Suspect Bryan Kohberger also appeared in magistrate court in Latah County, Idaho Thursday morning.
Ahead of his court appearance, the state of Idaho released several court documents related to this case, including the affidavit that led police to arrest Kohberger.
The document explained what the surviving roommates in the home heard and saw before and after the killings took place, including one seeing a masked man wearing all black.
It also detailed how police tracked Kohberger though DNA, phone records and the movement of his Hyundai Elantra.
Until today, law enforcement has not released many details about the investigation and Kohberger’s arrest. Moscow Idaho Police Chief James Fry told reporters last week that more information would be released after Kohberger appeared in Idaho court.
Kohberger arrived in Idaho Wednesday night after he waived extradition in Pennsylvania.
On Tuesday, Jan. 3, 2023, Kohberger appeared at the Monroe County Courthouse in Stroudsberg, PA. This came days after he was arrested at his parent’s home in Albrightsville, PA on Dec. 30, 2022.
In court Thursday, a judge read the charges Kohberger faces, including four counts of first-degree murder. The penalty for each murder count is life in prison or death, if found guilty.
Reporters inside the courthouse said Kohberger did not say much and was described as being emotionless during the hearing.
The judge denied Kohberger’s request for bail.
The family of at least one of the four victims was also present in the courtroom.
While the probable cause affidavit revealed more information about the murders and the police investigation that led to Kohberger’s arrest, there are still many important details left unknown.
Kohberger’s possible motive for allegedly committing the crimes is still unclear and the murder weapon has still not been found.
The next time Kohberger is set to appear in court will be next Thursday, Jan. 12.
“Contrary to reports, the December 15th traffic stops conducted on the vehicle being driven by Bryan Kohberger in Indiana were not requested or directed by the FBI,” the bureau said in a statement released Thursday by Indiana State Police (ISP).
Fox News previously reported that a surveillance team with the FBI asked police in Indiana to conduct a traffic stop as Kohberger and his father drove cross-country. They were headed from Washington state, where Kohberger was enrolled as a Ph.D. student at Washington State University, to the family’s home in Pennsylvania.
ISP released body camera footage earlier this week showing one traffic stop involving Kohberger on the morning of December 15 in Hancock County. The ISP said another traffic stop of Kohberger’s vehicle was conducted by a deputy with the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department less than 10 minutes earlier.
Kohberger was not issued a ticket in either incident, according to his public defender in Pennsylvania. Fifteen days later, Kohberger was arrested at his family’s home for his alleged involvement in the November murders of four University of Idaho students.
The roommates said everyone was asleep or in their rooms by 4 a.m. The only exception to this was Xana Kernodle, who received a DoorDash order at the residence at approximately 4 a.m., according to the affidavit.
Law enforcement were able to identify the DoorDash delivery driver who they say reported this information.
A forensic review of Kernodle’s cellphone indicated she was likely awake and using TikTok at approximately 4:12 a.m.
This was around the time one roommate, identified as D.M., said she thought she were someone say something like “there’s someone here.”
Investigators believe the four homicides took place inside the home between 4 a.m. and 4:25 a.m. on Nov. 13.
Kohberger’s car came up on a search conducted by a WSU police officer for white Hyundai Elantras that were registered to people at the university. The search was conducted on November 29 at about 12:28 a.m., the affidavit says.
The vehicle mentioned in the affidavit was a 2015 model that had a Pennsylvania license plate. It was registered in Kohberger’s name and listed his address in Pullman, Washington. The affidavit later says the vehicle’s Pennsylvania registration expired at the end of November and that Kohberger registered the car in Washington on November 18.
About half an hour after Kohberger’s vehicle was first flagged in a search by one WSU officer, another spotted it in the parking lot of Kohberger’s apartment complex. That second officer also ran the vehicle’s license plate and identified it as being registered to Kohberger.
Officers with the Moscow Police Department had on November 25 asked law enforcement officials in the area to keep an eye out for white Hyundai Elantras, the kind of vehicle they thought might be linked to the murders. In early December, police invited tips from anyone with knowledge of the vehicle spotted near the off-campus home where the murders took place.
According to News Nation reporter Brian Entin, the Latah County Sheriff said the jail will try to work with Kohberger’s vegan diet.
Sheriff Richard Skiles, however, said the jail is “not going to buy new pots and pans or anything like that.”
Ahead of his arrest, investigators were able to match DNA from the crime scene to Kohberger.
On Dec. 27, 2022, police in Pennsylvania collected evidence from the trash outside Kohbeger’s parents’ home in Albrightsville, PA, according to the affidavit.
The evidence was sent to the Idaho State Lab for testing. One day later, it was determined that the DNA profile obtained from the trash matched the DNA from the knife sheath found in one of the victim’s bed. Investigators determined the trash DNA sample was a near-perfect match to the father of the suspect profile.
“The Idaho State Lab reported that a DNA profile obtained from the trash and the DNA profile obtained from the sheath, identified a male as not being excluded as the biological father of Suspect Profile,” the affidavit states. “At least 99.9998% of the male population would be expected to be excluded from the possibility of being the suspect’s biological father.”
Judge Megan Marshall denied bail, after a request by his attorney. Marshall also issued a no-contact order for the surviving roommates and the victims’ families.
Attorney Shanon Gray appeared beside members of the Goncalves family outside the Latah County Courthouse Thursday morning after Kohberger’s hearing. Gray did not take any questions from reporters but released a brief statement.
“It’s obviously an emotional time for the family, seeing the defendant for the first time,” Gray said. “This is the beginning of the criminal justice system. And the family will be here for the long haul.”
Goncalves was among the four University of Idaho students killed on Nov. 13. She was just was 21-years-old.
A person with the PPD’s interview panel provided authorities with documents related to Kohberger’s application. The affidavit said those interview documents showed Kohberger wrote about having an “interest in assisting rural law enforcement agencies with how to better collect and analyze technological data in public safety operations” in an essay he submitted with his application.
Shortly after Kohberger’s arrest last week, internet sleuths located a Reddit thread that appeared to link Kohberger to a crime study that sought to “understand how emotions and psychological traits influence decision-making when committing a crime.” The affidavit said the study was posted by Kohberger, who previously studied psychology and cloud-based forensics.
Judge Megan Marshall denied bail for Kohberger, who is suspected of killing four University of Idaho students in a student home on Nov. 13, 2022.
Reporters inside the courtroom described Kohberger as silent and showing no emotion. Families of the victims were also present, reportedly sitting in the front row, and seen crying.
Kohberger is set to appear in court next Thursday, January 12.
At approximately 2:42 a.m., Kohberger’s cellphone was tracked near his residence in Pullman, WA on the day of the murder.
The phone stopped reported working at 2:47 a.m., “which is consistent with either the phone being in an areas without cellular coverage, the connection to the network disabled or that the phone was turned off,” according to the affidavit.
The phone does not report to a network again until about 4:48 a.m. just south of Moscow, ID.
Investigators believe the homicides in Moscow took place between 4 a.m. and 4:25 a.m. on Nov. 13.
Between 4:50 a.m. and 5:26 a.m. the phone was traveling on Idaho state highway 95 towards Kohberger’s home in Pullman, WA.
That was not the last time the phone was tracked near the scene of the crime on the day of the murders.
Further review of phone records show Kohberger’s phone left his home at about 9 a.m. and traveled back towards Moscow, ID.
Specifically, the phone utilized cellular resources that would provide coverage to the King Road Residence, where the murders occurred, between 9:12 a.m. and 9:21 am.
The phone then traveled back to Kohberger’s residence in Washington and arrived back at his home at approximately 9:32 a.m.
A Moscow Police Department officer who responded to the crime scene said he saw both Goncalves and Mogen on the single bed when he entered Mogen’s room. The officer noticed both Goncalves and Mogen had “visible stab wounds,” according to a probable cause affidavit released Thursday morning.
The officer said he “later noticed what appeared to be a tan leather knife sheath laying on the bed” beside Mogen. The sheath was described as having “Ka-Bar” and “USMC” lettering, and also had the “United States Marine Corps eagle globe and anchor insignia stamped on the outside of it.”
The knife sheath was taken from the crime scene for processing. Some male DNA was found on the knife sheath’s button snap by the Idaho State Lab, the affidavit says.
Kohberger’s phone was not utilizing cellular tower resources in close proximity to the crime scene between 3 a.m. and 5 a.m. on the night of the murders.
According to the affidavit, investigators note that individuals can leave their cellphones at a different location or turn their cellphone before committing a crime.
An individual, however, may surveil and area when they intend to commit a crime days or months prior to the date of the crime, investigators said.
“During these types of surveillance, it is possible that an individual would not leave their cellular telephone at a separate location or tum it off since they do not plan to commit the offense on that particular day,” the affidavit states.
Upon a search of Kohberger’s cellphone records, investigators found that his phone was used in the coverage area around the crime scene “on at least twelve occasions” before Nov. 13, 2022, when the murders occurred.
“All of these occasions, except for one, occurred in the late evening and early morning hours of their respective day,” the affidavit states.
Additionally, Kohberger’s cellphone usage was consistent with the movement of his vehicle, a Hyundai Elantra.
He will appear before Judge Megan Marshall in felony magistrate court. The charges against Kohberger will be read and the Judge will determine whether to set bail or not.
The redacted details on Kohberger’s case documents are expected to be unsealed immediately after the hearing.
While there will be one pool camera recording the court proceeding, it will not be live-streamed. Reporters in court were told by court officials that they are not allowed to live-tweet while inside the courtroom.
The roommate, identified in the probable cause affidavit as “D.M.” said she heard a man in the home who said something like “it’s ok, I’m going to help you.”
D.M. said she and her roommates were all home by 2 a.m. on November 13. The roommate told police she was asleep around 4 a.m. but heard Kaylee Goncalves, one of the four students who was later murdered, playing with her dog upstairs.
“A short time later, D.M. said she heard who she thought was Goncalves say something to the effect of ’there’s someone here,’” the affidavit says. The document notes the utterance could also have come from another victim, Xana Kernodle, who was believed to be awake at that time.
The roommate, known in the affidavit only as D.M., told police she opened her bedroom door after the third time she heard crying.
When she opened the door, she said she saw “a figure clad in black clothing and a mask that covered the person’s mouth and nose walking towards her.”
D.M. described the figure as “5’ 10” or taller, male, not very muscular, but “athletically built with bushy eyebrows.”
She said she stood in a “frozen shock phase” as the man walked past her towards the sliding glass door.
D.M. then locked herself in her room after she saw the man and told police she did not recognize him.
The affidavit also notes that at about 4:17 a.m., a security camera near the crime scene picked up a “distorted audio of what sounded like voices or a whimper followed by a loud thud.”
A dog was also heard barking “numerous times” on the camera locates less than fifty feet from victim Xana Kernodle’s bedroom.
Among the revelations: One of the surviving roommates told police she saw the killer inside the home and he walked by her as she stood a “frozen shock phase.”
At 4:17 a.m., around the suspected time of the murders, a dog was heard barking and a surviving roommate said she heard crying.
The affidavit also says Kohberger’s cell phone was in the area of the murders “on at least twelve occasions prior to November 13, 2022,” the date of the murders.
Newsweek is reviewing the document.
Kohberger was booked into the Latah County Jail at 6:44 p.m. Wednesday night and is being held there without bond. Following his arrest last week, Latah County Prosecutor Bill Thompson said Kohberger is being charged with four counts of first-degree murder and is also facing one felony burglary charge.
The probable cause affidavit for Kohberger’s arrest was under seal as authorities waited for him to arrive in Idaho. Thompson has said the affidavit must remain under seal until Kohberger is served with an Idaho arrest warrant, after which it is expected to become publicly accessible.
A summary of the “factual basis for the charges” filed against Kohberger are included in that affidavit, Thompson said, meaning the document could offer insight into what evidence authorities believe they have about Kohberger’s alleged involvement in the crime.
