondent with Fox News Channel. Laura, we found out from speaking yesterday, we went all over Moscow. And we spoke with students in the criminal justice program, the same program Koberger was in. And they're very upset. And they pointed out something really critical that I didn't think about earlier they said the day that the bodies were found here behind me that an all school email went out including to Koberger stating there has been there have been homicides just off campus. WSU students, excuse me, Idaho University students are believed to be safe. WSU students believed to be safe.

Classes are going to resume. They also said that the students that were afraid to come back to campus would be docked. In other words, it would be like missing class. You had to come back in person to campus. What do you think about that, Laura Engel? You know, that, you can only imagine opening that email. And, you know, of course, then we learned, I think it was days later, you know, there was some attraction there from the police. You know, well, maybe there is, obviously there is somebody still out there.

But one of the things, you mentioned talking to the neighbors where he lived in Washington. There was another neighbor that just this week came out and said to, in published reports, said that Koberger came out right after the murders in that time frame that you're talking about when that email went out and said, yeah, seems like they have no leads. Seems like it's a crime of passion. Talking to one of these neighbors in his parking lot. And it reminds me of the arsonist that goes back to check on the fire. Oh, yeah, that's a whole thing, Laura Engel. To go back and look at your handiwork and get gratification from seeing what you've done yeah nancy yeah go ahead that's so typical of a killer they do that

they go back when they're there they try to take a souvenir but they like to go back because they relive the excitement that they felt while it was happening i I also wonder, did he go back because he realized that he dropped that sheet from the knife and was trying to figure out if there was a way that he could get back inside? You know, I'm thinking about another thing that another neighbor told us, that Koberger came around and was saying, Hey, I heard police don't have any leads. They don't really know what happened. What have you heard? And just like you just said, Laura Engel, stating, wow, it looks like it's a crime

of passion that was to a different neighbor. So he was out talking about it with people, but when it would get brought up in class, he'd clam up. Oh, hey, Laura Engel, I learned something else. You know, let me throw this to Dale Carson with me, high profile lawyer joining us out of Jacksonville, former FBI agent and cop in Miami, author of Arrest Proof Yourself. Dale, another thing we learned and this was after we

canvassed multiple students at the school, that they are not allowed to talk about the murders in class, in the criminology classes. They're not allowed to even bring it up. They will be asked to leave if they bring it up in class. And they've been told that it's a legal problem if they talk about it, which, of course, it's not.

These are students at SWU or students there? At WSU, yes. WSU. That's ridiculous. You know, I don't know how I could have said that. It really is. It's a violation of the freedom of speech, and that should be a concern to any higher learning institution. Well, I'm just wondering, are they afraid, is the faculty afraid that they're going to be accused of basically schooling a serial killer? Well, they did. I mean, is that what they're worried about?

Well, they certainly did. No, no, I disagree with you on that, Dale. I disagree with you because that would be like saying you go to law school and you run out and you commit torts because you went to civil procedure or you are a violent criminal because you had criminal law. That's that's crazy. That's crazy talk, Dale Carson. All right. Well, it is a fact, though. You're going to take that lying down. You're going to take what I just said lying down. I wouldn't. I'd fight back. But go ahead. I believe that they intend not intentionally, but they certainly did provide the level of information that appears on TV and NCIS and other programs that that provide information to potential killers. And we all worry about this. We worry about getting on national news and talking about evidence acquisition, how they do it, all of these things, because it prepares evil people

to address those issues. The only thing that protects us is the fact that they're going to do it anyway, because there's something driving them that's very deep in their souls. So it's not like they're not going to do it. And clearly individuals who have never engaged in this behavior before make mistakes, as we're now seeing here. Nancy, when you talked about that edict going out for the students, that was at University of Idaho? When I was talking to the students, I was told the ones at WSU were told they cannot talk about Koberger. Right, right. And they can't talk about the case, and they can't talk about any theory or anything like that.

And, I mean, it's a real stretch i mean you could accuse any professor uh or anyone of implanting those thoughts in a killer or for instance what about this i studied domestic relations in law school so if I go and shoot up my house, do I then, is my teacher responsible for that? No, of course not. That's just way too attenuated. There's not a nexus between the crimes. crime stories with nancy grace i want to tell you what else we learned last night we learned that a lot of people would see coberger but only walking in and out he never once from anybody we talked to was spotted bringing a woman, a girlfriend into the apartment or even walking with them in the car with them. Never. OK, Chris McDonough joining me from the Cold Case Foundation.

He's the director, former homicide detective and host of the interview. What do you make of that, Chris? Not surprising, Nancy. We, you know, this individual obviously has very difficult time creating relationships. The fact that there's, you know, no obvious relationship also makes us think about, okay, is there a sexual component to this? We're talking a lot about looking for the MO, but we're missing what we would call in the investigative process, signature. And that would be the behavior that goes beyond the actions necessary to successfully commit this crime. We're seeing a lot of signature attributes come to the play here. And the fact that the university is maybe trying to quash that actually is detrimental to the investigation

and quite frankly, plays into the hand of the perpetrator. Guys, so much is happening fast and furious. Now, criminalists all over are analyzing Koberger's, quote, amateur mistakes. I'm calling him a textbook criminologist, Cheryl McCollum, because when I say textbook, I mean he read a lot of books about criminology, about committing crimes, and I really do believe at this juncture, until we find out something else, that as I mentioned before, you and I discussed,

he just wasn't getting enough of a thrill from reading about it and talking about it and talking to criminals and actually having students write essays. Oh, Kelly, remember last night, we also learned that there were shared docs where Koberger reportedly was having people write about the perfect crime and reading that.

So I think, Cheryl, and again, I'm a JD, not an MD, that it was no longer fulfilling him, and he actually had to try and commit the perfect crime. Could very well be. You're talking about seven years. This is what he concentrated on at a higher educational level. Seven years he has studied. So to me, there's two points I want to make.

One, you can read all the books you want to on parenting, but until that baby's put in your arms and you take it home by yourself, you've got no idea what you're in for. And that's just a fact. You can study all you want, but that doesn't make you sleep deprived. That doesn't make you fearful of SIDS and different things that are not really applicable until that baby's with you. The same is going to be for him. He had no idea the sound, the force, the, you know, the dog got in his way. Ethan woke up. All of these factors that came to be that he did not count on or plan for. It is a very different thing when you put something in action versus reading it in a book. Well, it's like a carpenter who forgets to put his hammer back in his pouch.

You know, you can't do something like that, which he obviously did. And Cheryl, I call you magic Cheryl now because you really do understand the dynamic here in a way that I have frankly never heard before, which is the bacon and cake syndrome, where you read the recipe, but you can't really put a cake together unless you really know what you're doing and you're a baker. And that's what's happened in this case. That's right. There's a second thing going on. Nancy, there's a second thing going on. Everybody right now is talking about Dr. Ramsland. Well, let me tell you something.

How much time have I spent in Sunday school and in church and there's a book filled with how you're supposed to be? I know the playbook. I know what's supposed to happen, but it has to be in me whether or not I'm going to be a good person. Hey guys, hold on, hold on. We've compared the murders to baking a cake, to raising a baby, to a carpenter, and now we somehow dragged in the Bible. But I'm hearing in my ear, Laura Engel has breaking news. Senior correspondent, Fox News Channel. Laura, tell me what you know. Well, there is the thought here that this may not have been his first time, right? We've all wondered, could he have committed this crime

allegedly on his first try? And so because of that, everybody has wondered, has he done this before? It is being looked at. I have spoken to federal and local law enforcement here on the East Coast, in Pennsylvania, and Washington, that are looking at that. We know that they are double checking and circling back. Where are the cold cases where there are no suspects? Now that he has been arrested that he has been arrested, he's been fingerprinted, presumably in CODIS, they are double checking that. And we don't have any hits yet, but we are looking into that. And it could be a small crime, it could be a large crime, but it is definitely something that is going on right now as we speak. And we're waiting

for any kind of hit, not just in the in the pennsylvania area but probably in washington state uh as well and i don't know can it be a virtual crime could it have been on his computers that have been seized where he gets on games and kills people to see how that actually works out and the software writers certainly are not going to know all the ins and outs of behaving that way. Well, you know what? I do know from the neighbors that the feds seized a ton of stuff out of Koberger's apartment. Guys, another thing we learned last night is that the county jail here where he's being held is called the County Hotel. I call it Camp Flower because I've

learned that they often play soothing music to wake the inmates up, that they order pizza sometimes for the inmates, that they have outdoor time, they have access to the library, which of course they should for their legal preparation. But it sounds like a pretty sweet deal. There are about 42, was it 42 or 47, Kelly, inmates at the county jail. He's one of them. But it sounds like a pretty cushy, pretty cushy jail to me and kind of like, you know, a bigger version of the Mayberry jail. And I'm not knocking it because where I grew up, it was the same way. But if and when he is convicted and goes into the state system, it's a whole nother ballgame.

I want to talk more about the parking lot we saw last night outside of Coburger's place. There is just really no way that the neighbors couldn't have seen the white Elantra. It's parked right in front of his apartment every single night. But I asked the neighbor, and I was afraid the neighbor was going to get mad at me, but the neighbor said, yeah, we saw it, but we just didn't put it together. I guess you see what you want to see and you know what you want to know. I've seen that so many times, Cheryl McCollum.

Oh, absolutely. And you know, Nancy, they want to feel safe. They don't want to believe that there's a murderer, mass murderer living one wall from them. They don't probably think like law enforcement to say they're searching for that car. A lot of times when something has always been there, like you know your neighbor's red truck or green buick you're not ever looking at it again it's just like when you look at your watch you're not really looking for

what time it is you're looking for what time it's not because you're supposed to be somewhere at a certain time they weren't looking for something that's always been there you know we've learned that the search warrant for the apartment, for Koberger's apartment, has been sealed. And it's likely going to stay sealed, according to the judge, for about the next two months. Now, I wonder where the two months timeline came from. And it's sealed over, quote, serious and imminent threat. It also says premature public disclosure could threaten law enforcement,

the integrity of the investigation, and public safety. Now, the judge also has a caveat that says it could be lifted earlier, but it's going to be at least two months. Who has any idea, Laura Engel, why the search warrant for Koberger's apartment has been sealed. Yeah, that document that was published and it was put out on December 30th and just what you read, I mean, they've got it sealed, but they did make, the judge made the caveat that it could be unsealed prior if there was reason. But for right now, they want to hold the integrity, just like we've seen for these last seven weeks, why they wanted to keep the information about probable cause sealed up. So I'm super curious. I mean, we're talking about Brian Koberger's apartment, and we've often talked about the white Elantra. And when we were in Pennsylvania after his arrest, we drove around looking for

lots, maybe police lots where that car is probably held in a garage somewhere. But with the reporting that we've done covering crime stories as we have, we know about MVAC technology, about the new technologies that are used to pull out fibers and hairs and any kind of trace of DNA in a vehicle. So if there is that kind of information that's out yet, we don't know, that could be something that we could be looking for. That's what I'm looking for as we move down the road, when we look at the evidence from the car and from his home, which is going to be a huge list of items. You know, that's interesting what Laura Engel just said, Fox News correspondent joining us. It is being theorized, and I think it's correct,

that there is very likely more DNA evidence that we don't know about because it's most likely being processed right now. When we talk about an MVAC, they're amazing. Cheryl McCollum, describe what an MVAC can do. It can extract DNA of items like a rock or a robe or clothing at a level that a bugle swab just cannot do. And Nancy, I can guarantee you they already have DNA off there because the killer, he would have had to grab them on their bedclothes and hold them down. He touched the bed sheet. They have more DNA.

There's no doubt in my mind. I sure hope so, Cheryl. Go ahead, Dale. It's certainly in the car. And that's where that can really pay off. Because clearly, he tried to clean the car. There's evidence of that fact from Pennsylvania. And so there's a reason you try to intensely clean your car. There's a reason for that. And with these new sophisticated things, which were essentially a vacuum cleaner with a really good filter in it, you extract all that data or that DNA from the carpets or wherever the hell else it is, because there's little doubt, as Cheryl said, there's plenty of

DNA. It just takes a minute to find it all. And of course, the initial emphasis was on identifying the guy and arresting him to make sure he didn't kill somebody else or get away. And so they've accomplished that. Now they can take all the time they want in order to solidify the case against Stoneberger in a way that makes it evident that he's going to suffer the death penalty. And that's called the Bardol method. Go ahead, because I'm really thinking about the car and where the trace evidence could be inside the car. And when I circle back to you, Cheryl, I want to hear a more detailed description of how an MVAT works when it comes to a car specifically. Do they have to cut the carpet out?

Do they have to cut out the upholstery? But Chris McDonough, back to what you were saying. Go ahead. Yeah, so it's called the Bardot method, Nancy. And you can also get you can also get DNA, touch DNA from jewelry on any of the victims. Let's say the suspect had an interaction during the struggle where if he touched even items they were wearing, that method through the MVAC can pull that touch DNA off of that. Yeah, I keep thinking about the car, but in reality, right behind me is a treasure trove

of evidence. And Sheryl McCollum, you and I were going back and forth yesterday off air about all the red sticky seals across the front door. It was like evidence. All the red sticky seals across the front door were obvious. It was like evidence. When you seal evidence, say DNA, you take a buccal swab and you put it in an envelope and you send it to the crime lab. You seal it. You remember how royals years ago would put wax on an envelope and they'd put their seal with their initial or whatever their mascot would be.

And if that were broken, then the recipient would know someone had read the message or even replaced it. Same thing with crime scene evidence. You close it up in an envelope, a brown manila envelope, and you put tape over it and you sign on the tape or around the tape your name, your rank, and the date and time. When it's opened up it is then recorded who, what time, and when it was opened up. And then after the testing is done it's actually resealed again.

Same thing with this house right behind me. The front door is covered with red tape horizontally placed on the door to show if anyone else has entered and broken the tape. It's really important because they may be going back in there because we've seen the lights, right, Sydney? We see the light go on and off in that bottom right room. So somebody has been in there for whatever reason. Go ahead, Cheryl McCollum. Well, that's exactly what they've done. They're going to maintain the integrity so that the prosecution and the defense knows exactly who came in and out of that house on what day and what time. And then they'll be able to

show the correspondent evidence to show the reason they went in the house again and what time and then they'll be able to show the corresponding evidence to show the reason they went in the house again and what they were able to retrieve. Now getting back to the MVAT and the Bardot method as well, this machine looks like a very miniature like carpet cleaner, like a steam cleaner and it shoots down the solution at the exact same time that it sucks it back up onto this cotton filter so that it can be then developed into a full profile of the person's DNA. Then they take that profile, obviously, and they put it into CODIS and they do it in the ancestry if they need to. And in this case, my gut feeling is they use the private lab like Othram to do the profile because it was done so fast. And like Dale said, now they're not in a hurry. They don't have to rush with the sheets or the clothing or the jewelry or even the dog's collar for that matter.

Anything they believe that this killer touched, they can potentially get DNA off of it. You know, you said Othram, I agree. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with the state crime labs, but sometimes some private DNA analysts, such as Othram or Parabon NanoLabs, they specialize in degraded DNA, mixed DNA, DNA that has mud in it, that has other particles in it other than the DNA they're looking for.

That's their specialty. And they're not overloaded like state crime labs. They can do it more quickly. So I think that's what's happening. And as I always say, and you'll love this, Karen Stark, when you don't know a horse, look at his track record. If this guy left his sheath from the murder weapon beside a victim on the bed, what else did he do? What other mistakes did he make? Beside that, the fact that his cell phone was cut off en route to the crime scene and then turned

on on that lonely dirt road, bumpy dirt road, in the middle of the night, he turns it back on, that's an omission. It's not actively doing something, but if it's out of character, like if he, like myself, leave my phone on all the time, and I charge it at night, turn it on, I leave it on all the time, and then at that particular moment he turns it off, that's uncharacteristic and that omission

proves something, Karen Stark. Yeah, Nancy, we kept talking about he's a student and he's studying this, you have to get into graduate school, you have to be so smart and for such a smart guy

he made so many stupid mistakes and didn't really think it through clearly. When I had this image that he kept rehearsing in his mind, but even the fact that he's surrounded by blood, right? How is he going to get all of that out of his car? It's got to be on his clothes, somewhere on his shoes, on the gas pedal. It's there. He left the seat. I mean, he didn't think of small details that you would have assumed he was sure about and careful about it. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. To Dale Carson, it was either Dale or Chris McDonough that first brought up the idea of the killer having a quote lair behind the house and we went up there and examined so many spots where the killer could

have sat and looked right in to the bedroom windows of the girls do you think anybody on the panel that he wore a protective outfit and then discarded the clothes on his escape route? Or would he be stupid enough to take the clothes home and try to wash them? Jump in, Chris. I think he came prepared for that evening. And after the incident, I believe he did discard those items in various locations, which is consistent with the idea of he had a fantasy purpose here. What that is, we don't know yet, but he was very consistent in the overkill, the after the scene, what he did when he left, to your point. So I'm going to be really surprised if they find those particular items in the house with the exception of the knife. What about the shoes? What about the shoes, Chris?

I'm going to be surprised. I think Cheryl will jump in here. I think it's going to be really surprising if he still has those shoes. But it's possible. But I'm not going with it yet. Agree or disagree, Dale Carson? I've handled a number of these cases. And typically the individual is wearing a jumpsuit and takes all of that clothing off and throws it in a dump truck. And we have a significant period of time between the time that that white car was at least identified to the public and the actual killing. So there's plenty of opportunity for those things to be in a dump somewhere,

but it's going to be too difficult to find them in a dump. So they're not going to do that sort of processing. But the idea that he kept stuff, you know, that's certainly consistent with serial killers. But I don't know that it's consistent here, because as one of your other guests, Joseph says, you know, if there's a fracture in that knife that's still in one of the bones in the body, they can find that fracture and connect the two together. He can't be that dumb, although i will say anyone with any sense would have left his phone on and back in his apartment and that way you have no connection guys i want to circle back to why there is a serious threat of damage and premature public disclosure of this a warrant this warrant could threaten law enforcement. Why could they possibly put that, those words in the judge's decision to seal the search warrant for Koberger's apartment?

Why would they do that, Cheryl McCollum? Nancy, the only time I've heard of that happening is if somebody has connections to gang or drug activity. Now, I do know that he's had a past addiction to heroin. If he got back on some type of drug and was meeting somebody, you know, at different locations, and again, his phone will tell that, his activity will tell that, his bank account will tell that, you know, maybe they were afraid that this person may have some type of retaliation toward law enforcement if they think law enforcement is going to make a connection and come after them as a secondary maneuver. Well, it could be novel investigative techniques as well.

I'm not sure what you mean by novel investigative techniques, but I will tell you this. They're playing it really smartly because they did not release that PC affidavit that talked about DM identifying Koberger, or in other words, not him by name, but could describe him to an extent. They did not release that until he was in jail to make sure he couldn't come back and kill her, kill DM. They also stated or put it out there that DM and BF, the other roommates, they made it very clear they were on the first floor, where in fact at least DM was on the second floor with the ability to watch the killer leave. So they kept that a secret until after he was behind bars.

And I'm wondering if a similar strategy is not being employed with a search warrant for his apartment. Laura, what's next? Well, circling back to what you mentioned about the search warrants on page two and talking about why these search warrants would be sealed, they also mention the personal privacy. That's item two on the search warrant. The personal privacy interest of the witness victims and victims families named in the

application filed in this cause also supports stealing the documents filed in this matter so it's it's an impact on law enforcement and public safety but also about the personal privacy and as we have seen with the other victims families we've heard from the Gonzalesalves family quite a bit, as we know. Ethan Chapin's family members just basically broke their silence speaking about the case in a Facebook page. The mother talking about on an update saying that anything that they have had for Ethan is now frozen with the defense.

The family of Ethan Chapin going on to say for us it involves two vehicles ease belonging and a nice set of golf clubs they've met with prosecutors handled media inquiries managed grieved talked and continued to try to process what they call their new normal so there is who knows what in those search warrants that they want to keep private from all of us as they continue to process these multiple crime scenes. And I also want to mention, I was asking about the University of Idaho earlier. We know that classes have resumed. Ethan was a triplet. His brother and sister, Maisie and Hunter, returned to the campus of University of Idaho this week.

That could be another reason why, you know, people are being very careful with them. They are going back to their classes. Can you imagine? These three children, these siblings, these triplets, chose this college. I spoke to the family spokesperson for Ethan Chapman this week. They said these three chose University of Idaho to be together. They wanted to learn together. They wanted to learn together. They wanted to have the college experience together.

And now two are returning without their brother this week. Laura Engel, that just broke my heart. And then Ethan's family posted a picture of the triplets when they were young. And just heartbreaking to me. Multiple bombshells emerging from the hearing that was held at the courthouse. It was called a status conference, but this is what emerged. Coburger's preliminary hearing, where we will hear more evidence, has been set for June 26 at 9 a.m. We all know that Coburger was in court for his status hearing in an orange t-shirt and

he told the court he waived his right to a speedy trial. That is significant. Under our Constitution, you can demand a speedy trial. You don't have to stay in jail for a year before your trial goes to a jury. If a speedy trial is demanded, the state has to gather its evidence and try you in that grand jury term, which is usually two months, and one other. In other words, your trial will go down within four to six months if you file a speedy trial demand. We know that preliminary hearing is set. I'm surprised they're not using a grand jury instead of a preliminary hearing because the state will have to show part of its case to the defense at a preliminary hearing where a grand jury is conducted in secret. Right now, we expect the

arrest, I mean the search warrants for a co-worker's apartment to be released on March 1. We're hoping they were released before then. Behind me, even in the rain, and it's really cold out here, people are continuing to come and leave flowers in memory of the four victims that died right behind us. And we will do the same. Nancy Grace, Crime Story, signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.