LIVE: Bryan Kohberger Sentencing — ID v. Bryan Kohberger

LIVE: Bryan Kohberger Sentencing — ID v. Bryan Kohberger

Are both your live views ready to take? Let’s see. Lacy said yes. Get on the sidewalk and arrest. Sorry. That’s all right. I just saw the back. Do you know who that was? You know who that was? It’s We’re using a lot of data. Wi-Fi and then only turning This is not I don’t Part of me doesn’t like I think he’s a little bit serious. He looks like They said it’s available starting hours. They were brushing all the time. How are you? Good to see you. Right. Yeah. Good to meet you. Yeah, you know who Well, well, I said two weeks ago. Good morning. Good morning. So, you’re up at 27. I’m listening. But was it that way for the jury? See you in Arizona. What? How old are you? Thank you. Yeah. right there. And I’m like, “Hey, we call the fire department. Don’t worry about it. and they said, “Yeah, don’t worry about right under that light. right there. You know, like They wanted it. So they literally just right now. Well, it was I went up and over and I was cruising. I was fine. And then I saw a tomo truck and I swung around to park and I swung around and never saw sticking out like this. Thank you for Yeah. Not yet. I want to get out. Why not? are not going to Thank you. What do you think? Exactly. So happy to meet you. So happy to meet you. It’s very nice to meet you. I try a little bit. Yeah. Yeah. This is my first murder trial though. Oh, really? It was the So, Did you get shots of them? They can’t keep us off. I’ll go over there. I have a zoom lens. I might hide somewhere. See if I can’t get a zoom in the corner. Okay, that’d be wonderful. Thank you. I would go with Irene. Heat. Heat. This might be someone just arrived. See who it is. The cable Oh yeah. Because you are guilty. Yes. And do you understand that by pleading guilty, the state no longer has to prove those things because you’re admitting those things are true? Yes. Good morning everybody. Welcome to Lawn Crimes live coverage of the sentencing hearing for Brian Coberger. Today, the man who killed four University of Idaho students on November 13th, 2022 will officially be sentenced to life in prison as part of a plea deal. That plea deal took the death penalty off the table. So, no firing squad, no lethal injection. We’ll have live coverage for the next hour before the start of this hearing in Boisee, Idaho at 9:00 a.m. Mountain time. That’s 11:00 a.m. Eastern. And we have a great panel of experts who will be joining us this morning to help break down what we can expect. But first, I want to go live to Boisey outside the courthouse and that’s where we find our Anget Levy, the host of Crime Fix here on Law and Crime. Anget, you have covered this case from the very beginning. I’m sure there’s a lot of emotions for you today as well. There’s so much interest in this hearing uh and what’s going to happen inside the courthouse. What is the scene there this morning? Well, good morning to you, Chris. Um, there is a lot of emotion surrounding this case. A lot of people thought this case would indeed go to trial, but it didn’t. Brian Coberger, as you mentioned, entered into that plea agreement, pleading guilty to the horrific, brutal murders of those four beautiful University of Idaho students, Mattie Mogan, Kaylee Gonalves, Ethan Chapen, and Zana Kernodal. some of the family. There is a great deal of interest in this case. People actually started lining up around 5:00 Mountain time last evening hoping to get one of those coveted seats inside the courtroom to watch Brian Cobberger be sentenced to those four consecutive life sentences. And there is no doubt that that will be the sentence that he receives. That is the sentence that’s been agreed upon between both the defense and the prosecution in this case. Judge Hippler could give a lesser sentence. He is not going to do that. I’m going to tell you that right now. He will go along with those four consecutive life sentences. He cannot go above that, of course. And as you mentioned, the death penalty has been taken off the table in exchange for Brian Cobberger’s guilty plea. And it’s been somewhat controversial. A lot of people thought that uh the prosecution should not agree to this plea agreement. They thought that this the case was strong enough that they should take it to trial and that Brian Coberger would have likely uh been sentenced to death. So, this has been controversial because this has been such a brutal, brutal crime and there’s been so much heartache surrounding this crime. And the fact that these were four purely innocent, truly innocent victims killed as they were in their beds just doing what college kids do after a night of partying. So, Chris, um it’s been an emotional roller coaster for the families and for the people of the state of Idaho. And I just think back anette and I mean you were there in Moscow when all of this happened and and the search that went on for for weeks looking for the person who would have done this and then and then we learn about Brian Coberger and you think of the years it took to get to this point and he will go to prison for the rest of his life. Um, today is going to be a very emotional day when you think of all of that and you think of the opportunity that these families are going to have to address Brian Cobberger and then move on with their lives as he goes to prison, which is where he’s going to die one day. What can we expect from this hearing today as as it begins now less than an hour from now? Well, I think you can expect a lot of emotional victim impact statements. that the families, this is their chance to let Brian Cobberger know the pain that he has caused them and this is their chance to let the public know the pain that they have endured. And I think that it’s important to to reiterate and to let people know that the that a lot of these families have been very quiet and they’ve grieved silently. Uh, only recently have we heard from Mattie Mogan’s mother in the Prime Docu series where she poured her heart out about losing her one and only child. Maddie was her only daughter. So, if she chooses to speak, we will hear the absolute just pain and horror that she has been through. Now, with that said, Brian Cobberger, I can tell you, is somebody who does not show any emotion whatsoever. We have seen no emotion from him throughout these entire court proceedings. So this may have no impact on him whatsoever. And he is somebody who on social media as a teenager wrote about feeling nothing and being able to do things without feeling any remorse whatsoever. So this is somebody who may lack empathy and may lack the ability to feel emotions. So, this is going to be for the families to share their grief, their loss, how the the loss of their loved ones has impacted them, and it will be for the court to hear this. Um, but what impact that has on Brian Coberger, it may have no impact on him. And and he seemed very matter of fact when he entered those guilty p um back in court on July 2nd. There was there was no hesitation, no emotion whatsoever. And his attorneys will say, “Well, that’s because he has autism spectrum disorder. He’s level one autism spectrum.” But I’m not sure I I believe that’s the reason why. He’s just not somebody who shows any emotion. And I do want to touch on one thing, Chris, that you mentioned about covering this in Moscow. I cannot overstate the fear, the absolute fear and terror that people in the city of Moscow felt after these crimes were committed. This tore a wound into the soul of that city. The people in that city were terrified. The students were terrified. They left the city. They chose to complete their courses at home. They went home to their to their parents and did their coursework, completed the semester online. That is how terrifying this was. This is a little college town that sees no crime. That the biggest crime you see there is basically underage drinking on the college campus. And somebody, a monster, came into a house in the middle of the night and stabbed four people. Stole their lives. and it really robbed the city of Moscow of its innocence. And so there’s a lot of healing that needs to begin and hopefully that can begin today. Hopefully that’s already begun with the arrest of Brian Cobberger. But but now he will be put away for the rest of his life as you mentioned. I I I talked about how he shows no emotion. There’s literally no emotion. and we’ve seen none of it from him throughout this proceeding or throughout the proceedings throughout this whole process. So, let’s take a look back if we will when Brian Coberger entered those guilty p back on July 2nd. We were here for that and everybody watched it here on Law and Crime. Let’s let’s watch as he enters those guilty p and we can talk about it on the other side. Glory, how do you plead Mr. Coberger guilty or not guilty? Guilty. As to count two, murder in the first degree. As it relates to uh the murder of Madison Mogan, how do you plead guilty or not guilty? Guilty. As to count three, as it relates to murder in the first degree for the murder of Kaylee Gonzalez, how do you plead guilty or not guilty? Guilty. As to count four, the first-degree murder of Zana Kernod Kernodal, pardon me, a human being, how do you plead guilty or not guilty? Guilty. as to count five, uh, the first-degree murder of Ethan Chapen, a human being. How do you plead? Guilty or not guilty? Guilty. Before I start asking you questions today, have you consumed substantive questions, let me ask you, have you consumed any alcohol, drug, or other intoxicating substance that would impair your ability to understand or exercise reasonable judgment? No. You feel like you are thinking clearly today? Yes. the uh plea agreement that I talked about today. Do you agree with that plea agreement? Yes. And do you understand the nature of the charges uh that are uh that you’ve been charged with uh that I understand you’re going to plead guilty today to? Yes. As uh you indic as I indicated, I’m not bound by the plea agreement, but the plea agreement is for the maximum on each count. Do you understand that I’m not bound by the plea agreement? Yes. Has anyone uh promised you that I would be lenient or easy on you if you plead guilty? No. Has anyone uh threatened you or anyone close to you to get you to plead guilty? No. Has anyone uh other than the state’s uh agreements uh with respect to the plea agreement, has anyone promised you anything in exchange for your plea agreement? No. Has anyone told you to be untruthful in answering my questions today? No. Has anyone offered you a reward of any kind other than the plea agreement uh in order to get you to plead guilty today? No. Are you pleading guilty because you are guilty? Yes. and council. Obviously, there have been a number of uh motions filed uh to suppress evidence in this case. Um uh other than those filed, are there any other uh motions uh that uh you felt uh uh were available with respect to uh rule 12? No, your honor. And Mr. Kobberg, you understand that by entering the guilty plea in this case, you would be giving up your right to appeal uh any uh uh decision this court made uh as well as your sentence. Yes. So, as you heard, uh Judge Hipler was asking if Brian Coberger was basically on board with entering into this plea agreement. He said yes. And you heard that was a a very a matter-of-fact back and forth conversation. No emotion, as I mentioned earlier. Now, one of the things that the family members or some of the family members, particularly the Gonalves family, has had an issue with in this case, is the fact that Brian Cobberger wasn’t forced to allocate publicly. uh he wasn’t forced to, you know, offer a detailed confession about these crimes. Why why he committed these murders, the location of the murder weapon, whether or not that happened behind closed doors, we really don’t know. But that is one thing that has really upset a lot of people in this case. Even President Trump weighed in on this on Truth Social the other day, saying he believes that Judge Hitler should ask Brian Cobberger about this. Of course, Brian Coberger has a fifth amendment right to remain silent. He doesn’t have to say anything. But this is the course the state of Idaho has taken in this case and this is where we are. That that’s that’s where we are in this case. We may learn more details about this crime today. It’s very possible that the prosecution may offer more details in a presentation about why these crimes were committed. We we don’t know or their theory of the crime. uh they didn’t need to do that at the plea hearing, but this is a sentencing hearing now. So, we’ll stay tuned for that. I want to bring up in our panel. We have a really great panel joining us today to discuss what we can expect from this sentencing hearing. Jennifer Oay is a defense attorney. She represented Richard Allen in the Deli murders case. Mark Weaver is a special prosecutor. He is based in Ohio and has handled many death penalty cases. and Bobby Chicone. He is a retired FBI agent and an attorney and has covered this case with me from the very beginning. But Jennifer, I’ll start with you uh first off the bat. As a defense attorney, what is a day like this like for you when you’re representing a defendant who who has pleaded guilty and admitted to heinous crimes and you are going to sit in that courtroom and sit next to your client who you know is going to prison for the rest of his natural life and you’re going to listen to these victim impact statements. Sure. That’s a really really hard day. Um, you know, as defense lawyers, we’re still humans and listening to those victim impact statements. Uh, it’s it’s really difficult. Um, but but you’re there for your client. You’re there to make sure that everything is fair and unbiased. Uh, even though it never feels like it’s unbiased. Uh but if you don’t have those attorneys there, if they’re not there sitting next to their client, and that’s our job is to advocate for our client. Um but those are really hard hard emotional days. Yeah. And it’s it’s expected to be such an emotional day today um inside of uh such an emotional day inside of this courtroom. And I think about uh just watching that clip that Anganette played of the moment that uh Brian Kberger just said yes. Kind of answering one after another. Uh Mark, I’m going to bring you in on this. We are starting to get some questions in our chat which I really appreciate from our viewers. Um make sure you drop your questions in the chat. We’ll bring them to our panel as well as Anette who is um live in Boisee outside the courthouse. A question coming in here from Shasta Lance Mark. She asks, “Can he still take back his guilty plea? that guilty plea to be taken back after the judge has had what’s called the colloquy. That’s the back and forth between the judge and the defendant asking all the questions we heard. But we have seen motions post colloqui where a defendant asks to have the the uh the guilty plea taken back. They have to make a significant showing. There has to be some underlying basis. I was on drugs. I was drunk. My lawyers lied to me. You’d have to have a very strong reason for a judge to undo a guilty sentence once the colloqui has been pronounced. I doubt it happens here, but occasionally you’ll see it happen. And Bobby, turning to you, I think about the emotion in the room today. Uh, one of our first polls that’s up, by the way. So, people who are joining us, uh, weigh in on this. We want to hear what you have to think of. What sentence outcome do you think is most appropriate, which is going to be a big question throughout the day. Uh, but I think of the emotion that is going to be in that room, Bobby. I think of Steve Gonzalez who has been very outspoken with his anger over this plea deal and what he might say when he gets the opportunity to address Brian Cobberger in these types of situations. What is someone allowed to say in these moments as a victim in the victim impact statement of um emotions and statements um I mean they can’t get too far a field but they have they have the right to say you know just as it’s called a victim impact statement how this crime has impacted their lives so they can go into all of that emotional uh damage that has been caus caused, you know, and a lifetime of suffering that they will endure now because of these these crime these crimes he’s committed. So, they are allowed to go into any aspect of the impact that this will have on their lives, what it’s had on their lives today and certainly what it will be like their lives in the future and and not only for them but their families um and their friends and and things like that. So they will they are usually given a wide latitude of the amount of things that they can describe because the judges realized kind of this is their one chance to be face to face with this monster that did this horrific thing to their loved ones. And so I think that that that allow that I think lets the judges give them you know a wide latitude and you’re going to hear a lot of of different things. Um, and most of it’s going to be, you know, the horrific aftermath, you know, of of of the lives torn apart. Obviously, the lives of the victims, but, you know, the families of victims as well. And there’s a these people have an extensive family and friend network. This this whole college and as Ananette said earlier, this whole community will be suffering for generations. This is a generational crime. People 30, 40 years from now will be still talking about this crime. Yeah. And and you know, to Anget’s point, kind of like the innocence of Moscow, Idaho was lost on that day and you think of what these families have been going through now for multiple years since 2022. Getting a question here in our chat. This is for the panel. Uh Jennifer, I’ll start with you with this question from Brett Loa. Uh what does the panel think? His autism diagnosis points to maybe he got hyperfixated on this crime and he just could not stop. What do you think when you look at this that autism diagnosis the defense says he has, what role that may have played in this crime? I don’t know if I’m qualified to answer about um how his autism diagnosis uh fits in with a crime. Certainly um the courts in in sentencing can take mental health issues into account. Um, but you know, really unless it impacts his ability to discern right from wrong, I don’t know how big of an impact it would be in a have in a crime of this nature where you’ve got, you know, four four young people who’ve been murdered. Um, but certainly it goes into probably his lack of emotion that he shows. Um, and so to the extent that that that might be confused with the lack of remorse, we don’t really know. He hasn’t said much yet. Um, but I don’t know that that would have a big impact if at all on sentencing. Think we’re going to go out to Anette with the next one. Anette, you got me. You know, Jennifer, I’m really interested in your perspective on this because Ann Taylor and her team, they’ve been representing somebody who really, you know, has become public enemy number one. He is somebody who who does have some support online. Uh he does have a group of supporters. They call themselves or at least I guess people who believe he’s guilty call them the proberers. Uh, but he is somebody who who really is a pariah um in the United States. I mean, people wanted him to face the firing squad here in Idaho. And so, that’s got to be a challenge as a defense attorney. But really, Ann Taylor, it seemed like her whole job here, her whole mission from the beginning was to save his life and to get the death penalty taken off the table. She filed motion after motion trying to get the death penalty taken off the table. So, she she accomplished that mission. H how how big of a struggle is that having a case that’s in the public spotlight? You you just came off of a case that was in the public spotlight, the Deli case. How big of a challenge is that defending your client when you’ve got, you know, the eyes of the world on your case? Well, it it definitely adds many layers of um stress, if you will. to have that kind of notoriety. Not only just and and it makes it harder, right? It makes harder to have um discussions, agreements with the prosecution uh because it adds that layer I don’t want to say of oversight, but it it certainly adds a layer of scrutiny. And at the end of the day, you know, in uh and I don’t know Idaho, but but here in Indiana, we have elected judges. You have generally elected prosecutors who have to answer to people on election day. And so to have that kind of overall scrutiny certainly makes it so much harder to engage in those kind of plea negotiations. Um because of that level of scrutiny, I guess. And Jennifer, there’s a big question today about Oh, go ahead, Anette. Well, yeah, I just I was going to say um there there’s been a tremendous level of scrutiny on this case. I mean, everything has been scrutinized when it comes to this case. Uh were you surprised to learn that the state settled this case and agreed to the terms of this plea agreement, taking the death penalty off the table? Well, look, I you know, I would never question um a victim’s families and their reactions at all. You know, they are absolutely entitled to that. But if you look at this, you know, a plea deal to take the death penalty off the table makes some inherent sense in that number one, there are always risks at trial. We as as attorneys, I can’t imagine an attorney who hasn’t won a case that they should have lost or who hasn’t lost a case they feel they should have won. So there always risks at trial. Um and and so a plea takes all those risks off the table. Uh had there been a trial, it would have been a lengthy, incredibly emotional trial. uh and the appeal process after a trial. Um it there’s absolutely going to be an appeal process after a trial. It’s so incredibly much more difficult to appeal a conviction to which you plead guilty. Um you know they referenced earlier you have to show that the plea was not knowing or voluntary and that’s really difficult to do. So, it gives a level of certainty um a huge level of certainty on what’s going to happen here. It it ends it right. You don’t have years of appeals. You don’t have a lengthy trial. Um and you know, you’ve got an outcome and and different people depending on their morals and values and viewpoints look at it differently. Um there are some people who certainly say that life in prison uh is much is a better out or a worse outcome if you will than a death penalty. You know um you’re spending every day of the rest of your life in prison with little if any hope that you’re ever going to leave. No. And that’s such a good point because I do think of even for those who were frustrated by the plea deal. Again, the Gonzalez family has been very vocal. I mean, decades from now, as everybody moves on with their lives to the best that they can, Brian Kberger will still be waking up in that prison in a box and and living that life for the rest of his life because of what he did. Jennifer, there’s a big question today of whether or not Brian Kberger may say something. I feel like I’ve run a lot of people saying that he probably won’t, but what would be your advice? What do you tell Brian Coberger? Do you think that we could hear him actually speak today? That’s going to vary with every case. Uh, you know, it it would be perhaps good if he gave an explanation. Um, it might make the judge, you know, appreciate the fact that he’s given these victims, their families, some answers. On the other hand, if you have a client with some type of mental disability, autism spectrum one, and I I again, I’m not an autism spectrum. Don’t know what all that entails, but if he’s going to see these things without emotion, um maybe that makes it worse. Uh I would never second guess a an attorney who’s in the trenches, who’s looked at 51 terabytes of information, who spent so much time with Brian Cobberger. Um, but you know, there would be pros and cons depending on on those kinds of facts. And you’re taking a live look here. I know Angelette, this is out where you are right now. This is the Gonalves family. You see Steve, her dad, the father of Kaylee Gonalves, walking in to the Ada Ada County Courthouse in Boisee. Um he has been so vocal uh throughout this calling for justice and also has been very critical of the prosecutor uh Bill Thompson and the decision to go forward with this plea deal. He wanted to see a trial. He wanted to see uh if found guilty the death penalty for Brian Cobberger. And so he is going to be someone um there will be a lot of eyes on what he has to say when he gets his opportunity to address his daughter’s killer today in court. Um, we continue to get your questions which we really appreciate coming in on the chat. We also have the results of our first poll. Thank you to four and a half thousand of you who were able to weigh in on this. We asked, “What sentence outcome do you think is most appropriate? The death penalty 59%, life without parole 37% and long-term imprisonment with parole coming in at 2%.” Um, Jennifer, question for you. This was uh from Leah. If a defense lawyer truly believes their client is guilty, can they step down from the case? You have an ethical obligation to zealously represent your client and you know you know that going in. You know what the allegations are. you know what the potential uh consequences are and it would be you know but if there’s a time where you feel that you cannot zealously represent your client you have an ethical obligation to get out. Um but you really should have asked those questions well ahead of time prior to sentencing. That’s what we do is we represent, you know, most of the people we represent are guilty. Uh, but they still deserve a fair trial and they st still deserve to have um representation and good representation. You know, Jen, um, I’m sitting out here watching the Gonalves family walk into this courtroom and walk into this courthouse. Um, this has been a long road for these families. It’s it’s been horrific and they’ve all been through so much. And they are going to come in here. This is their final chance to tell the court and tell Brian Cobberger what this crime has done to them, how it’s how it’s torn them apart. How do you counsel a defendant to to listen to this, to deal with this? Obviously, you counsel your client to act a certain way in court, to not engage with the family members, to not look at them. How do you counsel a defendant to go through this process? You acknowledge that it’s going to be incredibly hard um and to do your best again not to engage with the people who are speaking. Um you know you’ve this is where you are and to the extent you can you can sit there and listen uh and without you know emotion without any of that. That’s always you know that’s going to be the better advice or you know if you have regret remorse certainly you know that’s something good to show. Um, but it’s like you said, you know, don’t engage. Um, and you just have to sit and listen. And it’s it’s incredibly hard. And Jen, there have been a lot of questions about Brian Cobberger’s ability to appeal even though he has waved his appeals as part of this plea agreement. And we have a question from one of our viewers, Falcon Sore, who’s asking, “Do you think that Brian Kberger will appeal?” Because there is the case here in Idaho, Garza v. Idaho, that says if you don’t, even if you’ve waved your appeals and your client says, “Hey, I’ve been sentenced. I want to appeal.” And you don’t appeal, you’re then determined to be ineffective. Do you think he will appeal? I don’t know. you know, if he if the judge gives him four consecutive life sentences, um, and I and I apologize, I’m not familiar with Idaho law. Um, if you appeal a sentence in Indiana, they can come back and reentence you. So, you could be resentenced to a harsher penalty. Um, if that is the case in Iowa, that would be, you know, um, strong a strong reason not to appeal. Um, but if the judge can’t do that, if that’s off the table and you’re sentenced to four consecutive life sentences, what do you have to lose? Yeah, most certainly. Um, what do you have to lose? uh he has nothing to lose at this point because from here he will be going to the Idaho Department of Corrections and that will be his home for the foreseeable future unless they decide to transfer him out of state because of possible threats to his safety. Jennifer OJ, thank you so much for joining us today. We’re going to sign you off. Uh have really enjoyed talking with you. Hope you’ll come back some other time. Uh Chris, I’ll send it back to you for now. Thank you for having me. All right, Anette, thank you. Let’s continue on with our panel. Also want to note that shortly we’ll be joined by Dr. Dwayne Hendricks, retired senior warden with the US Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Prisons. And we’re going to be talking about the big question of what does Brian Cobberger’s life look like after today or after the day after that once these victim impact statements are done? What happens next in determining where he will spend the rest of his life and what will that dayto-day look like? Great guest going to be coming up with us shortly to talk about that. I want to bring in our other two members of the panel. I know you guys have been very patient uh waiting for us to come to you. Bobby Shicone, retired FBI agent and attorney, and Mark Weaver, who’s a special prosecutor and former deputy attorney general in the state of Ohio. Thank you both for being with us today. Uh we talked a lot with Jennifer there, Mark, about what it’s like to be on the defense side on a day like this. What is it going to be like for Bill Thompson, the prosecutor, to see all this play out, and what is he going to do in the courtroom today? This is a a difficult thing for him. Normally, as a prosecutor before the sentencing, I’m meeting with the victims or if it’s a murder, the victim’s family to make sure that we’re all together and that things they know I want to explain to them what’s going to happen, where they’re going to sit. We typically have a victim’s advocate who’s escorting them to this thing. So, we don’t have that, at least for for two of the families. the prosecutor won’t be meeting with them because they disagree with this prosecutor’s decision. So, this is a little different. The prosecutor knows already been criticized by two of the families for having made this uh this plea agreement, but normally it’s a very somber time. In most cases, judges come into these sentencing sent hearings sentencing hearings already deciding what they’re going to do. In fact, they have pre-written exactly what they’re going to say. Now, in some cases, maybe they left a blank where how many years they’re going to be penciled in depending on what the victims say and the defendant says, but for the most part, judges know what they’re going to do. So, for me as a prosecutor, I know that this is the chance for the victims to be heard. Yes, the defendant has a right to be heard. I suspect this defendant, Brian Kberger, will not in fact say much, but the victims, this is their chance. So there have been some times when victims want me to speak for them and I’ll do that always. I’ll speak uh as the prosecutor even when the sentence is guaranteed just because I think there the state’s position needs to be heard. It’s a somber time approaching a sentencing particularly in a case where there’s been people murdered. Yeah. And it’s going to be a very difficult day. Going to be difficult to watch a lot of emotion throughout the day. Um have a question coming in from Misty Barnhart. Will cameras be able to be allowed in the courtroom? uh we are going to be able to see the judge’s live feed which we will take live here on Law and Crime. So make sure you uh after we finish here at the top of the hour that is when this hearing is expected to begin 9:00 a.m. Mountain time in Boise and we’ll bring you those statements live. So stay right here on the stream. Also a question coming in and Bobby I’ll uh turn to you. A question from 49ers mama asks will all the evidence be released now that he took a plea? Uh I I I don’t know. I don’t I don’t I don’t think so. But um it could be uh you know they do have to uh maintain some um security of the record because like has been pointed out he still does have an appeal um possible and now Garza really only in Idaho only really relates to an ineffective assistance of counsel um argument but that can be made um and and and people should know like if you if you can make an argument later that your your lawyer tricked you into a plea or something you should have the right to appeal you know, but that’s a very high bar. Garza sets a very high bar for any appeal, but he’s most likely not going to get an appeal. It’s a very, very narrow ruling in that case. Um, but I do think the prosecutor will at least offer to sit down with the families and have a meeting with the prosecution team and the investigative team and be told, you know, exactly what they think happened, you know, any kind of motive that they may have and and most of the evidence um that they can share with them. I think at least that will be offered to the family should they want to do that. Um, as far as releasing everything to the public, you know, that’s going to be, you know, an internal decision by by that office. Um, I don’t know the particular um particular um, you know, rules that they they have. I know in in a serial killer case that I was involved in, the Israel Keys case, once he killed himself in jail, um, the FBI released all his interrogation tapes. Um, and you can actually go to YouTube and see them because he was he was dead and there was nothing to be risked by releasing all of that stuff. So, I don’t know. It depends on the rules of of the state and and the policies of that office because Anette, we’ve had this gag order um that’s been in place and I know in motions you’ve been able to find some information along the way, some of the evidence that prosecutors have on Brian Cobberger. There was that leak recently in the Dline episode where we saw some of those selfies and learned a little bit more about what prosecutors would have had in a trial. after today or tomorrow when this uh this sentencing hearing wraps up, how is this gag order, which I know has been lifted, but what does the process look like moving forward in getting more of this evidence? Well, the Moscow Police Department has actually said they will be setting up a website to release records because the department’s been inundated with requests for records. We’ve requested the records many many times and uh those requests have all been denied due to that non-dissemination order. They don’t like it when you call it a gag order. Uh we’ve called it a gag order because essentially that’s what it’s done. But it also uh basically prohibited the release of any information about the case, any records about the case, even body camera footage that would normally be released was barred from release due to the non-dissemination order. So, we don’t know exactly when they will start releasing those records. There’s a 422 day window or so uh for the appeal that we believe there’s some type of appeal window that will run and then possibly after that expires, we will start seeing the release of some of the records. And hopefully we will get uh the lion share of the records, the investigative reports, the body camera footage, things of that nature. But things like autopsy reports, very gruesome uh crime scene photos, I’m not sure we will ever see those types of photos, and the judge may order that those be sealed. Another result coming in from our uh poll, and we appreciate everybody who’s uh logging on, watching with us here on YouTube live as we countdown to the beginning of this sentencing hearing at the top of the hour. Poll question was, do you classify this plea deal as a win for the state of Idaho? No. 48% it’s complicated 30% and yes at 21%. Mark you’re a prosecutor uh and and there’s been a lot of criticism of Bill Thompson, a lot of second-guessing of this deal. Uh where do you stand on that question? I’m an advocate for the death penalty. I’ve worked on death penalty cases mostly on the appeal side but also at the trial level. And people should remember that had the state move forward with the death penalty, one juror out of 12 during the guilt phase, saying not guilty means we go back to square one. And then on the the the penalty phase, one juror out of 12 means it’s going to be life in prison, not death penalty. And if we had gotten 12 on the first phase and then 12 on the second phase, now the appeals begin. And death penalty appeals go on for many years. Any single particularly if the judge could say I don’t like the way that trial was done. This one little part bothered me back another where one could stop the case at either level. The prosecution has to weigh that against what the victims want. That’s what happened in this case. That happened to me in a death penalty case I worked on a year and a half ago. We made that same decision. Now, in that case, the victims were in agreement with us, the victim’s family. So, we were willing to go forward with it. But remember, it’s not easy to get the death penalty, even when the evidence is clear. Just one juror who has a disagreement is enough to stop the death penalty from going forward. And anette, I know you’re going to have to go into the courthouse uh here shortly. Uh we’ve been getting some good questions coming in and what I was thinking about today because Brian Coberger, you know, he’s been wearing civilian clothes when he goes into court and in these appearances. Is that what we’re going to see today? Absolutely not. He will be in a jail jumpsuit and he will be wearing shackles, handcuffs. He may even have some type of other type of restraint on. But the only reason and and some of the families were very critical of this. Particularly the Gonalves family was very critical of the fact that he was permitted to wear civilian clothes. But the only reason that happened was because there was a lot of media attention on this case. And he appeared in court and cameras were allowed in the courtroom. And this is very common in high-profile cases that defense attorneys will ask the judge to allow their client to appear in street clothes because he they enjoy a presumption of innocence. And the jail jumpsuit can project an image of guilt psychologically. It can project this image to the public that hey this guy is in a a jail jumpsuit. He’s guilty. And so this is to preserve that right to a fair trial uh and to not taint the jury pool. That’s why these people are permitted to wear civilian clothes and that’s the only reason that it happened. So at the plea hearing when Judge Hitler accepted Brian Cobberger’s guilty plea, he said that he was going to revoke that order allowing Brian Cobberger to wear civilian clothes. He said it was no longer necessary because he had pleaded guilty and he no longer enjoys the presumption of innocence. So today we will see Brian Cobberger in a jail jumpsuit and in restraints. Yeah. Well, and and you know, such a difference from the picture that we’re looking at right here when um he was in court and gave those chilling just one-word answers to whether or not he committed these crimes. And no longer do we have to say alleged when talking about Brian Cobberger. Uh we say that he is a murderer of the four students at the University of Idaho back in November of 2022. And Janette Levy, host of Crime Fix here on Lawn Crime. I know you’re heading into the courthouse. Um very interested to get your perspective um after um all of this and and just how emotional today is going to be. I I will be in there right now. Our managing editor, Kathy Russen, she is in the courtroom as I speak and I will be in there in a short time. So, I will be back here in just a short while updating you on everything that we both see inside that courtroom. So, Chris, uh, I’ll send it back to you. All right, Anget Levy live in Boisey. We’ll bring back Mark Weaver and Bobby Shicone who are continuing uh to answer your questions. So, make sure you bring them in um to us, drop them in the chat, and we’ll ask our experts as we continue on here ahead of the start of this hearing at the top of the hour. Just got an update from our managing editor, Kathy Russen, who says, “We’re getting instructions from court personnel right now. They are not expecting this to go into tomorrow.” So, the question was going to be if this was going to be a two-day event, but after today, it seems from what we’re understanding um that uh that this will be it for Brian Coberger and he will head off to prison for the rest of his life after today. Sarah C asks a question. What time what time does court start? We are expecting at the top of the hour 11:00 am if you’re on the east coast, 9:00 am mountain time in Boisee. Bobby, I want to turn to you because I know you talked about you have worked on serial killer cases. Brian Coberger’s name um sadly in some ways will be remembered you know amongst other serial killers and and I know anette was talking about people who were almost fans of his online but when you look at this not to compare but when you look at what he did and in your career what stands out to you when you look at Brian Coberger and what he has admitted to doing? Well, the viciousness of the attack um stands out to me in that I’ve seen attacks just as vicious, but the first thing I thought when I um heard about this case, you know, day one was normally such a vicious attack comes from a very passionate response from someone who knew the victims. It was involved with the victims on some level, some much greater level than we’ve now come to know. Colberger was involved with these victims. So the I was surprised not by the viciousness of it but by the viciousness of it in relation to his real lack of um contact with these people lack of relationship with any of these victims. So it really was disproportionate. I know again I’ve seen vicious attacks but in almost every case where an attack was vicious it was born out of some type of again illogical irrational psychopathic rage that was connected to a much more um uh intimate relationship between the victim and the murderer. And and so really what really stood out to me was how he could be so vicious. I mean, with a I I won’t get into the details, but everybody knows them. How he could be so vicious in this attack on four innocent people that he had no connection with. He obviously had some level of hatred towards whoever his initial intended target was, but having this level of rage and to carry out this level of vicious physical attack close in um to the victim when you had no other emotional connection to that victim really shows me a level of disconnect in Coberger’s brain somewhere that he it was anim animalistic quite frankly. um to have this level of rage against somebody you absolutely have no kind of intimate um relationship with. And it’s still to this point such a big question of of why. Uh and and we don’t know if we’ll ever understand the why and the motive. That’s not something that um Brian Coberger is required under this plea deal to say um even though he will have the opportunity to address the courtroom today. Mark, I have a question coming in from Bonnie who asks, “How long can the victims speak at the sentencing? Is there a time limit imposed?” So, the law gives trial court judges great discretion about how to run their hearings. Appeals court judges do not like to step in and second guessess trial court judges. And there’s nothing in the criminal rules that say how long. So, it’s always in the trial court judge’s best judgment. Uh, a smart trial court judge, somebody who’s wise, will allow the victims to say their peace within reason. A victim who walks up there with 30 pages and says, “I’m going to need an hour to do this.” A judge might say, “I’ll give you 20 minutes.” But that typically doesn’t happen. A because most victims don’t want to talk that long. In this case, victim’s families don’t want to talk that long. And secondly, because there really is a moment of closure that that the court is trying to allow happen. We know how this hearing will end. What we don’t know is whether the defendant talks, if you so what does he say, and whether the victim’s family speak and what they say. So most trial court judges will allow to play it out. Only one who’s really not so wise will step in and say, “Hurry it up there. I’d like to get this finished. I now want to bring in Dr. Dwayne Hendrickx, retired senior warden at the US Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Prisons. Thank you for taking the time to be with us on Law and Crime. Brian Coberger will be in state prison after today. So, once this wraps up and from what we’re hearing, this is going to be a one-day event. Um, what happens tomorrow to Brian Cobberger? Well, they’ll be preparing to uh send him over to the maximum security prison in Kuna, Idaho, which is about six hours away from where the murders occurred uh in Moscow. And uh and then once he arrives there, I would give him about 30 days uh 30 to 60 days, he’ll probably be sent uh over there to that facility. And depending on how today’s hearing goes, I know we’ve been discussing about in terms of uh whether he’s going to explain why he did it or is he going to have any level remorse or take responsibility, but I think if he does not do any of that, it’s going to take them a little bit of time to assess uh him and to try to determine which housing unit uh that he’ll be placed in in that facility. What we do know about the institution is about it holds about 550 inmates and about 130 of those individuals are serving life sentences. So, they’ll probably place him in more an administrative uh unit, maybe not necessarily where he’s locked down uh 23 hours a day, but I think it will take some time to assess uh him before they place him in a housing unit because I’m not actually sure if he has cellmates in the county uh facility or wherever he’s being locked up at this current time. So, they’re going to need some time to do a mental health evaluation and assess him uh before they give him a job assignment or place him in any programs uh which I would assume would be cognitive uh behavior therapy and some criminal thinking type courses that they’ll probably place him in uh at some point once he gets to that facility. Yeah. And we were just showing some pictures of just the outside gates of the maximum security facility in the state of Idaho. I mean, just a desolate, desolate place um that is uh not surrounded by much and there’s not much to look at if you were to look outside um which Brian Coberger will have to do for the rest of his life. Uh Bobby, I want to turn to you. This is a question from Devin Leine. Has the prosecutor ever accepted a plea deal without the blessing of the victim’s family? I know that there were some of the victim’s family said that they were okay with this deal. the Gonalves family, they were very vocal saying they were not um supportive of this deal. What goes into that decision uh as a prosecutor when you have to decide whether to take the deal or not when not everyone’s on board? Well, I’m a little hesitant to take that question when we have a prosecutor on the on the panel, but I will say this, you know, and and not to sound too callous about it, but the they do sometimes seek out the family’s input on it, but in this case, you did have families with differing opinions on it. Um, and you know, in the end, the families don’t make those decisions. um and and and sometimes they shouldn’t because you don’t make legal decisions on emotion and and so you have to make legal decisions uh based on sound experience and knowledge of the law and and the knowledge of the facts of the case. Those things may not have been in possession by the families. So I think the prosecutors always try to seek input. Um but again if you have different families and different victims families here giving you different um levels of support or or objection to it what do you do and so I think that yes they do seek the input but the ultimate decision obviously is the is the prosecutor and the prosecutor doesn’t work for the families they work for the people of the state of Idaho and they have a higher interest in in that in that mission and and so they have to balance that sure but in the end they work for the people of the state and and they have to do what’s best for the people of the state and locking him up in life with no parole and taking that risk as we heard earlier off the table of something happening at trial is what they decided to do. I’m a death penalty proponent. I would have liked to see Coberg get the death penalty, but I don’t have as much of a problem with the prosecutor taking this deal as as some of the family members. Of course, I don’t have that stake in it either. Yeah. And and here’s another poll that we have coming in and you just think of the impact that this story has had not just on Moscow, not just on Idaho, but people across the country. Uh the question was, has this case changed how you feel about personal safety or trust in others? Yes, much more cautious says 41% of people no change 36% and somewhat at 22%. Dr. Hendricks, we have a question from Anne Gibson. What is going to be in Brian Coberger’s what is Brian Coberger going to be able to have in his cell? uh his clothing, uh a set of sheets, uh for his bed, uh some commissary items. I’m not sure how much uh money they can spend uh on commissary a month. Normally, it’s you know, less than $200 a month he’ll be able to spend on commissary items. Uh he’ll be able to have books, uh you know, for personal reading, uh a certain amount of legal material. because I’m sure I mean I know he’s pleading guilty uh for these four consecutive life sentences, but I’m sure at some point he’ll probably try to appeal something or you know whatever so he can have legal materials uh in his cell. And that’s pretty much it. Now, you know what I do know after spending over almost 30 years working in uh jails and prisons across the country, inmates tend to have a lot of things in their cells. uh you know e access materials you know access commissary access clothing um you know so but typically it’s just his basic needs uh to function within that particular cell that he’s in and more than likely he’ll just have uh one cellmate uh and but in you know but if they ever get overcrowded there he could have upwards of two to three other inmates in that particular cell. So, uh that is very limited to what individuals can have in their living quarters and that helps maintain a safe and secure environment uh within that facility because as as we know inmates uh have contraband uh such as weapons and different things of that nature that they try to hide uh in order to try to maintain their personal safety on a daily basis. So the least amount of property, the least amount of materials in those sales will help maintain a safe and secure uh facility, especially in a maximum security institution where your most dangerous inmates are being housed uh across the country. And uh to think that that’s going to be his reality for potentially decades um until he dies in prison. Um I’m going to turn to you, Mark, and this was kind of to Bobby’s point. We have a prosecutor, might as well ask them prosecutor questions. U this is from LB. Why didn’t the deal to take the death penalty off the table also include him disclosing motive and exactly what happened to the family? What went into these negotiations? Yeah, that that is the only way to find out from him what he was thinking for sure. The judge cannot make him do that. So, the judge can’t require him to do that today. The prosecution could have said, “You want us to take the death penalty off the table? you’re gonna have to give us answers to the following questions and then list them out. So, the fact that the prosecution didn’t do that, I think that’s a a a better point to criticize the prosecutors on than the taking the death penalty off the table because we’ve all agreed the prosecution had a strong hand here. The evidence was overwhelming. I gave the case earlier for why a prosecutor might want to take the death penalty off the table to guarantee a conviction and dismiss nearly all of the appeals. But if you want a spot to criticize the prosecutor, there’s your weak spot. That’s where you could push on and say, “Okay, we understand you wanted to take it off the table, but why not give a list of questions? Who was your target? Why did you do this? What was the order? Did they say anything? Were they in pain when they died? The kind of questions that loved ones often have about their the person who was murdered. So that’s a fair criticism I think. And I suppose Brian Coberger could say all that today. I really doubt whether he will or not. And Mark, I just got a super chat question coming in specifically for you from Bailey Dorn. Uh and they ask, could the judge decide to go against the plea and do the death penalty? No. uh the judge in every other case has the ability to go against a plea deal and go a different direction but not to put the death penalty on the table. The death penalty is the hardest outcome to get in American courts and there are so many safeguards built in. The judge does not have that ability now. In fact, if he tried to, that would be a basis for appeal for Coberger to ask for the entire plea deal to be taken off the table and go back to square one. So the a judge can do lots of things when it’s regular sentencing. We agreed to 10. The judge is going to do 12. That’s possible. The judge cannot add the death penalty at this late date. And Bobby, a question for you because you have have followed this story um from the very beginning and and have followed this investigation. This is from Sarah Jones and and the question is did he know the girls? Um and I just think of what do we know at this point about Brian Coberger’s connection to these four people who he killed? Well, I mean, clearly he had some con. He didn’t randomly pick that house that night and go in and kill us. So, he had some connection to at least one of the victims. That’s that’s just common sense. That’s without any other investigation. That’s just common sense. Um the fact that he drove past that house or his car was in that house, parked near that house on what 12 different occasions, we now know there was some connection. Now, it may not have been a personal connection. It may have been some kind of cyberstalking connection or whatever, but he certainly had somebody in that house that he was looking at that he was surveilling online, surveilling in person. Um, so yes, there there’s ample evidence that um both both from a common sense standpoint and from an investigative evidence standpoint, there is ample evidence to believe that he had at least one or more of those victims, you know, in his mind, in his target um in his crosshairs kind of um you know, before all of this happened. Certainly. Um and the fact that now we know his movement through that house um went right for you know it looks like uh Mattie Mogan’s room um and that he was parked on a number of occasions in a spot that he could see into that room and Mattie was known to kind of put her makeup on and stuff at her vanity right near that window that could be seen from across that parking lot um in the back of the house. Um but you know so so we there is ample evidence to believe that he was um connected to them either you know just by cyberstalking or may have been in that town may have gone to where they work um and that kind of stuff. Um I don’t think it was much more than that. I don’t think he possibly ever spoke to them other than if one of them waited on him at a restaurant or something like that. I don’t think there was anything more than that. Um but certainly um he had intended to go after one or more of those victims in that house that night. Uh and if you’re just joining us here on Law and Crime, we are live awaiting the beginning of the sentencing hearing for Brian Coberger in Boisee, Idaho. It’s expected to begin any minute now. And we will uh bring you live inside the courthouse as soon as those proceedings start. Our Anget Levy is inside the courthouse today as well as Kathy Russen who is our managing editor here at Law and Crime. So, we’ll hear from them what the emotion was like, but we’ll all be able to watch these victim impact statements. Uh, and today we have learned uh that it’s not expected to go beyond today. Um, at least at this point, they have reserved two days for uh this uh hearing. So, victim’s families would have the opportunity to address Brian Coberger. Will he will Brian Cobberger speak? That is unclear. But that is a live look from Boisee, Idaho at the Ada County Courthouse. We are also taking your questions right now as we’re waiting for these proceedings to begin. Uh Dr. Hris, uh question for you. Uh this is a super chat question from uh Azanos who asks why is he allowed to have a tablet with email? Uh because uh more institutions are kind of mirroring what we’re doing in society and using technology uh to keep these inmates busy. Uh most states have contracts with uh several IT vendors that that allow inmates to have tablets to whether to do legal work or to watch movies or uh read books. Uh so other than work and possibly them doing religious activities uh and it used to be a you know and I’m still sure they still do have traditional TV rooms in these housing units but it’s just another mechanism for uh correctional staff to be able to keep these uh folks busy behind bars and keep them away from other mischievous activities such as harming one another or harming staff uh more importantly trying to harm staff and trying to possibly escape. So mainly to keep uh these inmates busy and also mirroring of what’s going on in society and then they can also uh contact their families via email, friends and associates but also it’s also an intelligence gathering tool as well. So for each all of the for each of these tablets, all that information uh is available to those investigators and other staff that uh someone’s, you know, communicating with someone to do something nefarious or any other investigative tool, you know. So it it serves as two purposes. One to keep them busy, but it’s also an investigative tool to track uh what inmates are doing while they’re in their housing units. Yeah. I think too because I know Anette talked today about uh before she went into the courthouse that Brian Coberger is expected to be in more of a jail house uniform today in shackles. He will not be allowed to wear the shirt and tie uh like he was able to prior to taking this plea deal and pleading guilty to these terrible crimes. I mean, what you’re looking at there is is likely the outfit that Brian Cobberger is going to wear for the rest of his life. Like the idea of wearing regular clothes, that is out the window after today. Um have some more questions coming in, but I do want to go to a poll. uh which is what has influenced your opinion about Kobberger’s guilt or innocence the most DNA evidence coming in at 79% you think of that knife sheet uh and the DNA that was found on that his behavior and background at 16% of course he was a PhD student nearby Washington State University in criminology and then just media coverage 4% the answer there more than 5,000 of you weighing in on that which we really appreciate uh Mark another question coming in from um Kellen on this one uh can the judge make him answer any questions i.e. motive? No. The uh the fifth amendment uh right against self-inccrimination extends throughout the entire process from questioning by the police all the way through the trial and the sentencing. As satisfying as it would be for us to have the judge say, “Mr. Cobberger, I want you to tell us why you did it.” The judge can ask. It would be unusual, by the way, for the judge to ask. Typically, the judge will say, “Is there anything the defendant wants to say, but we have no way of compelling him to do that?” We, meaning the legal system, has no way of compelling him to do that. And Bobby, a question for you just as we talk about some of the details that we do know about this um as we get ready for this sentencing hearing that should begin any minute now. This is from CM Rakes who asks, “Didn’t Maddie work at a vegan restaurant? Brian is vegan, right? She did work at a restaurant, Mad Greek, which is now permanently closed. Um, I know Anginetta has said that there’s no evidence that BK ever went there, but to the point of trying to figure out why and the connection and the motive. Um, and we talked about this a little bit before, but um, to you at this point ahead of this gag order being lifted and more information coming out, what just stands out to you about some of the biggest questions in this case and some of the evidence that you want to see that we haven’t learned about yet? Well, I think Chris, you’ve hit on one right there. I believe he was at that restaurant. I I know there’s been nothing publicly stated. Um, and we may even in the file may not have it, but even if it’s not there, I have to believe that he attend he he was present at that restaurant at some point. Um, she was online, some of her social media posts were there at work. You know, he probably was able to very easily figure out that’s where she worked. Like you said, he was vegan. I I I I have a strong feeling that he was at that restaurant at times when Mattie was working. Um, that’s my strong belief based on everything that I’ve read about the case. Um, whether it’s detailed in the in the file or not, that’s just my personal feeling as an investigator who’ve investigated many murders. Um, and by the way, you know me, I don’t get wrapped around the wise of it. I know I think there’s an inordinate amount of time uh spent concerned about the wise in in the true crime community, but as an investigator and all the most of the homicides I investigated, uh, motive was not an element of the crime. It was not in the statute. We did not have to prove why somebody did something. And particularly in vicious crimes like this that have no sense to them carried out by a psychopath. The reason why was is never going to be satisfactory. It’s never going to provide any comfort to the families. No one’s ever going to be saying, “Oh, that’s why. Now I now I understand.” We’re never going to understand his motivations. Whatever. If you want to hypothetically try to say in your mind, “Oh, you take something that he might say as to why and try to figure it out.” It’s not going to make any sense to us. He’s a psychopath. There is no why. This never should have happened. And so anything he tells us about why he did it, I quite frankly don’t care. He’s an animal. He’s evil. And I don’t care what in his warped mind went through to tell me why he did this because it’s not going to make any sense to me. And it’s and I’m still going to be as devastated by what he did as I am before knowing that stupid illogical reason. No. And that’s that’s very important context um as we head into today. Um and did get a question from Cheryl Annie who asks, “Have other families arrived?” Um at this point, we know that all families have arrived except for the family of Ethan Chapen. Um which that family did say uh they would not be attending today. Just got the notice that we’re going to go live into the Ada County Court Ada County Courthouse as the sentencing hearing of Brian Coberger is now getting underway and we’ll take that here live on Long Cry. M Jennings, Mr. Mr. Nye, and Miss Allen. This is the time set for sentencing in this case. Um the uh defendant previously entered a plea of guilty to four counts of first-degree murder and one count of felony burglary. In exchange uh the party stipulated to uh recommend a sentence uh consisting of on burglary 10 years fixed on each of the four counts of first-degree murder, life uh fixed. Um the parties waved a pre-sentence investigation. Uh to my understanding neither party submitted a sentencing memorandum or other materials for the court. Court is familiar with the file and the evidence submitted uh previously um u by the parties uh as it has reviewed them throughout the case and in anticipation of trial. Is there any legal cause uh why uh sentence uh should not be imposed at this time? No, your honor. Um does the state uh before uh impact statements and arguments wish to present evidence today? Your honor, the state does not intend to present evidence um in a documentary since we have provided the court through the clerk uh with photographs that we would like to use during the course of our sentencing argument. Sure. All right. Thank you. But no uh testimony other than impact statements. That’s correct, your honor. All right. So, with that, let’s uh start with then impact statements. Miss Jennings will be introducing the And my understanding, just so I’m clear, I indicated through the trial court administrator that we need to see uh if uh any of the victims wish to have the camera not running uh and audio only and my understanding is all of them indicated they are fine with the video. Is that correct? Yes, your honor, that’s correct. All right. Very well. Um, go ahead, students, your honor. Um, the first, um, and we’re taking these in the order, um, victim impact statements in the order that the charges were listed in the indictment. Um, the first charge being burglary. So, we will have um Bethany Funka’s statement, and she has asked that her friend Emily Alant read that statement. All right. Any objection to that? All right. Very well. Thank you, your honor. Um, I’ll be speaking on behalf of Bethany. And so, yeah, here it reads, uh, my name is Bethany Funk, and I was roommates with Maddie, Kaye, Zana, and Ethan. I not only lost some of my best friends, but I also lost a sister. Never in a million years would I have would I have thought that something like this would have happened to my closest friends. I thought that we were going to wake up and go upstairs, see them, and tell them how they had scared us and that they were going to tease us about how we are constantly scaredy-cats. I make jokes about it as we would go to Taco Bell like always, but sadly that is not what happened and what turned out to be my worst nightmare. When I first woke up that morning, I had no idea what happened. I woke up around 7:00 with a terrible toothache. So, I called my dad who is a dentist and he asked what I should do. He told me to take Advil, so I did and I went back to sleep. I was still out of it and still didn’t know what happened. If I had known, I of course would have called 911 right away. I still carry so much regret and guilt for not knowing what had happened and not calling right away. Even though I understand it wouldn’t have changed anything, not even if the paramedics had been right outside the door. I was so frantic that morning and scared to death not knowing what had happened. And when I made the 911 call, I couldn’t even get out the words. And from then on, I don’t remember a thing. It was like my brain wiped that whole memory. That was the worst day of my life. And I know it always will be. While I was still in shock trying to process the fact that my friends were truly gone, I had been attacked by the public. I was grieving, numb, and unsure of what had happened was even real. And at the same time, I was getting flooded with death threats and hateful messages from people who did not know me at all or know the dynamic of our friendship. Social media made it so much worse. And strangers made up stories to entertain themselves. The media harassed not just me, but also my family. People showed up at our house. They called my phone, my parents’ phones, other family members’ phones, and we were chased while I was still trying to survive emotionally and grieve the loss of my friends. I hated and still hate that they are gone, but for some reason, I am still here and I got to live. I still think about this every day. Why me? Why did I get to live and not them? For the longest time, I could not even look at their families without feeling sick with guilt. I did not know what to say or what to do. I was terrified that my presence just made their pain worse. And I was still here when their kids, their siblings, and their friends, their loved ones should have been here instead. After everything happened, I was afraid to go into my own backyard or alone in my house. I was scared that the person who did this would come for me next. I was always scared that the media would try to catch me at any moment of any day. Even when I was just walking around my house, I made my parents close all the blinds during the day so not no one could see me even in the slightest chance. I barely left the house and when I did, I made sure I was never alone. I slept in my parents’ room for almost a year. I made them double lock every door, set an alarm, and still check everywhere in the room just in case someone was hiding. And I still check my room every night before, and I double lock it. I have not slept through a single night since this happened. I constantly wake up in panics, terrified. Someone is breaking in or someone is here to hurt me, or I’m about to lose someone else that I love. The fear never really leaves. For a long time, I could barely get out of bed. But one day, I realized I have to live for them. They did not get the chance to keep living. But I do, and I will not take that for granted. So now, every day, I remind myself to live for them. And everything I do, I do it with them in mind. I am still scared to go out in public, but I force myself to do things because I know that they would want me to keep living my life to the fullest. I am beyond blessed to still be here. And I refused to take that for granted when they did not get a chance. Our house was not just a house. It was a home. It was where we laughed till we couldn’t breathe. Make meals, did crafts, binge watch reality shows, played games, and spent lazy days on the couch. It was movie nights, wine nights, morning debriefs, pranks, hot chocolate, cookies, and warmth. I would cherish those memories forever and I will not let what happened erase how special our home was or how much those memories meant to me. Now I would like to share some bits and pieces of who they were as people and some of the memories that we shared. One of my favorite memories was Halloween and we all went to Sigma Kai but instead of partying we just sat in an apartment talking and laughing all night long. I do not think I’ve ever laughed that hard in my life. We did not care about the party. We were just happy to be with each other. Zanna was one in a million. She was the life of the party. But she was also the kindest and funniest person I knew. Everyone loved her because she made everyone feel so loved. She was just someone you always wanted to be around no matter the circumstance. One of my favorite days with Zana was when she laid on the couch. When we laid on the couch together all day watching movies and snacking or when she, Maddie, and I would go and get margaritas, chips, and salsa. She would also light up a room with her presents alone. Kaylee had the most beautiful, radiant smile. And she was so kind, but also one of the funniest people I’ve ever known. She loved playing little pranks. and she always had us laughing so hard that we could not breathe. She was so full of energy in life. I really believe that she could have ruled the world if she wanted to and she would have been America’s sweetheart. Ethan was the sweetest, most genuine guy. He was always smiling and always making other people smile, too. Ethan was the kind of person you wanted around. He was so kind and easy to talk to and just so fun. and the way he cared for Zan was truly something to admire and really was proof that storybook love and true romances really do exist. I was not only it was not only obvious to me but everyone that was around Ethan and Santa that they were absolute soulmates. Maddie was not only one of my best friends but she was the older sister I would have always wanted. There was no one I looked up to or admired more than Maddie. She was truly a ray of sunshine and everyone was drawn to her. She was so kind, loving, funny, fun, and passionate. She had the sweetest soul and wanted nothing but the best for everyone and to love and show love to everyone. She took me under her wing and always made me feel so safe and included and above all loved and valued. She never failed to make me laugh or put a smile on my face. Still to this day, I am beyond grateful that she chose me to be her sorority little and I thank God every day that I not only got to know her but had her as one of my best friends. Honestly, I cannot pinpoint one favorite memory with Maddie because I have so many and this would be a very long read if I did. But if some little memories with her that I cherish is when the two of us made a nice dinner and split some wine or when we would binge watch Jersey Shore or Summer House. When we came up with a whole dance routine on Halloween and danced and sang all night like no one was watching. All the late night walks home from going out and just little shopping trips and so much more. I am beyond blessed that I had the chance to know each and every one of them. They changed my life in ways I would have never put into words. I hope that they are remembered for who they are, not what happened to them because who they are were so beautiful and they deserve to be remembered in the highest way. My heart breaks every time I go to text one of them or how badly I wish I could see and hang out with them. And then I remember I cannot I will never be able to again. But I still talk to them in my prayers every single night and I always will. I wish more than anything I could hug them one last time. And I wish I could tell them how much I love them. And even though I cannot, I still tell them every night. I will keep living for them as long as I am lucky enough to still be here. And they were all truly one of a kind. And they will be in our hearts forever and always. Thank you. and please convey uh to uh Bethany my appreciation for her courage uh and I hope that she heals. Next is Dylan Mortonson. We’re asking for some accommodations from Miss Mortonson and that she be allowed to sit in my seat. Sure. Dylan, just take your time. All right. Sorry. Thank you, your honor. What happened that night changed everything because of him. for beautiful, genuine, compassionate people were taken from this world for no reason. He didn’t just take their lives. He took the light they carried into every room. He took away how they made everyone feel safe, loved, and full of joy. He took away the ability for me to tell him that I love them and that I’m so proud of them. He took away who they were becoming and the futures they were going to have. He took away birthdays, graduations, celebrations, and all the memories that we were supposed to make. All of it is gone. and all the people who love them are just left to carry that weight forever. He didn’t just take them from the world. He took them from me, my friends, my people who felt like my home. The people I looked up to and adored more than anyone. He took away my ability to trust the world around me. What he did shattered me in places I didn’t know could break. I was barely 19 when he did this. We had just celebrated my birthday at the end of September. I should have been figuring out who I was. I should have been having the college experience and starting to establish my future. Instead, I was forced to learn how to survive the unimaginable. I couldn’t be alone. I had to sleep in my mom’s bed because I was too terrified to close my eyes. Terrified that if I blinked, someone might be there. I made escape plans everywhere I went. If something happens, how do I get out? What can I use to defend myself? Who can help? Then there are the panic attacks. the kind that slam into me like a tsunami out of nowhere. I can’t breathe. I can’t think. I can’t stop shaking. All I can do is scream because the emotional pain and the grief is too much to handle. My chest feels like it’s caving in. Sometimes I drop to the floor with my heart racing, cons convinced something is very wrong. It’s far beyond anxiety. It’s my body reliving everything over and over again. My nervous system never got the message that it is over. And it won’t let me forget what he did to them. People call me strong. They say I’m a survivor, but they don’t see what my new reality looks like. They don’t see the panic attacks, the hypervigilance, the exhaustion, the way I scan every room I enter, the way I flinch at sudden sounds. They don’t know how heavy it heavy it is to carry so much pain and still be expected to keep going. And that’s because of him. He stole parts of me I may never get back. He stole that. He took the version of me who didn’t constantly ask what if it happens again. What if next time I don’t survive? He may have shattered parts of me, but I’m still putting myself back together. Piece by piece, I’m learning how to live in this new version of life. It is not easy. It hurts, but I’m still trying. Still trying. And I’m not trying just for me. I’m trying for them, my friends. About a year ago, I had a dream about them. I got to say goodbye. I told them I won’t be able to see you again, so I need to tell you goodbye. They all kept asking why. And all I could say was, “I can’t tell you, but I have to.” When I woke up, I felt shattered and heartbroken, but also strangely grateful, like maybe in some way that dream gave us the goodbye we never got. Still, no dream can replace them. And no goodbye will ever feel finished. He is a hollow vessel, something less than human. A body without empathy, without remorse. He chose destruction. He chose evil. He feels nothing. He tried to take everything from me. My friends, my safety, my identity, my future. He took their lives. But I will continue trying to be like them to make them proud. Living is how I honor them. Speaking today is to help me find some sort of justice for them. And I will never let him take that from me. He may have taken so much from me, but he will never get to take my voice. He will never take the memories I had with him. He will never erase the love we shared, the laughs we had, or the way they made me feel seen and whole. Those things are mine. They are sacred. And he will never touch them. I get to feel sadness. I get to feel rage. I get to feel joy even when it’s hard. I get to feel love even when it hurts. I get to live. And while I will still live with this pain, at least I get to live my life. He will stay here, empty, forgotten, and powerless. John, thank you so much for your courage. I appreciate it. Next we have members from the Madison Mogan family. First would be Scott Laramie, Madison Mogan’s stepfather. Standing by home is Karen Larson’s mother. Thank you, your honor. My name is Scott Laramie. I’m Mattie Mogan’s stepfather and the husband of Mattiey’s mother, Karen Laramie. I will read this victim impact statement on behalf of Karen and myself. Maddie was our gift of life, our purpose, and our hope. Maddie quickly became Karen’s joy, identity, and purpose in life. I joined Mattiey’s Maddy’s life when she was 2 and a half years old. Experience transformed me into a life of joy, love, and family. Mie was bright, beautiful, kind, empathic. She listened carefully to others and was observant, seeing and caring about the hearts and the minds of all she encountered. She loved music and music festivals. She had a wonderful sense of humor. She excelled in school. She was an easy child, easy child to raise, almost never requiring discipline and almost always giving us parental joy. One time Karen, one time Karen remembers disciplining Maddie as a little girl. Maddie responded, “You broke my heart.” Which of course melted ours. She had a she had a keen wit even at that young age. As she transition transitioned in into teenage years, she pri prioritized us and extended family over many of the distractions that capture teenagers. She showered us with her presence and love at family events, barbecues, picnics, birthdays, holidays, and others. She’s she spent countless hours with her papa, her uncle David and Aen, and her other close family and friends. This world was a better place with her in it. As she reached adulthood, adulthood, Maddie applied her studies to be a marketing professional, entering into an internship at Pain West and started planning her professional f future. As with all things, she involved Karen and myself in the joy of her journey. As she transitioned into womanhood, Karen and I continued to be astounded at this wonderful and accomplished person we had created. All parents dream of their children accomplishing more than them. We realized this dream. All we had not become, she was becoming. Karen and I are ordinary people, but we lived extraordinary lives because we had Maddie. Maddie was taken senselessly and brutally in a sudden act of evil. She was taken along with the with with the young, promising and bright lives of Kaye, Zana, and Ethan. First, we felt disbelief. Next, we felt disorientation. Then we felt grief overcome us. Our grief has compounded even more for the Gulovas, Krennodal and Chapen families. We speak of hope and healing. And we do have hope and some healing, but the vast emotional wound will never fully heal. Since Matty’s loss, there’s emptiness in our hearts, home, and family, an endless void. After losing her mother in a car crash, Karen took Karen took to grieve. Karen took years to grieve and recover. The feeling that her life with Maddie and A was perfect helped her to start to heal. Now, this is no longer perfect. After Matty’s loss, Karen felt like she was spinning out emotionally, emotionally collapsing in anx into anxiety and depression. She sometimes asks, “How am I supposed to go on when I’ve lost my favorite person in the world?” I felt the same, and we continue to struggle. The loss of Maddie has impacted so many beyond our family. Her second family is her sorority sisters who grieve who grieve alongside us. She has so many close friends who suffer from her loss. We will we will continue to be her her loss will continue to be felt by the Vandal community, including Vandal Solutions on campus where she volunteered her time for others. It helps us to know that he is in heaven now, freed from the trials of this earth. We, however, continue to live on without the grace and support of her presence. We will grow old without our only child, our bright, beautiful friend and daughter. In the end, there are no words that can accurately capture the devastation of losing Maddie. We will endure and we will go on. For Maddie, we will not let our grief consume us. For Maddie, we will continue to love and care for our family and friends, including the families of Kaye, Santa, and Ethan. We will remain united with them. We can only hope that others out there suffering similar losses can look to us and see that we can overcome hatred, darkness, and evil. We know the law allows us to comment on the defendant and his sentence. As for a sentence, we support the plea agreement. Society needs to be protected against this evil. As for the defendant, we we will not waste the words, nor nor will we nor will we fall into hatred and bitterness. Evil has many faces, and we now know this. But evil does not deserve our time and attention. We are done being victims. We are taking back our lives. We will turn our time, talents, and attention to hope, healing, and helping others and to the future. We invite all those who have suffered with us on this on this to join us in our journey. We can make this world a better place. We can move on from tragedy. Adversity will visit us. Evil will visit us. But we will overcome. We can and will endure. Karen and I express our gratitude to your honor and to the prosecution team for allowing us the opportunity to make this statement. Thank you. Thank you so much for your courage and I am so sorry for your loss. God bless you. Thank your honor. Your honor, this is Leander James. He’s the attorney for the Mogan family and victim advocate. Um he’ll be reading a statement for Karen Laramie. May it please the court council. My name is Leander James. I am the proono counsel for Karen and Scott Laramie. Karen has asked me to read the statement into the record. I thank my husband Scott for his statement, his courage, and his unending love and support during this dark time. While words are inadequate to capture the impact of this horrific crime on our family, he expressed it as best anyone could. For Matt’s sake, I will add my supplement statement that incorporates additional impact in the context of my extended family. I am grateful to Mattiey’s great uncle, Brian Cfield, for assisting me with the difficult, difficult task of putting our pain into words. For me and my extended family, Maddie was our hope and our light. Her beauty both outside and in shown its light upon everyone with whom she came in contact. her beauty both uh uh pardon me uh she carried that hope and light into the future for our entire family. We have memories of our Maddie and grief and pain at her being taken taken from our presence. Any one of us would have given our own light to have been outshon by hers. We now look to our creator to know that her light continues where we look to see her in his presence. Those who commit evil for their own twisted gains and purposes truly defile the efforts and sacrifices of mothers, fathers, families, teachers, clergy, public servants, service members, and all those who commit themselves to the greater good, freedoms, and the future light of our nation. Condemnation falls heavily upon those who squandered the lives of our future hopes and dreams. Some may offer forgiveness for what the defendant has done. However, we cannot at this time or perhaps ever. Nor will we ask for mercy for what he has done. His acts are too heinous. The agony and grief he has caused too great. But we will we will waste no further words or thoughts on him. For Mattiey’s sake, we will move on. We will do our best to carry Mattie’s light into this world and make it a better place. I thank the court and the prosecution prosecution for allowing me the opportunity to make my statement. And I thank all those who have and will support my family and the families of Kaylee, Zanna, and Ethan. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Slar. Appreciate it. Next is Ben Mogan, the father of Mattie Mogan. Yes, of course. Actually, your honor, um, it’ll be Kim Chile, the grandmother of Maddie Mogan. My name is Kim Chile. I was Maddie Mogan’s paternal grandmother. as Ben Mogan. Her father is my son. I’m here today with my sister Lori Chile, Mattiey’s great aunt, and my son, Ben Mogan, and my daughter-in-law, Corey Hatrock. I’d like to begin by thanking a number of people involved in bringing this case to closure. In my daughter’s words, the plea deal the prosecution team reached this month is one that punishes the perpetrator of this horrendous crime protects the public from further harm and allows all of us who knew and loved these kids the time to grieve without the anxiety of the long and gruesome trial, the years of appeals and potential for for mistrials along the way. My family and I are so grateful to Bill Thompson and his prosecution team for their dedication and painstaking work that forced the perpetrator to admit his guilt. We want to thank the Idaho State Police, the Moscow Police Department, the FBI, and Judge Hippler. We’d also like to thank the University of Idaho officials who have treated the families of the victims with such dignity and kindness and who have honored the four victims beautifully. Maddie was my first grandchild. So when she was born, all her grandparents had the distinct pleasure of deciding what we’d like to be called. I chose Nana. Pretty original. But when Maddie was about a year and a half old, her papa, Ben’s dad, and I were planning to visit the new little family in Oregon. Maddie didn’t have an extensive vocabulary at the time, but for some unknown reason, she called bananas ba dedles. When Karen and Ben told her nana was coming to visit, she figured I say deedle for that word. So I became Deedle Beetle, shortened to Deedle, when she was about six or seven. And I was Deedle all her life. I don’t think her stepdad Scotty ever knew my given name was Kim. Maddie’s and my birthdays were one day apart. And a couple years before she was killed, she gave me this necklace with Deedle and Maddie engraved on it. And I added an angel wing and it’s one of my treasured possessions. I also got an angel wing tattoo. Never thought I’d see the day, but along with many members of our family, replicating the one that Maddie and her sorority sisters had, I wanted mine where I could see and touch it. often from preschool through grade school. I stopped teaching piano lessons early on Wednesdays and picked Maddie up for bubble baths, brownies, and books. It was our special time together. And she went home those nights in her jammies with a pan of warm brownies for her family. Although Karen and Scotty raised Maddie and did a such a lovely job of parenting, we Moganss were lucky to have her for holidays and many other family gatherings. We’ll always have our treasured memories of Maddie growing up in our big extended cooperative family. And I thank Karen and Scotty Laramie for being so generous and open and sharing Maddie with her Mogan side of the family. When the four kids were murdered, the foundation fell out of our world. Initially, the fear was truly debilitating. The first six weeks were excruciating despite the vigils, memorials, candlelight gatherings of students, friends, family, community members. After the arrest in the past 2 and 1/2 years, my family has lived with grief with the effects of traumatic grief of which I was blissfully unaware before all of this. I now have a stack of books on grief. I’ve attended grief classes at hospice. I’ve tried EMDR, a technique that helps replace disturbing visions with something more comforting. My son Ben, his two sisters, Mattiey’s aunts, and I have all experienced depression and anxiety and sleep disturbance requiring medical intervention at times. We’ve all sought counseling off and on. The struggle with media attention was extremely difficult, especially for Ben. No one should live through the violent murder of one’s child. Some days it’s beyond me how the parents of these kids are still upright. I’m thankful for the strong families and communities that are supporting the survivors. At the time, I could think of only two blessings surrounding the horrific mur murders. One was that Ben was living with my partner Tom and me at the time and that we could support each other emotionally through it all. Sadly, Tom died a year ago of a rare brain cancer, and he won’t be here to see justice served. He was our family’s rock, and we all miss him every day. A second blessing is that my mother died of COVID several months before the kids were killed, and she didn’t have to live through the horror. It was difficult to identify blessings. So, we’ve all lost our dear child and a future with her. I ache for the loss of the dreams that she and her true love Jake held. And my heart goes out to Karen and Scotty and your side of Mattiey’s family. You’ve had more than your share of loss. My heart aches for the kids’ roommates and the families of the other victims and also the family of the perpetrator. Going forward, we Moganss are choosing to put our energy and focus into honoring Mattiey’s too short life and sweet spirit by celebrating Maddie May Day, which my two daughters established. On May 25th each year, Mattiey’s birthday, we encourage folks to do random acts of kindness in Mattiey’s name. In my daughter Katie’s words, may we all protect our peace in whatever way possible. Unite in community and focus on joy. Please do an act in kindness in Mattiey’s honor during this week so a glimmer of Mattie’s light may live on. Thank you. Thank you. And I appreciate your courage and bless you and your family. Thank you. Now it’s been Mogan, Matty Mogan’s father. I’m uh Benjamin Mogan. I’m Maddiey’s dad. And um first I just uh want to say thanks to all the people that helped bring this all to a to a close. I I know it’s not the resolution that everyone, you know, wanted, but um I think that the that everyone worked so hard and and we really appreciate all their efforts that it was such a hard thing to to go through for everybody. Um, Maddie was my only child that I ever had. Um, she the most she was the only great thing I ever really did and uh the only thing I was really ever proud of. And um I thought we would have the rest of our lives together to to be together and and know each other and and I really I took for granted uh the time, you know, she was in college and I thought, “Oh, well, we’ll have the rest of our lives to to do all the stuff that we’re supposed to do. And and um and uh she was just about done. We she actually earned all of her credits for her college degree and Karen and Scotty and I got to go and get her diploma that she actually earned and she served every bit of that. And uh but I I I thought uh that that that was going to be just the beginning of a a long life together. And um and we never got that. Um Karen and Skye did such a great job raising her after Karen and I split up. And um so thankful for Scotty and and the role that he played in in her life when I wasn’t able to. And but we got to spend a lot of great times together, Maddie and I. me. She was my favorite person to go to a concert with. Um, we got to see some fun shows together and I told her, “If there’s ever a show that you want to go to, you let me know and I’ll I’ll get you tickets for you and your friend or if you want we want to go together. We’ll we’ll make it happen.” And we we my my favorite memory with her was when the Mac Miller show sold out here in Spokane and all the everyone wanted tickets. no one could get them. And they on the last day before the show, they did a radio thing and I I got four meet and greet tickets for for Maddie and her friends and me to go and see the show and and that was her favorite artist at the time was Mac Miller and and uh and he’s gone now, too. And my my little cousin Zach drove us all there that night and he’s gone, too, tragically. And uh yeah. Um anyway, I the last thing that she ever wrote to me was this Father’s Day card. And um I’m so glad I still have it. Um I’m just going to read what she said. It says, “Happy Father’s Day. I hope you have the best day. I can’t wait till we can hang out again soon. I’ll be in Celane 6:24 to 7:4. Hopefully, we can find a time then. I loved your birthday card that you sent me, by the way. Maybe we can see a concert sometime soon. I’d love to see the gorge when it’s not so smoky out. I hope you’re doing well. I’m proud of how far you’ve come. Thank you for always encouraging me to do my best. Love you lots and lots. Love, Maddie May. She did encourage me to not just to do my best but to live on. I I went through a lot of uh issues with addiction and with uh with substance abuse and and um when I wasn’t wanting to live anymore, she was what would keep me from just not caring anymore. and um knowing that she was out there and that she was just such a beautiful person uh kept me alive. A lot of a lot of rough moments and um I’m so glad that she was able to meet Jake. He was the only one that actually ever got to take her to the gorge. Um they went and saw water shed together and uh yeah, they they had a heck of a time. I’m glad she got to that’s a really special place for me and I always wanted she always wanted to work out there with me in the summer sometime. Uh and she never got to but at least she got to see it once with Jake. He was such a great guy. He is such a great guy and I I really wanted to see what a future with them would have looked like. Um I I’ll never I’ll never be able to uh replace her, you know. I don’t I wrote a bunch of stuff. I don’t I just don’t know what to say right now. It’s that I just miss her so much and I just love her more than anything. And this shouldn’t have happened. And you know, a death sentence is is one thing. You know, you know when when it’s going to happen and you know it’s going to be all gentle and stuff, you know, life without parole with a room building full of people that all just want you to not be around anymore and winking at every morning, not knowing if that’s the day they’re going to pull your card. I mean, that’s it’s not a very nice sentence either. So, uh, you know, I don’t I don’t know. I I just love you, Maddie, and I wish you were still here. Thank you so much. You’re on. Our next would be members from the Kaylee Gonzalez family. Um, first will be her father, Steve Gonzalez. Today we are here to finish what you started. Today you’ve lost control. Today we are here to prove to the world that you picked the wrong families, wrong state, the wrong police officers, the wrong community. You tried to break our community apart. You tried to plant fear. You tried to divide us. You failed. Instead, your actions have united everyone in their disgust for you. I just learned from these lead investigators to their shock. They worked in an investigation and actually in worked with Pennsylvania police officers and the federal FBI. You united everyone. Everyone was united after you. None of us are divided. We were united in our disgust and our love for these children. Today you have no name. Because when this all started, we all came together and we said, “Let’s stop even talking about his name and just use initials.” See, even the media just called you BK. That’s all you are. Looking back when the police officers knocked on my door, told me what happened to my child, told me what happened to Matty May. I don’t think he was even out of the driveway before my kids turned around, looked at me, and said, “What do we do, Dad?” I told him, “You get to work. You get your ass to work.” And we started calling. We started texting. We started emailing. And you know what? Within hours, within hours, we had your white car on a camera. We knew. We knew from the very beginning we had you. The police officers tell us within minutes they had your DNA, like a calling card. You were that careless, that foolish, that stupid. Master degree? You’re a joke. Complete joke. But we took this disaster and we did what we could. We put everything online. We took our kids. We took our images. We took everything that they did. Their videos, their photos, the girls pranks, Ethan singing. We put it out there. We shared it with the world. And the world united. And all they ended up when they talked about this case is they talked about Kaye Jade, Maddie May, Zanna, and Ethan. Everything with these people meant to us. A father, a mother, a brother, a sister. We shared that with our community. Then we shared it with our state. We shared it with the country. And eventually we shared it with the world. The world’s watching because of the kids, not because of you. Nobody cares about you. You’re not worth the time, the effort to be remembered. In time, you will be nothing but two initials forgotten to the wind. No visitors, nothing more than initials on an otherwise unmarked tombstone. From this moment, we’ve all started Come on, Smallville. From this moment, we will forget you. We want to all leave in closing. One last thing. You picked the wrong family and we’re laughing at you on your trip to uh to Penn. That will be today or tomorrow. I’ll close with God bless all the men and women that worked on this case. and all the hard work that you guys did. You guys allowed us to grieve and allowed us to get through this. The amount of work that you guys put together and the way that you guys put it together was beautiful. There was hard times to be expected, but thank you all and God bless. Thank you. Your honor, next is Steven Gonzalez, Kayle’s brother. Steven’s actually going to pass. I’m gonna go. Okay. Olivia Gonzalez, Kayle’s sister. Hello. I’d like to start by thanking the court for allowing me the time and opportunity to speak today. My name is Olivia and I’m the big sister of Kaylee Gonzalez and I was blessed to love Madison Mogan as a sister, too. I’m not here today to speak in grief. I’m here to speak in truth. Because the truth is my sister Kaylee and her best friend Maddie were not yours to take. They were not yours to study, to stalk, or to silence. They were two pieces of a whole, the perfect yin and yang. They are everything that you could never be. loved, accepted, vibrant, accomplished, brave, and powerful. Because the truth about Kaye and Maddie is they would have been kind to you. If you had approached them in their everyday lives, they would have given you directions, thanked you for the compliment, or awkwardly giggled to make your own words less uncomfortable for you. In a world that rejected you, they would have shown mercy. Because the truth is, I’m angry. Every day I’m angry. I’m left shouting at the inside of my own head everything I wish I could say to you. The truth about me is when I heard the news, I didn’t cry. I listened for them. I promised them I would. That I would fight for them. That I would show up no matter what it cost me. I swore I’d never let them feel alone. Because you see, I’ve always been their heavy weight. I’ve always been the one to fight the battles they didn’t feel ready to fight themselves. All it ever took was a call. And they knew I would handle it for them, no matter the time, no matter the cost. They could wave their white flag because they knew I would never back down. Not for them. And not even death could change that. Somewhere along the line, I started to think about what I would say to them if I was given just one last chance. If I could gather enough heartbreak or love or sacrifice or whatever it took to get just one message across. What would I say? Throughout this entire process, I’ve written my feelings down at every moment. my my wishes, my love, my denial, my anger. And as one final act of love, I’d planned to read these thoughts, even jarring and discombobulating and not even making sense. Because for me, that was true love, as bare and as naked as it could be. Not laced in pretty words or dressed for the occasion, but written through blurry eyes at 2 a.m. with clenched fists, angry at this reality. My true final act of love was to continue on without them for them. That dream to read a love to read aloud my love to them to bring meaning through pain was the latest blow in realizing you don’t deserve it and Kaye and Maddie don’t need it. Haley and Maddie have always known my love, and they would never ask me to prove it by further victimizing myself to a defendant who has shown no guilt, no remorse, no apprehension. They would say to me, “Why would you give the satisfaction of showing vulnerability now? You promised you would never back down.” And for that clarity, I’m thankful. I won’t stand here and give you what you want. I won’t offer you tears. I won’t offer you trembling. Disappointments like you thrive on pain, on fear, and on the illusion of power. And I won’t feed your beast. Instead, I will call you what you are. Sociopath, psychopath, murderer. I will ask the questions that reverberate violently in my own head so loudly that I can’t think straight most any day. Some of these might be familiar, so sit up straight when I talk to you. How was your life right before you murdered my sisters? Did you prepare for the crime before leaving your apartment? Please detail what you were thinking and feeling at this time. Why did you choose my sisters? Before making your move, did you approach my sisters? Detail what you were thinking and feeling before leaving their home. Is there anything else you did? How does it feel to know the only thing you failed more miserably at than being a murderer is trying to be a rapper? Did you recently start shaving or manually pulling out your eyebrows? Why November 13th? Did you truly think your Amazon purchase was untraceable because you used a gift card? How do you find it enjoyable to stargaze with such a severe case of visual snow? Where is the murder weapon? The clothes you wore that night? What did you bring into the house with you? What was the second weapon you used on Kaye? What were Kayle’s last words? Please describe in detail the level of anxiety you must have felt when you heard the bearcat pull up to your family home on December 30th, 2022. Which do you regret more? returning to the crime scene 5 hours later or never ever going back to Moscow, not even once after stalking them there for months. If you were really smart, do you think you’d be here right now? What’s it like needing this much attention just to feel real? You’re terrified of being ordinary, aren’t you? Do you feel anything at all? Or are you exactly what you always feared? Nothing. If you’re so powerful, then why are you still hiding, defendant? You see, I’m here today as me. But who are you? Let’s try to take off your mask and see. You didn’t create devastation. You revealed it in it in yourself. And that darkness you carry, that emptiness, you’ll sit with it long after this is over. That is your sentence. And it was written on the wall long before you ever plead guilty. You didn’t win. You just exposed yourself as the coward you are. You’re a delusional, pathetic, hypocchondric loser who thought you were so much smarter than everybody else. constantly scolding, turning your nose up to grammar mistakes, nitpicking and criticizing others. You wanted so badly to be different, to be special, to be better, to be deep, to be mysterious. You found yourself thinking you were better than everyone else, and you thought you could figure out the human psyche and see through it, all while tweaked out on heroin. lurking in the shadows made you feel powerful because no one ever paid you any attention in the light. You thought you were exceptional all because of a grade on a paper. You thought you were elite because your online IQ test from 2010 told you so. All of that effort just to seem important. It’s desperate. There is a name for your condition, though. Your inflated ego just didn’t allow you to see it. Wannabe. You act like no one could ever understand your mind. But the truth is, you’re basic. You’re a textbook case of insecurity disguised as control. Your patterns are predictable. Your motives are shallow. You are not profound. You’re pathetic. You aren’t special or deep, not mysterious or exceptional. Don’t ever get it twisted again. No one is scared of you today. No one is intimidated by you. No one is impressed by you. No one thinks that you are important. You orchestrated this like you thought you were God. Now look at you begging a courtroom for scraps. You spent months preparing and still all it took was my sister and a sheath. You worked so hard to seem dangerous. But real control doesn’t have to prove itself. The truth is the scariest part about you is how painfully average you turned out to be. The truth is you’re as dumb as they come. Stupid, clumsy, slow, sloppy, weak, dirty. Let me be very clear. Don’t ever try to convince yourself you mattered just because someone finally said your name out loud. I see through you. You want the truth? Here’s the one you’ll hate the most. If you hadn’t attacked them in their sleep in the middle of the night like a pedophile, Kaye would have kicked your ass. Thank you. Thank you. Next is Christy Gonzalez, Kaylee Gonzalez’s mother. Just relax. Great. Thank you, your honor. I never imagined having to speak to someone so devoid of humanity. For a long time, I didn’t think I’d find the words low enough to meet you where you are. But now, I realize this isn’t about you. It’s about what you’ve done to me. And I need you to hear it. When you murdered my daughter, Kaye J. Gonzalez. You didn’t just take her life. You shattered others. You attacked what you could never be. And in doing so, you left a trail of devastation far beyond that house. You stole my peace. You’ve altered my every waking moment, every sleepless night, the way I view the world, people, safety, trust. It’s all been changed by your your cruelty. I no longer recognize parts of myself. Joy is harder to find. Laughter feels foreign. The world world moves forward, but I’m suspended in place of sorrow and rage. You’ve taken from me something that can never be restored. The grief sits with me every day. Some days quietly, and other days so loud it drowns out everything else. The emotional toll you’ve inflicted on me is immeasurable. I live with a constant ache. With birthdays that are now memorials, with holidays that feel hollow, with empty chairs that scream louder than words ever could. I am forever changed. But for you, as a person working on a PhD in criminal justice, you really didn’t think this one through. You’re not that good. In fact, you’re not that good at anything. You couldn’t secure a job. You couldn’t get along with others. You couldn’t even get a female to look in your direction. All because you are pathetic. Now you’re a joke in this courtroom. I wish I could have crown I wish I could crown you with a jester hat to complete your orange jumpsuit clown look. A dead killer doesn’t kill again. So, while I’m disappointed the firing shot won’t get to take their shots at you, I’m confident that the men in prison will have their way with you in more ways than one, you will finally get what you wanted. Physical touch. Just probably not how you were expecting it. See, you haven’t beat the system. You’ve simply entered a new one where the rules are cruel and the consequences will never end. You are entering a place where no one will care who you are and no one will ever respect you. You will be forgotten, discarded, used, and erased. You will always be reme remembered as an as a loser, an absolute failure. And when those prison doors slam shut behind you, I hope that sound echoes in your heart for the rest of your meaningless days. I hope it reminds you of what we all already know. You’re nothing. May you continue to live your life in misery. You are officially the property of the state of Idaho where your fellow inmates are anxiously awaiting your arrival. But it’s okay cuz they’re there to help you. Hell will be waiting. Quick message from our youngest daughter. Aubrey wanted to say, “You may have received A’s in high school and college, but you’re going to be getting big D’s in prison.” Thank you. Do we have more from the Gonzalez family or are you Yes. Um, next would be Shannon Gray, the Gonzalez family attorney. He’ll be reading statements from Kaylee Gonzalez’s grandmothers. Morning, your honor. Shannon Gray, the attorney for the Gonzalez family. I actually have three statements. One from her aunt and two from her grandparents. This is from her aunt Tammy Buts. You and the cloak of darkness made a decision to turn our whole family’s world upside down forever. You and the cloak of darkness took our Kaylee J. Gonzalez away from us all without hesitation. Never have you shown any remorse or regret. We just get creepy non-expresses non-expressive stares as you as you have your team of women defend you. Haley was a strong, kind, fun, loving, caring person and she will greatly be missed by all her family and friends for the rest of our lives. She had goals in life that you took from her and us. We lose on watching her enjoying her life, working hard and building the future she wanted. She was ready to start that after college life. You and the cloak of darkness took it all away. You left us without her future wedding, her future children that she would have added to our family. No more talking to her on the phone, going for a coffee, celebrating holidays. It’s all gone. You and the cloak of darkness gave each and every one of Kayle’s family members their own lifetime sentence. You and the cloak of darkness also took our Matty May from all of us. She was so genuine, caring, polite. She was part of our family. You came in, harmed our children that were younger women than you in their own beds. You’re nothing. You’re a coward. It’s not right that you have received life. I pray that you meet your end in the cloak of darkness. burn in hell. I have two other statements, your honor. This is Linda Lukan’s statement. This is Kayle’s grandmother. I really don’t know how to address something so inhumane, but I will try. Nothing in the past two and a half years has made any sense. All I get is you cowardly went into a home at night filled with what I’m sure you thought was all sleeping girls and went on a vicious killing spree for no other reason but to appease your demonic urges. You took my granddaughter Kaye from us, plus three other beautiful lives. You took my granddaughter Kaye, beautiful, sweet soul, doll-faced Kaye, who was getting ready to start her amazing life, who had such a bright future, who was loved by so many, who you were so envious of. She had a life you could never have. You are so beyond human. You’re definitely a demon from hell. I truly wish your punishment would be the same death you inflicted on our kids. But I think you will meet some new friends in prison who will be there just to help you. Thumbs up. And I have one last statement, your honor. This is from Cheryl Gonzalez, Kayle’s other grandmother. John 1:5 says, “Light shines in the darkness and the o and the darkness overcomes it not.” Somewhere in your life, something some jealousy, envy, ego, something went dark. It pushed out all light until you became dark and evil. And when you saw my granddaughter and her friends, their light, because they have such a light, you couldn’t stand it because the darkness in you could not stand the light in them. And so you decided to destroy it. Cowardly, you walked into their rooms in the dark and took their lives, hoping to get rid of your darkness. But you didn’t. You failed. Because you know what was once a light shown only to their friends, families, and loved ones is now all over the world. Everyone sees it. Their smile, their beauty, their plans, everything they were and had and you think you put a close to it even that, but you didn’t because they still exist. They are still light. They are still beautiful. You can never take that away. They will always be in the light of all eternity. And you will be in the darkness because you could not overcome it. You failed. I want you to be gone. More than gone. I want you to be cast out. Cast out from my life, from my family, from this earth. I will not allow your hatred to penetrate into my own soul. You did not get that power. You are evil. And in the end, evil is eradicated. You didn’t take Kayle’s light. You spread it into the world. Thank you, your honor. Thank you. All right. Um, if the consult are you moving to a different family now, why don’t we take a 10-minute recess? All right. All right, Miss Jennings. Thank you, your honor. Um, the next family is the family of Zana Kernodal. And first would be Jasmine Kernodal, Zanna’s sister. Just want to say thank you to everyone who’s been involved in this and just for all the hard work and dedication they all put into this. I also want to thank everyone for the support and just my family and friends and around um through this time. I went back and forth on whether to speak today because the truth is you don’t deserve power over my feelings, my words, or me. Thank you. In the end, um I realized this moment isn’t about you. It’s about justice for Zana, Ethan, Kaye, and Maddie. It’s about honoring the beautiful, beautiful people they were and still are in God’s eyes. On November 13th, 2020 2022, piece of my heart was ripped away. There’s no way to ever fully describe the weight of losing my sister, my best friend. No sentence or punishment will ever come close to the justice Zana, Ethan, Kaye, and Maddie deserve. Zanna was everyone’s best friend. She was the kind. She was kind. She was funny. She was a gift to each person she was able to make an impact on. Zana was someone I turned to when I needed direction or advice. Although I am her older sister, I often found myself looking up to her. She had a radiant energy that everyone loved and she always knew the right way to approach a problem. She knew how precious and special life was, and she truly did live every day to the fullest. Yet, her story was cut short by an act of evil. I believe in a God whose justice is not bound by this courtroom. I find peace knowing that judgment ultimately belongs to him. For your sake, I hope one day you feel the full weight of what you did. I hope you take accountability. I hope you ex truly experience the guilt and your surrender yourself to Jesus Christ because no punishment on this earth can ever compare to the isolation and pain of eternal separation from God. Zana deserved more. They all did. But I come here to say this. I am strong. I am brave. I’m a fighter. Just like Zana. And you don’t get to control how I move forward or what I believe. I walk with the comfort of knowing I will see my sister again. Zana didn’t get the future she deserved. She won’t be the maid of honor at my wedding, the cool aunt to my future children. I’ll never hear her laugh or see her light up a room ever again. But I will carry her with me for the rest of my life. I will live in her honor. Fight to be the best kind of woman and someone she’s proud of. To make sure the world never forgets who she was. Zanna’s story doesn’t end with what was taken from her. It lives through the love she gave, the people she touched, and the legacy our family will protect. Her light still shines, and her voice will echo louder than this pain. You didn’t take that from us, and you never will. Thank you. I just want to say before I start, I’m Zana’s dad, Jeff Kernodal. Um it’s been a hard road down, you know, because she’s gone. And um I want to thank everybody other families that’s speaking so far, spoke about things. I agree with everything they have to say. It all comes back to a lot of the same things that I’ve had to deal with and we as a family have had to deal with. Um, and that brings me, you know, basis of what I’m talk about a little bit is on my way up here, um, flying up here on the plane and and, um, about halfway through the flight, it’s a little little girl calling out for her dad. Hey, dad, dad, dad. And, and then in in my mind, I was kind of half asleep. It’s dark on the plane. I heard Zana calling out for me like she did, you know, back when she was really little, 5 years old. And um those times were hard. It was chaotic, but we always had something to work toward that was in a positive direction. Um compared to right now, which is necessarily not as positive as that for sure. Um and I know not I miss Zana a lot. my life’s been changed and then and Zana had a great impact on me and the impact was when she was gone I realized how important she was and what she really did for me influenced me was way beyond what I ever thought she’d call me up on the weekends check on me see who’s with me she’s like accountability to your youngest his daughter and um that really made a big difference and made me really think about things and what what it’s all about, you know. Um that’s that’s the things that I I miss the most is those calls on the weekends, the calls at 11 night, what what’s going on? You want to meet my friend? You know, whoever she she’s with, a couple of her friends, I meet them, talk to them. And um she always did that and uh it’s pretty cool. Pretty cool. I really miss that. And um that has she made a big impact on me on on other people, her family, but the impact that she made is so extensive on what happened here. Um and it goes so far. People from everywhere in the world, you know, are following things and and and Zana has made a difference in their lives. So, you know, countless people told me that they might not even know even know her. They never knew anything about her. They what they see and they just are they just love her and say how they wish that she could have been their friend, you know, could have been their friend, could could hung out and it’s like this is just this is a blessing, you know, this little kid was and um definitely was a big big blessing in my life. and so so is Jasmine. And um basically, you know, we worked hard to do the things we did, you know, through the times that were growing up. And um through those times I realized that I wanted both of them to graduate college and that’d be the ultimate thing for them to do to prepare for the world. Then it then it came back to me Z didn’t get to finish college. She she had it all figured out. And this all just came back to me when I, you know, when I was there and that little girl was was on the plane doing that. It’s like where I was going, what I was going here for. And then I just realized and thought to myself about the wonderful life that she had and we had together and we, you know, I still get to have with Jasmine, but that’s the part that really counted. It’s the part that really counted is those memories. And those are what I have left. The memories with her and the ones I can make with her and the life that I can go on with now, which is what she wants. And I say that in present tense cuz that’s what she wants. Cuz I’ve been told that, you know, I’ve had countless ways that she’s she’s out there and has a way to communicate. um which I’m very grateful for. Um that that goes to say that the impact of what happened to them, all the four kids goes so much further than just not me, the parents, the families, the community. It it goes so far because a lot of kids, you know, in the colleges, just for an example, they lock their doors now. The door wasn’t locked in the back. You know, Penn State or wherever it was, all the colleges I know that I’ve heard, they all lock their doors now. So maybe the impact that it’s going to make is going to help out and maybe protect some people. having this outreach and having the influence of what these kids what happened to these kids did, you know. Um, all I know is I was 7 milesi away when it happened and I had a she wasn’t feeling that good. It was 11:30 and I almost went over to Susanna to say and I would have been sitting right there in that couch and you wanted to deal with me. So, they would have had a chance and I regret that and I regret not going. But the reason why I didn’t is because Zan said, “Don’t be drinking and driving. You got the rental car, don’t be drinking and driving, you know, the week before that.” So, she she was um she would have been mad at me to do that. But I really wish I would have drunken drunk and drove, you know, cuz they would have had a chance, all four of them. Um at this point, I just have to go on. where you’re going with everything and make things better in my life because that’s what that’s what it’s all about closure and things and the part that we miss is Santa her influence her smile the things that she did and um we have the memories left the great memories and um she just wants us to make more memories and not be sad or upset or shocked or taken for that, you know, and that’s what we’re gonna do. We just have to That’s all I got. Thank you for your words and your courage and bless your family. Next, Kim Kodal would like to address the court. Thank you, your honor. My name is Kim Kernodal. I am Zanna’s aunt. I was very blessed to have her in my life in our family. And I thought I had everything in my head what I wanted to say, but it kind of went out and I try I’m I’m always looking for the positive thing because evil hate can destroy people and that’s what it started doing with our family. It created anger with our family members. And then I had to look. Cassanna was everything that the media, her friends said. She was that fun, loving, high-spirited, beautiful person. And I no longer get to get my nails done with her, have lunch with her. Sorry. But how I look at it now is this tragedy, this horrible tragedy on all of our the four children has brought us closer. You united us with your actions. We’re united now and we’re stronger than ever. We have family and friends now that we never knew we had. And you know, this is probably going to bother everybody, but Brian, I’m here today to tell you I have forgiven you because I no longer could live with that hate in my heart. And for me to become a better person, I have forgiven you. And anytime you want to talk and tell me what happened, get my number. I’m here. No judgment because I do have answers or questions that I want you to answer. And I’m here. I’ll be that one that’ll listen to you. Okay. Thank you, your honor. Thank you very much. My name is Stratton Kodal and I’m Zana’s uncle, Jeff’s brother. Um sitting here today listening all the stories and feelings and feeling the pain from everybody um is pretty a pretty powerful thing. It’s each each time a statement was read, it sort of would tug into my center core as I felt everybody’s anguish. And Dana meant a lot to us and we loved her very much. But I started thinking about instead of rehashing everything that everybody else has talked about, I wanted to direct it another direction toward Brian and what he’s done to his family, his parents, his siblings, his friends, his universe. He has contaminated, tainted their family name, and pretty much made a horrible, miserable thing to be ever related to him. And I know that that’s what he has to live with and that has to be his pain. And that’s all I have to say. Thank you. Next honor, I believe Randy Davis, stepfather to Santa Cron, would like to address the court. Hi, my name’s Randy, stepdad is Anna. I just feel the same way we all do. We all of us are united because of something that happened and I’m grateful to know and have met some new family because of this awful event. But this is probably the last time we’re all going to be in the same room together. Let’s be real. So I can say I love you all and I feel your pain and just God bless us all. you know, just get through it. Um, I had stuff wrote up. It was probably best I didn’t read it out. Probably get kicked out of here. So, um, you know, I I’ll share one thing to you guys, not to you, um, with Zana. So, I was working in North Dakota and came home and Jazzy and Zanna had uh taken our son Elijah and put him in a dress makeup and it was it was awful, you know. I was like, I just I I don’t know. She was funny. I told her she’d be a in the movies and be somebody great one day like that. And now she is just above us as an angel with all the other beautiful kids. So let’s hold that to our hearts because this evil thing is not going to take nothing from us. You man, I I don’t know what my limits are here, but I’m really struggling, dude. I am struggling. So I want to I want to just be out in the woods with you just so I can teach you about loss and pain. I’m not I love I love God. I wouldn’t take your life. That’s up to him. But I guarantee you, you are weak. God, I would just give a moment, man. 5 minutes out in the woods. Oh man, you’re going to go to hell. I know people believe in other stuff. You’re you’re evil. There’s no place for you in heaven. You took our children. You are going to suffer, man. I’m shaking because I want to reach out to you, but I just I hope you feel my energy. Okay, go to hell. Next is Cara Northing, Zanna’s mother. I’m Cara Northingington. I am I am Zanna Kernodal’s mother. This letter is to you really, but is for my daughter who was murdered by you. Today I stand before you, the man who is responsible for murdering my beautiful daughter, Santa Kernodal. My daughter was beautiful both inside and out. She possessed love for those around her and had a light so bright it will live on forever in our hearts. She brought joy and laughter to her friends, her family, and anyone in her presence. Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ now has her in his loving arms in heaven where she can never be harmed ever again for eternity. Because of her, I came to know my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Because of her, many will come to Christ. It is Christ who lives in me that has given me the strength to forgive you. It was of no power of my own. In return, the Lord has filled me with joy, hope, and peace that surpasses all understanding. Jesus has allowed me to forgive you for murdering my daughter without you even being sorry or asking for this. This is only possible because he who lives in me is greater than any evil in this world. For God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. I do not fear you or even let you rent space in my head anymore. This forgiveness has released me from any and all evil you have inflicted on me and my family. It has allowed me to let our Lord deal with you. You have accepted a deal that will prevent you from receiving the death penalty. Nothing man can do to you can ever compare to the wrath of God. Inevitably, you will stand before our Lord and will have to answer to him over the sins you have committed in murdering our children. I pray you come to the end of yourself before that day. Whether you like it or not, heaven is for real and so is hell. the innocent life of Zana that you stole from myself and my family and the destruction of this and the destruction it has caused. I am washing my hands of you and turning you over to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ whom vengeance belongs to. In closing, I want to read a passage from the Bible. Ephesians 6 King James version. Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and then in the power of his might. Put on the whole armor of God that ye may be able to withstand the ws of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood. against. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, that ye may be able to stand in the evil day. I’m not going to share memories of Zana or anymore of the goodness of her with you because I do not want that to be in your head. I don’t want it to be in your head. You don’t deserve that. You don’t deserve our good memories that we have. I do pray for you. I pray that you come to the end of yourself. I pray that before this life is over that you ask our Lord and Savior in your heart and to forgive you. I do pray for that. But after today, I wash my hands of you and you are no longer a thing. Thank you. Thank you. I don’t believe the state has any other victim impact statement. Okay. All right. Stay and argue. Thank you, your honor. Just as a housekeeping matter to start, um there will be the issue of restitution. um that is the documentation is being gathered and we ask the court would defer that for 30 days so we can present it in an orderly fashion and make sure it’s comprehensive for everyone. Any objection to leaving restitution open 60 days? All right. Thank you your honor. I think it’s necessary and appropriate to share for everyone here, including the court, um the background that brings us in front of your honor today for these proceedings. Uh, as the record reflects and as everybody in this courtroom knows, the defendant has pleaded guilty to all five counts charged in the indictment. Under oath before your honor, he has admitted that the charges against him are true. He has reassured the court that he has not been coerced or threatened to make those admissions. and your honor did an extraordinary job in taking the pleas back on July 2nd. We appreciate the court’s discipline and insight. The defendant has also waved appeal on the multitude of rulings from this court and your honor’s predecessor in LA County on dozens of literally dozens of motions seeking to dismiss the case, seeking to control or limit evidence, seeking to offer evidence that would not be appropriate. and we appreciate the court’s consistent rulings based on the law, based on the facts. As your honor will recall, on June 18th, it’s just really not that long ago, we appeared before this court for arguments on what became the defendants’s final motions to this court. motion where they wanted to offer evidence suggesting that other people were responsible for the defendant’s actions and the motion seeking essentially an indefinite continuence of the trial. It was readily apparent to all of us in the courtroom from your honor’s comments that those motions were not going to be granted. So we returned to Moscow and continued with what we had been working on for months in preparation for trial. We had no qualms about going to trial if trial was what was necessary and appropriate. The following week after we were in court, we were approached by the defense with an inquiry about a possible plea. And I can tell the court this is the first suggestion ever that there was any consideration because indeed the defense had maintained from the beginning that Mr. Coberger, the defendant, was factually innocent. It’s clear that the reality of the evidence and the case that had been investigated and prepared and that we were ready to present in court became a reality. Our reaction among other things was to reach out to all the families. And in fact later that week on Thursday and Friday of that last week of June, we met with representatives by teams, virtual meetings with representatives of all the families. And we talked about the status of the case uh and the upcoming trial and things that related to the trial. And we also let them know that there had been an inquiry about whether there might be an offer for a plea. And we asked the family members for their thoughts and feelings and they were candid and they have been candid since and we respect that and we understand, recognize and acknowledge that there was a difference of opinion among representatives of the different families. We understand that one of the challenges of this case, one of the unique things about this case is we have multiple victims. Each unique unto themselves, their families and friends unique unto themselves, and all of them entitled to their opinions, all of them entitled to their thoughts. Over the following weekend, our prosecution team, very skilled attorneys who were personally as well as professionally deeply invested in this case, met and we talked and the decision was reached. Well, to start with, were there to be any sort of plea offer or discussion, there’s only one possibility, and that would be for the defendant to plead guilty straight up to all charges. There would need be no bargaining about counts. There would be no bargaining about reduced sentences. And so we made the proposal to the defense that if the defendant was willing to plead guilty upfront to all five counts as charged and wave appeal of the court’s myriad decisions during the past two and a half plus years on all these motions that would have consumed years if not decades of time in the future. By the end of the weekend, we were notified the defense defendant was prepared to plead guilty as charged and factually acknowledge his responsibility in court for these horrible crimes. Obviously, those discussions and negotiations were confidential. And as your honor noted, I believe that was necessarily so because if the defendant had decided not to plead guilty, it would have been devastating to our jury pool for there to be public information that there had been consideration by either party to a plea resolution. And protecting the perspective integrity of trial after so many years was paramount. So the end of the weekend came, we notified the victim’s families of what had occurred. We recognize, I recognize and acknowledge personally and I respect the fact that of these fine suffering people here, not everybody agreed with the decision we make. I accept that it’s my responsibility in the end. I recognize that that’s the duty of the office that I hold. So now it is time for the judicial system to impose final judgment and close the door on this chapter of these tragedies. As the court is aware, by the agreement of the parties, it is the state’s prayer. Perhaps have the Elmo, please turn on. Thank you. that on count one, the felony burglary that the court sentenced the defendant to the maximum period of 10 years fixed in the custody of the ID, excuse me, Idaho Department of Correction. Then on count two that the court sentenced the defendant to fixed life for the murder Mattie Mogan. on count three that the court sentenced the defendant to fixed life for the murder of Kaye Gonzalez. On count four, did the court sentence the defendant to fixed life for the murder of Zana Kernogal on count five that the court sentenced the defendant to fixed life for the murder. of Ethan Chapen. And the state further prays that these sentences be ordered to run consecutively, backto back, not at the same time. To recognize and respect the unique individuality of each of these beautiful young people whose lives were taken brutally and for no reason. And hopefully now as we have heard earlier this morning, it is time to afford the families and the friends and the community and the state of Idaho and the nation and the world to move forward. We can’t undo and we can never undo the horror of what occurred on the early morning hours of November 13th, 2022 at 11:22 King Street in Moscow, Idaho. For a long time, the presiding district judge in Law County was John Stegner, who eventually became a member and a justice of the Idaho Supreme Court. And Judge Justice Stegler Stegner often observed that even God cannot change the past. But everyone in this room has the ability to take themselves forward. And we want the judicial system to afford them the opportunity today to do that. From today forward, our memories should be focused on these innocent victims whose lives were taken on their families, on their friends, on the community. The court has heard discussion talked today, reminisces today about a special family that our victims shared. Not just their natural, legal, and biological families, not just their university family within their sororities. For example, but this family, this is the picture taken on November 12th, 2022 of the special family of 1122 King Road. And you can see all six of these dynamic, vibrant, loving, special, innocent faces taken together just across the street from their residence. and barely 12 hours before four of them would be brutally murdered in their sleep. They’ve been described consistently as being bright, caring, vivacious with futures we can only imagine now. But they were and they remained a special family that I think we should all recognize and appreciate. So, it’s time to move forward. There have been a number of statements directed specifically at the defendant today. I have one last thought. after your honor imposes judgment and sentences the defendant to spend the rest of his life in prison. In other words, sentence the defendant to die in prison. He’s going to stand up in the belly chains and leg irons that he’s wearing today and he’s going to be escorted into the custody of the Idaho Department of Correction. and the door will close behind him forever. That is the closure that we seek that all of these people, these loving friends and family deserve so that we can move forward. Thank you, your honor. Thank you. All right. Does the defense have evidence to present today? All right. Defense uh wish to make argument today. We do not wish to make Mr. All right, Mr. Coberger, uh, you have an opportunity to make a statement if you wish to. I take it you are declining. I respectfully decline. Please. All right, let me uh start this morning by u acknowledging and thanking uh those that have come here today in support of their loved ones. And I appreciate your courage and your strength and I hope that you are able to move on as best as possible. Thank council uh for the professionalism that they’ve exhibited throughout this case. It’s been my great honor to uh preside uh in this case and to help bring uh to the extent possible some some resolution and hopefully justice to this case. During the quiet morning hours of November 13, 2022, a faceless coward breached the tranquility of six beautiful young people, and senselessly slaughtered them, four of them. Who committed this unspeakable evil was unknown for several weeks, but due to the killer’s incompetence and outstanding police work by numerous local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies, the person that slithered through that sliding glass door at 1122 King Road now stands before the world and this court unmasked. This unfathomable and senseless act of evil has caused immeasurable pain and loss. No parent should ever have to bury their child. This is the greatest tragedy that can be inflicted upon a person. Parents who took their children to college in a truck filled with moving boxes had to bring them home in herses lined with coffins. The loss this killer inflicted was not just the death of these people’s children, siblings, grandchildren. As we’ve heard today, it has ripped a hole in their soul, destroying a special part of their very essence. Any person who is a parent defines themsself foremost as such. It is their existence and purpose of being and it has been stolen from these parents. None of us have experienced the loss these victims have in the unspeakable way that they have. And therefore, none of us can nor should we question the way in which they have handled their loss. Whether that be in private mourning, removed as far as possible from this media circus or in front of a camera demanding retribution with the loudest megaphone. I’ve listened intently to the stories and pain that have been shared today with great awe at the courage and resilience of the surviving family members of those wonderful children. I’ve listened also to the surviving roommates both in person and through uh their friends and I can’t think of how frankly courageous they have been despite the hell that they have faced by uncaring people who have come up with all kinds of crazy theories about two kids simply being kids. The parents, siblings, siblings, and other family members who have spoken today are designated as victims in our legal system. But going forward, I hope that they can shed that label as it gives too much power to the evil that condemned them to that role. They are and should be known as survivors, fighters, and foremost as witnesses to the tremendous lives of value. an unbounded promise of these four young people. But those speaking today and those who did not speak but who carry the same burden, this same loss, now carry forward the memories of these now perpetually young people, these forever children. These survivors carry the responsibility of ensuring that the voices of these children, Maddie, Kaylee, Zanna, and Ethan, are never forgotten. And the positive impacts that they have had on so many lives are never minimized. And that the love they shared, the light that they shined onto others is forever celebrated. As we sit here today, this case is ending. And we are now certain who committed these unspeakable acts of evil. But we don’t know and we what we may never know is why. I share the desire expressed by others to understand the why. But upon reflection, it seems to me, and this is just my own opinion, that by continuing to focus on why, we continue to give Mr. Cobberger relevance. We give him agency and we give him power. The need to know what is inherently not understandable makes us dependent upon the defendant to provide us with a reason. And that gives him the spotlight, the attention, and the power he appears to crave. Yet, even if I could force him to speak, which legally I cannot, how could anyone ever be assured that what he speaks is the truth? Do we really believe after all of this he’s capable of speaking the truth or of giving up something of himself to help the very people whose lives he destroyed? Rather, I suspect the so-called reason would be dished out in enticing, self-serving and arandizing untruthful bits, leaving leaving people wanting more information, more insight, and thus enhancing even further the power he seeks to hold. Even if we could get truthful insighted would would not in any way quench one’s thirst for actually understanding why in the first instance because there is no reason for these crimes that could approach anything resembling rationality. No conceivable reason could make any sense. And in the end, the more we struggle to seek explanation for the unexplainable, the more we try to extract a reason, the more power and control we give to him. In my view, the time has now come to end Mr. Cobberger’s 15 minutes of fame. It’s time that he be consigned to the igniminy and isolation of perpetual incarceration. I know there has been concern about him collaborating on books or movies or other media projects and I truly hope that someone does not stoop to affording him this spotlight that he desires in the name of clicks, royalties or profits. While criminal behavioralists should study him away from the spotlight in an attempt to prevent other wouldbe killers from acting on their worst impulses. There should be no need for that to spill over into the public eye. The great Idaho jurist Edward Lodge was known for trying to find something positive about every person he ever sentenced. And with over a half a century as a trial judge, that was a lot of people. This was often challenging. And I recall in one case he said that the best he could come up with was the defendant had good penmanship. Truth be told, I am unable to come up with anything redeeming about Mr. Cobberger because his grotesque acts of evil have buried and hidden anything that might have been good or intrinsically human about him. His actions have made him the worst of the worst. Even in pleading guilty is giving nothing hinting of remorse or redemption. Nothing suggesting even a recognition or understanding let alone regret for the pain that he has caused. And therefore I will not attempt to speak about him further other than to simply sentence him so that he is forever removed from civilized society. and accordingly based upon his conduct and based upon the record before this court recognizing the standards that govern this court’s sentencing decisions as set forth in state B2ill I hereby sentence Mr. Coberger as follows. On count one, burglary, 10 years fixed, zero zero years indeterminant. I also impose a fine of $50,000. Count two, first-degree murder of Madison Mogan. I sentenced the defendant to a fixed term of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, a fine of $50,000, and a civil penalty of $5,000 payable to the family of the victim. On count three for first-degree murder of Kaylee Gonzalez, I sentence the defendant to a fixed term of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, a fine of $50,000, and a civil penalty of $5,000 payable to the victim of the family or to the family of the victim, pardon me. On count four for the first degree murder of Zana Kernodal, I sentenced the defendant to a fixed term of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. a fine of $50,000 and a civil penalty of $5,000 payable to the family of the victim. On count five for the first-degree murder of Ethan Chapen, I sentenced the defendant to a fixed term of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, a fine of $50,000, and a civil penalty of $5,000 payable to the family of the victim. The sentences on counts one, two, three, four, and five shall run consecutively to one another. Restitution will be left open for 60 days. Defendant will be uh required to submit a DNA sample and a right thumb printition to the Department of Corrections and comply with the DNA database act. I ref I remand the defendant to the custody of the IDO state board of corrections for to be imprisoned in an appropriate facility in execution of the sentence where he will remain until he dies. Though you’ve waved your right to appeal, you do have a right to file a notice of appeal. And any such appeal must be filed within 42 days the date of the written judgment uh which will uh be entered uh shortly hereafter. Though the appeal, you should be aware, may be deemed a violation of the plea agreement. And so I certainly uh suggest you discuss that with council uh if that is your desire. I ask the uh media and public present to allow the families to uh be escorted out first before they leave. Um again, thank you to everyone for your stories today. I am strengthened by them and I am encouraged by your humanity and strength and God bless you. We’re journed. Yeah, I see. today you have no name because when this all started we all came together and we said let’s stop even talking about his name and just use initials even the media just calls you BK that’s all you are just a blistering witness uh victim impact statement from Steve Gonzalez who is the father of Kaylee Gonzalez, one of the four victims killed by Brian Cobberger. And you just watched the sentencing hearing for Brian Cobberger in Boisee, Idaho. Thank you for joining us here on the law and crime live stream. We’re going to continue our coverage now that that hearing has finished, but we are expecting in about 45 minutes from now to have a news conference with state prosecutors. Our Anget Levy was in the courtroom for those witness uh victim statements throughout the morning. and then of course what the prosecutors had to say and then Brian Coberger decided not to make a statement which did not come as a surprise. Uh let’s break down what we heard and what was a very emotional morning in court to say the least. I’m joined now by professor of applied forensics at Jacksonville State University, Joseph Scott Morgan. Uh thank you for taking the time to be with us um as we wait to hear what state prosecutors will say um as uh the story of Brian Coberger comes to an end and he heads off to a prison in Idaho. Uh what stood out to you and there was a lot but as you look back on everything you heard throughout the morning what stood out to you Joseph sister’s response it was used the term just a second ago blistering. I’ I’d concur with that. It was a pin dipped in acid, as they say. Uh, as well it should have been. And this is something that I was kind of hoping for along the way. Uh, you know, since we knew that he was not going to be compelled uh to allocute to anything. Uh I think that uh you know her comments united in one voice uh relative to the anger, the frustration, the loneliness, the emptiness because you have to understand something here. I think it’s not just the fact that Brian Cobberger has now been sentenced uh for this massacre. He has sentenced these families to a life without their kids. And this is something that they will uh they they will be serving consecutive terms forever and ever. Amen. There is no such thing as closure. Please understand that. It’s a fallacy. It’s it doesn’t exist when it comes to homicide victims and these families are victims. Um this is something that he sentenced them to by his own heinous actions. And I think the sister kind of summed that up and she she had her say and I think that she had her say on behalf of all these other families as well. Um you just saw the impact too just and and you think about just you know many of us will forget about Brian Cobberger. I mean, it’s it’s, you know, certainly, you know, cases are covered and talked about forever, but after today, he goes off to this this prison in Idaho and then everybody else moves on with their lives. Um, but the impact that this crime, the the loss of life has had on people, um, it just stood out that you’re going to hear about it forever. And the judge, Judge Hipler saying, you know, Brian Coberger’s 15 minutes of fame, that that is now over. Like that stood out to me because this was a guy that didn’t seem to have a lot of friends. He was someone who was awkward. He met people briefly at a party and they thought he was weird and that was it. And then he has this 15 minutes of fame and now it’s over. What stood out to you when you looked at his body language today as one person after another uh remembered their loved ones but also just talked about, you know, in so many ways just how cowardly he is. Reptilian. If if I were to use one word, uh reptilelike, uh just blankly uh viewing these people who literally ripped their hearts out of their own chest and gave these descriptors of what these victims all meant to them. And he was nonreactive. I don’t I have no idea what that speaks to, Chris, but it it’s cold. Uh it’s heartless. It’s almost like a marble countertop. Uh it it’s so without life. Um and those people demonstrating their grief there in in the face of this guy who now has been deemed truly a monster. And can I say that there’s one thing about this case that that really stands out to me. A lot of people talk about Ted Bundy um and over the years and they’ve drawn conclude or drawn comparisons between him and Ted Bundy. You know, the thing about it is most of us that are out there when we hear about Ted Bundy, we can’t name really any of his victims. I know one of the victims that survived uh the FSU uh u uh assaults, but save her, I I don’t know that many of us could really name them. You know what? We’re going to remember these kids’ names forever and ever. It It’s some something has has turned here with this case. We will remember each one of these kids. And they’re frozen in time. They’re frozen in time at this at the moment in which they died. and they had their entire lives but before them and we’ll always remember their names and and yeah, we probably won’t forget his name, but I I hope that it it does diminish and fade over time and that these the memories of these kids just continues to grow. Yeah, it just stood out to me too when Bill Thompson, the prosecutor, you know, was putting down the pictures in talking about the sentence for Brian Cobberger, you know, and seeing their faces one after another and then just the iconic picture, sadly iconic picture now of them the day before all of this happened um on the front porch of that house on on uh in Moscow, Idaho. I’m also now joined by retired FBI agent and attorney Bobby Shicone. Uh Bobby, you were with us early this morning uh counting down to the beginning of this hearing now that it’s it’s ended. We were texting a bit about some of the effective victim impact statements. What’s what stood out to you? You know, um particularly with the roommate who described having to sleep in her parents’ bed and and her voice trembling and fearing. I I I mean I I thought Coberg was probably getting a thrill out of that. He was probably aroused. He’s a psychosexual driven killer. Um, and and I think he’s getting his last thrill of the fear that he instilled in those kids in that house. Um, and that kind of, you know, it made me a little angry. I mean, not that not at the person speaking, but at the fact that he’s he’s getting one last thrill hearing the fear in this person’s voice, knowing this kind of killer feeds on that kind of fear. Um, but then it shifted and then you had people start to really go, I’m not afraid of you. You’re small. you’re stupid. You’re And I thought, you know, Kayle’s sister did the best job of really articulating the things that really would get under his skin. And I think, you know, from from what I saw, his his his jaw clenched a little bit. I know other people that said his his his fist may have been clenched. Um, you know, and his eyes were darting when she was making those statements. I think then then it shifted to this group of people really kind of took the right aim at him and I think he’s going to be hearing those those words in his sleep. I think they really probably touched the one nerve that he had that he is not the smartest guy in the room that he’s sitting there when they’re all out and that you know and that these these kids and and and probably Manny who fought back and probably probably caused that sheath to fall off his waist reached out from the grave and and put him in jail. his own victims actually are responsible for his capture because that one piece of DNA, probably the strongest piece of scientific evidence they had, was probably the result of her fighting back and and making that sheath fall off his waist um off his belt belt loop. And you heard her sister say like, “If you didn’t attack him, these kids in the dead of night while they were all asleep, they would have kicked your ass.” And I think that that I think that will strike a chord in him. I think I think that they said the right things that that that to get under his skin. And while he had a poker face on in that courtroom, I’m hoping and I’m thinking that he’s going to he’s going to he’s going to relive those words that they said to him and it’s going to bother him and I hope it does. And we are waiting uh just being told that the Gonzalez family uh might speak shortly. So, we’ll bring you those comments live. You can see the camera is setting out and and I’m told that they are speaking now. Let’s listen in. All right, we’re going to work on getting the audio. Uh, that is Steve Gonalves who is speaking right now and a little bit of what Bobby was talking about. You think about the DNA, the knife sheath. Joseph, I’m gonna turn to you because part of Steve who you see there, his words to Brian Cobberger, turning the lectern so he could face him as he said it. And I think of Brian Kberger, he was this criminology PhD student, you know, took effort after the crime to try to clean up his car, thinking that he would get away with it, but he didn’t because to Bobby’s point, he left the sheath down. And and Steve Gonzalez said, “You were reckless. You know, PhD, you’re a joke.” Joseph, for you, you work in in the field of evidence and forensics when you look at this case uh for Brian Coberger, I mean, how reckless was he that that is really what sunk him in the end? I think that it was probably his own vanity. He thought that he was in fact the smartest guy in the room. And we see that kind of played out also in his graduate studies. We’ve heard these reports of how he interacted with with his uh you know with his supervisors at Washington State and I think that that by extension he thought that he could get away with these sorts of things uh with everything in fact and you know he might have thought that he was very smart. It’s that one molecular bit of biological evidence there that’s left behind that touch DNA on that button snap. You know, I I I’ve been considering this ever since, you know, I was covering this the the day after it happened and haven’t stopped since. And I just had this idea that he was sitting there actuating that button back and forth, snapping it over and over again. Maybe he wiped the rest of that sheath down. He’s wearing gloves now. And in his brilliance, air quotes there, uh, he forgot that he swiped his thumb across that snap and he left that tiny tiny bit of biological evidence behind, which of course I think, you know, was the final nail in the coffin for him. And Bobby, as I just was going through and making notes during um what we heard throughout the day and as far as the the plea agreement and turning to that, the judge talking about restitution. Um Brian Cobberger is going to go to prison for the rest of his life. I know that there was you’ll be fined $50,000 for some of these charges. How does all of that work? And then I even think of and and the judge had mentioned I hope that nobody makes a documentary or movie or writes a book with him that he could make money. I mean the fin and I know just the idea that he would make money. Um what’s the reality of that considering as you take a look here this is what life is going to look like for him every day for the rest of his life. Well let’s hope it looks like that. But you know there’s a there’s a a police officer murderer in the state of Pennsylvania uh Mamula Mamia and he became a celebrity by by Hollywood backers and stuff and he’s sitting he was sitting on death row for a while. He was sitting in prison and he became a professor of some university online university in Ohio and this guy was convicted of killing a police officer. So there’s going to be opportunities for him and and Joe Duck and I both work in Hollywood a lot and you know you know despite the judge’s words and I hope he’s right but there’s always going to be someone scrupulous person that’s going to look to make money. If Brian Kberger wants to be interviewed they’re going to be banging down his door to be interviewed and to make some project with him unfortunately. Um I wouldn’t be part of it. Um, but there’s going to be unscrupulous producers out there that look to do that. And you know, we used to have what was called the Son of Sam laws, which wouldn’t allow people to make money off their crimes. The Supreme Court struck that down a few years ago based on the First Amendment on right to free speech. And so they can make it, but what back to your question, these these civil these $5,000 and $50,000 judgments against him are going to be sitting there. They’re going to be filed. and any money he does make um you know will have will go to pay off those judgments first. Um I hope it doesn’t happen at all. I’m sure the families aren’t going to be looking for that money, you know, and it’s a drop in the bucket, you know, but I think that that’s it’s technical part of the law. They have to be levied. Those fines have to be levied. They will be there. Um and they will be a judgment against him and the families can get paid if he does, you know, anything like that. if you know if he gets a job in prison like somebody offers him a professorship you know or if he finishes his PhD and then and then goes to work you know as a researcher in jail you know by based online I don’t know these guys seem to get a lot of um you know uh opportunities in jail and and I you know I know I’m a proponent of death on the and I know he’s been sentenced to life with no parole but you know just last week I believe Minnesota um released a quadruple murderer who was sentenced to life with no parole And now he’s holding people to a halfway house. Um because they changed the law and said any this was a 16-year-old who killed his mother, father, brother, and sister. And he was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole on all four counts. And now he’s going to be living in a halfway house. Now he’s done 30 some plus years in jail. But his life without possibly parole had been changed because Governor Walls changed the law or championed a change to the law. Um and that they applied it retroactively to cases like his and now he’s going to get out. Now, it was interesting that Coberg’s attorneys made sure on the record that he was put as a what level one autistic, you know, person. Um, who knows? They could change the law down the road. Some progressive Supreme Court in the state could change the law and say anyone that was, you know, on this level of autism or mental health illness, um, you know, when they were sentenced, so when they did the crime should not be sentenced to this, you know. So, life without possibility parole is not always life without possibility parole. We just saw that last week in Minnesota. I hope it sticks here. Um I have reason every reason to believe it it it will, but you never know. Yeah. And um you know, you just think of of the emotion of the day too that that is not forgotten. You know, the anger that so many people had, so many of us had, you know, as you were just listening to the impact that his crimes have had on these families and on these loved ones. We are getting questions into our chat. Uh we’re gathering those now. So, if you’re you’re joining us, a great panel of guests with me. um drop in some questions. Uh Joseph, for you, Bill Thompson shortly, the prosecutor of Lat County. Um he’s been criticized for this plea deal, but he also uh had a very very several emotional things to say, powerful things to say uh in the courtroom today. What are the big questions you would have for him in this news conference as he’s expected to speak for the first time in some time um about this case? I think probably timeline. Uh just going to the nuts and bolts of the case from an investigative perspective. U how did they how did they finally conclude that it was him in those early days? You know, where they narrowed the field down. I’d like to know that probably in uh you know, this is kind of my investigator mind and my academic mind here. uh thinking about in granular detail uh because I do think that that’s something that we could learn learn from uh to try to understand it. You know, when you’re trying to put together the electronic forensics that are involved here, the CCTV phone pings and then of course back to the DNA uh the forensic genetic genealogy uh kind of how that worked, who were some of the players in that and trying to understand that and also the documentation of the scene I think is very important. I’m still very curious about his apartment, what was found there. Um, and and one other thing I just want to touch on very lightly. Uh, he had mentioned that, and to Bobby’s point as well, that, you know, there would be no uh he would not be allowed to strike any deals with anybody uh that produces anything either in the fiction realm or the non-fiction realm. Uh, I submit to you I disagree with the judge on the whole thing about, you know, that he needs to be studied by academics. What the hell else are we going to learn? What what what fantastic news from the burning bush are academics going to do? Because I submit to you that academics can be just as mercenary as anybody in Hollywood and they’re going to try to make a name for themselves off this guy. I, you know, yeah, there is no death penalty in this case. I just assume he’d be shoved down into a deep dark hole and we never speak of his name again. Yeah. No. And incredibly well put. Yeah. That was a part of the the judge’s speech. I mean, he said so many important powerful powerful lines uh in what he had to say, but uh you know, talking about studying of of Brian Cobberger, you know, to your point, what more is there to learn? Uh Joseph Scott Morgan, professor of applied forensics at Jacksonville State University. We we appreciate your time as always. Thank you for for being with us. I know we’re getting our our Anget Levy, host of Crime Fix here on Law and Crime, who is in the courtroom for this hearing. Um, she’s getting set up to join us live here in a moment. Uh, Bobby, turning to you, kind of the same question that I asked Joseph because we are expected shortly to hear from Bill Thompson. We will bring that to you live when it begins. What are some of the big questions that you would have for him uh as he’s now going to answer to members of the media about this deal and about the investigation that led to this point? Yeah. Um, Chris, I wasn’t opposed to the deal, although I would have liked to see him get the death penalty. I wasn’t opposed, but I don’t have any standing. I know that families were somewhat split. I I’m not that upset about the deal. What I am upset about the part of the deal was there was somebody today in court that went through the list of questions that she wanted to know. What you did with the murder weapon, what you did with this, you know, what all of these different things, what you took into that house, what that second weapon was that you used against Maddie. Those questions could have been made part of the negotiations. That’s why it’s called a plea negotiation. There’s a give and take. You want this, we get that. I’m not sure what the other than the plea itself, what the prosecution got out of this deal. Um and and you certainly they were certainly free to say part of this deal, you have to come into court and on the record say where what you did with the weapon. you have to say these certain things and they don’t always have to be um you know allocutable elements of the crime. You can negotiate anything you want as part of the deal. And I would I forget who it was today that posed that list of questions but they were all great. They were all stuff that I wanted to know and I would have taken that list from her and said why weren’t these questions part of the plea negotiation? Why wasn’t he said you want this deal? Then you answer these questions on the record in open court. I mean, they kind of had the ball in their court. They kind of had the leverage because, as they said today, the defense came to them with with looking for a deal. So, the prosecutor was ready to go to trial. They had what they thought was a very, very strong case. They had the murder, they had the death penalty hanging over his head. They could have insisted that part of the deal where he get up in court and answer these questions. So, I would want to know from the from the prosecutor and the team, was that ever considered? And if so, why wasn’t he made as part of his alleocation? Why wasn’t he made to have to answer those questions? Right? And the prosecutor said, Bill Thompson, he was saying that they were ready to go to trial. They were getting ready to go. And then the phone rings from the defense. And that was the first time that the phone had ever rang from the defense about making a deal. And then here we are at this point. He’ll spend his uh rest of his life in prison. Um but will not get the death penalty. And he also signs over that he won’t appeal. I want to bring in Anginette Levy now, host of Crime Fix here on Law and Crime. Anette, you were inside the courtroom for this. Uh, what was it like? Well, I can tell you, Chris, it was incredibly emotional watching each one of these surviving family members get up there and speak. Also, this is the first time ever that we heard from the roommates, the surviving roommates, one of whom, Dylan Mortonson, saw Brian Kberger that morning. She came face to face with a killer. She didn’t know he was a killer at that time, but he certainly scared her. And so watching her come up to the podium to the desk, and she was physically convulsing, that’s how terrified she was and emotional she was as she explained what this has done to her, how this has affected her. And to watch Brian Cobberger sit there stonefaced like a robot and the only movement or reaction that came out of him was just his jaw moving. His jaw would kind of move. And I’m sure that his defense attorneys have talked to him about how he should not react. Um how he should not display any emotion. But I’m not I’m not sure this is a guy who can display any emotion aside from what we’ve seen in photographs like the the thumbs up selfie six hours after the murders. That may be the only type of emotion he has the ability to express. But he he just sat there cold as ice, moving his jaw ever so slightly. At times it appeared he was sticking his tongue into his cheek as these emotional, gut-wrenching statements were read. Even the judge at points in time when Mattie Mogan’s grandmother was talking about her, he appeared to be wiping tears from his eyes. His two defense attorneys, Alyssa Massith and Becca Barlo, as Mattie Mogan’s grandmother spoke, her paternal grandmother, they actually smiled and you could tell they were they were touched by what she had to say. And Taylor, very stoic, no reaction whatsoever. But those two women were touched by a grandmother’s words and grief. Nothing, absolutely nothing from Brian Cobberger. Brian Ker Kberger’s mother, Maryanne, was in the courtroom. His sister, Amanda, was also in the courtroom. They had another woman with them who I’ I’ve seen in court many times. I just don’t know her relationship to that. But they sat there and listened. There were times that Maryanne Coberger appeared to become very upset. I I didn’t see tears shed, but she did appear to become emotional when listening to Maddie Mogan’s family talk about her. And and when there were a couple of people who actually offered words of grace to them, trying to imagine what it must be like to be related to somebody who’s committed such a heinous crime and to have their their name their family name tainted by this and forever linked to this. They they seemed almost touched by that. you could see almost like a sense of relief on their faces to to hear somebody offer them some some words of solace and some words of comfort despite their great loss. So, um it was it was very emotional. Um it was so sad. And then to watch Olivia Gonalves get up there and speak for her sister and for Maddie who she called her sisters. Maddie had been in their life for years, for years. And to listen to her just face off against Brian Coberger and for her to call him a loser and basically to talk about how he’s nothing. Um, and that basically Kaye would have essentially kicked his you know what, um, had she not been attacked in her sleep. And he just sat there stonefaced. And as people applauded these victim impact statements, that was the only time Brian Cobberger moved. He he shifted over and looked at the gallery. And it kind of made me wonder if he was thinking, “How dare you? How dare you applaud that?” Uh, you know, that’s what I was wondering if he was if he was thinking that. Um, because that was the only time he kind of looked away and and looked away from the people who were speaking. So I I am still kind of stunned and u coming to terms with what I witnessed in that courtroom today. What was uh in the moment that Brian Cobberger is given the opportunity to speak? He says, “I respectfully decline and that was it.” What was the reaction like in the courtroom when he said that? Well, I’m glad you brought that up. uh because he he as you saw leaned over into the microphone and said, “I respectfully decline very forcefully.” And I’m sure that he believes that he’s being respectful, but people in the courtroom um muttered under their breath. Uh the people to my right who are on the victim’s side, you know, the survivor side of the courtroom, there was a lot of muttering under uh breaths, a lot of words said. One of the words was coward. Um, people were angry that he said that because I think that there are some of the family members who would like for him to have said something, even an apology. You’re pleading guilty. You’re admitting to committing these heinous, atrocious murders, and you respectfully decline to say anything. And I I think that they were just probably not surprised but at the same time disgusted and horrified by the fact that he refused to say anything. Uh and Bobby, even though this was this was a plea deal, this was negotiated by the prosecution and the defense. the judge makes u his statement and you know we all know that Brian Coberger showed no remorse but by him saying that from a legal perspective when someone you know a judge says you showed no remorse how does that factor into the decision of what the sentence is going to be well it doesn’t really in this case it won’t it didn’t u factor into what the sentence is going to be but right now what’s going to happen in the department of corrections is they’re going to do like a report about him. They’re going and this report is going to take in all of his behavior both in the courtroom and and at at the crime scene and things like that. And so, uh, so they’re going and then you get a a score. The Department of Corrections scores you according to all this investigation that they do. Doesn’t take that long. Um, it’s ma mainly behavioral because they they then they categorize you according to that score on how you’re going to be housed, where you’re going to be housed, among what other types of prisoners you’re going to be housed. And the fact that he didn’t show any remorse and it’s on the record, that factors into that scoring that the Department of Corrections is going to make and it doesn’t help him that it’s that he showed no remorse. if he showed remorse, if he was repentant, if he apologized. All of that kind of go into that report that the Department of Corrections then uses to figure out, okay, where are we going to put this guy and under what conditions within the Department of Corrections he’s going to live, at least initially. And Anette, I know that there’s some people behind you. I see members of the media as you’re just live right outside um as you’re live outside the Ada County Courthouse. Just what’s the scene out there um outside the courthouse right now? This Gonalves family had held a press conference over here to my right just a short time ago. We tried to bring that to you live. We had some audio issues. They’re now speaking to some members of the media right behind my left shoulder. So, uh, we’re working to see if we can, uh, have them work their way over to us. Uh, we have Kathy Russen over here behind me, our managing editor, uh, over there, uh, on the media side over there where everyone is, uh, talking with them. So, you heard their very powerful victim impact statements. They wanted Brian Kberger to get the death penalty. They wanted answers, and they wanted a trial in this case. That didn’t happen. but they had a chance to address him and to talk about their grief today. So, uh, they are kind of debriefing and offering their thoughts on how this sentencing went. And Bobby, I know with the gag order being lifted, we were talking about this a little bit earlier today. And now the judge, he says that he’s going to go through and and kind of evaluate what can be released to the public. What does that process look like now that Brian Cobberger has been sentenced? He’s waved his right to ever file an appeal. And so in many ways, this is now set in stone. Yeah. I mean, I would hope what happens is Sorry. Go ahead, engine. No, you go ahead, Bobby. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. So, I I would hope that there’s a meeting between the prosecution team and and and all the families and they open up that entire file to the extent appropriate. Um, you know, you don’t want to show crime scene photos of a crime like this to family members um because of the for obvious reasons and stuff. But I think the the judge is beyond that, beyond the families, the judge is going to look at the file and then kind of determine, you know, what public benefit exists in releasing different portions of of the file. Like again, the family might have access if they want to see them, but certainly the public shouldn’t need to see them. there is no public benefit to showing these crime scene photos. Um so there are certain parts of the file that probably would be withheld. Um but for the most part, most of it other than you know the photographs and some other more um upsetting type of uh evidence like that um I think the judge will air on the side of of making hopefully making this whole file public. Uh, and uh, if you’re just joining us here on Law and Crime, uh, welcome to our live stream coverage. The sentencing hearing for Brian Cobberger is now over. We are awaiting a news conference with state prosecutors. Now that Brian Cobberger is headed to prison in Idaho for the rest of his life. I’m joined by retired FBI agent and attorney Bobby Shicone, as well as the host of Crime Fix here on Law and Crime, Anette Levy, who was in the courtroom for this sentencing hearing this morning. Another moment that for me was just I mean I’m just watching the live feed um here from my studio Anginette was Bill Thompson the prosecutor taking pictures and putting one after another down and then there’s that photo that we’ve all seen of the six roommates on the front porch of the house during that time and I know we could hear the prosecutor getting emotional as he was speaking but what was it like to be in the room during that moment? Um, you know, this was he described this as a family. The six roommates who lived in that house together, the five, um, but including Ethan, this was a family, a family of people who gathered together on King Road to share fun times. You know, there are different kinds of families. There are the families you’re born into and the families that you choose. and and this was a family that was shattered by one person and we and we still don’t know why. Uh so I think that was a very emotional way to end things. I think that was an emotional way to to really you know it was kind of capping this off and showing how much damage one person did to so many people in just such a short amount of time. And and as he said, these people died for no reason at all. Brian Cobberger didn’t know these people. These kids didn’t go out one night and this wasn’t something like an accident or or a car crash. They were in their beds in their home where they had the right to feel safe and someone entered their home and just shattered everything and and destroyed their lives and destroy destroyed the lives of so many people. Uh, so I think that was a powerful thing to do and that’s probably that’s may have been how he was planning to end his closing argument at trial. I mean that that may have been part of his closing argument or opening statement had this case gone to trial. So he may have been practicing that for a while and now he is using it to wrap up an argument at a sentencing hearing. And I I think it was a poignant way to do it. Yeah, it was it was just an an incredibly impactful moment. We just got a fivem minute warning for this news conference with Idaho State Prosecutors uh of when it’s expected to begin and we’ll bring that news conference to you live uh here on Law and Crime. You’re taking a live look right there. There’s the podium uh where uh state prosecutor Bill Thompson will take questions and we’ll speak to the media. Um, as we kind of countdown to hearing from these prosecutors, Bobby, I know you have as as well as Anganette. I mean, both of you have followed this case from the very beginning. I mean, you go back to 2022 and there was the emotion of the search, you know, the horror of of learning of what happened and then seeing how all of this played out. Just for you, Bobby, as this reaches somewhat of a conclusion as Brian Coberger heads away to prison for life, just what are the main things you’re reflecting on today, whether it was hearing the victim impact statements or just looking back on this case from the very beginning? You know, I I thought from the very beginning uh that it was it was great police work done and I think that um you know, that was reflected in some of the statements today when they said, you know, you you were sloppy. I I you know you know like I said I I think that I think that Maddie probably fought hard and and and got that chief to fall off and I and Ethan Chapen. While this marks the end of a long and challenging journey through the criminal justice system, we acknowledge that for the families, friends, and loved ones of these four young people, the grief does not end because the losses are permanent and the pain remains. We want to express our deepest gratitude for their strength and resilience during this challenging time. We will honor their loved ones memories and reaffirm our commitment to ensuring their lives are not forgotten. This investigation, one of the most complex and high-profile cases in our state’s history, was made possible by an extraordinary level of collaboration from local and state police officers to federal agents and analysts, as well as prosecutors, forensics teams, and technical experts. It also took immense courage, patience, and resilience from a grieving community whose role was invaluable. From the very beginning of this strategy, Moscow Police Department and our law enforcement partners never lost sight of the mission, which was to bring justice for the victims and their families and to hold accountable the person who committed these horrible crimes. Despite the complexity of this case, our team never wavered. They never gave up, and we completed the mission. During this investigation, I was fortunate to witness the level of professionalism, expertise, drive, and passion that each member of the investigative team brought to the overall effort and it was truly all inspiring. To all who came to our aid and assisted in this immense undertaking, I cannot express my gratitude enough. We are forever thankful. And I would be remiss if I did not thank the amazing communities of Moscow and the University of Idaho. For weeks on end during this investigation, the support you provided to our team was greatly appreciated. The numerous phone calls, letters, and seemingly endless stream of food helped keep our spirits high and encouraged us to press on. Today, we want to provide an opportunity to hear from the key agencies involved in the investigation, prosecution, and overall response to this case. Each agency played a vital role in pursuit of truth and accountability. Further remarks will be provided by the Lat County Prosecutor’s Office, followed by the Idaho State Police, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Office of the Attorney General. Each speaker will provide brief comments followed by a limited Q&A session. With that, I’d like to introduce Lat County Prosecutor Bill Thompson representing the Lat County Prosecutor’s Office. Thank you, Anthony. Welcome everybody. It’s been a long time since we’ve been able to stand in the same room together and you have to listen to me talk. I’m sorry. Um, first off, I want to thank the folks here in Ada County. I can tell you I would much prefer to be in Law County right now and be able to talk to the people most directly impacted by this, but Ada County has been a phenomenal support and protector for the integrity of this case. And I just want to send that shout out right now. So today you are all I think listening in either in person or with the live stream. We have reached the conclusion of the judicial process and we believe we’ve achieved accountability and finality and certainty for everyone who has suffered from this so we can try to move on. As you are aware, Mr. Coberger pleaded guilty to all five counts of the indictment. He pleaded guilty as charged. There was no plea bargain to change charges, drop charges. He pleaded guilty straight up. And he admitted under oath to Judge Hippler that the allegations are true. He has also received a life and death sentence and that he is going into the Department of Corrections custody and he will remain there until he dies and our communities are protected from him. Our communities are safe from him and we have finality and conclusion not just for the families but for everyone who suffered because of this. Chief Dinger talked about the extraordinary team work on this case. I can tell you that Ashley Jennings, my senior deputy and I, we were with the investigators from day one. We worked as a team beyond any team that I’ve seen in my 30 almost 33 years as a Lake County prosecutor and 45 years as an attorney in Idaho. This level of collaboration is indescribably phenomenal. And in this room, we have representatives of the FBI, and you’ll hear, of course, Special Agent Grover. Uh we have representatives from the Idaho State Police. We have representatives from the Moscow Police Department. We have representatives from the office of the Idaho Attorney General. I can tell you I will be forever grateful for the assistance that Jeff Nye, the head of the criminal division, and his deputy attorneys general, Ingred Maddie, standing beside him offer to us. I don’t know that we would have been able to reach the conclusion that we have today as successfully without their brilliant and dedicated work. And they too have lived this case from the get-go. Our hearts and prayers go out to the families, not just the immediate biological or legal families, but the university family, the 1122 King Street family that you all saw the group picture, and you’ve seen that group picture so many times over the past two and a half years. And now you have real faces to go with those young vibrant people who four of whom were killed 12 hours half day after that picture was taken. We respect the families. We realize that we had tough decisions to make and we made them. But we did not make them in a vacuum. As I said in court today, we reached out to the families. We asked their thoughts. We listened to what they had to say. We accept and recognize that not everybody agrees with the decision we made. But this isn’t a popularity contest. And we made what we thought was the most appropriate decision under the law and on the facts to give this case closure in a sense that would never be realized. Otherwise, Judge Hitler talked today about, I guess, the fallacy of expecting that there would be some miraculous coming clean and disclosure from the defendant. In the first instance, as the judge said, he doesn’t have the power to compel that. We the state don’t have the power to compel that. And as a practical matter, it would not be helpful. It would give him a forum to share whatever he thought to control the dialogue. Not going to happen to our victims. We can’t allow that to happen. So, I’ll say this caut with caution. I think I look forward to your questions. I will be perfectly honest with you. I will answer them as best I can. And if I can’t tell you the answer to something, I’ll tell you that. And I ask for your assistance and your respect as we walk through that because there are still people who are suffering. And I’m not going to victimize families. I’m not going to victimize the deceased again. And I’ll just tell you that if we get those sorts of questions, but we’ll get to that in a little bit. Right now, what I would like to do is hand the podium over to Colonel Bill Gardner from the Idaho State Police so he can share his AY’s perspective on this. Thank you. Thanks, Bill. Good afternoon, everyone. Um, I’m Colonel Bill Gardner, director of the Idaho State Police. To the families, your courage and strength throughout this painful process, it indeed kept us moving forward. Your strength and particularly your love for one another was inspiring and it motivated all of us. You’ve carried a burden no one should ever have to bear. This investigation demanded the very best from everyone involved. Crime scene teams, forensic scientists, intelligence analysts, and investigators answered the call with professionalism, precision, and resolve. They did not do it for recognition. They did it because four innocent lives were taken, and the victims and their families deserve nothing less. It is clear this case required a team approach. Not only did the Moscow Police Department, the Leto County Sheriff’s Office, the Adate Police, and the FBI come together quickly, but others provided significant assistance behind the scenes. I’d like to highlight a few of those. I personally want to thank Colonel Paris of the Pennsylvania State Police. Once this case moved across the country, the Pennsylvania State Police went out of their way to provide resources and support while our people were on the ground there. Also, it’s important to note that from the moment this case began, Governor Little was fully supportive of the investigative process. He provided funding and support to make sure the job was done right. And finally, as was already mentioned, the Idaho Attorney General’s office provided significant input and help during the preliminary motions. We relied heavily upon their expertise as we move throughout this whole process. As law enforcement officers, we often say that this is more than a job. It’s a calling. This case reminds us why we answer that call, why we stand for victims, why we fight in this case, why we fight pure evil, and why we keep going. Even when the road is long and answers are hard to find. In this horrific case, I am proud of the work that was done and the people who carried it out. They exemplify the very best of our profession and helped bring closure to four families. I’ll now turn the podium over to Salt Lake City FBI field office supervisory senior resident agent Brett Grover. Good afternoon. Uh my name is Brett Grover. I’m the supervisory senior resident agent in our Cordelane office of the FBI which is part of our FBI Salt Lake City division. On behalf of the FBI, we offer our deepest condolences to the families of Madison Mogan, Kaylee Gonzalez, Xander Canud, and Ethan Chapen. The culmin culmination of this case was a long time coming, and we hope the victim’s families and friends have some sense of peace in knowing that Brian Cobberger is being held responsible and accountable for his heinous actions. The FBI is proud to have supported the MO Moscow Police Department in the state of Idaho with the investigation and prosecution of this case. Countless hours have gone into this investigation. The FBI dedicated significant resources to include digital and forensic analysis, intelligence support from our folks at FBI headquarters and field offices around the country, and victim services, which continue to this day. Today’s sentencing also demonstrates how the responsible use of investigative genetic genealogy or IGG can transform a crime scene into accountability enclosure. The IGG process involves the use of DNA analysis combined with traditional genealogology research to generate investigative leads for unsolved violent crimes. In late 2022, IGG provided a crucial investigative direction for investigators working this case. But I want to be clear, IGG was just one tool that led us here today. It’s a powerful complement to the core investigative work done by both the FBI and our partner agencies. The bottom line is is that successful cases like this are about strong partnerships and a shared goal. the goal of keeping our communities safe and providing a measure of justice for the families of our victims. Thank you. I’ll now turn the time over to the attorney general for the state of Idaho. Good afternoon. I’m Raul Labrador. I’m the attorney general of the state of Idaho. Today’s a heavy day for the families who lost their children, for the community of Moscow, and for the entire state of Idaho. With the sentencing today, a painful chapter closes in one of the darkest and most heartbreaking moments in our state’s history. We’re here because four young lives were stolen from us far too soon. They were full of promise. They had dreams and aspirations, people who loved them and communities that believed in them. Their loss is immeasurable. Their absence is felt every day, not only by their families, but by classmates, friends, neighbors, and all of us who came to know their names and their stories. There is no sentence that can bring true justice for this kind of evil. Nothing we do today can undo the heartache or fill the empty chairs at family tables. But today’s sentencing ensures one thing, that the perpetrator will never again walk free. In fact, he will never harm another family. I want to extend my deepest gratitude to prosecutor Bill Thompson whose steady leadership has guided this case from the beginning to the people of Lea County for their trust and commitment to justice and to the state of Idaho and to the state also to the local and federal law enforcement communities who have been focused on bringing justice for the victims. I also want to recognize Jeff Jeff Nye, who’s the chief of my office’s criminal law division, and the team of attorneys in my office who works side by side with local prosecutors. Their contributions were quiet but vital. They helped protect the grand jury’s work. They pushed back against legal challenges and successfully defended the use of advanced forensic tools that helped identify Coberger. These were groundbreaking legal efforts done with resolve, with care, and in the name of public safety. Their outstanding legal work spare the families and the public from a drawn out, painful trial that would have reopened wounds and prolonged the family’s agony. When I became the attorney general two and a half years ago, I interviewed Jeff Nye. He was not the chief of the criminal division at the time. And I asked him if there was anything he would change in the office of attorney general. If you get to know Jeff, he had a long list. It was a very long list of things that he would change in the criminal division. But the first thing he talked about was the fact that our office was not helping local prosecutors with their def with their prosecution. it was an uh take it or leave it kind of approach and we either took the case and became and handled all the matter or we did nothing at all. And he said that there were important cases where we could actually assist in the office of attorney general. It’s one of the reasons I hired him to be my chief of the criminal division and I think today culminates the the wise decision that he had to to make those changes and the important change that we made in the office. This moment didn’t come easily. It was the result of tireless effort, careful preparation, and unwavering pursuit of the truth. Behind the scenes, our legal teams worked diligently to defend dozens of legal challenges. Their efforts not only helped ensure a just outcome, they also spared the families and the community uh from the painful trial and endless appeals that would have reopened deep wounds. To the families of Madison, Kaye, Santa, and Ethan. No words from any of us, no legal ruling, and no sentence from a judge can heal what you’ve endured. But I want you to know this. My sincere wish is that you have not carried this burden alone. Idaho grieavves with you. Idaho stands with you. And your children’s names will not be forgotten. We honor them not only with our words today, but with our commitment to protecting others in their memory. I will never stop fighting for the people of Idaho. And I thank every single member of this community who has just reached out to the families and supported them. And may God bless the souls of the victims and the families who have suffered. Thank you. Now, we will transition into our question and answer phase. Joining me at the podium will be Bill Thompson with the prosecutor’s office and the two lead investigators, Brett Payne and Darren Gilbertson. Just a couple of things before we begin. Um, we recognize that everyone has a lot of questions. We’re going to try to do our best to get to as many as we possibly can. Also keep in mind that there are still some things that we are unable to talk about because of either privacy interest for the victims and their families and or they are under seal currently in the court. So if those items do come up then that will certainly be the answer that you will will receive. Uh and to keep this sort of orderly I will try to be the one to uh point out who’s who’s got their hands up back there. Uh, Chief Dallinger, Rolley with Creme 2 in Spokane. Uh, what can what more can you tell us about the release documents that the police department is working on putting online and and what what can we expect from that? Certainly. Um, as we put out in that press release, I hope everybody can understand the immense amount of information that’s in this investigation is going to take a lot of time to prepare. It has to be gone through legally to be redacted or figured out whether or not it can actually be released. So, uh, I did get word today, it sounds like our website will be going live hopefully this afternoon. There should be another press release coming out in the next few hours to, uh, show that website so that people can start accessing that. Initially, what is going to be on there, uh, and certainly this is just for the Moscow Police Department because we’re only the holders of our records. Uh, but it will be all of our police reports from this investigation. So, just the documents there. Um, they’ll be redacted, ready to go. Again, free of charge for the public. We want to be as transparent as we possibly can. We wanted to get those out to everyone. Chief, from the very beginning, your department was saying this was a targeted attack. Um, can you now say who was the target and what’s your evidence to show that? Uh, I’ll turn that question over to the investigators to to answer that one. Okay. Well, I think Darren and I have uh the evidence suggested that there was a reason that this particular house was chosen. What that reason is, we don’t know. Um, we don’t know who the target was and we’re not going to speculate on that up here today, but we can tell you that for whatever reason Mr. Cobberger chose that residence. Um, perhaps it’s the location layout. We don’t know, but um, that’s to the best of my knowledge that’s what that statement likely led to. Haley got there KHQ. There was a social media account that surfaced that has long had speculation that it was Brian Coberer. Can you talk at all about the the Papa Roger um potential connection if any? Right. There was uh there was no connection. There was an add-on. We uh we looked into every bit of it. We took a deep dive into it. We researched it. Um we util it was not it was not. Thank you. We can cut that off. Um, is it possible that there was a second? Is it possible? All the evidence shows and tells us that he used a knife, a KBAR knife, and that’s that’s a weapon we believe was used to commit all the murders. Sounded like um said that there was a second question. out of respect for the families. That’s something that you you’ll have to get from them. Um if they wish to share that with you, it probably be through them, not through us. And one more question. You said that it seemed like he chose that house. There’s no clues as to why he chose that house. you know, after working in Moscow for several years, as has uh Chief Dinger, um that area is frequented by many, many people at all hours of the night when college is in session. So, what Darren and I have surmised is that perhaps it’s the old hiding in plain sight. There’s lots of people around. There’s lots of vehicles around at all hours. It’s not isolated where you’d be noticed. So, that’s where that comment comes from. It does. And though it’s it doesn’t make sense and it’s a uh if you’re in that neighborhood at all, it’s a very complicated neighborhood. It’s very closed in, but at the same time, there’s everything from college kids to adults that live there, people that have full-time jobs, part-time jobs. So, any one of us could come and go and fit in there. So, uh DA Thompson, um during the plea hearing and then again today, it seemed like when you were putting up photographs, just wondering about the emotional Yeah, you’re right. My voice was quivering. Um, y’all were in there. There was a lot of powerful emotion. The losses are almost indescribable. Uh, and maybe my filters aren’t as good as they might have been 45 years ago when I started in this business. Um, but I think you also saw that even Judge Hipper was affected and impacted by this. There’s just no there is no easy way to remain stiff lipped and dryeyed through this kind of tragedy. There just simply isn’t. I’m sure you’re not aware of this yet, but there’s there was a photograph where they zoomed in on a picture of that Brian had on the defense council table. It was an image of a black heart. I don’t know if you’ve heard this or if you’ve seen the image uh hearing this your thoughts. First I’ve heard of it. First I’ve heard of it. There is something I need to say though real quick. This is a product of I’m sure I’m getting old in my failed memory. But there’s one other person I need to recognize and this is very important to us because this was a key person that was going to take us through trial and that’s Josh Herurwart. the former United States Attorney for the District of Idaho who left office and voluntarily joined our office as a special deputy to help us. My apologies for the oversight as I wasn’t reading my notes correctly, but thank you for that little interlude. Chief, I guess my question is for Mr. Thompson since you’re still up there with law and crime. Um, you said that you know it was your decision to accept this plea agreement. It it brings finality. He will die in prison. But just said he they don’t know who the target was and why he targeted this house. Was there a reason why as part of the plea agreement you wouldn’t require and Taylor to have her client sit down with you all and to answer some of these questions? I I think that Judge Hiper addressed that today um very very well. Of course, Judge Hippler addresses everything very well. We found um the law does not give the court or us the power to require a specific factual allocution. And just let me finish. Um and we recognize that. We recognize that we could have said, well, in order for us to move forward, we want a factual allocution. But I have to be perfectly candid. I don’t believe that there is anything that would come out of his mouth that would be the truth. I don’t believe that there’s anything that would come out of his mouth that would be anything other than selfserving and I don’t believe there’s anything that would come out of his mouth that would not further victimize the families. And so that just simply wasn’t a factor. We made our decision based on our assessment of law and the facts. Uh we made our decision based on being able to obtain accountability and certainty not just for the victim’s families but for the communities for the state. And that’s where our obligations go. In the end, the old Harry Truman thing, the buck stops on my desk. Well, that’s what I got when I was elected prosecutor 33 years ago. I never dreamed it would involve something like this. But we don’t sherk our responsibilities just because it got big and nasty. Thank you, Corporal. And we first of all I want to say a few that the family told me every night during that I just think that that goes to show that being said I’m curious as to where you think or believe that is where you think but believe How do you think heated forensics? Well, I can just tell you, and forgive us if we go back and forth. It’s just kind of how we roll. Um, but uh um there is no evidence that we found that would lead us to any specific even general location as to where the murder weapon or the clothes have been. And we searched, I mean, we the FBI, again, to their to their credit, um we had folks doing soil samples and so all sorts of things to try to come up with somewhere to start searching for these things. and we just never found it. Um, as far as the forensics piece, I’ll let Darren speak to that. Yeah. And on the weapon, it wasn’t a lack of trying. Um, you know, everywhere that we had evidence of where he went based upon phone records, based upon, um, the evidence that we had gathered, we searched that. Um, we went there. Uh, we did searches, uh, on the ground in the water. We did searches. Um, we sent soil samples to try to figure out maybe where a shovel had been used. Um, so we searched everywhere that we possibly could, but the reality is we’re looking for a singular small, it’s not that small, but KBAR knife and that’s it. So, um, it’s endless of where it could have been and we just were not able to find it. So, the visibility though to forensics at the scene in a murder scene where we now know himself was stabbed 34 times and another victim was stabbed. Right. So, uh, the reality is is that somebody can carry this out and still not get covered in blood. That’s the reality of it. And this does happen. And there’s plenty of studies of that. And we’ve had some of the world’s experts that we’ve asked those same questions because we’ve struggled with that. Why do we not find more here and there? Um, and the reality was if somebody has the training, if somebody has thought about it, if somebody wears the right type of clothing that that could be the outcome and that’s what we were left with here, chief of stars of CNN, Mr. Thompson, did you do psychological testing on Brian Cobberger? Did that weigh into your decision to have a plea deal? And stabbings, multiple stabbings are very personal. How did you assess that mode of murder? Uh, I can tell you that psychological testing was done of Mr. Cobberger. Um, the results of that do not rise to a defense to his conduct under Idaho law. Um, the results of the various testing, most of it done by the defense or on behalf of defense. It’s also sealed by court order. So, I can’t speak to any specifics, but I can tell you yes, psychological was testing was done. I can also tell you that no psychological testing or any potential psychological condition of Mr. Cobberger that did not play a role in our decision. Bill, does it have any bearing on where he will be placed or housed? Where Mr. Cobberger where the defendant is going to be housed is going to be up to the Idaho Department of Correction and that could very well change over time and the reality is we will know about it after it happens. over here. Did you monitor Mr. Cobber’s communications while he was incarcerated and did he say anything that was helpful or gave you any insight as to why he did this? Yeah, we uh we did monitor it uh both while he was housed in Le County and then once he was moved down to Ada County. Um we have hundreds thousands of hours of uh monitoring that was done but uh there was nothing of evidentary value that was gained from any of it. Will you be releasing those uh conversations? It’s my understanding the jail um will not be releasing things that involve personal conversations with third parties. Uh that ultimately would be a decision because the recordings or the possession of the two correctional facilities or detention facilities. Uh but I’m pretty certain the late county sheriff’s office policy does not allow for that. And I would guess Adita County similar. You can ask them back here. Thank you. Uh Greg Fischer with CBS News 48 hours. Was there any evidence that Coberger was following the social media of any of the victims? So trust us, we wanted that to be the case. Um, we’ve looked for a link and we have not found one. Not one. Yeah. Through the entire investigation, uh, I think that’s something that we need that you want is to help to understand this and say, well, what’s the connection? What was the link? Um and so we had every resource possible and we worked that tirelessly um both from everything from his side but all the victims and all the members of the house from their side. So uh we have never to this date found a single connection between him and any of the four victims or the two surviving roommates. Uh Michael Ruiz from Fox News Digital. My question is for the investigators. Uh you guys are going through this case. You got a lot of evidence about his background, his education, his training. Um, you know, you said earlier you couldn’t identify a reason the house was targeted. Do you have a motive? We don’t. This question for Anthony actually talked to us at the very beginning and all this happened and now you’re running the show. So, I wanted to ask as a community member, has this case shaped and changed how your focus on? It’s changed uh everyone involved. Um it how how could it not? Um you know, it was a devastating tragedy to our community and our police department is a part of that community and it was it was very difficult for us as well. So, um you know, this is just one of those things that will not define us, but it is certainly a part of our history that we will never forget. Yes, Rebecca associated unprecedented level of interest in court like this in Idaho case. Um the Gonzalez family has said that they’re desperate for answers about what happened to their daughter. Um, do you anticipate uh most of the court documents sealed or are there things that you will specifically remain sealed? As far as the court documents, Judge Hipard told us that he is going to work with the attorneys to go through every sealed document. Many, probably most of the documents were sealed for the purpose of protecting against tainting a jury pool. Uh, and those documents, I would expect would become unsealed. um requests for discovery, various things like that. Uh there are also documents in there that contain very personal private information regarding victims and families. I expect those likely will not be released um under Idaho’s protections against what the law calls unwarranted invasions of personal privacy. I realize that can be frustrated frustrating for folks who want to be able to explore this thoroughly, but we have to balance and the law balances the privacy of the people who have suffered uh including the victims who are dead with giving the public as much information as we responsibly can. Also, um I’m just wondering did a lack of knowing the reason or the motive concern you prepping for trial? um because juries tend to want to explore the motive or reason for a crime. And also, how do you as investigators and attorneys grapple with that? Because if you can’t rationalize something irrational, how do you continue knowing that an answer? Well, I tell you from an investigator standpoint, we already know and realize we often don’t get to know that. We want it. We all do. We naturally want that. But the reality is um it’s not something that we have to have or that we get. And the reality also is that oftentimes those very things that you’re asking about, they’re only known to one person. It’s a person that commits those crimes. Um and I think that’s probably what what we have here. And I would add that going through this whole investigation, it was I probably say it’s easier than it was for Bill’s office is we were focused on a task. We had a task to do and it was discovering evidence and interviewing folks and that sort of thing. So the motive necessarily doesn’t play a part in that, right? Obviously it can, but we were just focused on getting the job done in the correct way as best we could. So, and from the prosecutor’s point of view, yeah, certainly lack of a clear motive is something that we think about and consider as we’re preparing for trial because we’re going to have a jury of 12, you know, ordinary honest citizens there who are wanting to figure this thing out. But we also and I’ve I’ve also found that juries tend to follow the law and even jurors who come in with strong feelings, they tend to follow the law that the judge gives. And there is no element of motive in Idaho law for murder. Uh and so we set that aside as something that we were going to dwell on. uh whether there was clear proof of a of a specific motive because we knew it wasn’t legally required and practically speaking, we knew it wasn’t something that we possessed that we could give to the jury without speculating. And I’m sure as heck not going to stand in front of a bunch of 12 jurors and start speculating. We’re going to give them the evidence. And the evidence in this case, what you heard at the time of his guilty plea back on the second, you know, that evidence was compelling and it showed his guilt without having to worry about motive in a human sense. Thank you for the question. Did he say anything when he was arrested? Yeah. So, uh, Brett and myself, uh, members of the FBI, we we traveled back to Pennsylvania. We were there. Um, and I know they hit on it earlier, but I’d be remiss without talking about, uh, the cooperation and the support that we had from them was absolutely incredible. Uh, from the time that we got on the ground with the Pennsylvania State Police and with the FBI back there, it was unbelievable. Anything that we needed, uh, they were there to facilitate it. So, um, we helped to shape what that looked like, what the arrest looked like, uh, what took place, uh, once, uh, they hit the house on the search warrant and he was taken into custody. Uh, Brett and I were at another location, uh, a barracks of the Pennsylvania State Police and then he was brought to us and we conducted an interview with him that night um, there in Pennsylvania. Can you talk about what he said? So, we went into this interview, we used a lot of influence and guidance from the FBI and their behavioral analysis unit to help us a ton in framing our investigative uh our interview strategy rather. Um, when we spoke to Mr. Cobberger, we kept it pretty surface level to begin with. The idea being get him to speak and keep him speaking. Um, it was pretty surface level. Um, and then when we tried to get into things a bit more detail, he decided to end the interview. Um, that’s pretty as soon as we tried to get walk into the purpose of why we’re there, which obviously he knows we’re uh detectives from Idaho. So, um, uh, that’s when he really started to shut down and, uh, and they just shut it down. So, what was his demeanor? Calm, relaxed, say very similar to what you see in whenever you see him in court. Next question. Yeah, Mike Baker for the New York Times. I’m wondering if you talk about Mr. Ber’s family, whether you got much cooperation, tips, input from them along the way. The only thing I’m really able to talk about is that we didn’t get any tips or any evidentiary items from the family. So add to that. No. Um just wondering if you ever um if you ever had any idea what made No. Can I ask a followup? Um, I know there that was a short answer. You probably have time for a short followup. Um, can I also ask follow the investigator? I know there’s some reports that there was a container at the house. Did you ever determine what that was? No. And uh the the belief was in the um one of the surviving roommates and her statement and uh that’s out there was that she observed something in his hand um when she saw him, but we don’t we don’t know what it was. You had an expert who was going to testify about cleaning something off of his work computer some software experts. Was there any evidence that he had tried to wipe anything from his phone software wise? Um the Barnards I believe is their name. Yeah. And so this kind of goes into the connection to the victims as well as ask a similar question. Um we had the world’s foremost experts on this look into it and there was evidence that he had used software to wipe many of his devices relatively effectively. Um, so there wasn’t much evidence obtained after that including I think he had two two cell phones or just one think he had one active phone but I don’t remember so don’t quote me if he had more at his home more than just work computer that he wiped yeah he regularly used software to try to wipe clear things off he used VPN u on his devices also hey back here Kevin Fixer with the Idaho statesman I’m hoping you can walk us through the decision to hand off the DNA processed on the knife sheath over to Offram Labs who’s contracted by ISP and then ultimately the FBI takes over that IGG process and then prosecutor Thompson I’m curious if you had concerns about constitutional rights issues based on how the FBI conducted themselves in that partial I I’ll start and I’ll just speak briefly to uh you know when we were notified that we had um a DNA from the knife sheath um and it was a single source male DNA uh touch DNA then we knew that we had capabilities to take that further. So the you’re correct the IDO state police has a contract with Aram Laboratories in Texas. Um so we flew that over there and they started the process of working that and what was the beginning of the uh IGG process and at some point during it um we were working with the FBI which we did closely throughout the entire case and every aspect of it. um we talked and met with them and they had further resources and some capabilities that we thought may get us somewhere quicker and so we made the decision to then shift that to the FBI and continue that process there. And as as to your question about legal concerns and my simple answer is no. Uh I didn’t have legal concerns about um how the FBI um uh conducted their IGG investigation. Uh, I know that was the subject of lengthy detailed, painfully detailed uh, motions and briefing and Mr. Nye rose to the occasion and was able to address all of that. But in the end, uh, it’s simply no different than sending somebody undercover uh, into any place to gather information. And I was not concerned about the legality of it. uh and the judge came through and made the right decision that there was no violation of the defendant’s rights or anybody else’s rights. Had he not left the night she behind a truck? We’ve talked about this ad nauseium. Um the answer is yes. Um through the car most likely. Um we have some amazing people going truly line by line over tens of thousands of white Hyundai Elantras. Um, so we believe we would have got to it through that avenue. The time frame for that is uncertain. It could have been a week later, could have been two months later. We just don’t know. Um, we would have found him. We would have found it. There’s a lot of questions in regards to that initial window. uh Brett and I made the decision on what that window was, even though the experts were saying there may be more years that match it, but the simple numbers that we began to look at were astronomical of thousands and thousands, tens of thousands of these vehicles. So, we chose to try to narrow it and start smaller and then as we had to, we were going to open that up. But, uh we both believe we would have gotten them through the car eventually. A question for Mr. Thompson. Uh Amanda Rolley with Crime 2. It it appears that the plea deal it felt a bit rushed. So the question is why did it happen so quickly considering some of the families were against it? And also uh the Mogan family at the plea hearing had mentioned saying that this is the best possible outcome. Just wondering do you agree with that or would you have liked to have seen a different outcome? Well, I think we agree with the Mogan family. Our decision was that this is the best possible outcome all things considered. Uh and factoring in the fact into that uh that the defendant was prepared to plead guilty as charged. Now, if that hadn’t been a factor, we’d be picking a jury for trial starting right now uh or starting this week. Uh what was the other first part? Why why was this so such a quick it felt rushed. So why did this happen so quickly even though the family No, I hear you. The process moved quickly. There was no doubt about it. And like I outlined for the court earlier today, um things changed dynamically uh the week following the June 18th hearings on the defense motion for a continuence and the alternative alternate perpetrator motion uh where Judge Hitler made it very clear that the defense was not going to prevail on either of those. And uh so the reality of trial was there and there was nothing else. um uh in its way. We were continuing to prepare for trial. We had been doing that for months. Uh and as I mentioned, that’s me bringing Mr.wood in to help us because the attorney general’s office was not able with the manpower to help us all the way through trial. Uh we were ready to go. Um when we were approached uh by the defense about the possibility of a plea, our first question was, “Is your client prepared to plead guilty?” and it took them a little while to give us that answer. In the meantime, we reached out to the families and we talked to the families and we solicited their input. Um, uh, and we considered that in making our decision. The fact of the matter is, and I think Judge Hipler commented on this back on July 2nd when we were in court, uh, is that the logistics of the upcoming trial with what, 10,000 prospective jurors being summoned in, the court staff making arrangements and preparing to process that part of the case dictated that if the case was going to resolve, it needed to resolve quickly. Uh and so that kind of drove uh the pace uh over that weekend, the last weekend of June at the end of the weekend when we understood from the defense that m that the defendant was prepared to plead guilty. Um the court was notified the next morning and the court wanted to move quickly to make a make to get a plea done on the record if it was going to be done and if it wasn’t so we were not interrupted in our trial preparations. The trial logistics were the the main concern just as Judge Hipler had had said prior right with the with the jury as as a factor and that sort of thing. Yeah. I I the practical aspect is that the trial machine was running and uh if it was going to be interrupted that had to be known as soon as possible. I think that’s that’s the fairest explanation. Question here. Yes, Michelle from 48 hours. I just had a question about when you were looking into Kberger’s past, was there any early sign trouble or what what did his background look like? Well, we can’t go into his his younger years. I believe that’s actually still under seal. And correct me if I’m wrong. But what I can tell you is uh the things we do know about him was that his education led him down a path that was very much focused on forensics, crime scenes, um that sort of thing. So that was really what we focused on in his background is what led him down this path. How may he have prepared for this? Um, and I think that was a big component of that was just his schooling and his his choice of potential future pres uh profession. So, and just so just so there’s no speculation here by uh what Detective Payne just said, um documents under seal involving Mr. Cobberger’s background, they may or may not be released down the road. I can tell you that there is no evidence of any criminal history of any significant nature. There was no evidence of a history of violence. There was no evidence of a history of a factual predisposition to do the crimes that he committed here. Uh so if there are any concerns among your listeners or readers that somehow he was a um serial killer in waiting with all of these prior uh actions, we are not aware of any behaviors like that that led that preceded what happened here in Idaho. Take this question here and then we’re going to have two more after that. talked about the consulture with this and so that we have spoken with with uh with families afterwards. Uh and I can tell you that families that are not that did not agree with our decision have made that very clear to us. Uh and I don’t expect anything different. I respect and we respect that everyone is going to grieve differently even within family units and uh everyone is going to look at the case and possible resolutions from their own light and they are entitled to that as victims. Uh, I’m not going to pretend that everybody was just fine with our decision because they there were families and family members who were not and we accept that. We recognize that it’s just a fact of life. It was the target. However, it’s been speculated that the convicted may have encountered Maddie um while she was serving at restaurant due to the menu options. Um digital data was analyzed. Were there any location pens or any information there that could have connected him to where Matt worked? No, there wasn’t. And like I said earlier, uh we we wanted that. We looked for it um in every possible way uh digitally uh financially um physical location anything you could think of anything that we thought where is the connection where’s the overlap and we searched tirelessly and never found it I can’t say that he was never there at all but we never found any evidence at all from interviewing everybody that we possibly could talking to every person that would have that information to be able to show that he was there or that there was a connection through through the restaurant. Last question here. Just two followups to earlier questions. Um first of all question about the family. You said that you didn’t evidence from the family. And was there any specific evidence you were? Are you talking about his family coers? um there was not any hindrance anything nothing that impacted us carrying out the investigation. Thank you. And then the second follow up um when you mentioned like obviously you follow this line of interest in studies. Um did anything in your investigation indicate that that was chosen as part of a planning process as opposed to just an area of interest? There was nothing aside from, you know, we have some of his coursework where he did, you know, a crime scene recreation, that sort of thing, but it was all part of his studies. So, I don’t think that any of us attributed that to a planning process, per se. Certainly, it was a learning process, but whether or not it was a planning process ahead of what he did, we’ll probably never know that. Yeah. And I would say we didn’t find anything that would be any different than uh a student similar, a different student in the PhD program. So then I understand you said the planning process investigation. Did he plan it? Did he buy it with the purpose of that? Is that what you’re asking? And we don’t we don’t have anything to show or prove that he did that. Well, thank you all. Uh that concludes our Q&A section uh today. hopefully tried to get as many of you folks’s questions answered as possible. I’m sure you’re going to have further questions and certainly the question was already brought up about public records requests. Just keep in mind that if you’re looking for those in the future, you will need to go to each individual agency or entity that has the keepers keepers of those records. Um so just to reiterate the website that the Moscow City of Moscow is going to be putting up hopefully today, that will only be Moscow Police Department records. uh and those will be our police reports. So, we understand that this case has captured the attention of literally the world and today’s news conference was not held to relive the tragedy, but to honor those lives that were lost, to acknowledge the conclusion of this legal process and to reinforce our wavering commitment to justice. A commitment we share with you. I want to take a moment to thank the members of the media here today. We understand that you do have a vital role in helping the public comprehend the intricacies of this case and your continued professionalism in covering this emotionally charged and complex case is appreciated. No additional comments from law enforcement will be made today and if you have further questions, please feel free to submit those through the AY’s public information officers. Thank you very much. Thank you. The way you ask

Bryan Kohberger faces sentencing on Wednesday after Kohberger agreed to plead guilty to the 2022 murders of four University of Idaho students as part of a deal that removes the death penalty and ensures four consecutive life sentences. The plea avoids a trial and has drawn mixed reactions from victims’ families, with some expressing outrage and others welcoming closure. Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin were found dead, stabbed to death, inside their King Road off-campus home in Moscow.

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