Bryan Kohberger Prosecutors Lay Out Evidence — and Discuss Question of Motive

The case against Bryan Kohberger may not have been as strong as expected, and now some questions about the crime may never be answered.

Latah County Prosecutor Bill Thompson shared details of the investigation into the murders of four University of Idaho students and summarized the case prosecutors planned to present at trial in court on July 2.

He made his remarks after Kohberger confessed to the murders of four University of Idaho students: Madison Mogen, 21; Kaylee Goncalves, 21; Xana Kernodle, 20; and Ethan Chapin, 20.

That confession marked the end of a nearly three-year-long case that began in the early morning hours of Nov. 13, 2022, when the four victims were brutally stabbed to death in their off-campus home. 

Thompson said in court that a KA-BAR knife sheath was found under one of the victims and contained enough single-source DNA to eventually trace that sheath back to Kohberger.

What prosecutors do not have, and investigators were never able to find, however, was the actual KA-BAR knife.

Thompson said in court that the investigation had failed to locate the murder weapon used to kill the four victims.

So while prosecutors had evidence of Kohberger purchasing a KA-BAR knife and sheath from Amazon months before the murders, they did not have that knife to show jurors.

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Then, there is the question of motive, which Thompson briefly spoke about in court.

The investigation found evidence of Kohberger’s phone pinging the cellular tower in the area of the victims’ Moscow home multiple times in the months before the murders.

In the four months before the murder, Thompson said that Kohberger’s phone pinged that tower 23 times between 10 p.m. and 4 a.m.

Prosecutors, however, could not connect the killer to his victims, Thompson said.

“We do not have evidence that he had direct contact with [the home], but we can put his phone in that area at those times,” Thompson said.

No murder weapon, no evidence that he knew his victims and as a result, no motive.

Now that the case will not go to trial there is little to no chance that Kohberger’s motive will ever be known.

It appears his one mistake was leaving behind that knife sheath, and if not for that, he might never have been apprehended.

Thompson explained in court that the case was difficult, in large part because the person being investigated was an expert.

“The defendant has studied crime,” Thompson explained. “In fact, he did a detailed paper on crime scene processing when he was working on his Ph.D., and he had that knowledge skill set.”

Kohberger will now spend the rest of his life in prison, after agreeing to serve four life sentences for the murders in exchange for his guilty pleas.

In exchange for those pleas, prosecutors agreed that they would not seek the death penalty.

More answers might come, however, after Kohberger’s sentencing hearing on July 23 — which is when the court will address if hundreds of documents filed in the case and unavailable to the public or media will be unsealed.