Idaho judge urged to remove gag order on Kohberger case following quadruple murder plea
At a change of plea hearing last week, prosecutors asked to have the gag, officially called a "non-dissemination order," remain in place until Kohberger's official sentencing on July 23. Kohberger's defense did not object, and Judge Steven Hippler granted the request.
Then-Magistrate Judge Megan Marshall put the gag order in place days after Kohberger's arrest at his parents' house on Dec. 30, 2022. The stated aim was to protect Kohberger's right to a fair trial by limiting extrajudicial information available to the potential jury pool.
Much of the case proceeded behind closed doors until Hippler became the third judge to preside over the case following a change of venue that moved it from Latah County to Ada County.
Still, there are many questions that remain unanswered, and under the order, lawyers, investigators and other witnesses have been blocked from discussing details that haven't already surfaced in the courtroom. And the terms of the plea deal did not require Kohberger to explain his actions.
Latah County Prosecuting Attorney Bill Thompson hasn't held a news briefing since before Kohberger's extradition to Idaho in January 2023. The defense never has.
But now that Kohberger has admitted to the murders, there is no risk to his right to a fair trial, according to the motion. There won't be a trial at all.
"The Nondissemination Order, and its infringement on the First Amendment rights of the media, is no longer justifiable and should be vacated immediately," the motion continues.
The media coalition includes FOX News, The Associated Press, other major outlets and a number of smaller Idaho publications – including The Argonaut, the student paper at the University of Idaho, where the victims were killed.
Kohberger last week admitted to four first-degree murders – killing University of Idaho students Madison Mogen, 21, Kaylee Goncalves, 21, Xana Kernodle, 20, and Ethan Chapin, 20. He told the court, with his parents looking on, that he entered their house, which has since been demolished, around 4 a.m. on Nov. 13, 2022, with the intent to kill.
The guilty plea will spare him from the potential death penalty. He is expected to receive four consecutive terms of life in prison without the possibility of parole, plus another 10 years. And he forfeited his right to appeal and to seek a sentence reduction.
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He is also a producer on the new Prime Video docuseries, "One Night in Idaho: The College Murders," which is based on the book. Several loved ones of the victims spoke out in the film. Read On The Fox News App Fox News Digital reached out to Kohberger's lawyer for comment. Kohberger, a former Washington State University criminology Ph.D. student, pleaded guilty on July 2 to killing four University of Idaho students on Nov. 13, 2022, as part of a deal with prosecutors to escape the death penalty. The 30-year-old faces four consecutive life sentences for fatally stabbing 21-year-olds Madison Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves, as well as 20-year-olds Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin at their off-campus house. For the book, Patterson and Ward conducted more than 300 interviews and took a deep dive into Kohberger's upbringing. "He was inappropriate – he didn't know how to socialize very well," Patterson explained. "… He was a teaching assistant, and he was just turning people off. He graded the women poorly. He had an inability to deal with women, yet he thought he was popular. It was a thought of, why aren't these people, these women, loving him? Because he found himself very worthy. And in this documentary, most of this comes out." Follow The Fox True Crime Team On X According to the book and docuseries, Kohberger may have been inspired by one killer – Elliot Rodger. The 22-year-old was obsessed with exacting "retribution" after experiencing what he claimed was a lifetime of social and sexual isolation, The Associated Press reported. In 2014, Rodger killed six people in a stabbing and shooting spree in Isla Vista, California, before turning the gun on himself. "No one knows that, like Rodger, Bryan is a virgin who hates women," the book claimed. "No one knows that Bryan copes with loneliness by immersing himself in video games. Like Rodger, he goes for night drives. Like Rodger, he visits the gun range. And, like Rodger, he goes to a local bar and tries to pick up women." "Elliot Rodger wrote that he kept trying to place himself in settings where he could pick up women," the book continued. "But no one noticed him. Bryan must think that surely he'll be noticed. Women must spot his looks, his intelligence, and they must want him. They don't." Patterson pointed out that at the Seven Sirens Brewing Company in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, Kohberger would push his way into unwanted conversations with female bartenders and patrons. He went as far as asking for their addresses. Some women, according to the book, started complaining to the brewery's owner about "the creepy guy with the bulging eyes." Kohberger was adamant that women would notice him. But Patterson noted that to many, he was simply "off-putting." "He made people uncomfortable," said Patterson. "The bartenders and owners remembered him as being this weird duck who would sit at a bar and just weird everybody out and talk inappropriately. He had a lot of trouble socializing." Sign Up To Get The True Crime Newsletter According to the book, Kohberger felt that by going to Moscow, Idaho, across the state border, he could find a girl willing to date him. He read about a place online called the Mad Greek where they sell vegan pizza – he's vegan. When he walked inside, he noticed a blonde waitress – "Maddie" Mogen. It's been speculated by sources who spoke to Patterson that Mogen rejected Kohberger. The book pointed out an eerie similarity. "Elliot Rodger wrote of reuniting with a childhood friend named Maddy in the months before the day of retribution," read the book. "She was a popular, spoiled USC girl who partied with her hot, popular blonde-haired clique of friends," Rodger wrote, as quoted by the book. "My hatred for them all grew from each picture I saw of her profile. They were the kind of beautiful, popular people who lived pleasurable lives and would look down on me as inferior scum, never accepting me as one of them. They were my enemies. They represented everything that was wrong with this world." When asked if we'll ever know Kohberger's true motives for committing the murders, Patterson replied, "Oh, I think we already do [know]." "I think he had decided that Maddie… You could see it when you went by the house. You could see her room. Her name was up in the window of her room. We think it seems like he went there to deal with her. It seems fairly obvious. Will we know more? I don't know. If he wants to be interviewed at this stage, I'm happy to go there and do an interview. And I've done that before – people who've gone to prison, and they decide that, all of a sudden, they want to talk." GET REAL-TIME UPDATES DIRECTLY ON THE True Crime Hub Past acquaintances described Kohberger as frustrated by females – and even sexist as a result. One woman who met Kohberger on a Tinder date several years ago claimed on social media that her interaction with him was so awkward she pretended to vomit just to get him to leave her apartment. He also appeared to be well-versed in "incels," or "involuntary celibates." "Pretty much everybody we talked to just said, 'This is a strange man with a strange look – couldn't look people in the eye,'" said Patterson. "If he did look at you in the eye, sometimes people wished that he hadn't. And his impression of himself was totally out of whack with the way other people perceived him." The book describes Kohberger as having once expressed an "offensive, anachronistic view of gender roles." And following the murders, he may have viewed himself as a criminal mastermind. Moscow, Idaho, was overwhelmed by the gravity of his heinous crimes and the public scrutiny that came with it. "You've got not only the murders here, but all of a sudden, you've got press from around the world in this small town," Patterson explained. "You've got all of these rumors. One of the things in the book, and one of the saddest things that we discovered in the documentary, is the way that this stuff gets picked up by these true crime people, some of whom are vampires. They're awful, they don't care. They don't take responsibility for their actions. And when you write a book or do a documentary, you have to be responsible for it. And we were responsible." WATCH: ATTORNEY FOR MADISON MOGEN'S FAMILY VOWS TO EMBARK ON A NEW PATH FOLLOWING BRYAN KOHBERGER'S GUILTY PLEA And it could have been that "tunnel vision" Kohberger had that reportedly made him believe he wouldn't get caught. "Dr. Ramsland teaches her students that killers get tunnel vision when they are committing murder," the book shared. "That's why mistakes get made. Amid the high adrenaline and hyper-focus on the act itself, killers can forget things they otherwise would not." And Kohberger's family isn't to blame, said Patterson. "I think from everything we can gather, his parents did their best," said Patterson. "They seemed to have done their best with him." Kohberger's guilty plea doesn't end the quest to seek more answers. "Look, people talk," said Patterson. "… When you're in a big city, like New York, you're kind of used to, unfortunately, to violence. But you've got these two college towns, Moscow, Idaho, and Pullman, Washington, and they don't know what to make of this. "… It's a story of these families, and these kids… And, to some extent… the documentary – it will make you afraid. It will certainly make you feel what it was like to be in those towns during this period. What it was like the next day – the shock, the fear." Watch: 'Bryan Kohberger: I Am Blank' On Fox Nation "It was a hard case to solve," he reflected. "[Investigators] were very fortunate that Kohberger made that one really big blunder… He didn't make a lot of mistakes. So it was a tough investigation… He might've never been caught. We might've been writing about God knows what right now."Original article source: Bryan Kohberger believed he committed 'the perfect murders' until one key mistake shattered his plot: author
