New details have emerged in the deaths of Xana Kernodle, Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen and Ethan Chapin, four University of Idaho students who were fatally stabbed in 2022.
The latest findings, obtained by Dateline for their recent episode “The Terrible Night on King Road,” reveal the events leading up to the day when 27-year-old Bryan Kohberger allegedly committed the killings.
[embedded content]
What happened in the days leading up to the murder of four University of Idaho students in 2022?
Kohberger, who was a 27-year-old doctoral student in criminology at Washington State University in 2022, was living in Pennsylvania with his family before moving to Pullman, Washington, for school in the summer before the murders. However, Kohberger’s phone data showed that he frequently visited Moscow, Idaho, in the summer of 2022 after being invited to a pool party on July 9. During that summer, the data also showed that Kohberger often spent time near the address of the students who were murdered in Moscow.
Additionally, investigators obtained records from September 2022 showing that Kohberger’s internet history included searches for “Sociopathic Traits in College Student.” He also searched keywords such as “drugged” and “sleeping,” the records showed.
On Oct. 14, 2022, police pulled over Kohberger for a traffic violation. Five days after the stop, Kohberger’s internet history showed that he searched “Can Psychopaths behave prosocially?” In November 2022, the criminology student’s activity showed that he frequently continued to visit the area of the murdered students.
What happened on the day when four University of Idaho students were murdered?
On the night of Nov. 12, 2022, students from the University of Idaho were celebrating Senior Day after the school’s football team played a game earlier that day. One of the students, Kaylee Goncalves, posted an Instagram photo from the party around 9 p.m. that night and said, “One lucky girl to be surrounded by these ppl everyday.”
Goncalves was still with Mogen around 2 a.m. after the party ended. Meanwhile, Kernodle stayed with her boyfriend, Chapin, and two of their friends, Dylan Mortensen and Bethany Funke.
At 3:30 a.m., security cameras showed a white Elantra approaching the King Road home and circling the area multiple times over the next 30 minutes. The white car drove by again shortly after 4 a.m. Then, at 4:20 a.m., the car came back into view and sped off. Investigators believe that’s when the four students were murdered.
What did Kohberger’s phone data show on the night when the Idaho students were murdered?
Phone data showed that Kohberger’s device had been turned off around 3 a.m. on Nov. 13, but it connected to a cell tower in Moscow at 4:48 a.m. The phone user also appeared to make a call to an account registered to Kohberger’s father later that morning. Prosecutors said the phone briefly returned to Moscow around 9 a.m., before it was seen at Kohberger’s apartment in Pullman. That’s when Kohberger took a selfie, showing a thumbs-up sign in a bathroom mirror, prosecutors said.
Kohberger, who faces four counts of first-degree murder and one count of burglary, awaits his trial in August.
