Killer Stories with Harvey Guillén - The Idaho Four Pt. 2 (with Kayna Whitworth)

Episode Date: August 4, 2025

In 2022, Six weeks after the murders of the Idaho Four, Bryan Kohberger was arrested in Pennsylvania. Fast forward to July of 2025, when just weeks before his trial was set to begin, he pleaded guilty. Later that month, he was sentenced to life in prison. ABC News Kayna Whitworth joins to talk about who Bryan is, what the evidence is, and what role his criminology background may have played in the crimes. Keep up with us on Instagram @serialkillerspodcast. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, serial killers listeners, producer Chelsea here. Before we dive into part two of this story about the Idaho four, I wanted to talk about some breaking news. You'll hear some references to an upcoming trial in this episode, but after we recorded, Brian Kovberger made a surprise move. On July 2nd, 2025, just three weeks before his trial was set to begin, Brian Koberger pleaded guilty to the murders of Zana Kronodal, Ethan Chapin, Madison Mogan, and Kaylee Gonzalez. The agreement made with prosecutors

means that Koeberger will avoid the death penalty. On July 23rd, he was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. Though there was some speculation he may address the court and answer some of the many lingering questions, he ultimately declined to make a statement. In a press conference after the hearing,

Moscow police captain Brett Payne did reveal some new information. Payne said that in law enforcement's initial interview with Koberger, he, quote, shut down as soon as he learned the interview was about the Moscow murders. LATAL County prosecutor Bill Thompson believes that even if Kovberger had spoken, he likely would have lied. When they dove into his background, police said they couldn't find any evidence Koberger was, quote, a serial killer in waiting, nor could they find any reason why he targeted the house on 1122 King Road. It turns out, Koberger thoroughly wiped his election

before authorities could dig into those records. Prosecutor Bill Thompson also outlined the case his team would have presented if the trial had happened. You'll hear that evidence along with information about Koberger's childhood, dark struggles from his time in grad school, and eerie criminology homework, all in this episode. At the sentencing hearing, loved ones of the victims got to say their peace during the victim impact statements. parents, aunts, uncles, and siblings talked about how much Kaylee, Maddie, Ethan, and Zana meant to them. The surviving roommates, Dylan and Bethany,

talked about the anxiety and fear they still experience every night. And when his time came, Steve Gonzalez, Kaylee's father, turned the lectern directly toward Coburker. He looked at him and said, The world's watching because of the kids, not because of you. Nobody cares about you.

In time, you will be nothing but two initials forgotten to the wind. Last night, in conjunction with the Pennsylvania State Police, Federal Bureau of Investigation, detectives arrested 28-year-old Brian, Christopher, Colberger in Albrightville, Pennsylvania on a warrant for murder of Ethan, Zena, Madison, and Kaylee. Welcome to Serial Killers, a Spotify podcast. Every Monday, we bring you the true crime stories that stand out. I'm Janice Morgan. We'd love to hear from you.

Follow us on Instagram at Serial Killers Podcast and share your thoughts on this week's episode. Or if you're tuning in on the Spotify app, swipe up and leave a comment. To help us tell this story, we interviewed Kana Whitworth, ABC News anchor and host of the podcast, The King Road Killings. We're thrilled to have her on the show today. This episode includes discussions of murder. Consider this when deciding how and when you'll listen.

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Find yours at Target today. We got on a plane that night to go back to Moscow. And I remember it so vividly because all this fog had rolled in and our flight was delayed. And because of that, his flight had a hard time getting off the ground. They had to wait until the next day to get him into Moscow. And so he lands and it was a spectacle. A media was lined up. You know, he's arrived back in this tiny little town.

And so he's going for his first quarter appearance there in Moscow. and this probable cause affidavit drops. And it dropped while all the media was lined up to get into this tiny little courtroom. That's Kena Whitworth. She's an ABC News journalist and host of the podcast, The King Road Killings, which investigates the 2022 murders of Maddie Mogan,

Kaley Gonzalez, Ethan Chapin, and Zana Kurnodal. She's talking about the day suspected killer Brian Coburger was extradited from Pennsylvania to Moscow, Idaho. Shortly after Koberger landed, journalists got access to the probable cause affidavit, a document created by law enforcement showing there is sufficient evidence for an arrest. I'm telling you, you could have heard a pin drop.

You have all these journalists, all of a sudden, silent. Some of us were sitting on the ground, you know, trying to read through it as fast as we could in our computers. The site kept crashing because so many people were trying to read through it. Kena's been covering this case from the very beginning. In fact, she might have been the first network reporter on the ground in Moscow. And we stayed on the ground for a very long time. Because this is also a community, I think, that is really unique. It's really small up there in northern Idaho.

And, you know, I'm from Colorado myself. I lived in Boise at one point. This is not only a region of this country that I love, but a state that I love. and for whatever reason, I felt a real commitment to the story, to the victim's families, and to the accuracy of it, because there was so little information at the beginning that all these rumors started swirling. And it just didn't feel right. And so we, myself, my team, had an early commitment to this. And then we became, well, then we found ourselves just kind of just trying to make sure that absolutely everything was accurate because the speculation

was just rampant. Brian Coburger had been arrested on December 30th, 2022 in eastern Pennsylvania, more than 2,500 miles from where he allegedly killed the four University of Idaho students. He was charged with four counts of first-degree murder and one count of burglary. He has pleaded not guilty. For many, the arrests seemed to come out of nowhere. As we discussed in part one, police didn't release much information about their investigation into the murders. It was by design, but it had a huge impact on the people in the town.

That was initially Mosco PD's take, was they were going to keep it close to the vest. This was important to the investigation. They didn't want to divulge too much information that they believed would assist the alleged killer, you know, in hiding in some fashion. There was a huge impact on this community. I think first and foremost for there to be so much secrecy, yet law enforcement chose to use the word targeted attack. You know, when you attach a word like targeted to a case, everyone is wondering why, who.

And then there was also the confusion of the community is safe, but also we're looking for the murderer. I'm telling you, people in Moscow were scared. And it was hard because this is one of those communities where people are like, we don't lock our doors. And I don't want to feel silly for not locking my door. You know, that's the beauty of this community. But then the probable cause affidavit was released,

and the public could finally put together a picture of how Brian Koberger was tracked down. The first big reveal, a description of the suspect. Our heads were just exploding to learn that not only were there, There are two surviving roommates, but that one of them saw a man clad in black with a mask covering his nose and mouth. And that's the first time you hear of these bushy eyebrows. Dylan, one of the surviving roommates, saw the suspect when she opened her bedroom door around 4.17 a.m. She told police he was 5'10 or taller with an athletic build and bushy eyebrows. He wore black clothing and a mask that covered his nose and mouth.

She stood frozen in shock as he walked past her and made his way to the kitchen. He then left the home through the sliding glass door. Initially, the piece of evidence that led authorities to Brian was this knife sheath that was left at the crime scene. It belonged to a K-bar knife, famous for its use in the United States Marine Corps during World War II. Found next to Maddie's body, the sheath was tan with K-bar and USMC-E-E-S-M-E-E-E. etched into the leather. The Marine Corps insignia was stamped on the side. As of June 2025, authorities still haven't discovered the knife that belongs inside, which is presumably the murder weapon. They swabbed that and they found DNA and it wasn't a match in the law enforcement

database. And so they had to use investigative genetic genealogy to make a match. Investigative genetic genealogy is a breakthrough in forensic technology that emerged in the 2010s, leading to hundreds of cold cases being solved. A lab will take a DNA sample from a crime scene and analyze it to identify genetic relatives using publicly accessible genealogy databases. That allows investigators to zero in on a suspect or identify unknown remains.

And what they did was by building out this family tree, they found essentially Brian Coburger's father. And so they started monitoring the co-burger family home across the country in Pennsylvania, and they worked, the FBI worked with a trash collection company, and they collected trash, and then they swabbed that, and then they were able to match it back. Once Brian Coburger was arrested,

they did a cheek swab and matched that. It was a statistical match to his DNA that was on the knife sheath, according to authorities. Once police had the DNA, The case's puzzle pieces started to fit together. You'll remember that that was another sort of big piece of evidence that authorities alerted the public to. Before he was arrested, they let everybody know they were looking for a white Hyundai Allantra. And it's not a super unique car.

There was a lot of them. And there was an officer who happened to see a white Hyundai Alantra, you know, like on campus. and he pulled up the file and has like a picture of the driver's license of the person who owns the car. And I mean, according to authorities, his first thought was like, that guy has bushy eyebrows. After officers linked Brian to the white Alantra, they started pulling surveillance and cell phone records. The affidavit filed by the Moscow Police Department lays out what they believe to be Brian's movements on November 13th, 2022. According to cell phone data, Brian left his apartment in Pullman around 2.45 a.m. Two minutes later, the phone disconnects from the network.

This means Brian either turned his phone off or drove through an area without cell coverage. Surveillance cameras captured a white Hyundai Allantra matching Bryans, driving out of Pullman and crossing the Washington-Ido-State line. The car made it into Moscow at 3.26 a.m. Between 329 and 404 a.m., the Alonra was spotted by cameras multiple times driving through the King Road neighborhood where the Idaho four victims lived. The last time the Alontera appears on camera in Moscow is at 4.20 a.m. This time, it's leaving King Road at a high speed. Brian's phone didn't reconnect to a network until 4.48 a.m.

At that point, he seemed to be on a highway just south of Moscow. His phone pinged back at his apartment complex in Pullman by 5.30 a.m. Interestingly, records also show Brian returned to Moscow around 9.15 a.m. His phone pinged on a tower covering the King Road residents. Then he was back at his apartment around 9.30. The authorities also discovered that the morning of the murders wasn't the only time Brian's phone pinged in Moscow. His cell records show the phone access networks in the area in and around King Road 12 times between June and November 2022. All of the evidence was presented in the arrest warrant on December 29th, and the The next day, Brian was arrested in Pennsylvania.

There was a lot of relief once he was arrested. And, you know, he's a suspect at this point, right? He has not been convicted. But even the thought of an arrest of some kind lifted a tremendous weight for the community of Moscow. That's for sure. They had a name and they started digging in right away. Who is this guy? Snoring, gasping during sleep, feeling fatigue,

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Sterling Point, and more. Slow burns, second chances, chemistry you can feel through the screen. Your next obsession is waiting. Watch only on Prime. Brian Coburger was born in November 1994 in Monroe County, a remote part of Pennsylvania near the Poconos Mountains. His parents work for the local school district and have two other children. Brian is the youngest. In her investigation for the King Road Killings, Kana made several attempts to speak to Brian herself, but did not get a response.

So Kana turned to the people in his life to get a picture of who Brian is. In some reports, Brian has been described as an outcast and maybe a little. little socially awkward, but Kana discovered he did have a small group of friends who described him as a happy kid. From what we learned from talking with people who knew him then, you know, when he was younger, was that he was quite ambitious, he had an early interest in law enforcement, always described as very smart, perhaps standoffish, not necessarily a loner, but not the most popular guy either. In high school, Brian did his best to reinvent himself.

He had been teased about his weight, so he started dieting and taking exercise classes. He dressed in the same clothes the popular kids wore. But it all starts to really take a turn as he's getting a little bit older. Brian's physical changes were accompanied by a personality shift. One of his former friends told the Idaho statesman that Brian, quote, always wanted to be dominant physically and intellectually. His personality changes began to wear on his friends, so they distanced himself from him. Brian's behavior toward women reportedly became creepy.

He would ask girls out on dates repeatedly, never taking no for an answer. He was also struggling internally. When Brian was about 14 years old, he began experiencing a neurological condition known as Visual Snow Syndrome, a rare condition that creates white or gray dots in someone's field of vision. It's like looking at the world, through a static television. It can be accompanied by painful migraines and tinnitus. Researchers still don't know what causes the condition,

which was first discovered in 1995. There's currently no known cure. In 2009, Brian joined an online forum to talk about his experiences with visual snow syndrome. He reported feeling depressed and anxious, sometimes even void of emotion. He struggled with depersonalization, a symptom in which a person feels detached from their own body.

According to experts, these mental health disturbances are common in people with visual snow syndrome. Eventually, Brian found a way to alleviate his symptoms. He adhered to a strict diet, no sugar, wheat, corn, peanuts, soy, or alcohol. A former friend told the Idaho statesman that Brian grew so stringent about his food intake that he ended up hospitalized with an eating disorder. That wasn't Brian's only struggle. Around the time he graduated high school, he allegedly began using heroin. heroin. Friends reported he was in and out of rehab between 2013 and 2014. After one stint,

he returned home and stole his sister's phone. He then sold it at a local mall and his father reported it to the police. Brian was charged with misdemeanor theft but didn't serve jail time. The record has now been expunged. Outside of a few traffic stops, that incident is Brian's only known run-in with the law. By 2018, he appears to have cleaned up his life. He wrote to an old friend that he was sober and had just graduated from Northampton Community College with a degree in psychology. He'd revived his interest in law enforcement. He worked as a security guard and told his friends that he'd like to get a job capturing violent criminals. In 2020, Brian enrolled at DeSales University. There, he studied under Dr. Catherine Ramsland, a leading forensic psychologist

and serial killer expert. She's renowned for studying Dennis Rader, better known as the BTK killer, for more than a decade. She wrote a book based on her correspondence with him in 2016. Brian graduated with his master's in criminal justice in May of 2022. One of his professors gave him a glowing recommendation for a PhD in criminology at Washington State University. He was admitted to the program, and that summer, he moved across the country to Pullman, Washington, less than 10 miles west of Moscow, Idaho. Brian lived in an off-campus apartment intended for graduate students. As a PhD student, he was required to be a teaching assistant, so he was also given an office in one of the lecture halls at the university. One of Brian's former students told

Kana that Brian was distant and not very engaging. He also earned a reputation as a harsh grader. But all in all, the students said he didn't notice any major red flags. The other PhD candidates in Brian's cohort, however, saw a different side of him. I spoke with some. students who were part of the graduate program that he was in at Washington State. And what they really talked about the most here was his really bizarre behavior, especially toward women. They kept what they called a Brian tally. And in this tally, they would monitor if he'd be late to a female professor's class,

if he'd miss it, if he would be rude to them, things like that. While at the same time, there was a... another member of the program, a woman who essentially they banded together to make sure that she never was like left behind in the office alone with him. They would always help her walk to her car. They said he did weird things like kind of holding bizarre office hours, like strange times, and that he would sort of position himself like in between the female student and the door, that he would take their laptop and during these meetings. things, just really generally uncomfortable behavior is what was described to me.

According to the Brian Talley, Ryan missed class on November 14th, 2022, the day after the Idaho four were killed. Brian's former students told reporters that after the murders, Brian seemed more upbeat. He gave better grades to his students. He got a new license plate for his car and sported a new haircut. There was also some stories that he was struggling in school. school a bit at that time, perhaps that they were moving towards removing him from the graduate program. And it was interesting because it sounds like he wasn't sharing that with his parents,

the struggles that he was having at school. I was told that, you know, he fully believed that he would be able to appeal the university's decision to remove him from the PhD program. And so perhaps that's why he didn't share it with his parents. According to News Nation, Brian was under investigation at Washington State University for behavioral problems and a sexist attitude towards women. He had repeatedly been warned about making rude comments to female students and grading them more harshly than their male peers. On December 9th, Brian allegedly had a meeting with one of his professors who told him he hadn't made progress towards professionalism. 10 days later, he was terminated from his teaching assistant position. It's important to note that a representative from Washington State University did not confirm or deny these allegations due to student privacy.

In February 2023, he told media outlets that Brian was no longer employed as a teaching assistant and was not enrolled in the university. When the semester ended in December, Brian's father flew out to Pullman to accompany his son on a drive across the country. They were going back home to Pennsylvania for the winter holidays. During the trip, Brian was pulled over twice in the span of 10 minutes by Indiana police officers. Both times he had been following another car too closely, and he was let off with a warning. The traffic stops were unrelated to the murder investigation. Brian and his father drove for about two and a half days before reaching their hometown of Albright'sville. Meanwhile, Idaho police were ramping up their investigation, obtaining some of the state.

obtaining cell phone records and surveillance footage. On December 27th, Pennsylvania agents gathered trash from the Koberger family home. They sent samples of Brian's father's DNA to the Idaho State Lab to compare with the DNA from the knife sheath found at the murder scene. The following day, the lab confirmed with 99% certainty the sample belonged to the suspect's dad. At 3 a.m. on December 30th, six weeks after the killings, the FBI entered the Koberger home and arrested Brian for the murders of Zana, Maddie, Ethan, and Kaylee. Want to support your gut health? Take Activia's gut health challenge by enjoying two Activia yogurt today for two weeks and see if you feel a difference. With billions of

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with limonada gelada, where zest Brazilian Lemonade Accord meets coconut milk and golden brown sugar. Don't miss Sol de Janeiro's limited edition perfume mist collection only at Sephora. As of this recording in June 2025, Brian Coburger is scheduled to go on trial in two months. Brian's defense has entered a plea if not guilty. The prosecution is seeking the death penalty. In the last two years, more and more information about Brian and his case has trickled out through unsealed documents released by the courts. The past spring has brought even more information to light. This case has been shrouded in secrecy for years,

and now all of a sudden in these last couple months it's just been a deluge of information. Just two weeks before our interview with Kena, court documents were unsealed, revealing more than two dozen new pieces of evidence to the public. To me, some of the most interesting parts of the recent filings have been the fact that the prosecution says that Brian Koberger purchased

a knife like the murder weapon on Amazon eight months prior to the murders. And not only did he purchase a knife, but he also purchased a sheath as well as a sharpener. And so, you know, the state is alleging this. They're also alleging that he searched Amazon for a replacement knife. I'm putting it air quotes there. That's their word exactly. After the murders, because it's important to note that the murder weapon was never found. And so that's what they're saying about his Amazon purchases, but, you know, his defense team is pushing back hard saying that anyone in the family could have used that Amazon account, anyone in the Coburger household, and that they do things like go camping and stuff like that. And so, you know, trying to argue that perhaps

purchasing a knife like that wouldn't have been out of sorts. Shortly after Brian was arrested, social media sluice found his Reddit account, later confirmed by investigators. While Brian was studying at DeSales, he posted in a subreddit for criminology students. In the post, Brian said he was looking for survey responses for a research project. Throughout his academic career, as he's pursuing, you know, first his master's in criminal justice and then his Ph.D. in criminology. His classwork is essentially under the microscope. early on, everyone was able to dig up this Reddit survey that he used.

And his survey, which was interesting, was actually of criminals. So he was surveying criminals and he wanted to know what drives them to commit crime, what makes them break the law. And so he goes through and he starts to ask a really interesting question. of these criminals, things like, did you prepare for the crime before leaving your home? He asks them why the victims, were they chosen? Were they targeted?

What did you do to accomplish your goal? And the other thing, too, that I found really fascinating was he wanted to know how these criminals felt and what they were thinking about after committing me. a crime. The newly unsealed documents reveal more homework that may seem eerie in hindsight. The 12-page paper, titled Crime Scene Scenario Final, was also written while Brian was at DeSales.

In it, Brian describes a case in which a woman was found stabbed in a trailer park. He lists out the steps an investigator would need to take in order to analyze the scene of the crime. What prosecutors are really alleging here is this is almost like a how-to guide. I think what the prosecution is trying to do here is to highlight what they feel are some similarities between his crime scene scenario final and the murder scene on King Road. Notably, the victim in this case that he writes about is a white female approximately 35 years of age. And so what it is is essentially how to secure a crime scene and what to look for if you are an investigator. that's arriving on scene.

And so he has what you do when you arrive, the equipment that you would need to have with you, you know, things like gloves, a mask, goggles, stuff like that. You don't want to contaminate the crime scene, a camera to take pictures. He also talks about how you would enter the home in this case. And then he starts talking about,

he says you need to look to see if she has defense wounds, are there hesitation marks on her related to the knife, or are there multiple stab wounds? He talks about photographing the knife under adequate light. He also discusses the investigation of forced entry.

Is it possible that she knew the assailant? Prosecutors allege the homework shows that Brian has knowledge of crime scenes, but Kana and Slashire. Some experts have pointed out that this might just be standard homework when someone is pursuing a degree in criminology. Brian's defense team, led by attorney Ann Taylor, is refuting some of the evidence that has been presented by the prosecution. For one, the cell phone records. Brian insists he has an alibi for the night of the murders.

He was simply out for a drive and a hike. His lawyers say Brian frequently took these late night trips because his diagnosed obsessive-compulsive disorder causes difficulty sleeping. That's why his cell phone pinged in different towers on the morning of the murders. What I'm told by cell phone experts that I've talked to is that in a rural area like Moscow, the cell towers are so far away. It is really hard to pinpoint anybody's exact location. His defense team is also offering up this alibi that Brian Koberger was out stargazing by himself, the night of the murders.

and Anne Taylor is also linking that to some of his autism spectrum disorder, OCD, insomnia, that he needed to go on these nighttime drives to clear his head and look at the night sky. And they are saying that he was out in this rural park, Hawaii State Park. I drove out there, by the way. It's gorgeous, but it is really out of the way. And it's interesting because if you ask people in Moscow, where it is, hardly anybody knows.

Moscow is surrounded and trails and outdoor activity and you have to really go out of your way to get there. I actually spoke with the park superintendent and I asked him if people are out there a lot in November and it's just cold out there in November

the roads are icy. There's no cameras or anything. But it's not a super popular place in the colder months according to the park superintendent. But that is the alibi that they are using. And part of it is because Brian Koberger's phone dropped off the cell network for so long. And they're not sure why.

Was it turned off? Was it an airplane mode? Were they out of cell phone service? So both sides are going to try to use cell phone data to prove their point there. Anne Taylor has made multiple attempts to have the death penalty taken off the table. Her first argument that the punitive. punishment is unconstitutional was rejected by the judge in the case. But now her latest argument is that it needs to be taken off the table because of his autism

spectrum disorder. And what she's arguing here is that he may appear unsympathetic to a jury because of his disorder and that he comes off perhaps as sinister is the word that's used a lot because he might not be reacting to things that are said in court in a way that society might deem a appropriate. And so she's really worried that, you know, he'll be unsympathetic to a jury. And she's taking it broader than that, though. She's saying that not only is his autism spectrum disorder that's accompanied with some OCD, that because of his disorder, according to his defense, he lacks the speed and the coordination that it would even take to have murdered these four

students in such a short amount of time. In late April 2025, the judge rejected the defense team's request, ruling that the death penalty is still on the table despite Brian's diagnoses. The key piece of evidence is Brian's DNA, which was found on the knife sheath in Maddie's bed. It may appear airtight for the prosecution, but the defense is prepared to counter that argument. Brian Coburger is the only suspect in this case, and his defense team, argues in court filings that the knife sheath containing his DNA could have actually been

planted by the real perpetrator. That's what they believe. They would like to offer up alternative suspects come trial. The state is pushing back hard on that as well. The defense also plans to present more DNA evidence. Investigators found blood stains at the crime scene belonging to two unknown males. One of them was found in blood that on a handrail that leads from the first to the second floor and the other on this glove that was outside. But, you know, what prosecutors will say is the reason that they focused in on Brian Coburger's DNA was because it was found on a knife sheath in a crime scene where four people were stabbed to death. But because this was a college party house where students were constantly in and out, DNA evidence is more complicated than usual.

I remember investigator early on telling me it's sort of hard for investigators to determine, like, what might be part of the crime scene and what is just part of college kids living, how college kids live, you know? And so that's tricky because there's DNA absolutely everywhere in that house. The defense will likely present alternative suspects at the trial, but it's not the only question that remains unanswered. You know, we heard targeted on like day one. I still don't have an answer to that. The prosecution has not laid out a motive. They have not laid out the target. I thought that would be something we would have learned

the second he was arrested and the fact that we're going into trial with all this new information and we still don't know the answer to that is wild. One of the most emotional revelations for Cano was the audio of the 911 call placed by the surviving roommates and their friends at 11.56 a.m. on November 13th, almost eight hours after authorities believed the murders took place. To me, what's the most revealing about the 911 call is what you hear in the background. Because just reading through it, you don't understand the panic. You don't understand like the heavy breathing and the crying that's happening on the call.

Law enforcement told me early on that the call was made essentially in the driveway of the hospital. home and that they had called their other friends over. So there's multiple people out there standing in the parking lot. And you hear the surviving roommate who saw the man clad in black that night on the phone with the dispatcher. And the dispatcher is saying, go in and check. Is there somebody that's passed out? And she turns to the other surviving roommate and tells her, we've got to go back inside. And there's this silence. And then you hear her say, no, but we have to. You're just having to coax her back in the home. And when they go back in the home, that's when you hear this male voice, Zana, Ethan, and then it's just commotion. You kind of make a get out, get out, and people are running.

What did they discover? Dylan and Bethany, the surviving roommates, have received public criticism for their decision to call 911 so long after the killings, especially after Dylan saw the suspect in their home around 4.17 a.m. But as Kana points out, these were young college students who were likely very afraid. Very early in this investigation. There was a source that told me, throughout your reporting, it's going to be important that you remind yourself what college was like, what it was like to be a 20-year-old, right? Not even a 21-year-old. Drinking illegally, off-campus, at a party, your perhaps fear of law enforcement, the level into, which you are intoxicated, you know, don't overlook that when you're trying to analyze what happened.

I've also been told by authorities that the crime scenes themselves, these two bedrooms, were kind of closed off and that the rest of the house wasn't a mess, right? It wasn't like you would walk into the kitchen and know what happened. And so, to me, the background and the call is horrifying and how that young male was able to stay so calm is incredible. You know, Kaylee's father told me he thinks of that young man today as a hero. Throughout the time Kana's been reporting on the story, she's kept in touch with many of the victim's loved ones. We spoke with Zana's cousin early on, and she's just an incredible young woman, budding young

woman. I speak sometimes intermittently with Ethan's mom. That family is amazing. They're such good people. And they're living for their two other kids right now. You know, Ethan was a triplet. And they are incredible. I'm so inspired by them, if I'm being honest. I spent some time with them up on the tulip farm where Ethan worked for summer. Zana went up there too. Maddie's dad spoke with us early on, and he shared stories of his Maddie Mae, as he calls her. It breaks my heart, the Maddie Mae thing, because she's just the sweetest little thing in the world. And in fact, I went out to the memorial that they built for the students on campus in Moscow, and they have their names in iron, and they decided to write Maddie Mae.

Kaley's mom has these new tattoos on her. arm for both girls. You know, Kaylee's sister was pregnant when Kaylee was murdered and she had a baby and she named her Maddie Kay. There's a lot of love going around. Kena has been with ABC News for 10 years and she says that this is one of the stories that has had the biggest impact on her. As a journalist, you cover a lot of stories and not all stories stick with you. I feel like this story's become a part of me. I've gotten to know specifically Kaylee's family so well. But I am telling you, when I hear like giggling, laughing, hysterical,

that's how people describe Zana as just this most fun person. I think about her. I planted white and yellow tulips in my yard for Ethan, you know. It seems so simple. And I think about him all the time. The color pink, I don't see it now without thinking about Maddie. and especially her pink cowboy boots that sat in her window. Everyone could see for days in that house after she was murdered.

And then Kaylee is like every single person's best friend. You know, she was best friends with everybody. And I have this memory of her mom telling me she had bought her these like succulents for her bedroom or something. That's not for whatever reason. I see succulents and I think about her. Charity Foundations have been established in each of the victim's names, which Kana says inspires her. They're trying to make this horrible tragedy into something beautiful for future generations. The Ethan Smile Foundation Scholarship was established by Ethan's parents in 2023.

So far, 83 high school seniors have been awarded a total of $105,000 to put towards their college educations. If you're interested in donating, please visit ethanesmile.org. The Made with Kindness Foundation was co-founded in 2024 by one of Kaylee, Maddie, and Zana's former roommates. The Foundation awards scholarships and offers workshops promoting safety on campus for college students. If you'd like to donate, please visit madewithkindnessfoundation.com. Thank you for listening to Serial Killers. We're here with a new episode every Monday. Be sure to check us out on Instagram at Serial Killers podcast. And if you're tuning in on Spotify, swipe up and give us your thoughts.

A big thank you to our guest, Kana Whitworth. Kana will continue to cover the Idaho forecase as it heads into trial. Her podcast, The King Road Killings, will release bonus episodes when new court documents are unsealed and twice a week once the trial begins. This episode was written, researched, and produced by Chelsea Wood, fact-checked by Sophie Kemp, and sound designed by Kelly Gary. I'm your host, Janice Morgan. A beloved 75-year-old man washing up getting ready for bed is a

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