UPDATE: The Idaho Four Killer Wants To Withdraw His Guilty Plea

In November 2022, four college students: Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin, were brutally stabbed to death in their off-campus share house in Moscow, Idaho. Seven weeks later, criminology student Bryan Kohberger was arrested and eventually accepted a plea deal, receiving four life sentences without the possibility of parole to avoid the death penalty. Now, Kohberger is back in the headlines after filing for post-conviction relief. In this update episode of True Crime Conversations, Gemma Bath is rejoined by journalist and author Vicky Ward following the release of the updated edition of The Idaho Four: An American Tragedy. LINKS Find out more about Vicky Ward’s book The Idaho Four: An American Tragedy here https://www.amazon.com/Idaho-Four-American-Tragedy/dp/0316572853. If any of the contents in this episode have caused distress, know that there is help available via Lifeline on 13 11 14 or Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636. Contact Full Stop Australia https://fullstop.org.au/ on 1800 385 578, 7 days, 24 hours. GET IN TOUCH Follow us on Instagram and TikTok @truecrimeconversations https://www.instagram.com/truecrimeconversations/?hl=en Want us to cover a case on the podcast? Email us at [email protected] mailto:[email protected] or send us a voice note. https://help.mamamia.com.au/en-US/send-a-podcast-voice-note-467960 Make sure to leave us a rating and review on Apple & Spotify to let us know how you're liking the episodes. CREDITS Guests: Vicky Ward https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0533976/Host: Gemma Bath https://www.linkedin.com/in/gemmabath/?originalSubdomain=au Producer: Ella Maitland Video Editor: Jess Chan Audio Designer: Tegan Salder Mamamia acknowledges the traditional owners of the land on which we have recorded this podcast. Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Gemma Bath?

  Hi, I'm Gemma Bath, host of True Crime Conversations. And I'm dropping in your ears with an update on a case we covered almost a year ago exactly. The Idaho Four, the murders of four young college students in their share house in November 2022. Kaylee Gonzalez, Madison Mogen, Zanna Kanodle and her boyfriend Ethan Chapin were stabbed multiple times and found in two separate bedrooms of their three-storey rental. Two other roommates, Dylan Mortensen and Bethany Funk, were home during the attacks and left unharmed. The killings set off a nationwide manhunt, including

• 0:40Gemma Bath?

  an elaborate effort to track a white sedan spotted on CCTV repeatedly driving past the house. Seven weeks later, Brian Koberger, a criminal justice graduate at the nearby Washington State University, was arrested and charged. He took a plea deal and was given four life sentences without the possibility of parole. If he'd gone to trial, the death penalty would have been on the table. Now he's back in our headlines. He's trying to get his case revisited. We've invited Vicky Ward, author of The Idaho Four: An American Tragedy, back on the show to explain exactly what's happening. Vicky, thanks for coming back on.

• 1:23Gemma Bath?

  We last spoke to you in August 2025, so around the time of the sentencing of Brian Koberger. Did you think that that was case closed? Are you surprised to see he is pursuing another legal avenue?

• 1:37Speaker 01

  I'm not really. I mean, I think that, you know, it's funny timing doing this, right? Because we have just put out the paperback version of The Idaho Four in which there is a whole new ending, which I wrote, that really covers the events of last summer after Brian Koberger quite suddenly made that guilty plea. And the extra section at the end talks about how the four victims' families were very divided about sort of the prosecution's rush, as some of them saw it,

• 2:19Speaker 01

  to accept that plea because the Gonzalez family, for one, really wanted Brian Koberger to stand there in a court of law and explain to the world what he'd done and most of all, why. And they felt that the guilty plea really robbed them of answers and that they were then now left with this appalling tragedy, the loss of Kaylee Gonzalez, and really not understanding why she'd been taken from them and not really having any closure as to what the last few minutes of her life were like.

• 3:02Speaker 01

  I also think, you know, it's important to remember that part of their objections weren't just about that. They were about the very fact that they were afraid that Koberger would try to pervert the sentence, that he would find some way to try to appeal, that he would, from jail, teach other people inside the prison, sort of tell them what he'd done, kind of mentor other criminals, if you will, that he would try to capitalize on the infamy of this case. I mean, it was a hugely famous case in the US.

• 3:47Speaker 01

  And that he would perhaps try to sell his story for money. He'd sit down with one of his former prosecutors and, sorry, one of his former professors. It's late here in New York. And so they were really worried that this was, you know, that what happened was not closure. It was not closure for them. And that somehow he would try to control the narrative. And so, you know, I talk about how in the book, when his sentencing came and the Gonzalez family showed up. Not every family showed up for that.

• 4:32Speaker 01

  The Chapin family, the family of Ethan Chapin chose, you know, they didn't, they attended court when they heard Brian Koberger say guilty. But as far as they were concerned, that was the end of it. They, you know, their view was that they wanted to cope with all of this by focusing on the living, by focusing on Ethan's triplet brother and sister, Maisie and Hunter. But the Gonzalez family wanted to go to the sentencing and they wanted to face Koberger, which was kind of actually directly against the court protocol. They wanted to talk to him and it was their way.

• 5:15Speaker 01

  And they wanted to tell him how they felt, in particular Olivia Gonzalez, Kaylee's older sister. And that was their way of taking back control of the narrative from him. They'd had a really frustrating three years in which they felt the prosecutors hadn't shared everything that they knew in order to protect the investigation and to protect sort of the trial, you know, because the last thing you want in a case like this is for there to be any reason for someone who goes to trial to appeal. And so the prosecutor really hadn't shared an awful lot of what happened with the victims' families.

• 6:00Speaker 01

  And as a result, I think they felt very much a loss of control. I mean, I was quite horrified as a journalist who'd never really covered a true crime before. I was stunned to learn actually how little agency murder victims' families have in the US.

• 6:22Gemma Bath?

  It's horrible. It happens here too.

• 6:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's a flaw in the system. And so they, you know, so they, and they were worried that by not having this trial, by accepting Koberger's guilty plea, that they were still giving him control of the narrative in some way. So they, you know, that's why, I mean, Olivia Gonzalez's, her quote unquote victim impact statement was one of the most powerful, stunning things I've ever seen. And in the book, this new ending, we, you know, I take you into her thought processes and her nerves and all the decisions that went into making that and delivering it.

• 7:10Speaker 01

  But there was always this fear that Koberger would put a stunt like the one he's just pulled to try to take back the control of the narrative.

• 7:21Gemma Bath?

  In terms of the options available to him though, because he took a plea deal, is it that he couldn't do a normal appeal? And that's why he's gone for this, I believe it's called a post-conviction relief?

• 7:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's exactly why. I mean, I spoke to Steve Gonzalez and I spoke to James Fry, the former police chief involved. Neither of them were surprised that this has happened. But yeah, it is important that there is this distinction. He can't appeal, but he can claim that he didn't have a proper defence. You know, that is a legitimate, you know, he can do that. Having said all of that, I mean, I believe that Ann Taylor, his public defender, spent about $5 million of US taxpayer money on Brian Koberger's defence. It was considerably more than the prosecution team spent.

• 8:19Speaker 01

  And so, I mean, the general expectation here is that a judge will just knock this down straight away and, you know, that Brian Koberger has, you know, doesn't like being in prison. He's a very antisocial person, as we know. I mean, he's a, you know, strange, strange guy. I'm sure he doesn't like the scenery. But as James Fry, former police chief, said to me, well, you know, he should have thought about that before he went out and killed four people in the middle of the night.

• 8:48Gemma Bath?

  Yeah.

• 8:52Gemma Bath?

  He's used some pretty strong language, you know, that he was convinced to falsely confess. He received ineffective counsel. It has already been two weeks at the time we're talking. So do you think the chances of it just being thrown out are getting further and further away? That this actually will go through the courts again? And what would that look like?

• 9:12Speaker 01

  If this were to go through the courts again, I think the the loss of trust and faith in the US justice system by the American public would be at an all time high. It would be astonishing. I would be absolutely shocked. I'm not shocked, by the way, that Brian Koberger is articulate and, you know, and and smart. I mean, we know this about him. This is a guy who came from abject poverty, overcame a heroin addiction to wind up in a criminology PhD programme in a really good school. I mean, the guy is very smart. So that doesn't surprise me.

• 9:57Speaker 01

  And I'm not shocked that it's taken two weeks because, again,

• 10:02Speaker 01

  you know, the legal system, you know, has rolls carefully. You know, if they're too quick to back this down, that could open yet another door. You know, I'm in the middle of writing a new book, which about there's another huge case going on here. Luigi Mangione, who allegedly murdered the the CEO of United Health Group, Healthcare, rather, Brian Thompson. And there's a lot going on in that trial. And the more that I cover these stories, you know, you learn that for all its flaws, there is a careful method to the way that the

• 10:42Speaker 01

  US justice system rolls. And and you have to be super careful to protect that process. Or or that would hand the advantage to someone like Brian Koberger. Frankly, they've got to take their time and look at what he's saying. And and otherwise, otherwise, it, you know, actually, that that could that could be to his advantage. But I I would be shocked if a judge doesn't just say, sorry, no. And when, you know, the idea that he wasn't, he didn't

• 11:16Speaker 01

  understand when he was asked again and again and again in that courtroom by the judge, you know, have you been coerced or told to say that you've done this? Are you making the, are you saying guilty of your own free volition? I mean, this is precisely why the judge goes through all of this in open court. In Koberger's case, it was televised to the country. I remember watching it. I was on a plane. And, you know, that's exactly why, so that he can't come up out a year later and come up with this furious claim.

• 11:56Gemma Bath?

  Well, as you mentioned, he's a criminology student. So he knows this stuff in in and out.

• 12:01Speaker 01

  Right.

• 12:02Gemma Bath?

  If if it was to go through the courts, obviously, we're hoping that doesn't happen. But doesn't that open him up again to the death penalty?

• 12:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, actually.

• 12:13Gemma Bath?

  Which I guess would please some of the families who don't think justice was had here. But, you know, we'd have to go through all of this again.

• 12:22Speaker 01

  Right. Well, look, I mean,

• 12:27Speaker 01

  the last I spoke, I spoke to Steve Gonzalez last week, and

• 12:33Speaker 01

  he was not spiraling. He was not going where you where you are right now.

• 12:37Gemma Bath?

  Right, okay.

• 12:38Speaker 01

  He he, you know, what he said to me is that, you know, he takes no pleasure in being right. In in other words, he warned some of the other families, you know, I mean, Kayleigh Gonzalez was best friends with Maddie Morgan. And I think at the time, Maddie's parents had wanted to take the plea deal and Steve had voiced his concerns and they but they, you know, you know, they they had sort of gone along with it. So had Xana's parents, the Conodals. And and and so when they heard the news of, you know, Brian's in interview, quote unquote,

• 13:23Speaker 01

  with the New York Times, they were very upset and sort of said to Steve Gonzalez, we should have listened to you. And he took no pleasure in in that scenario at all. But I also think he there's he he's not sitting there thinking, well, now we may get the trial that I wanted a year ago. I don't think that's not where he is, or it wasn't when we last spoke. He was like, this is, this is ridiculous. This is what I was afraid of. But he did believe that a judge would knock it down.

• 13:56Gemma Bath?

  You know the drill. You pick the couch, pay the deposit, then wait 12 weeks praying it matches the living room. Let's skip that. Mamma Mia is giving one lucky subscriber a $5,000 voucher for B2C furniture to spend on pieces that are in stock and ready to ship right now. High end style, zero weight. To enter, head to mamma mia dot com dot au forward slash subscribe. You'll unlock all our subscriber only podcasts, articles, and our fitness app, Move. Already subscribed? You're already in the running. Offer ends October 31st. T's and C's apply. Why do you think Koberger is doing this now? It's very interesting timing because

• 14:36Gemma Bath?

  we've just had a Netflix documentary come out, you know, that's very based on the the victims and the families, as it should be. He is a kind of subplot. Am I being a bit too conspiratorial here? Is that could it be related to the attention the families are getting?

• 14:53Speaker 01

  You know, this is a guy, you know, based on my reporting and what I say in in the Idaho Four, he's a narcissist, right? He's a he's an arrogant narcissist who almost got away with this, right? I mean, they never found the murder weapon. I mean, that, you know, that, you know, he if were it not for technological advances and the fact that now, you know, the use of genealogical websites, I mean, the very clever way they could, they could take that speck of DNA on the knife sheath that he made, you know, his one mistake that he left behind, and then go and

• 15:35Speaker 01

  very carefully put together family trees from, you know, people like you and me who do ancestry and me, or, you know, the those DNAs. And and, you know, the way they finally got him, you know, if if this crime had happened 10 years ago, they wouldn't have been able to do that, most likely. But no, this is a guy, he, this guy is a loner who spent his life, you know, in his parents' basement in Pennsylvania. You know, he didn't have friends, he didn't have suddenly didn't have girlfriends. And suddenly, he he gets all this attention. And then you you've got to imagine,

• 16:16Speaker 01

  and he gets all this attention. And then now it's been a year that he's been in a jail. He's, you know, we know he's vegan, doesn't like the food, you know, there can't be, there can't be much about the setting that he's in, that he is happy about. And so, yeah, I'm not at all surprised. I mean, I'm sure, I hate to say this, because it's not helpful for the victims, for the victims' families. But it's probably isn't the last we've heard from him.

• 16:45Gemma Bath?

  Great. I I do want to remind listeners that the evidence against him was pretty damning. You've just mentioned the DNA. He was spotted in the like, they they traced the car that was circling the area to him. And they traced the phone that he was using. So it wasn't like it was just one piece of evidence, was there?

• 17:07Speaker 01

  No, it was exactly, it was the, it was, it was all, it was all three. It was, it was the trifecta. And the DNA was the most pivotal bit, because once they got the DNA match, then they could go back and look at the video footage and find that see the car clearly for the first time. Because remember, he changed the license plates. But they could then clearly see that. And then they could go to the DMV and and then see that he had changed the license plates. And yes, you're right, the phone, the cellphone pings. But at the same time, if you didn't have the DNA, you know, a decent lawyer could probably have found holes with the other two things,

• 17:49Speaker 01

  because there was, you know, his car was immaculate and clean. There was, and, you know, they never found any clothes with blood on them. You know, they never found the murder weapon. So there were, you know, in, you know, he, he, you know, you could tell that this was a guy who had studied how to commit murder.

• 18:14Gemma Bath?

  And the big elephant in the room has always been the motive, hasn't it? Do you, a year on, have a clear understanding of what you think the motive was? Or is it still confusing?

• 18:23Speaker 01

  No, I mean, I feel like, you know, what I wrote in the book still really is the best, is the closest. And I still, as far as I know, it's what the families and the friends of the victims all still believe, that everything points to the fact that he was targeting Maddie Morgan. And tragically, you know, tragically, not only was she at home, you know, in bed, but there, you know, unexpectedly, was Kayleigh visiting for the weekend. Kayleigh had already left the house and moved out. And, you know, clearly, Xana was awake on the floor below and

• 19:06Speaker 01

  moving around and heard something, which is why when he came down the stairs, he got into a tussle. I mean, Xana, we know, fought back really bravely. And poor Ethan was lying in the bed. He was asleep behind her. And, you know, so it's just a horrendous case of sort of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. And then, you know, as we know, Dylan was one floor down.

• 19:41Speaker 01

  From all that, but she, you know, she was able to lock her door. Um, and you, you know, which is why, why one assumes he, he moved on past her.

• 19:55Gemma Bath?

  Obviously, we've got to wait to see what the judge says.

• 19:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:58Gemma Bath?

  You've, you've mentioned your conversations with Steve. Have you, have you managed to talk to any of the other families about how they're feeling right now?

• 20:06Speaker 01

  Do you know, I haven't, and partly actually out of respect. I, I mean, I got to know Stacey Chapin very, very well. And I have to believe that she's rolling her eyes and you, you know, she's an extraordinary woman. I mean, you know, one of the other things I really learned when reporting this book was that

• 20:29Speaker 01

  when something like this happens to you, to someone close to you, we all react in very, very different ways. And there's no right and no wrong. And so the Gonzales family, um, I think really felt that they were going to fight. They were going to fight. They weren't going to take

• 20:53Speaker 01

  the prosecutors kind of not telling them all the things they wanted to know. They were going to pursue, get, get answers because they felt that that's what Kayleigh would have wanted them to do. Stacey Chapin is a former school principal and her view was that she could do nothing to bring Ethan back and that she needed that, that his, his brother and sister and his close, close friends, Emily Allen and Hunter Johnson, the, the young couple who found, went into that house on that awful morning and found, I mean, you can't imagine.

• 21:32Gemma Bath?

  No.

• 21:33Speaker 01

  The trauma of that.

• 21:34Gemma Bath?

  Young adults to think how that will be shaping their lives.

• 21:38Speaker 01

  And so Stacey, Stacey Chapin sort of took the view that her job was to protect the living. Was that you, you know, that you, that, that

• 21:50Speaker 01

  you know, that, that was just her view and she, she has been extraordinary in that regard. And, and I know that

• 21:59Speaker 01

  you know, I didn't want to actually, you know, it's funny being a journalist in this situation. I don't want to compound people's suffering. And I, I knew, I, I know Stacey Chapin well enough to know, to know what she thinks. And, and it's the last thing she needs is a phone call from me saying, how are you feeling?

• 22:19Gemma Bath?

  Well, how are you feeling then? Are you going to be watching through one eye open?

• 22:24Speaker 01

  One eye open. You know, I, I very much stay. I mean, the, this is going to sound a strange thing. This was a terrible story and a terrible tragedy. And reporting it was difficult and, and obviously incredibly sad. But at the same time,

• 22:49Speaker 01

  I saw the best of humanity. And that was a really heartwarming thing to see. And, and the bond with the Chapins and the bond with the Gonzalvases that I formed and the bond with Emily and Hunter and some of the four victims' friends was very special. And so I really enjoy the positives that have come out of this, as strange as that may sound. Hunter Johnson and Emily Elant recently got married. Um, and that was a truly wonderful thing to see on Instagram. I sent them

• 23:34Speaker 01

  a note. I was very proud of them because to have come through everything they came through. I mean, this

• 23:42Speaker 01

  this event completely derailed their lives, as you would imagine. I mean, imagine being a senior in college and this going down. I mean, the last thing in the world you, you're going to be able to do is focus on your studies. And on top of all of this, you know, one of the themes in the book is how difficult the world of social media

• 24:06Speaker 01

  now is for people around a crime like this, because all the true crimes sleuths have theories and all the true crime sleuths start to point fingers at innocent people. And so Emily and Hunter, yeah, got singled out and got trolled. And that, their lives were utterly, so, and, and they were afraid. So they were dealing with the awful trauma of being in that house the, the morning after the murders. They were, they were dealing with the fear that whoever did this might be coming for them. And then they were dealing with the trolling of all these people online who thought they were the murderer. And, and imagine what that would do to you. So

• 24:51Speaker 01

  the positive for this was that I got to see some remarkable people who, who went through what I hope is the only nightmare, real nightmare that they have to experience in their lives. And I got to see the best of humanity, the warmth and the kindness. And a lot of the people in the, in the town of Moscow, Idaho, were incredibly welcoming to me. And I'm an outsider. It's a really small town. And they really opened their hearts, um, and their, you know, hospitality. And, um, I hope all that is really captured in the book, actually.

• 25:33Gemma Bath?

  And I, I like ending here because I'd like to think that Koberger would hate that we're focusing on all of this and all the positives and all of the, the love that's come from it. So let's leave it there and let's, um, yeah, look with one eye open. Hopefully, hopefully we don't have to go through a whole nother court process. Thank you so much for joining us, Vicky. We really appreciate it.

• 25:55Speaker 01

  Thank you for having me.

• 25:56Gemma Bath?

  Thank you to Vicky for joining us on this update. Make sure you're following our show on Apple Podcasts and Spotify for updates on this story and all the stories we cover. Thanks so much for listening. I'll be back later this week with another True Crime Conversation.