Bryan Kohberger renews effort to present alibi, other suspects at Idaho murder trial

Attorneys for defendant Bryan Kohberger want to reserve their ability to point to other possible suspects during his forthcoming murder trial, as part of assertions that their client was elsewhere at the time of the University of Idaho student homicides.

Pushing back against prosecutors, his attorneys said in their latest court filings that they should face no restrictions on how they present the prospect of other perpetrators in his trial this summer. The prosecution has asked Ada County Judge Steven Hippler to limit such arguments to jurors and said they “would do nothing more than mislead and confuse.”

“Mr. Kohberger has a right to present a full and complete defense for the crimes of which he is accused,” Kohberger’s attorneys wrote. “This case is full of alternative perpetrators. The state has chosen to focus on Mr. Kohberger, at its own peril.”

At a hearing earlier this year, the defense raised questions about two sources of unknown male blood DNA found at the crime scene. Investigators did not run the samples through the FBI’s national DNA database known as CODIS, because they did not meet certain criteria, Latah County Prosecutor Bill Thompson previously said at a hearing in August 2023.

The defense also filed a response to prosecutors’ attempt to force Kohberger to take the stand to testify, if he wants to offer up that he was never inside the three-story home in Moscow where the four college students were found fatally stabbed in November 2022. Prosecutors argued his alibi lacks sufficient support or any witnesses who can corroborate his whereabouts.

In prior alibi filings, Kohberger’s defense said he was out driving alone in southeast Washington, about 30 miles from Moscow. Kohberger’s attorneys said in the response filing released publicly Wednesday that a cellphone expert would offer “partial corroboration” that their client wasn’t near the crime scene at the time of the homicides.

“Mr. Kohberger further advised the state of his intention to cross-examine any state expert in that field,” lead defense attorney Anne Taylor wrote.

Kohberger, 30, is a former graduate student of criminal justice and criminology at Washington State University in Pullman, Washington. He is charged with four counts of first-degree murder, and prosecutors intend to seek the death penalty if a jury finds him guilty.

The four victims were Kaylee Goncalves, 21, of Rathdrum; Madison Mogen, 21, of Coeur d’Alene; Xana Kernodle, 20, of Post Falls; and Ethan Chapin, 20, of Mount Vernon, Washington. The three women lived in the Moscow home with two other young women who went physically unharmed; Chapin was Kernodle’s boyfriend and stayed over for the night.

Meanwhile, the prosecution pushed back against a prior defense filing asking to exclude one of the surviving roommates’ statements that the masked intruder she saw in their off-campus home had “bushy eyebrows.” The defense previously questioned her reliability in identifying the masked man and pointed to an interview she did with police days after the homicides in which she said “she was really sleepy and probably very drunk” that night.

The prosecution in a filing also published Wednesday argued the roommate gave “consistent descriptions” of the man she saw and that one of the common descriptions was the man’s “bushy eyebrows.” They said they intend to admit a photograph of Kohberger, taken hours after the students were killed, to help corroborate the roommate’s statements.

“This description is clear,” Latah County Senior Deputy Prosecutor Ashley Jennings wrote in the filing. “It is not confusing and therefore will not confuse a jury.”

“The fact that this description may, or may not, implicate defendant, is not a reason to keep this fact from the jury’s consideration,” she added. ”It is not reasonable to believe the jury will convict the defendant based on the status of his kept or unkept eyebrows.”

Victims’ deaths defined as ‘murder,’ prosecutors say

The defense did not object to the court allowing the immediate family members of the victims to be present for the entirety of the trial in Boise, scheduled to start with jury selection in late July. Kohberger’s attorneys sought Hippler’s guidance, however, on proper decorum, including the clothing that relatives may wear, seeking to bar T-shirts with the victims’ pictures or messages that promote the state’s new firing squad execution law, which members of the Goncalves family have previously worn at hearings.

“This must not be allowed in any future courtroom proceedings,” the filing read. “Case law from other states have noted that ‘it would seem that the wearing of such buttons or T-shirts is not a good idea because of the possibility of prejudice which might result.’ ”

Kohberger’s attorneys asked to ensure that his family also be permitted in the courtroom, should any of his mother, father and two sisters choose to attend, citing their client’s Sixth Amendment right to a fair trial.

Prosecutors, meanwhile, rejected a request from the defense that they not refer to the four students’ deaths as murders. The defense did not cite any authority that would limit the state’s use of the term, and the motion should be denied, prosecutors wrote.

“Here, the state’s use of the word murder will not unfairly prejudice (the) defendant,” the filing read. “The indictment charges defendant with four counts of murder in the first degree, and the jury will be told as much immediately after the trial begins. The jury will also be instructed as to the presumption of innocence.”

Prosecutors said that they have no plans to use the terms “psychopath” or “sociopath” in reference to Kohberger, as the defense filed to prohibit to avoid “name calling” at trial.

Defense wants ‘complete picture’ at trial

Kohberger’s attorneys this week also asked Hippler to deny the prosecution’s request to admit some of the surviving roommates’ phone calls and text messages — which were partly revealed this month.

Instead, Taylor requested the entire record of phone calls and text messages be released, according to an objection filed Monday. She urged Hipper to view the prosecution’s request with “consideration of the complete picture,” the filing read.

The prosecution “has asked the court to look at a timeline and Mr. Kohberger urges the court to look at everything that occurred during the timeline,” Taylor wrote.

In addition, Taylor requested that the court block the 911 call from being admitted during the trial. The audio was released last week after a transcript of the call was disclosed in a court filing the week prior.

The texts between the two female roommates, whom the Idaho Statesman is not identifying by name, revealed in the prosecution’s filing that the second-floor roommate saw someone in their home wearing all black and a ski mask or covering over his head and mouth, and texted the first-floor roommate between 4:22 and 4:24 a.m.

“I’m not kidding. (I) am so freaked out,” she wrote.

“So am I,” the other responded, urging the roommate who lived on the second floor to come down to her room.

The women spent the night together downstairs and, before falling asleep, called their other roommates several times. All their calls went unanswered.

The next text messages disclosed by the prosecution began around 10:20 a.m., when one of the surviving roommates started texting Goncalves and Mogen to see whether they were awake. But the defense called the prosecution’s claim “wrong” that the roommate “woke up and realized her roommates had not responded.”

Records disclosed by the defense showed the other roommate, who lived on the first floor, made several phone calls starting at 7:30 a.m., while the second-floor roommate was using Instagram on her phone by 8 a.m.

“The state is looking at the messages with the benefit of hindsight,” Taylor wrote.

Kohberger is next due to appear in court for oral arguments on the motions to limit evidence on April 9.