Featured Image Credit: Getty Images/Pool
Topics: Bryan Kohberger, Crime, US News
Niamh Shackleton
Police have released new documents on their investigation into Bryan Kohberger.
Yesterday (July 23), Kohberger was sentenced to life behind bars for the murders of Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin in 2022.
The 30-year-old managed to avoid getting the death penalty for the University of Idaho students' brutal murders by agreeing to a plea deal.
Initially he denied killing them but, as part of his deal, he changed his plea to guilty.
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The plea did not order Kohbeger to share why he killed Goncalves, Mogen, Kernodle and Chapin however, and we may never know why he carried out such heinous acts.
Addressing this, Judge Steven Hippler said at Kohberger's sentencing, as per Today: "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 what we may never know, is why."
He added: "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. Kohberger relevance. We give him agency and we give him power."
Just hours after Kohberger was sentenced, Moscow Police made hundreds of pages of their investigation public.
The files detailed interviews law enforcement carried out with Bethany Funke, one of the two surviving housemates.
According to Funke around a month prior to her friends' deaths, Gonclaves had said she'd spotted an unknown man staring at her while she walked her dog, Murphy.
Gonclaves was concerned about this and 'told everyone' about it, even calling her roommates to ask if they would be home soon, says The Independent.
The files also note that on November 4, just days before the November 13 murders, the students had come home to find the door to their home open and on its hinges.
Kernodle's father later fixed the damaged door for them.
The steps police took in their investigation were also detailed in the files. In one tip they received, someone spoke of a white male who went into Walmart asking for a black ski mask that would cover his face.
Another tip that came in from a woman who lived near the student's rental accommodation, who said that she and her daughter spotted a man who 'looked nervous' in their yard in the months leading up to the murders.
Apparently she was almost certain that the man in question was Kohberger.
Police ultimately identified the Washington State University student using a DNA sample found on a knife sheath at the crime scene.
They further connected him to the crime by tracking his movements on the night of the killings using his cellphone data, which placed him near the students' home.