The suspect in the shocking murders of four students at the University of Idaho was identified by authorities using DNA found in public genealogical databases, according to ABC News.
Bryan Christopher Kohberger, 28, was arrested in Pennsylvania on Friday. He is accused of killing roommates Kaylee Goncalves, 21, Madison Mogen, 21, Xana Kernodle, 20, and Kernodle’s boyfriend, Ethan Chapin, 20, while they slept in their off-campus home.
Police haven’t said much in public about how they linked Kohberger to the murders in Moscow, which has about 25,000 people. ABC News said that unnamed law enforcement sources said that DNA found at the crime scene matched DNA in a genealogy database, which led investigators to Kohberger.
Idaho murders suspect Bryan Kohberger seen for the first time since his arrest. via /r/pics https://t.co/43Ob3oSnev pic.twitter.com/LiFApU2klz
— Bogdan Duman (@BogdanDuman) January 3, 2023
When the probable cause statement for Kohberger’s arrest is made public after he is moved from Pennsylvania to Idaho, we will know more about why he was arrested.
His lawyer said that Kohberger won’t fight being sent back to Idaho and that he could be there as soon as Tuesday evening. Kaylee Goncalves’s father said that his family is looking forward to seeing how the case against Kohberger plays out in court.
“I want him to be sick of seeing us and sick of knowing these people won’t let it go,” Steve Goncalves told NBC News on Monday. “You know, it’s a battle of wills, and we’ll see who wins.”
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When Goncalves, Mogen, Kernodle, and Chapin were killed on November 13, it seems like a long knife was used. Kohberger was a graduate student in the criminal justice program at Washington State University, which is nine miles from the University of Idaho.
Later, local police and a group of 60 FBI agents focused on Kohberger after finding out that he owned a white Hyundai Elantra that had been seen near the scene. They also found information from his cellphone that showed he was often in the same place as the victims.
A month after the murders, Kohberger and his father were driving from Washington to their home in the Poconos mountains in Pennsylvania in that Elantra. Police in Indiana pulled them over twice as they drove through the state.
I’ve been waiting on pins & needles for them to arrest a suspect in the Idaho murders of those 4 college students. I hope there is proof, that this is the culprit. pic.twitter.com/FnOoKf5yzV
— Jaz🛡️🌐🔗 (@Jazzie654) January 3, 2023
The traffic stops were about an hour apart. One was for following too close and the other was for going too fast. The police watched Kohberger’s house in the Poconos for four days before they caught him on December 30.
Before he was caught, Kohberger got a master’s degree in criminal justice from Pennsylvania’s DeSales University and studied under a forensic psychologist who wrote a book about the so-called BTK Strangler serial killer. His lawyer has said in a statement that, despite the accusations against him, Kohberger expects to be “exonerated.”
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