Idaho college killings suspect Bryan Kohberger set to appear in court Friday
Written by ABC AUDIO ALL RIGHTS RESERVED on August 18, 2023
(MOSCOW, Idaho) — Bryan Kohberger, the doctoral candidate accused of killing four Idaho college students last year, is scheduled to appear in court on Friday.
The hearing is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. PT in Latah County before Judge John Judge. Kohberger is expected to attend in person.
The judge is set to hear arguments on whether the case should be paused, after Kohberger’s team requested a stay for the second time.
In a July filing, defense attorney Anne Taylor alleged an “apparent failure” in the grand jury process and said, without elaboration, that “other irregularity exists within the grand jury process and further investigation is necessary to determine the impact, if any, in the convening of this grand jury.”
In response, prosecutors claimed the defense was trying to “grind the litigation” to a “halt” with flimsy arguments and attempting to “buy more time” to challenge his indictment.
The hearing is also set to address whether Kohberger’s team will get additional information on the DNA analyses, data and methods investigators used to zero in on a suspect in the murders — their DNA evidence, a critical linchpin of their larger circumstantial case.
Prosecutors allege that in the early morning hours of Nov. 13, 2022, Kohberger, a criminology Ph.D. student at nearby Washington State University, broke into an off-campus home and stabbed to death four University of Idaho students: Ethan Chapin, 20; Madison Mogen, 21; Xana Kernodle, 20 and Kaylee Goncalves, 21.
After a six-week hunt, police zeroed in on Kohberger as a suspect, saying they tracked his white Hyundai Elantra, cellphone signal data, and recovering what authorities said was his DNA on a knife sheath found next to one of the victims’ bodies.
That DNA evidence taken from the knife sheath at the crime scene “showed a statistical match” with a cheek swab taken directly from Kohberger after his arrest, authorities said in court filings.
Kohberger’s attorneys have pushed back on that analysis, saying the “statistical probability is not an absolute,” and pointing to what they called a “total lack of DNA evidence” from the victims in Kohberger’s home or car.
The defense has been pushing for more information on those genealogical analyses — and they have attempted to cast doubt on the strength of investigators’ evidence, and whether it pointed irrefutably to only their client.
Prosecutors have said in subsequent filings that they will continue to provide evidence in accordance with the law.
The defense has also sought to dismiss the indictment, though that motion is not currently slated to be addressed at Friday’s hearing.
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