Bryan Kohberger returns to court for Idaho murders hearing with ‘surprise witness’: Live updates

Kohberger was out for a drive the night they were killed, his attorneys said in a new court filing that lays out more details of the alibi defense he intends to use at his trial.

“Mr. Kohberger was out driving in the early morning hours of November 13, 2022; as he often did to hike and run and/or see the moon and stars,” Anne Taylor, Kohberger’s public defender, wrote in a court filing. “He drove throughout the area south of Pullman, Washington, west of Moscow, Idaho including Wawawai Park.”

Authorities have said that cellphone data or surveillance video shows that Kohberger visited the victims’ neighborhood at least a dozen times before the killings; that he traveled in the region that night, returning to Pullman along a roundabout route; and that his DNA was found at the crime scene.

His phone, however, was not communicating with his cellphone provider during about a two-hour period when the attacks occurred — consistent with him having turned it off to avoid being placed at the murder scene, police said.

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The hearing on Thursday ended without a ruling on the motion to compel, and further proceedings are scheduled for 30 May where two DNA experts – Leah Larkin and Bicka Barlow – will testify for the defense.

Another hearing is scheduled for June 27, where attorneys will make arguments about whether the trial should be moved outside of the county where the crime occurred in order to seat an impartial jury. The state has been opposed to the move, while the defense is in favor of it.

Mr Kohberger declined to enter a plea in the case in May 2023, prompting the judge to enter his plea as not guilty on his behalf.

Earlier this year, the Idaho Supreme Court denied a request from the suspected killer for his grand jury indictment to be thrown out, citing a biased grand jury, inadmissible evidence and prosecutorial misconduct.

Prosecutors intend to seek the death penalty if he is convicted.

A trial date has not yet been set.

Defense attorneys for Bryan Kohberger are hoping to get their hands on a trove of key evidence they believe could support his alibi that he was out stargazing on the night of the brutal Idaho murders and so could not have been the mass killer.

Among this evidence is mystery cellphone data that law enforcement officials have admitted to only discovering now – 18 months on from the murders.

Here’s what we know so far:

Bryan Kohberger’s father called the police on his son nine years before his son allegedly murdered four University of Idaho students in a shocking knife attack that has horrified America.

Court records, newly obtained by ABC News, reveal that Mr Kohberger was arrested and charged with stealing one of his sister Melissa’s cellphones back in 2014.

The then-19-year-old had recently left rehab for drug addiction issues and had returned to the family home in Pennsylvania.

Then, on 8 February 2014, he stole the $400 iPhone and paid a friend $20 to pick him up and take him to a local mall where he then sold it for $200.

When confronted by his father Michael over the theft, Mr Kohberger chillingly warned him “not to do anything stupid”, according to the court records. His father reported the incident to the police.

Catch up on the story here:

Bryan Kohberger is facing the death penalty if convicted of the November 2022 murders of four University of Idaho students.

He is accused of breaking into an off-campus student home on King Road, in Moscow, and stabbing the four students to death with a large, military-style knife.

Two other female roommates lived with the three women at the property and were home at the time of the massacre but survived.

One of the survivors – Dylan Mortensen – came face to face with the masked killer, dressed in head-to-toe black and with bushy eyebrows, as he left the home in the aftermath of the murders, according to the criminal affidavit.

For more than six weeks, the college town of Moscow was plunged into fear as the accused killer remained at large with no arrests made and no suspects named.

Then, on 30 December, law enforcement suddenly swooped on Mr Kohberger’s family home in Albrightsville, Pennsylvania and arrested him for the quadruple murders.

He was tied to the murders through his DNA found on a knife sheath left on the bed next to Mogen’s butchered body.

The motive remains unknown and it is still unclear what connection the WSU PhD student had to the University of Idaho students – if any – prior to the murders. The murder weapon – a fixed-blade knife – has never been found.

Before yesterday’s hearing, NewsNation’s Brian Entin visited the site of the Idaho murders on King Road in Moscow, Idaho.

The property was razed on 28 December 2023 during the school’s holiday break.

Demolition began before the sun came up and within two hours, the three-story house was gone.

It marked an emotional step for the victims’ families and a close-knit community that were devastated by the brutal slayings of Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin, who were stabbed to death there in November 2022.

An empty lot now replaces a Moscow murder house five months after demolition.

Some of America’s most notorious murders happened in private homes.

Many were demolished – some have become tourist attractions.

Andrea Cavallier reports:

The family of victim Kaylee Goncalves expressed their frustrations with the ongoing court delays in response to Bryan Kohberger’s hearing yesterday.

They wrote on the Goncalves Family Facebook page:

“It seems as though we are not making any progress to set a trial date. Is this what justice looks like in America? What is going on? This is OBSURD!  Please pray for us.”

Idaho murder suspect Bryan Kohberger appeared in a Latah County courtroom as part of his defense team’s efforts to compel prosecutors to reveal more of the evidence they plan to use in his upcoming trial.

The 29-year-old criminology PhD student is awaiting trial for the stabbing deaths of University of Idaho students Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin, who were killed on November 13, 2022, at their off-campus house in Moscow.

Mr Kohberger’s defense team has claimed he was driving around looking at stars at the time of the murders and argue prosecutors have not handed all the evidence over for the defense to review, filing multiple motions to compel since Mr Kohberger’s arrest in late 2022.

As Mr Kohberger looked on in silence, his public defender Anne Taylor grilled Moscow Police Detective Lawrence Mowery about a series of records related to cell phone data police plan to use in the case.