CNN
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A hearing is set for Thursday to determine whether the trial of Brian Koberger, accused of killing four University of Idaho students in 2022, will be moved from Latham County. A long awaited trial.
The trial is the latest update in a two-year legal battle to take Kohberger’s case before a jury, which has seen multiple pretrial hearings and complaints from victims’ families about delays. A trial in which Kohberger could face the death penalty is currently set for June 2025.
Kohberger has pleaded not guilty to four counts of first-degree murder.
Attorneys for the 29-year-old Kohberger argued in court filings that he should leave Latha County because of a “gang mentality” that threatens the safety of their client and the court. They hope to move the trial more than 300 miles to Ada County, home of the state’s capital and largest city, Boise.
“The traumatized city of Moscow is understandably filled with deeply preconceived notions of guilt,” the defense writes.
Anonymous residents of Latah County, where the murders took place, told security experts in phone interviews that if Kohberger is not convicted:
• “They’ll burn down the court. Outrage would be an understatement.
• “They will find him and kill him.”
• “There might be a riot, and he won’t be out long, because someone will do justice to a good boy.”
His defense argued that “there is an enormous venue problem” and that Kohberger “has a constitutional right to a fair trial with an impartial jury.”
Lata County’s media coverage of the case has been the highest in the state and the coverage has been “largely inaccurate and inflammatory,” the defense filing said.
His attorneys found in the survey that the more media accounts a potential juror knew, the greater the presumption of guilt.
The defense argument is based on a study by Brian Edelman, a defense expert at the consulting firm Trial Innovations, of the four Idaho counties where the Moscow murders took place, including Latah and Ada counties.
Edelman surveyed 400 residents of Latah County about their knowledge and perceptions of the case’s prejudice. TrueScope, a media watchdog, looked at the media coverage available to residents of Moscow and Boise, but could not determine the amount of media from YouTube, TikTok, Facebook or podcasts that did not reach Idaho citizens in those cities.
While respondents in Lata County said there would be outrage from the community if Kohberger was not punished, respondents in Ada County said community members would “go on with life as usual” and “take it well.”
The defense argued that Moscow lacked the proper facilities to accommodate the highly publicized three-month trial and cited the move to Ada County in high-profile cases such as those of Lori Vallo and Chad Table. Valo was sentenced to life in prison and her husband, Tabell, to death for murdering Valo’s two children and Tabell’s first wife.
Prosecutors, on the other hand, argued that a fair and impartial trial could be held in Moscow, and that intense media coverage of the case extended beyond Lata County. They criticized the survey results, arguing that “Lada District residents who heard about the case were, overall, statistically less likely to prejudge the defendant.” In addition, prosecutors say other strategies can be used to ensure a fair and impartial trial, such as convening a grand jury panel and thoroughly screening them.
According to prosecutors, moving the trial hundreds of miles would be difficult for witnesses and victims’ families.
The case stems from murders that occurred on the morning of Sunday, November 13, 2022. Police in Moscow, Idaho, were called to a home near the University of Idaho and found the bodies of four students inside: Kaylee Goncalves, 21; Madison Mohan, 21; Ethan Chapin, 20; and Xana Kernodle, 20. All four were stabbed to death.
The killings — and a suspected manhunt — rocked the small college town of Moscow, prompting fears for student safety and subsequent attacks.
Kohberger, a graduate student in criminal justice and criminology at Washington State University, was arrested at his parents’ home in Monroe County, Pennsylvania on December 30, a month after the murders.
Law enforcement partially zeroed in on Kohberger by linking him to a white Hyundai Elantra found in the immediate area of the murders. His DNA also matched DNA recovered from a brown leather knife sheath “lying on the bed” of one of the victims, according to court documents.
