Court documents reveal a detailed timeline of the University of Idaho killings suspect's whereabouts before and after the stabbings
- Bryan Kohberger was arrested and charged in connection to the University of Idaho killings.
- A new affidavit details where police believe the suspect was before and after the slayings.
A 28-year-old man was recently arrested in his home state of Pennsylvania in connection to the stabbing deaths of four University of Idaho college students.
Bryan Kohberger, a Ph.D. student in the criminal justice program at Washington State University, was charged with four counts of first-degree murder and one count of felony burglary in connection to the November 13 slayings in Moscow, Idaho.
Authorities identified Kohberger as a suspect through DNA discovered at the crime scene — an off-campus rental home where three of the victims lived — cellphone records, and a car, according to a newly released affidavit.
Police have not yet provided a motive for the killings of Kaylee Goncalves, 21, Madison Mogen, 21, Xana Kernodle, 20, and her boyfriend Ethan Chapin, 20. But the affidavit outlines more details from the night of the slayings and where police believe the suspect was before and after the stabbing deaths.
Kohberger's phone was tracked to crime scene a dozen times before killings
Cell phone records obtained by police showed that Kohberger's phone was near the three-story home where the victims lived with roommates at least a dozen times between June and before the early morning killings, according to the affidavit.
"All of these occasions, except for one, occurred in the late evening and early morning hours of their respective days," the affidavit states.
In the aftermath of the killings, the Moscow Police Department repeatedly described the slayings as an "isolated, targeted attack" but never detailed why investigators believed that.
The department later backtracked and, as recently as December 19, said that "investigators have not concluded if the target was the residence or its occupants."
"We have not changed our belief that the murders were a targeted attack," the department has said.
Authorities believe the victims were killed between 4 a.m. and 4:25 a.m. on November 13
Goncalves, Mogen, Kernodle, and Chapin were slain in beds on the second and third floors of the King Road home following a night out, according to police.
Investigators believe the killings unfolded between 4 a.m. and 4:25 a.m., the affidavit says.
A 911 call for an "unconscious person" was made hours later, shortly before noon, from the phone of one of the surviving roommates in the house, authorities have said.
A surviving roommate saw a man in black clothes on the night of the killings
One of the roommates of the victims told investigators that she heard crying and saw a man in black clothing and a mask walking towards her inside the home on the night of the killings, the affidavit says.
The roommate said that when the roughly 5-foot-10 "athletically built" man with "bushy eyebrows" walked past her, she stood in a "frozen shock phase," the court documents state.
The man walked towards the back sliding glass door of the house, and the roommate said she locked herself inside her bedroom.
Before she saw the man, the roommate said she awoke around 4 a.m. to what sounded like Goncalves playing with her dog in one of the upstairs bedrooms, the affidavit says.
"A short time later," the roommate told police, "she heard who she thought was Goncalves say something to the effect of 'there's someone here,'" according to the affidavit.
The documents say that phone records obtained by police showed Kernodle was on TikTok at 4:12 a.m., and the roommate could have heard noises from her phone.
The roommate "opened her door a second time when she heard what she thought was crying coming from Kernodle's room," the affidavit says.
She told police she then heard a male voice say, "It's ok, I'm going to help you."
At 4:17 a.m., a nearby security camera picked up "what sounded like voices or a whimper followed by a loud thud," according to the court documents, which add, "A dog can also be heard barking numerous times starting at 4:17 a.m."
Kohberger's phone went dark from 2:47 a.m. to 4:48 a.m. on the night of the killings
According to the affidavit, records showed that Kohberger's cell phone pinged at around 2:42 a.m. on the night of the killings in Pullman, Washington, where Kohberger lived a short distance from the University of Idaho students.
At about 2:47 a.m., the phone "utilized cellular resources that provide coverage" near Kohberger's residence that was "consistent" with the phone leaving the home and traveling south through Pullman, according to the court documents.
Kohberger's phone stopped reporting to the network at 2:47 a.m. "which is consistent with either the phone being in an area without cellular coverage, the connection to the network is disabled (such as putting the phone in airplane mode), or that the phone is turned off," the affidavit says.
The phone came back online at 4:48 a.m. south of Moscow, according to the affidavit.
Additionally, police said surveillance footage captured multiple sightings of a white sedan investigators believe to be Kohberger's near the King Road home where the stabbings occurred between 3:29 a.m. and 4:20 a.m. on November 13.
The movements of Kohberger's cellphone were "consistent" with the movements of the car, the affidavit said.
At around 4:20 a.m., the vehicle, determined to be a Hyundai Elantra, was seen on surveillance footage leaving the students' home "at a high rate of speed," according to the affidavit.
The route of travel of the phone in the early morning of November 13 and "lack" of reporting to AT&T between 2:47 a.m. and 4:48 a.m. is "consistent with Kohberger attempting to conceal his location during the quadruple homicide," the court documents say.
Police believe Kohberger returned to the scene of the crime later that morning, hours before 911 was called
According to the affidavit, police tracked Kohberger's cell phone leaving his home at about 9 a.m. on November 13 and traveling to Moscow.
The cell phone was pinged at the scene of the crime minutes later, according to the court documents, which say the phone "utilized cellular resources that would provide coverage to the King Road residence between 9:12 a.m. and 9:21 a.m."
The phone was then tracked traveling back to the area where Kohberger lives and arriving there at about 9:32 a.m., the affidavit states.
Kohberger was pulled over by Indiana police twice within 10 minutes about two weeks before his arrest
In mid-December, Kohberger left the state of Washington and drove across the country with his father to Pennsylvania in a white Hyundai Elantra.
During that trip, Kohberger was stopped by police on December 15 two different times within the span of 10 minutes on I-70 in Hancock County, Indiana, for allegedly tailgating.
The car was pulled over the first time by an officer with the Hancock County Sheriff's Department and the second time by an officer with the Indiana State Police. Kohberger was driving the vehicle both times.
Police body camera footage captured both incidents and Kohberger was let go with a warning each time.
"At the time of this stop, there was no information available on a suspect for the crime in Idaho, to include identifying information or any specific information related to the license plate state or number of the white Hyundai Elantra which was being reported in the media to have been seen in or around where the crime occurred," Indiana State Police said this week.
According to the newly released police affidavit, surveillance footage showed Kohberger's Elantra in Pennsylvania on December 16 at about 2:26 p.m.
Kohberger was arrested by authorities in Pennsylvania on December 30
Authorities arrested Kohberger on December 30 at his parents' home in Albrightsville, Pennsylvania, after he made a cross-country drive there with his father from Washington.
He agreed to be extradited from Pennsylvania, and law enforcement took him by plane to Idaho on January 4 to face the charges.
Kohberger made his first court appearance in Idaho's Latah County Courthouse on January 5 and was denied bail.
In addition to the cell phone records, police linked Kohberger to the crime scene through DNA
Authorities discovered DNA linked to Kohberger on a leather knife sheath in one of the victims' bedrooms at the crime scene and made a DNA match by searching his parents' trash bin, the affidavit says.
The court documents say authorities discovered a tan leather knife sheath lying on the bed where the bodies of Mogen and Goncalves were found.
According to the affidavit, the Idaho state lab located a single source of DNA on the knife sheath, which had "Ka-Bar," "USMC," and the United States Marine Corps eagle globe and anchor insignia stamped on the outside of it.
"The Idaho State Lab later located a single source of male DNA (Suspect Profile) left on the button snap of the knife sheath." the affidavit said.
Late last month, before Kohberger was arrested in connection to the killings, authorities went through the trash from Kohberger's parents' home in Pennsylvania and sent the evidence to the Idaho state lab for testing, the affidavit says.
A DNA profile from the trash and the DNA profile from the knife sheath found in the Moscow, Idaho, home "identified a male as not being excluded as the biological father of the Suspect Profile," according to the affidavit.