If quadruple murderer Bryan Kohberger felt anything as the friends and families of his victims excoriated him with a series of increasingly fiery witness impact statements, he did not show it.
Kohberger was today handed down four consecutive life sentences plus ten years for felony burglary. The sentencing came at the end of a three-hour hearing during which the killer fixed each person who stood to address him in Ada County Courthouse with the same intense stare.
It is two and a half years since Kohberger entered 1122 King Road in Moscow, Idaho shortly after 4am and stabbed 21-year-old best friends Kaylee Goncalves and Maddie Mogen and 20-year-old Xana Kernodle and her boyfriend Ethan Chapin to death.
Yet today he didn’t flinch as he faced down the devastation his crimes have wrought – not even when Kaylee’s father, Steve Goncalves, dragged the lectern from where it stood facing the judge and turned it, like a tank’s gun tower, towards him.
Goncalves had been vocal in his disagreement with the plea deal struck by Kohberger earlier this month – a move that saw him avoid trial and with it the threat of the death penalty.
Now Goncalves trained his rage on the killer. ‘You picked the wrong families, the wrong state, the wrong community,’ he thundered. ‘You tried to divide us. You failed. Your actions have united everyone in our disgust for you.’
‘Today you have no name,’ he told him, stripping Kohberger of the notoriety that, many believe the former criminology PhD student craved. ‘A Master’s degree? You’re a joke. A complete joke.
‘The world’s watching because of the kids, not because of you. In time you will be nothing more than initials on an otherwise unmarked tombstone.’
Kohberger was today handed down four consecutive life sentences plus ten years for felony burglary
Dylan Mortensen was so overcome with emotion she could not stand but instead sat by the prosecutor’s table. She struggled to steady her breathing as she read her statement
Seated between his defense attorneys, Anne Taylor and Elisa Massoth, Kohberger simply watched, his eyes hooded by his heavy brow.
Last time he sat in this courtroom he looked every bit the former University of Washington teaching assistant that he once was – in dress pants, a white button-down shirt and tie.
Today he suffered the ignominy of his imminent incarceration and his status as a guilty man.
He wore an orange prison jumpsuit, his hands cuffed to a belly chain, his ankles shackled. A single sheet of paper sat on the table before him, on it a print of a dark heart. A pen sat on top of it. He neither touched nor looked at it for the duration of proceedings.
His mother Maryann and sister Amanda were there, seated at the front of the gallery, away from the grieving families. At times Maryann visibly shuddered as the details of her son’s crimes were rehearsed.
The day opened with impact statements from the two surviving roommates – Bethany Funke and Dylan Mortensen.
One of Maddie’s best friends, Emily Alandt, read a letter on Funke’s behalf. Alandt was the sorority sister who Mortensen called on the morning of the murders. She went to the King road house with her boyfriend Hunter Johnson and was among the first that day to learn the horrifying truth.
Struggling to contain her emotions Alandt read Funke’s words, ‘I was afraid to go into my own back yard, scared the person would come for me next… I made my parents close all the blinds, barely left the house and made sure I was never alone. I slept in my parents room for almost a year and made my parents double lock every door.’
Kaylee Goncalves’ sister Alivea delivered a fiery statement throwing barbs and insults at the killer
Madison Mogen’s father also delivered a seering statement
She has not, she revealed, ‘slept through a single night since this happened.’
Prosecutor Bill Thompson put his hand to his forehead as Alandt continued, ‘One day I realized I had to live for them. I do not take that for granted. Everything I do I do that with them in mind.’
Xana, she wrote, was ‘one in a million.’ Kaylee could have ‘ruled the world and been America’s sweetheart.’ Ethan was ‘the sweetest and most genuine guy…the way he cared for Xana was proof that storybook love and true romance do exist.’
As for Maddie she was, quite simply ‘the older sister I would have always wanted.’
Next came Dylan Mortensen – just 19 when the murders upended her life and the one roommate who set eyes on Kohberger as he stalked through the house that night.
Overcome with emotion she could not stand but instead sat by the prosecutor’s table. She struggled to steady her breathing, gulping and stifling cries. Judge Steven Hippler comforted her, ‘just take your time.’
Kohberger’s eyes darted to the side, he breathed heavily. ‘Because of him,’ Mortensen said, ‘four beautiful genuine compassionate people were taken from this world for no reason.
‘He didn’t just take away their lives. He took away the light they created in every room. He took away what they were becoming and the futures they were going to have… all the memories that we were supposed to make.’
Kim Cheeley, grandmother of victim Madison Mogen spoke of her grief for the other victims’ families, as well as the Kohbergers, which made Kohberger’s mom MaryAnn cry
Maddie Mogen’s father Benjamin fought tears as the sentence was handed down
With his senseless violence Mortensen told Kohberger, ‘You have shattered me in places I didn’t know I could break.’
To this day she suffers from panic attacks that ‘slam’ into her ‘like a tsunami out of nowhere.’ When that happens, she shared, she couldn’t breathe, she dropped to the floor.
‘It’s far beyond anxiety,’ she said. ‘It’s my body reliving everything… My nervous system never got the message that it’s over.’
Still, Kohberger sat – as impassive as stone. The only time he gave any slight indication that any of this was getting to him was when Mortensen said of him, ‘He is a hollow vessel, something less than human. He chose destruction. He chose evil. He feels nothing.’
His lips pursed, he blinked and shifted in his chair.
Maddie’s stepfather Scott, and mother Karen Laramie told how their daughter was taken away ‘by a sudden act of evil.’ Scott spoke for them both, ‘We know the law allows us to comment on the defendant and the sentence.
‘We support the plea. Society needs to be protected against this evil. As for the defendant we will not waste words. Evil has many faces, but evil does not deserve our time and attention.’
Again, Kohberger’s lips twitched. As the morning went on, the loved ones of his victims stood one by one and took their turn to diminish, ridicule and dismiss him as a failure, as foolish, as nothing.
Pictured left to right: Housemates Dylan Mortensen, Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen (on Kaylee’s shoulders) Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle and Bethany Funke in 2022
Xana’s aunt Kim, offered him forgiveness. She said, ‘I have forgiven you because I no longer could live with hate in my heart.
‘And any time you want to talk and tell me what happened I’m here. Get my number because I have questions. I’m here, I’ll be the one who listens to you.’
Xana’s mother, Cara Northington, who has struggled with addiction throughout her life and says she has found God and sobriety since the death of her daughter, said, ‘Jesus has allowed me to forgive you for murdering my daughter.
‘Without you even being sorry or asking for this, because He who lives in me is greater than any evil in the world.’
Her stepfather Randy Davies had no such compassion. ‘I don’t know what my limits are here,’ he said. ‘I’m really struggling. I want to be out in the woods with you so I can teach you about loss and pain.
‘You are weak. God what I would just give for a moment in the f***ing woods.
‘I’m shaking… I hope you feel my energy.’
But in a morning filled with rage and loss and love perhaps the most powerful iteration of them all came from Kaylee’s older sister Alivea Goncalves.
Like her father she turned towards the killer and word by word she took him apart.
‘I won’t stand here and give you what you want,’ she said, ‘I won’t give you tears. I won’t give you trembling.
‘Instead, I will call you what you are: sociopath, psychopath, murderer.’
She turned his own research methods against him – echoing a questionnaire once written by Kohberger for his academic study.
She peppered and mocked him with questions, ‘Did you prepare for the crime? Please detail what you were thinking and feeling. Why did you choose my sister? Detail what you were feeling.
‘Before leaving their home is there anything else you did? How does it feel to know that the only thing you failed more miserably at was trying to be a rapper?
‘Why November 13? Did you truly think your amazon purchase was invisible because you used a gift card?’
And then a chilling revelation and a hint of how her sister suffered, ‘What was the second weapon you used on Kaylee. What were Kaylee’s last words?’
Kohberger slouched in his chair and gave very little emotion as victims shared their devastation
Xana Kernodle’s father Jeff also spoke at the sentencing hearing of his grief and loss
Kaylee was so badly beaten by Kohberger that, her father has claimed, she would have died of the assault if she had not died from her stab wounds – of which he has said there were more than 50.
‘Do you feel anything at all, or are you exactly what you always feared? Nothing,’ Alivea rounded.
Her disdain rose as the court sat enthralled and all Kohberger could do was sit in his humiliation.
‘There’s a name for your condition,’ Alivea said, ‘Though your inflated ego just didn’t allow you to see it. Wannabe.
‘The truth is you’re basic. Your patterns are predictable, your motives shallow. You’re not profound, you’re pathetic.
‘Don’t ever get it twisted again. No one is scared of you, no one is impressed by you. No one thinks that you are important.’
And then the mic drop moment. ‘Here’s the one thing you hate the most. If you hadn’t attacked them in their sleep, in the middle of the night like a pedophile, Kaylee would have kicked your f***ing ass.’
The gallery erupted into applause as she retook her seat and the judge did nothing to stop them.
Shortly after 11am prosecutor Bill Thompson stood to ask the court to impose the maximum sentence for each count and for those sentences run consecutively.
He twirled his moustache and stroked his beard, folded his hands across his chest and choked back clear emotion – just as he had during the July 2 plea deal hearing.
He said, ‘We can never undo the horror of what occurred in early morning hours Nov 13, 2022 1122 King Road, Moscow, Idaho… even God cannot change the past.
‘But everyone in this room has the ability to take themselves forward and we want the judicial system to afford them the opportunity today to do that.
‘From today forward our memories should be focused on these innocent victims whose lives were taken on their families on their friends on their community.’
Asked if they intended to offer any evidence the defense said no. Asked if he had anything to say Kohberger told the judge, ‘I respectfully decline.’ His voice was barely audible.
As he sentenced him Judge Hippler described Kohberger as a once ‘faceless coward,’ who ‘slithered’ into 1122 King Road and ‘senselessly slaughtered,’ four of the six young people there that night.
He lambasted the killer for his cruelty and for his ‘incompetence’ which, along with ‘outstanding police work,’ saw him brought to justice today.
Steve and Kristi Gonsalves consoled one another as Kristi delivered a scathing warning shot to Kohberger
Judge Hippler said, ‘Those speaking today and those who did not speak but carry the same burden of loss now carry the memory of these forever young people, these perpetual children.
‘What we don’t know and what we may never know is why?
‘I share the desire to know the why, but it seems to me that by continuing to focus on why we give Mr Kohberger relevance, we give him agency, and we give him power. It makes us dependent upon the defendant to give us a reason.’
He continued, ‘Even if I could force him to speak, which legally I cannot, how can anyone truly believe that what he says is the truth?
‘I suspect the so-called reason would be dished out in enticing self-serving and aggrandizing bits leaving people more desire for understanding. Even if we could get truthful insight into his way I suspect it would not quench anyone’s thirst for understanding why.’
The judge hoped that none would ‘stoop’ to provide Kohberger with a spotlight in future. Criminal psychologists should study him, he said, but ‘there should be no reason for that to spill into the public eye.’
As he brought proceedings to an end Judge Hippler said, ‘His acts of evil have made him the worst of the worst.
‘Even in pleading guilty he’s giving nothing hinting of remorse or redemption or regret for the pain that he’s caused and therefore I will not attempt to speak of him further other than to sentence him and remove him forever from society.’
