0:04

Investigators believe Coburger killed Kayleigansalves,

0:07

Madison Mogan, Zeyner, Kernodle, and

0:09

Ethan Chapin inside of a rented home not

0:11

far from the University of Idaho campus. At

0:13

the time of the murders, Coburger was studying at

0:16

Washington State University, which is just a few

0:18

miles away from the crime scene.

0:21

Outside Coberger's apartment in Pullman,

0:23

Washington, detectives removing boxes

0:25

and bags from the apartment. They just kept

0:27

coming out with more and more stuff and loading

0:30

it into evidence vans. But in that list

0:32

of what they brought out, they do not list

0:34

knife in that evidence list.

0:42

This is the Idaho Massacre,

0:45

a production of KT Studios and iHeartRadio,

0:49

Episode twelve A Discussion Part

0:51

two with forensic expert Joseph

0:54

Scott Morgan, Courtney

0:56

Armstrong, a television producer at KT

0:59

Studios, with Stephanie Lydecker, Jeff

1:01

Shane, and Connor Powell. In

1:06

this episode, the producers Stephanie

1:08

Lydecker and Connor Powell speak with forensic

1:10

analyst Joseph Scott Morgan to discuss

1:13

the latest information about the Idaho

1:15

murders. Here

1:19

they are now.

1:21

Talking with the Great death investigator

1:24

and forensics expert Joseph

1:26

Scott Morgan, also the host

1:28

of body Bags, our favorite show

1:30

here. And then of course Connor Powell who's

1:32

been executive producing and also contributing

1:35

on the Idaho Massacre podcast, also

1:38

making the documentary which Joseph

1:40

is also appearing in, and being

1:42

knee deep in this case with Brian Coberger

1:45

and the tragedy in Idaho that

1:47

there does seem to be some similarities.

1:49

You know, there's obviously very big key differences,

1:52

but the large scale of

1:54

these cases, the idea of such

1:56

an overkill in both cases

1:59

is probably what has drawn us to

2:01

them so deeply. And you know, Joseph

2:04

was, frankly when this case first

2:06

hit the press, or when these murders first happened,

2:09

Joseph, we were communicating real

2:11

time, and you were the

2:14

first person to really

2:16

not only be covering the case but also in

2:19

many ways solve it. You had said the word knife

2:21

sheath before I even knew what a knife sheath

2:24

was. To be honest, you called it

2:26

from day one and have been the leading pundit

2:28

speaking about it as an expert and also

2:31

as a human and have done it so beautifully

2:33

and so important obviously doing that

2:36

with pikedon as well. What can we talk about

2:38

that sort of shows how these cases

2:40

do have some crossover.

2:42

I've got a word I want to throw out here at

2:44

the beginning as we're chatting,

2:46

and I think it's important. I was thinking

2:49

about, you know, similarities, and there are many

2:51

similarities. That word is bold.

2:54

Kind of an innocuous word. It's used quite

2:56

a bit thrown around in media, but in

2:58

parlance of death investigation.

3:01

When you think of bold, that can imply very

3:03

many things. It goes to the scope,

3:06

It goes to even if it's misplaced,

3:08

it goes to intestinal fortitude, I think on the part

3:10

of the individual that's going to do it, because

3:12

they are singularly focused

3:14

on an objective. And I think that we

3:16

see that displayed in both the

3:19

Piked and massacre, as well

3:21

as what's going on at the University

3:23

of Idaho and that small little

3:25

town up there. And this is

3:28

another piece to this that again

3:31

their rural, both of these locations.

3:33

I don't the Good Lord Almighty couldn't send

3:35

down a thunderbolt and it would be any more shocking

3:37

in these two places, I think, because who

3:40

saw this coming? No one did? You

3:42

know? Back when Pikedon occurred, and

3:44

certainly in Idaho. You know, who

3:47

could have even have anticipated this.

3:49

I was just talking the other day with my wife,

3:51

you know, reflecting back about what were we

3:53

doing. You know what I was doing. I'm college

3:55

professor in a town that's very similar

3:57

in size, sitting there thinking, just

4:00

get me to Thanksgiving break. I do that every year.

4:02

I've had enough. And those people

4:05

there at the University of Idaho, we're thinking

4:07

the same thing, just get me to Thanksgiving break. I

4:09

just want to go home for turkey and dressing that just

4:11

I'm so sick of these people around

4:13

here.

4:13

And then this happens, and the level

4:16

of depravity that a person

4:18

has to have to pull this off. And you

4:20

know, we've said this many times, and then air quotes

4:22

go back to the real world thereafter, as if nothing

4:24

happened. If in fact what Brian Cooberger

4:27

is accused of is true, is impossible

4:29

to wrap our brains around, right. But from a

4:31

forensic standpoint, you've said this since day

4:33

one, and frankly before it had even

4:35

hit the press. Just about the level

4:38

of blood that was

4:40

at the scene in Idaho,

4:43

in Moscow when this crime occurred,

4:46

was really unparalleled, except for

4:48

potentially the tragedy in Pike County,

4:51

where again the level of

4:54

overkill was really

4:56

unimaginable.

4:58

Yeah, it is. And you know, we have to think about this

5:00

is not done. Neither

5:02

one of these horrible events occurred.

5:05

We talked about rural. It's not like these

5:07

occurred out in an open field

5:09

and a pasture somewhere. These happened

5:12

in structures. And

5:13

what do we think about when we think about

5:15

structure, Well, we go home to be home,

5:18

we go home to have privacy,

5:20

we go home to be left alone. And

5:22

when you let that sink in and you think about

5:24

this level of violence that was perpetrated

5:27

in these two environments, it's one thing

5:29

to kill in an open field

5:31

or out in an environment that's so

5:33

so far out there that maybe certain

5:36

elements might be lost. Not in these cases,

5:38

not in either one of them. You have

5:40

what's referred to as containment of evidence.

5:43

Therefore, if we take that

5:46

train of logic and we think about the

5:48

containment of evidence therein during

5:50

the dynamics of both of these events,

5:53

you know, you have to know that

5:55

at least some elements of these

5:57

tragedies wind back up

5:59

on the perpetrators as we

6:02

saw in piked In, I think to a

6:04

great degree, and what I

6:06

believe had occurred

6:08

in Idaho as well.

6:10

It you know, you talked about the blood bath.

6:12

You know piked In involved firearms. This is

6:15

something different. This is as much overkill

6:17

as is involved in Pikedon,

6:20

with multiple gunshot wounds, with multiple

6:23

victims. These sorts of things, when you're talking

6:25

about sharp force injuries, these

6:27

are the types of things

6:29

that require such anger

6:32

and such fury because

6:35

you're you're in close proximity

6:37

within a home or within a place that becomes

6:40

home. I think back to when I was an undergraduate in

6:42

college, the places that I occupied

6:44

it as an undergraduate student, temporarily that

6:46

became a home. They were my space, right And

6:49

with these kids, these four kids, and

6:51

they were kids that were in the shared

6:53

home, it was their home temporarily.

6:56

And I think about, particularly

6:58

that scene in the bedroom where we have

7:01

two victims in a bed and

7:03

they're actually co sleeping in

7:05

this bed where this infamous sheath

7:07

has now come into play. It

7:09

was a bigger bed. And my

7:12

only thought thinking about kind

7:15

of the perpetrator interacting

7:17

with the environment, would that person

7:19

would have to have been compelled to have gotten

7:21

up on the bed. So when you begin to

7:23

think about intimacy and

7:26

you begin to think about anger, you

7:28

have containment in that environment

7:31

where these poor young

7:33

women are being stabbed to death on this

7:35

surface in a very frenetic type

7:38

of event, and it would been I've likened it

7:40

to the view of a sewing machine

7:42

needle going in and out, up

7:44

and down like this and striking only variably,

7:47

you know, because the arm is not

7:50

going to act human arm is not going to

7:52

act that same way. It's not going to be in the same spot. It'll

7:54

be a variety of spots. But yet

7:57

there's something very mechanical about

7:59

it. Closed, it's confined.

8:02

But we do know this. We have blood

8:04

that has been shed, so therefore it would

8:06

have been transferred onto the perpetrator

8:09

into the weapon perhaps that was being

8:11

used. It's key here, I think that

8:14

they're not talking. They haven't really mentioned

8:17

at this point about what the DNA

8:19

that was on this the snap

8:22

as they refer to it, the thumb snap that

8:24

has to be actuated in order to release

8:26

this knife. The blood would

8:29

have supersaturated the surfaces of this knife.

8:32

It would have been on the

8:34

leading edges of the blade

8:36

itself. It would have been on the hilt, the hilt

8:38

guard that runs here that protects your

8:40

hand when you're stabbing it. These

8:43

knives have a curious texture on the

8:46

handle. Many of them were made from

8:48

early on. These are military style knives,

8:51

and we heard that early on military style knife,

8:53

honeting knife and all that, and then they land on K

8:55

bar and kbar traditionally. You know, our

8:57

troops use them in World War II. That's where the gain

9:00

great fame, the Navy, the

9:02

Coastguard, but most famously the

9:04

Marine Corps. And they're made for hand to hand

9:06

combat. They're very heavy, heavy

9:08

in sense of the durability, the way they're

9:11

made, and so the handle that was

9:13

manufactured at that time was almost like a wrapped

9:15

leather that's kind of brushed that would

9:17

contain Now we don't know what the nature of this

9:19

particular handle is, but just suffice

9:22

it to say that their

9:24

blood, the victims blood, would have transferred onto

9:26

that weapon. The curious thing is

9:28

the two young victims that were in the bedroom

9:31

together. I've always wondered

9:34

how if there was any cross contamination

9:36

of DNA that was brought from those victims

9:39

upstairs, which I believe were the first

9:41

victims, because I think that one of them at

9:43

least was the target of this

9:45

massacre. How much of that

9:48

DNA was transmitted

9:51

to the other two victims, Ethan

9:53

and Xana down on

9:56

the second floor, because it's almost

9:58

like an inoculation, if you will. It's

10:00

kind of a weird term, but you're going and you're

10:02

introducing this biologic element

10:05

into into these two downstairs.

10:08

Who knows if they were intended, but

10:10

it would seem that there was no an awareness

10:12

that they were there in dwelling that structure at

10:14

the time. But again, we

10:16

don't have all of that information, but you've got

10:18

this kind of sharing of

10:20

evidence. Now how much of it can be

10:23

tied back to the accused coburger, We

10:25

don't know at this point. Okay, a

10:27

lot of guff a lot of stuff going back and

10:29

forth, as lawyers do. And I thought

10:31

greatly about, you know, why on

10:34

the snap itself, would you have

10:36

a deposition of DNA there

10:39

these snaps on these knives

10:41

when you're attempting to utilize

10:44

them, it's almost like somebody Let's

10:46

say somebody has a firearm and they're going to do

10:48

something called dry firing, and dry firing

10:51

means that you take a gun that is unloaded,

10:53

and you go and buy a new weapon. You want

10:56

to know what the trigger pull feels like. You know how many

10:58

pounds of pressure does it take to actually the

11:00

trigger as you pull it and drop the hammer

11:02

and all those sorts of things. If it's semi automatic, you

11:04

rack it back and forth, you get the feel of it. And

11:06

I have this kind of vision of the

11:08

individual that's using this knife

11:11

sheath that may contain the

11:13

murder weapon, sitting in a chair somewhere

11:16

flipping it with their thumb. How much time,

11:18

how much speed does it require to

11:20

flip that thing and clear it from

11:22

the sheath. And then, perhaps, just perhaps,

11:25

if you're in such a frenzy, sexually motivated

11:27

or just motivated by anger, you

11:30

forget the sheath. You drop it because now

11:32

your focus is there before you, lining before

11:34

you, as you may occupy the same space,

11:36

and you go to work, and

11:38

now the only thing you can think of is you feel the warmth

11:41

of that blood that's on your person. You've

11:43

heard the screams, you've heard the mones, you've heard

11:45

those last gasp of breath leave the

11:47

body. The next thing you want to do is get

11:49

the hell out of the place. But what happens

11:53

you go down that staircase, that interior staircase

11:55

leading from the third floor down to the second

11:57

floor. You make that hard left and you're head

11:59

and were those sliders that are there? Somebody

12:02

pokes their head out, possibly Ethan.

12:04

There was a sound that was heard. We believe that

12:06

at this point in time, we know Zana

12:09

was up she was on TikTok? So

12:11

did she stick her head out of the door,

12:14

did Ethan stick his head out of the door? How

12:16

many injuries did they sustain? Was it overkill,

12:19

just like the two young women upstairs?

12:21

Or was it quick just to put separation

12:24

between yourself and this horror show

12:26

that you've created and then get

12:28

out of the place as quickly as you can because

12:30

everything didn't go as planned. And when

12:32

we reflect back to Piked and I don't

12:34

know that everything when is planned there. You can

12:37

plan forever, man, you can,

12:39

but you can't anticipate these unknowns,

12:41

these unseen things that are going to

12:43

arise. You know, somebody's willingness to fight

12:46

back, or maybe it's a mother cradling

12:48

her child while she's nursing her in bed

12:50

and suddenly you hear you know

12:52

where there's an awareness that there's

12:55

somebody in the room and then bam.

12:57

You know, how does that affect the shooter piked

13:00

in? You know, when they hear that gasp

13:02

or they sense that there's an awareness that they're there.

13:04

Because they've tried to be stealthy, They've tried to

13:06

defeat every measure that there

13:09

is electronically, They've dumped phones,

13:11

they've used alternate vehicles,

13:13

all these sorts of things, and you begin to think

13:15

about this, always have to plan for those

13:19

things that you can't anticipate,

13:21

and how do you plan for that way you don't? And when

13:23

you're committing an illegal act

13:25

like this, you know, it's one thing when a military

13:28

goes in, our police officer goes in and they're trying

13:30

to execute a warrant and they're within

13:32

the boundaries of the law. But now you're

13:35

doing something that you know good and well

13:37

is against the law and is the

13:40

most horrible thing that you can possibly participate

13:42

in. What other layer does

13:44

that add of stress when you're trying to put

13:46

yourself and you know, put distance between

13:49

yourself and the crimes.

13:50

So, Josef, I just want to ask you something about the nice

13:53

sheath button, because I

13:55

envision it sort of what the way you

13:57

did, which is at some point he was

13:59

opening, opening

14:01

and closing, and he did it without the glove. He

14:03

probably did it at home when he first bought it. And

14:06

I my thinking is that his

14:08

DNA got on the inside of the button,

14:10

not the outside, because he probably wiped

14:12

down the entire knife sheath and everything, but

14:15

he forgot when he closed it not to get

14:17

on the inside. And if

14:19

you push too hard, you know, you can leave

14:21

a little bit of DNA, You can leave a little bit of skin

14:23

or something like that inside the snap. Is

14:25

that kind of what you were thinking as well?

14:28

I had contemplating that because the

14:30

snaps have leading edges. If

14:32

you're looking at it, you know, face on for

14:34

people that are listening to us right now, if you're looking

14:37

at the snap, the domed we

14:39

have the dome surface of the exterior of the snap,

14:41

and then if you flip it over, you look and you see

14:43

this kind of concave interior

14:46

of the thing, and it's got an edge all the way

14:48

around it. And I have thought about this Connor that

14:50

perhaps when he's actuating

14:53

this thing, you know, he's sitting in a I don't know

14:55

his Barco lounger his house. He's

14:57

watching television or whatever the hell he's doing,

15:00

and he's sitting there and he's actually in the

15:02

same flipping it back and forth. It's one thing,

15:04

And isn't that interesting because that's

15:06

one that's one place that you would not

15:08

think of to clean

15:11

or wipe down that it kind of catches

15:14

and rubs and takes away

15:16

that sample. Maybe it is touch

15:18

DNA, which you know, we we've

15:20

talked about before at length, but just as

15:22

kind of a refresher. You know, touch

15:25

touch DNA originates from dead

15:27

skin cells, and we sleught thousands

15:29

of these things. That's why people put lotion

15:31

on. So how much more so at

15:34

a microscopic level if we can

15:36

see, if we can look at our hands and say, Alli,

15:38

you know, I got dry skin, I need to cracked

15:41

and weathered and all this stuff. I need to put some lotion, all right,

15:43

how much more so to microscopic level,

15:46

you know, we're scraping off these dead, dead

15:48

skin cells that are falling off into that kind

15:50

of convex area and it could hold on

15:52

to it, and I you know, I think about

15:55

the technician perhaps that was in

15:57

that environment that you know, had the sheath.

15:59

Can I adge that moment when they have the sheath

16:01

and they don't have the knife, and they're thinking and

16:04

all the other evidence that came out of that home

16:06

up there just off the campus University of Idaho,

16:09

they're looking at them, said, be careful. This

16:11

is sacred. This is what we have. This is

16:13

our offering right here to you. How

16:15

are you going to treat it? And so the

16:17

scientist that's taking a look at this thing is

16:20

they're not just going to go in randomly

16:22

to use this thing to swab it, you

16:25

know, with the saline solution and you

16:27

know, just kind of randomly do it. Now, they're going to

16:29

break this thing down into regions

16:32

and they'll enumerate it, like just randomly,

16:34

just off the top of my head. They'll say this is section

16:37

one, section two, three,

16:40

four, five, and each region

16:42

will have a number and they'll

16:45

go through and swab those those

16:47

areas to see what they come up with. Now, they'll

16:49

do a control swab too as

16:51

well, just to demonstrate, you know, it's a

16:53

control that you use in the lab. And then they

16:55

go to every region and for

16:58

some reason, as you pointed out, come and

17:00

you're right, you are, they get

17:02

to that snap. Now, why would

17:04

it be that on the smooth maybe

17:06

metallic leading edge on the exterior.

17:10

All other surfaces are clean or are

17:12

absent any kind of trace DNA. But

17:14

yet they still recover it from there. I think

17:16

that that might be shielding. It might be protection.

17:19

And it doesn't matter how many times you snap it.

17:21

If they take that swab and they run it on

17:23

the inside of that lip, they're going to find

17:25

things. And we even find this with Layton

17:27

prints. When people I go

17:29

through an exercise. It's a college professor that teaches

17:32

forensics, and I tell my students and they

17:34

always hate me for this because they think about it for days

17:36

and days afterwards. I say, when we're

17:38

doing latent prints, I say, Okay, when you

17:40

leave campus today, leave with this thought

17:43

in mind. Think about how you get in

17:45

and out of your vehicle. How do you leverage your

17:47

body in and out of your vehicle. Most people don't

17:49

think about that. They don't think about the fact

17:51

that they have to use their key. Perhaps they have an

17:53

old door lock on it, or they're

17:55

going to hit the buzzer. Oh and by the way,

17:57

they have to stick their fingers underneath and

18:00

open the door handle. You know, actuate the

18:02

door handle, then grab the bar,

18:05

the support bar side next to the window. Maybe

18:07

they'll push it up and some people will push on the interior

18:09

glass. Then they're going to have to leverage their

18:11

self into it to sit down. You're

18:13

gripping multiple layers. Most people don't

18:15

think about that, and that's that's

18:17

the nature of us as humans. We go through these

18:20

repetitive tasks all the time. We don't think about

18:22

where we're coming in contact. That as

18:25

a forensics person is where we can find

18:27

those little land mines that perpetrators

18:30

have not thought about. And Connore you

18:32

thought about one. So there you go. I've actually

18:34

referred to the car as a rolling crime scene.

18:36

So what may have happened with that? Did

18:39

he plan so much that he had a change of clothes

18:42

that he changed into before he

18:44

mounted back up in that car and then

18:47

he tossed the clothing? Remember there was a big

18:49

stink over I guess it was the

18:52

Tuesday after the Wednesday, after

18:54

the primary crime scene had been worked, you know, on

18:56

that Sunday, you know, that morning morning

18:58

up, and they were talking about trash pick up and how

19:01

they had not checked all the trash cans and I've

19:03

often wondered did they miss something?

19:06

Did they miss something? And it's mass confusion

19:08

around the campus. You got kids,

19:11

his parents are calling them saying leave. And

19:13

I'm sure that not all details were

19:15

Did they go through and check every single trash

19:18

can in that little community. Did

19:20

they look for clothes that had been

19:22

you know, tossed aside, perhaps in

19:24

a bag somewhere, Because if if

19:26

he is this criminal mastermind, which

19:29

you know, the media is trying to portray him, as

19:31

you know, because he was working on a PhD

19:34

in criminology, which is

19:36

not forensic science, did he think enough

19:38

to show up with a change of clothes, you know?

19:40

And I think that that's an interesting question.

19:43

And the shoes as well. There were early there was an

19:45

early conversation about a pair of vans

19:47

where there was some kind of print

19:49

that was left in the hallway and it turns out somebody

19:51

else was in vans in the house. And they never

19:53

said what kind of media that the

19:55

print was left behind. Was it dirt, was

19:58

it dust? Was it blood that left

20:00

this pattern? But there were

20:02

other vans that were left there, and there were all

20:04

kinds of photographs floating around for

20:06

a period of tom You know, demonstrating

20:08

different types of vans you know that are out there

20:10

that people wear. You know, it's not just surfer dudes.

20:16

Let's stop here for a break. We'll be back in

20:18

a moment.

20:26

One of the things that we talked about in one

20:28

of the episodes, there was a mention, and this was

20:30

just stuck out. There's a mention that there was

20:32

no shower curtain in his apartment,

20:35

and I think Jeff and I were talking

20:37

about speculating that could he

20:39

have possibly taken the shower curtain put

20:41

it in his car seat so that when

20:43

he was driving, essentially there was some type

20:45

of bubble And maybe that's the reason

20:48

why there's no shower curtain in his apartment.

20:50

Maybe he was just cheap, poor student. He never bothered,

20:53

he couldn't care less. But I mean that's

20:55

the type of thing you're saying that, you know, if he's

20:57

thinking about he's planning this stuff out, that he

20:59

could have thought about bringing in a change of

21:01

clothes, having multiple pairs of gloves so that you're

21:04

tearing off the dirty one, putting in a bag

21:06

to dispose of later, but you still have another pair

21:08

that is clean, or something like that as well. Right, Like that's

21:11

kind of what you were talking about.

21:12

Yeah, creating that barrier that's going to separate

21:15

you from those cloth seats. And I remember

21:17

seeing I remember looking not so much

21:19

at his dad and him when they had

21:21

those videos of them being pulled over in Indiana,

21:24

looking at the seats, thinking well,

21:26

is that is that the kind of surface that

21:28

I would expect kind of a supersaturation

21:31

of blood remnant to be left

21:33

behind in if I remember correctly, there's some kind of

21:35

funky cloth. You're not talking about

21:37

a high end vehicle here that's going to have pleather

21:40

or certainly not leather, which

21:43

still you know that absorbs blood

21:45

and you can find it. But just think about cloth,

21:47

if you've ever had a cloth seat in a vehicle,

21:49

and just if you have a kid and

21:52

kids spill something in the vehicle, Oh my

21:54

lord, I forbid it's chocolate milk. Of

21:56

course, that's never happened to me. But you know, when

21:58

you think about what, how do you get this out of

22:00

there? And it requires a bit of elbow

22:03

grease, and it requires a knowledge

22:05

of you know, what can be applied to

22:08

that covering to render it

22:10

clean and absent that

22:12

that car though I think

22:14

holds many keys and it

22:17

was but Steph,

22:19

you had mentioned the visual capture

22:22

of the sing on CCTV, you know, and they did

22:24

the infamous ring. That's what they're referring

22:27

to. It is I can't remember. It's twenty plus miles

22:29

I think where they went around to all the CCTV

22:31

spots and the car

22:33

plays a role into that. We have to think, did

22:35

he have any other conveyance, Well, not that we know of,

22:38

but we know that he kind of circled

22:40

about the University of Idaho

22:43

because the phone's pinging in those

22:45

specific locations, and this is you know,

22:47

they they're claiming that they can put him

22:49

there prior to the deaths, and then of course

22:51

we think that there's a return visit

22:54

maybe that morning, you know, thinking

22:56

about well, what's you

22:58

know, what's happening, you know, and a

23:00

lot of us have talked about this, Why isn't there

23:02

anything in the news and we've got you know, that

23:04

plays into the whole timeline thing where

23:07

things not reported until noonish

23:09

or you know, just shy of nunish

23:11

and he's probably wondering at this point in

23:13

times they're curious, did he ride back

23:15

over there? Would you leave Washington State hop

23:18

in your white Hyundai and drive back

23:20

over there and take a look, just a

23:22

peek, just to see what's going on.

23:24

And how could you be that foolish? So

23:27

you begin to think about this, did he think

23:30

about this thoroughly? And to your

23:32

point, Connor, about creating this barrier

23:35

in the car? I think certainly the shower curtain

23:37

could do that. But if he's such

23:39

a mastermind, wouldn't he know that,

23:42

you know, the shower curtain, even though it's in a

23:44

wet environment, could very well contain some

23:46

of his DNA because he's bathing in there,

23:48

and you're going to use that to cover a seat.

23:51

That's a very intimate thing, a shower curtain. Don't

23:53

know about you guys, but you know you brush up

23:55

against it in all manner of things.

23:57

You got hair falling off, you know, all kinds

23:59

of things that can be contained on the shower curtain.

24:01

Just because you put water to it doesn't mean it's

24:04

clean. That's an interesting thought, you

24:06

know, did he create a barrier for that car?

24:09

And then those what the

24:11

the FBI team saw him

24:13

doing up Pocono's with

24:16

the observations of you know, this

24:19

just constant cleaning of the vehicle. You

24:22

know they've got this, they're viewing this, and you

24:24

know they're he's digging through it, he's hauling

24:26

off, putting things in zip lock bags

24:28

and creating them off. I mean, maybe

24:30

he's fastidious. I don't know. Maybe he's substidious

24:33

about cleaning his car. Looking at it going through

24:35

down the road in Indiana didn't appear to be that

24:37

he was fastidious. Why would he did

24:39

he clean it in Idaho and then clean

24:41

it again once he got to mom and Dad's house.

24:44

I mean, presumably he would have after the

24:46

murder, if he used that vehicle,

24:48

he would have cleaned it. Then after

24:51

the stops in Indiana he got scared

24:53

and decided to clean it more. I mean, that's

24:56

that's the only way to sort of approach that. But who

24:58

knows. I mean, did he clean it NonStop for months?

25:01

Like you know that murders happened in the middle of November.

25:03

He doesn't get arrested until the end of December.

25:06

Is you know, is he cleaning every single day?

25:08

Yeah? And he's becoming obsessive about it. You

25:10

think about that, and I'm curious

25:13

from sampling perspective,

25:16

I have to think that you know, working in

25:18

conjunction with Pennsylvania State

25:20

Police and the FBI when

25:23

they got this car. I'm wondering

25:25

what type of samplings did they take from

25:27

within the vehicle and was there

25:30

did they do any kind of chemical testing

25:32

and get an idea as to what he may

25:34

have been cleaning the car with and talk about

25:36

tie backs just at a molecular level.

25:39

Did he have anything under the sink in

25:41

Idaho that he had purchased to use

25:43

for cleaning that they found

25:46

remnant of in the car that

25:48

may have varied from what he was using at mom

25:50

and Daddy's house. You know, are there multiple

25:53

agents that are being used? The question

25:55

is is when he's doing all of his studies

25:57

of the tenants of I don't

25:59

know, Hans Gross and all these other people

26:02

that are criminologists, does

26:04

he have time to go through and dig

26:06

out a forensic text and begin to see,

26:08

you know, how to defeat defeat

26:10

any kind of of you

26:13

know, testing that

26:16

an organization as sophisticated as

26:19

the Idaho State Crime Lab

26:21

or the FBI crime Lab or

26:24

Pennsylvania State Crime Lab can he defeat?

26:27

Is he powerful enough intellectually to understand

26:29

that and anticipate it and defeat anything

26:31

that they've got going on in the laboratory and

26:33

defeat what the crime scene investigators

26:36

are doing at those scenes. You know, the things they're

26:38

going to think about, because I don't

26:40

know, there have been people that are saying, you

26:42

know, you need to go back to Pennsylvania and check check

26:44

for unsolved cases and all these

26:46

sorts of things. Well, to the best of my knowledge, at this point

26:49

time, he hadn't been charged with anything. This is his

26:51

first time at bat. You know, if it is,

26:53

is he that much of a wonder

26:55

kind that he can you know,

26:58

he can anticipate everything that he has this

27:00

big brain. You're always going to miss

27:02

something. You know, the snap might be

27:04

the thing that would do him in if

27:06

that turns out to be accurate. You

27:09

know, if he's in possession of that knife, I

27:11

think from an investor, this is an investigative

27:14

part as opposed to a forensic part. But you

27:16

know the provenance of that knife and that sheath,

27:18

is there some way to tie it back to a

27:21

purchasing where they can actually physically

27:23

put that in his hand, that he ordered it

27:25

somewhere, he went into a sporting

27:27

good store or ordered it online

27:29

from some you know, from Amazon, or whoever,

27:31

or that he decided to buy it. I mean immediately when

27:34

I started hearing about the type of knife

27:36

that was being alleged that was being used, I

27:38

immediately went on a variety of sites

27:40

on the internet. You know, how hard would it be

27:42

for me to buy a K bar? I mean, I've seen k bars.

27:44

I go to gun stores, I go to hunting stores.

27:47

You know, we've got a lot of them where I live, and

27:49

I see k bars there. I've seen in my whole life. My dad's

27:51

a four Marine and he had a k bar,

27:53

And you know, so I'm thinking about

27:56

that sort of thing. How would you and why whyn't

27:58

you use a k bar? Why there's a lot of knives

28:00

out there. You know, they'd thrown around the term rambo

28:02

knife, which is not a k bar. That's

28:04

a survival knife that has a scruff end

28:08

on the handle that contains things

28:10

like needle and thread and fish hooks and all

28:12

that sort of compass and all that sort of thing. It's

28:14

not a k bar. Is a classic combat

28:17

knife. It's weighted and balanced for that purpose.

28:20

So I'm thinking about these things and thinking, why

28:22

choose a k bar out of every knife that's

28:24

out there is it something he's familiar with that you

28:26

have a history of having an interest in

28:29

the military. Well, as soon as I

28:31

thought about that, I start seeing images of him and

28:33

I don't know if it was a j RTC or whatever

28:35

it was. And there's this picture

28:37

of him when he was larger than he is today,

28:40

and he's doing push ups and he's wearing a BDU

28:42

uniform, and I start thinking, well,

28:44

he's got some familiarity with the military.

28:46

Maybe that entered k bar entered in

28:48

his lexicon. Why would it be that you

28:51

would choose that weapon to perpetrate

28:53

such a heinous crime? And

28:56

he might be many things, but I can tell you what he's not.

28:58

He's not a special opera person.

29:01

You know, in special operations people are trained

29:03

in hand to hand combat, edged

29:05

combat. So this is a daunting

29:07

task. It's one thing to take a gun out and shoot

29:10

somebody. You don't need to be a marksman to

29:12

do that. You start to get into a knife play. This

29:14

is a completely different realm that you

29:16

enter into because you have to be aware

29:18

that there is a high probability that someone could

29:21

take that knife and bury it in your chest. They could

29:23

take it away from you and you're running a real risk.

29:25

So why this knife, Why the students

29:27

at this particular times. It's

29:30

an interesting question that I think that

29:32

the investigators have asked of themselves.

29:34

Yeah, we have done a lot of research, going back

29:36

to Pennsylvania and etc. Trying to find

29:39

a previous occurrence that would point

29:41

to something that maybe was a

29:43

pregame to this crime. And frankly,

29:45

we haven't been able to identify something super

29:48

obvious. But you know, something

29:50

about it just doesn't track. And why in the hell,

29:52

if you're so bright and smart, would you drive your own

29:54

white car to and from the crime scene

29:56

even the next day. I mean, you're really

29:58

we're talking about something that it's unexplainable, I

30:01

guess, But yeah, the smartest guy in

30:03

the room wouldn't do that.

30:05

Serial killers have budgets too. He may not have

30:07

had access to another vehicle. I mean, like

30:10

you go to war with what the

30:12

weapons you have, and all he had was his

30:14

weight, you know, Hyundai.

30:16

Maybe it's some kind of grandiose manifestation

30:18

that you see being played out here that

30:20

I you know that I'm capable of doing this,

30:23

you know, and I think about bodybags. I

30:25

was amazed, and I'm just you know, kind of mentioning

30:27

this on the side, but covered the case a few weeks

30:29

back involving Sam Little, and many

30:32

people are familiar with Sam Little. He it

30:34

turns out he's he's arguably one of the most

30:36

prolific serial killers to exist

30:39

in US history. And they finally got

30:41

one of the bodies identified from the mid seventies

30:43

that he actually killed.

30:45

He killed the young woman and making Georgia and

30:47

Sam Little lived to

30:50

kill. He would take jobs

30:52

just so that he could be near victims, and he traveled

30:55

everywhere, and he he

30:57

didn't have a dime to his name, but

30:59

he figured out of way to you

31:02

know, lure women in their own environments,

31:04

generally prostitutes, all of them just

31:06

about prostitutes, and choke

31:08

them out and leave very little evidence

31:11

behind over the course

31:13

of time. So is this are we looking

31:15

actually at a serial perpetrator?

31:17

Here? Are we looking at a mass

31:20

murderer? You know, anything three

31:22

or more is essentially a mass killing. So

31:24

you if it is who they

31:26

alleged that it is, is there so much

31:28

anger that's pent up? Is there so

31:31

much hatred and venom

31:33

that he wants to take out

31:36

on you know this these

31:38

poor college students. Did it just all come

31:40

to a head at this particular time,

31:42

you know? And this goes to motive, and of course

31:44

state doesn't have to prove motive, but circumstantially

31:47

you begin to think about what are the motivations for someone

31:50

first off, to leave Pennsylvania and come to Washington

31:52

of all places to work on a PhD.

31:55

And I've said again was it was

31:57

a fine school. But you know, you're you're

31:59

talking about going to a very high end

32:02

Catholic institution in Pennsylvania.

32:05

The sales to get your undergraduate and your masters.

32:08

You're in the heart. You're in the heart of

32:11

doctoral studies in criminology

32:14

in that Northeastern corridor. The state of

32:16

Pennsylvania alone has four PhD

32:18

programs in criminology. You go up the Eastern

32:20

Seaboard, you start hitting places like you

32:22

know, d C. You hit New York obviously

32:25

John Jay School of Criminal Justice.

32:27

You go to Boston and North Northeast

32:30

Northeastern that's there is considered

32:32

to be their holy shrine. Why

32:35

are you going to pack up and head to Washington

32:38

State? And then you screw

32:40

around while you're there because I got

32:42

to tell you, people that aren't familiar with what it's

32:44

like being a PhD student. It's in dentured

32:46

servitude, particularly those first few semesters

32:49

you're there. And the fact that he had enough time

32:51

to go and do this while he is a

32:53

TA teaching assistant, which he

32:55

was doing miserably at From what we're understanding,

32:58

that you have and I know it's really close,

33:00

but you have enough Tom to get in your car

33:03

and drive literally across state

33:05

lines and cruise another

33:08

campus. You have enough Tom to do

33:10

this. And I'm perplexed by that.

33:12

Can I impack that for a second, because you just made a point

33:14

that I have not heard anyone make, which is

33:16

that he potentially

33:19

chose where to go to school, maybe

33:21

with the idea that somewhere like Idaho

33:23

would be the easiest place to get

33:25

away with him murder.

33:26

Or something even more ominous.

33:29

Because a small town. They

33:31

don't. Idaho is not a rich state. They don't.

33:33

They just don't have murder, so there's not

33:35

as much forensic opportunity for their

33:38

investigators. And would

33:40

staying in the Northeast or staying in Pennsylvania

33:43

maybe if he had this fantasy and he wanted

33:45

to carry it out, would be more problematic,

33:48

more difficult, So you go away for your PhD

33:51

to be in a place closer to a

33:53

place like Idaho, which would have limited resources

33:55

to solve a murder.

33:57

Or if he had some sort of pre existing

34:00

social relationship on social media

34:02

or some interaction with one of the victims,

34:05

we would only be speculating to say, who

34:07

if there was some sort of dynamic

34:10

happening that he perceived

34:12

as a relationship prior to moving,

34:15

and that's why he actually moved, because

34:17

he had targeted one of the victims in

34:20

his mind already. I'm not

34:22

making the suggestion that he was friends or that

34:24

there was any sort of, you know, obvious

34:26

connection. But a person's screwy

34:28

brain can really make screwy

34:31

fantasies happen. And

34:34

this is not an original thought. Somebody has said

34:36

this to me, that it's possible that that was one of the

34:38

reasons for the move.

34:39

Yeah, I agree completely,

34:42

and I think that it's something. I'm

34:44

almost positive that they investigative

34:46

collective, I'll put it to that way or exploring

34:49

because being an academic and being

34:52

you know, in academic for twenty years, this

34:54

is what I do know is that when you go up for a

34:56

PhD program, something. When

34:58

you get to that level and you're stud something

35:00

as specific as criminal behavior,

35:02

which criminology is, you look

35:04

for people to It's the ultimate

35:06

and the socratic method. You're looking

35:09

for people, they say, to study under

35:12

or to sit at their feet some great scholar

35:14

in criminology. So what

35:16

is it that Wazoo has to offer

35:19

that no other institution in the

35:21

United States or Europe has to offer,

35:23

or Canada has to offer their fine schools

35:25

in Canada that have criminology programs.

35:27

What is it about that location? Who

35:30

on that staff did he identify

35:32

when he was at the Sales completing his master's

35:35

degree. Who was it that he identified

35:37

at Washington State says, that's the person

35:39

I want to study under. That's the person

35:41

that I want to set my track on life with

35:43

because I'm going to go into academic because I got to

35:46

tell you, you're not going to do much with a PhD other

35:48

than to teach. You can consult eventually

35:50

if you get enough years, you know, under

35:52

your belt. So with that said,

35:55

once you've identified and targeted an individual

35:57

that you want to sit at

35:59

their feet, if you will, now you

36:01

have to apply. Well, the application

36:04

is a bit arduous as you can

36:07

imagine. First off, you have to submit writing

36:09

samples. You have to give

36:12

them a philosophy letter about

36:14

what your thoughts are, areas that you

36:16

want to do research in. You have to name

36:18

many times some of their staff members that are currently

36:21

doing because you know, when I mentioned in dner

36:23

Servitude, it's not just about you going to

36:25

get a PhD, it's about them looking for workers.

36:27

So if you've got Professor A that is

36:30

studying a particular area, is

36:32

this the person that Professor A wants

36:35

to bring in that will literally

36:37

become an employee, a full

36:39

time employee of the university while working on their

36:41

PhD. They're going to have their tuition

36:43

paid for, you know, maybe a dorm food,

36:46

they'll get a stipend, and you're going to be

36:49

at that person's bidding day in and day out. And oh,

36:51

by the way, you're going to do research while you're teaching my classes.

36:54

So after you make it through that, you

36:56

have to have recommendation letters. Who

36:58

wrote recommendation letters for him? Who

37:01

was it that sat down and thought that Brian

37:03

Coberger would be a great candidate

37:05

for Wazoo And was Wazoo the

37:07

only place he chose? That's another

37:09

sticking point because I got to tell you, as

37:12

an investigator, if you're I

37:14

don't know, maybe his GR scores, which is kind

37:16

of like the SAT, maybe his GR scores

37:18

are just off the scale. He

37:20

could choose anywhere he wanted to go, and he's solely

37:22

focused on Washington State and he's done

37:25

research at a

37:27

master's degree level. That's going to fold

37:29

back into that who is it that

37:31

he's going to study under? Who is it

37:33

at the sales or whoever that wrote him these

37:36

letters of recommendation. And that's

37:38

why this peeling of the onion to get

37:40

inside of his head and trying to understand what

37:42

he's doing is very

37:45

important, I think. And to

37:47

this point, I know that they have certain privacy

37:49

issues at work, but I have to think

37:51

that the authorities have begun to look into

37:53

this. I hope they have. As a matter of fact, I hope

37:56

that once they had identified who he was,

37:58

this is the first thing that they did know. Because

38:00

the world's a crazy place. Next thing, you

38:03

know, files are leaded and all these sorts of things, and it's

38:05

gone. You want to be able to catch that data

38:07

as quickly as you can to try to understand what

38:09

he's doing. Because if that is a purpose,

38:11

then you begin to develop a timeline,

38:13

and timeline is what we work on in investigations

38:16

and forensics. You arrive in June

38:19

or May, you know, after you've been accepted.

38:21

You get there, you find an apartment, You've drug

38:23

your ass all the way across the country,

38:26

you set up an apartment. You got

38:28

a job, you're supposed to be going to class,

38:30

you're supposed to be doing research, and you have

38:32

to account for every second that you're in a PhD

38:34

program, every second they demand

38:37

it. They want you to be well. The next

38:39

thing, I know, he's being disciplined. I'm

38:41

hearing things about him being disciplined, that

38:43

he doesn't get along well with students, he's

38:45

arrogant, you know, all these sorts of things that kind

38:47

of come out about him. Doesn't get along with

38:49

colleagues. You know who does that when they first show up

38:52

at the door. It's one thing if you've been working someplace

38:54

for two or three years, it turns out your

38:56

jerk. First day there, you show up,

38:58

you're a jerk. You know long is it's going to

39:00

last? And plus these people are going to give you grades.

39:03

So are you are you really bought into the

39:05

process of getting a PhD. I think

39:07

it's a legitimate question. And

39:09

so why why that

39:11

location? Why the University of Idaho?

39:14

Why those poor souls, those four kids

39:16

that are literally in the

39:19

conclusion of their undergraduate career.

39:21

Their lives are wrecked, their families,

39:24

lives are wrecked, they're dead. What set

39:26

them apart? Why why that location?

39:29

That brings us back to the place being a party house.

39:31

And we hear that anybody in the world could

39:33

have walked into that house. And look, most

39:36

people that are out there that have been undergraduates

39:39

in some place. You're familiar

39:41

with the house where everybody would go and congregate

39:43

and hang out, even if you were sitting on front porch drinking

39:45

a beer. Oh yeah, they they're tapped

39:47

a keg. We're going to go here. It's cool, man, It's

39:49

about being in college or hanging out. This

39:52

is that kind of place. The sliders are

39:54

open. Remember, nothing happens up

39:56

here. You certainly don't have quadruple

39:58

homicides. Everybody would trust. Everybody

40:00

come and goes you please. That one view from

40:03

outside that I think the Son

40:05

or the Daily Mail had published that

40:08

shot of the table. You can see it's a

40:10

classic shot now and you've got solo cups

40:12

sitting on the tail. You got all kinds of crap that are

40:14

in there. I'm not judging them, the college students,

40:17

anybody could have come and gone. So is

40:19

it possible that a person that wanted

40:21

to end the life of somebody? And this goes

40:23

to going back to Piketon. You

40:26

know, what do we know about the Wagoners and the

40:28

Rodents, Well, they

40:30

have familial ties. They go to one

40:32

another's homes, They've crossed

40:34

the thresholds of one another's houses.

40:37

Now this perpetrator,

40:40

this alleged perpetrator, Ryan Coberger,

40:42

the accused, certainly wasn't

40:44

family. But you can set yourself in a

40:47

kind of a quasi familial relationship. We

40:49

remember, we're talking about making a home. You know,

40:51

when party night is generally on, generally

40:53

at college town's party nights or Thursday nights,

40:56

people are checking out the next day. Maybe

40:58

Thursday night they throw a kicker. Every single

41:00

Thursday night. People would filter over from the Greek

41:02

village that's literally right down the road.

41:05

Who's going to know who this guy is? He comes walking

41:07

in, he's in this environment, he

41:09

sees it and one of the most chilling things

41:11

that came up from me. It's terrifying

41:14

to me, particularly as a father. Is that

41:16

damn TikTok video that those kids

41:18

put up where you can see just

41:20

in that quick flash, you can see

41:23

that great room, great room, family

41:25

room, kitchen, slash, open concept,

41:27

whatever you want to call it. We've got a great open

41:29

floor plan, yeah you do.

41:32

And in it broadcast for

41:34

the whole world to see, is an interior

41:37

upward staircase and an interior

41:39

downward staircase. And I see the sliders.

41:42

I know where they're at, and I know who's in there.

41:44

So if I were inclined to

41:47

perpetrate something like this, I've

41:49

got a snapshot. Now I might not have the entire

41:51

truth, but I'm kind of oriented.

41:53

And if you're an obsessed person, just imagine

41:56

watching that on a loop. You got

41:58

nothing but time. You're not going to not

42:00

doing your job. You're sitting there doing nothing

42:03

but watching. And

42:06

if you're already tracking somebody on

42:08

social media, Wow,

42:11

what a big old slice of cake for you. Huh?

42:13

You get everything, you get everything

42:15

you're able to see into

42:18

that world. What are my points of ingress

42:20

and egress with us sliders? And

42:22

I know behind those sliders because I've ridden around

42:24

that property so much. There's a place I can part my

42:26

car up there. Oh there's a hedgerow. Let's

42:29

go up there at night. Let's go see. I'll wear

42:31

black shirt, black pants, maybe a black jacket.

42:34

Side of hose can be cold. Let me just pull over

42:36

here and see if I can get into these bushes and sit here

42:38

and watch see what happens. Maybe I'll

42:40

bring my binoculars with me and at a

42:42

distance. You know when the lights go on, when lights

42:44

go off, you know when people are going up through the bedrooms,

42:47

when they're shutting it down for the night. You can time

42:50

it. You can look at it. Okay, Well,

42:52

if she shuts it down at this time of night, are

42:54

their food orders coming in? We've got door

42:56

dash? Do they use door dash? Is

42:58

that a way I could get in? Is there anybody

43:01

else that's pulling up leaving? Is

43:03

there a regular that shows up? Is

43:05

there some member of the football team that shows up

43:07

that I need to think about? Mike could beat

43:09

my ass. You know, do they have boyfriends

43:12

that are football players or whatever else?

43:14

You have a good old boy showing up in camouflage. It's been

43:16

deer hunting all day and he's got a gun a knife,

43:18

and I'm not gonna have a chance against him. So

43:21

you sit out there and you watch it and you observe it. And

43:23

there's that classic shot. And I love that

43:25

they put this out there because we've got those.

43:28

There's that shot of the investigators.

43:31

Actually you can see them. Somebody

43:33

in the media captured them doing this. They were

43:35

going to the hedgerow and they were squatted

43:37

and they're looking back toward the house.

43:40

See, the cops are thinking about this, they're thinking about

43:42

points of observation all the way around. And

43:44

when the time is right, when you've worked yourself

43:46

into a frenzy, you drive up there in your

43:48

car. You park it so nobody else sees

43:50

you. Remember, we're getting ready for Thanksgiving

43:52

holiday. Everybody's guards down right

43:55

now. It's not like you're in the October

43:57

and you're right in the middle of party season.

43:59

You're sitting there and you're watching and

44:02

you're waiting. You've got gloves on, maybe

44:04

you don't. Maybe you've got certain types of

44:06

boots on. Maybe you got shoe covers. You can go buy shoe

44:09

covers. I was just in a hardware store the other day. You can

44:11

buy coveralls that cover your entire body. Zip

44:14

them up, just like we use that on crime scenes so

44:16

you don't get pain on your clothes. You got gloves,

44:18

anybody can get gloves. And you got your kbar.

44:21

Where you're gonna put the sheath, Well, maybe you're carrying

44:23

it single handed because you've got something on

44:25

that's covering your person underneath. You're

44:28

not gonna hook it to your belt. It's got a belt loop.

44:30

So you're walking in with singing in your hand. You know the

44:33

slider is open. You're gonna quietly open

44:35

the slider, and you know where the staircase

44:37

is. Remember you've either been there for a party or

44:39

you saw the TikTok video. You make a hard

44:41

right when you walk in. You walk up that

44:43

staircase and they're low and behold, there are

44:45

two girls in that bed and they are shocked

44:49

and terrified, and you go to work.

44:52

So the perpetrator, whoever

44:54

it is, this is fishing

44:57

a barrel for somebody that has

44:59

a for the sort of thing that wants to perpetrate

45:01

this sort of thing. Because it's not

45:04

like you went in in a blaze of glory and

45:06

people can hear you shouting and screaming

45:08

and all that sort of thing that's going on. This

45:11

was done stealthily, and that's something that Piketon

45:13

has in common with Idaho. There's

45:15

stealth involved. You wait till the right

45:17

moment, You wait till you know that

45:20

everybody is out for the evening.

45:22

You know that you can defeat

45:25

the CCTV. You can take the mechanism

45:29

that records everything. You know

45:31

where the dogs are, you're friendly with the dogs.

45:34

Maybe bring snacks for the dogs. You

45:36

know that you're going to have to have firearms. Well,

45:38

these are college kids in Idaho. Maybe

45:41

not firearms. Maybe a knife is all I need.

45:43

Yeah, that's up close and personal too.

45:45

I can live out this fantasy there. The

45:48

motivations behind these two things are probably

45:50

completely different, but there's anger involved

45:52

in both of them. You know, you've got these elements

45:54

of overkill in both of them. But it requires

45:57

stealth and it requires some level of

45:59

precision. I think probably more precision

46:01

in piked In because you've got four separate scenes

46:03

that are spread out over this godly

46:06

space. When I rode rode through

46:08

that area taping, I was amazed

46:11

at first off the isolation of it, and secondly,

46:14

how you know the three houses

46:16

are kind of close together on Union

46:18

Hill, but you've got that the fourth one

46:21

that's often the distance and buddy, is it isolated.

46:23

You've got pipe sunshine in out there, and it

46:25

requires stealth, that requires precision.

46:28

You know you're going to do this under the cover of darkness,

46:31

so you've got to make sure that you're there before the

46:33

cock crows, that you can clear out before

46:35

anybody else sees you. You have to be able to dispose

46:37

of these things that you have purchased or identified

46:40

as something that you want to use. So

46:43

there is similarity in

46:45

both of these cases. I think that piked

46:48

in for me is more planning.

46:51

It took place when it came to this,

46:53

we know, and plus you've got multiple

46:55

brains working here to plan. You

46:57

know this. This infamy, if

46:59

you will, right now would appear that they've

47:02

identified only one person that's

47:04

thinking about Idaho. But

47:06

planning nonetheless went into

47:09

this. This is not something that was just simply

47:11

decided on a whim. You showed up

47:13

prepared. You certainly showed up with a knife at some

47:16

time.

47:18

Let's stop here for another break.

47:29

There was a filing yesterday from Brian's

47:31

defense attorney suggesting that they are

47:33

in fact going to potentially

47:36

have an alibi for him, and that is something

47:38

that might be potentially brought up in court. Connor

47:41

would say that there's not much to be said there

47:43

and it's just a formality, which is probably

47:46

accurate as always. Can you tell

47:48

us just a little bit about your first reaction

47:50

to this crime prior to their being an

47:53

arrest and why you

47:55

specifically were so drawn to this case.

47:58

Yeah, remember the exact

48:01

moment why I was, and this is why. When

48:03

I was a young man and I was working

48:05

still for the Corner in New Orleans,

48:08

there was a case that took place

48:10

in Gainesville, Florida, just

48:13

off campus from the University of Florida, and it was

48:15

not just a case, it was multiple cases,

48:17

and it involved sharp forces injuries, and

48:19

it was a gainsul ripper. And I

48:22

thought back to that time as a

48:24

young investigator because the person

48:26

that they identified in that particular case

48:28

that was eventually arrested and charged

48:30

and convicted, they were looking at

48:33

that person for homicides

48:35

that we had in my jurisdiction,

48:38

and he had connection to Louisiana.

48:40

And then of course there's always the specter Bundy,

48:43

you know, with the Cayo House, and so those

48:45

two things kind of married up. You had.

48:47

First off, the common denominator was university,

48:50

and who would go into a

48:53

university and do this

48:55

sort of thing? And the Gainsul

48:57

Ripper had male victims. But again,

49:00

say what you will? You know you don't

49:03

have these things, particularly back then, that would happen

49:05

in Gamesville, Florida. It didn't have it

49:07

happen in Tallahassee like

49:10

with the Kyo House. And I was taken

49:12

back for that moment, you know, when I heard

49:14

about these cases, I thought about what went

49:16

through my mind. Cases that I was

49:18

working in New Orleans at the time, because we had a

49:20

series of serial killings that were going

49:22

on, and you know, we were all I was on a task force

49:24

as a matter of fact, and I was thinking, is this guy associated

49:27

with anything that had happened here? You know, because

49:29

it's on the ITM corridor. And then my

49:32

professor brain kicked in and I

49:34

began. First off, I began thinking

49:37

as a professor, my kids that

49:39

I was teaching that I had it'll

49:41

it'll be a year a year

49:43

ago in just about six

49:46

weeks when fall semester began, and I

49:48

began to know, these kids that come into my class

49:50

and here you roll into Thanksgiving

49:52

and you think about them. They're sick of you and

49:54

you're sick of them, but they're still my kids.

49:57

And then I thought as a father because my

49:59

child sophomore in college

50:01

last year. He's a junior this year, and I had

50:03

a daughter that went to my university.

50:06

And immediately, you know, all of

50:08

that kind of spun up inside of me.

50:10

And that's why, Yeah, I

50:12

was in the middle. You know, back then, I was just

50:15

coming off of covering Gabby Patito

50:17

and all the storm that that had kicked up.

50:19

I was roaded, weary, you know by

50:21

that time, and I

50:23

was suddenly in a real twisted way

50:26

and reinvigorated when it came

50:28

to this case because I knew that I could in

50:30

some way identify with the environment

50:32

in which this took place, because I

50:34

was so familiar with it both as a death investigator

50:37

forensic scientist, but also as a professor

50:39

and a father. So it hit, it ticked

50:41

a lot of boxes with me. And plus

50:43

it's rural. I knew immediately

50:45

because I've actually got a colleague that's we

50:48

shared office space together. Actually he's

50:50

down the hall from me. And he's from Idaho and he

50:52

had attended the University of Idaho. And I

50:54

thought about, you know, my friend, and immediately

50:56

I went and talked to him, you know, give me the lay of

50:58

the land, you know, tell me what's going on with

51:01

this case, and not the case, but tell

51:03

me about the place, you know. And suddenly I

51:05

saw it, started seeing parallels between Moscow

51:08

and Jacksonville, where I

51:10

live, Jacksonville, Alabama, you know, where our university

51:12

is. Campuses are roughly the same

51:14

size. We're both rural, though they are

51:16

more isolated than we are. We're only ninety

51:18

miles from Atlanta, but still we're a rural

51:21

place. And I thought about the kids that we have. We've

51:23

got brilliant people on our campus, but you know, we're

51:26

we don't have people that have matriculated from

51:28

going to Harvard and all those sorts of places.

51:30

They're common every day salt of

51:32

the our people that you know that come from families

51:35

that are probably in pretty close proximity. You got

51:37

generations that would attended this school, just like my

51:39

school. And so it just really grabbed me by my throat.

51:41

You know, when this happened, I couldn't believe

51:44

that it was happening, that it had happened, and to

51:46

this degree when the information began

51:48

to come out, thinking, oh my lord, this

51:50

is this is horrible, absolutely horrible.

51:53

Who And then on top

51:55

of it, you know, because the first thing I think

51:57

is angry boyfriend. That's what I'm thinking.

51:59

I'm thinking, angry boyfriend. We're gonna find out

52:01

in the next twenty four hours this

52:04

is some kid that got in a twist because

52:06

he got rejected or whatever it was.

52:08

And then nothing, it was cricket.

52:11

And suddenly I'm thinking, oh my lord,

52:13

Okay, I have to go to my map. What major interstates

52:16

run through this location. There's some place

52:18

that some animal could have jumped off

52:20

of the road and just decided to target

52:22

these kids randomly. And I'm thinking, you

52:25

don't wind up in this town by accident. You

52:27

have to be purpose to be going there. It's

52:29

not a suitcase college either. It's not a place where

52:31

kid's gonna pack up Friday morning. You

52:34

know, you've got to unless you're going across

52:36

the state line to Washington. You know, in

52:38

Pullman. Maybe it's not an easy

52:40

trek even to get to Boise. I mean, it's

52:43

a poke where you go so a lot of these

52:45

kids stay there, you know, they stay there,

52:47

but they were going home for Thanksgiving. They'd make that

52:49

big drive or go to the local

52:52

airport and try to get on a plane and go home for at

52:54

least a bit. These people really invested

52:56

in this location, so in turn, it left

52:58

me being very very invested

53:00

in this investigation as it's kind of played out.

53:03

Connor, how about you.

53:05

My initial reaction, I was sort

53:07

of just amazed at for

53:09

people being stabbed in a college town. The

53:12

news is full of shootings.

53:15

I've covered a bunch of shootings. I get

53:17

alerts all the time for people shot

53:19

in a shopping mall, people shot at a

53:22

picnic, people shot at a house party,

53:24

people shot everywhere. You know, to get

53:26

an alert for stabbings college

53:29

kids, it stuck out and it

53:31

blew my mind because it's so out of

53:34

the normal of what American society is. And

53:36

I mean, let's be basical, like gun violence

53:39

in our country is really normal. Stabbings

53:41

just aren't. And if you hear of a stabbing, it's

53:44

usually you know, to people

53:46

who are in a relationship where a fight's

53:48

gone wrong. And so to hear four

53:50

people in a college house, I mean

53:52

that just sort of it blew my mind. And

53:55

it's just so out of the normal

53:58

view and conversation of violent in this country

54:01

that I just wasn't expecting it.

54:03

It became really clear, I think, really

54:05

early on, that there was something

54:08

more to this story. I didn't

54:10

have the idea that this was a

54:12

lover's quarrel gone wrong, because how do you explain

54:14

the other people? And so I was definitely interested

54:17

from the very beginning because it just it

54:19

didn't seem to line up with what we sort

54:21

of knew. But there was something more to

54:23

this story that was clear very early on.

54:25

And Joseph, we had just come off the heels

54:27

at that time of George Wagner's

54:29

trial and his recent guilty

54:32

verdict, and we're frankly just

54:34

wiped out from the sadness

54:37

that surrounded that case, right,

54:40

and we were so happy for the Rodent

54:42

family to have finally felt some justice.

54:44

And then the news gets you, and

54:47

sure enough you see those beautiful faces

54:49

and lost souls and families

54:51

crying and a town grieving. I

54:54

feel like we all kind of knew quickly that we

54:56

had to jump in.

54:57

Yeah, I'd certainly agree with that stuff.

55:00

It's you know, for anybody that's

55:02

ever spent time in a college town and

55:04

you know, you have kind of this collegiate family

55:07

that you're part of, and even if it's

55:09

not. You know, that's a bit arrogant

55:11

on my part to say that, because you're talking about all

55:13

the other people that are part of that university

55:15

that may have never matriculated from there. But they're

55:18

the people that serve dinners. There are the people that pull beers.

55:20

They're the people that you know, fix these kids cars

55:23

when mom and dad are not around. Just let that sink

55:25

in for a second. You know that whole

55:27

community is trusted with these kids.

55:29

You know, when you send your kid to a place

55:32

like this, there's a whole support system

55:34

that goes into it. And one little interesting

55:36

aside from what my understanding

55:38

is is that it's so interwoven into

55:40

the culture there. You can have certain colleges

55:43

where they exist in a

55:45

town, but they're not part of a town. I've

55:47

worked at places like that where

55:49

the college is just kind of isolated, they don't

55:51

really interact with locals. That's not the way. As

55:54

a matter of fact, the local police

55:56

department in this town actually police

55:58

the campus, and that's that's kind

56:00

of odd, you know when you think about it, Because most

56:03

universities, particularly state universities, will

56:05

have their own police force. So the

56:07

police officers that are working to bet

56:10

on main Street, that are going to the domestic

56:12

calls and all that stuff, they handle frat parties

56:14

too, they'd be familiar with these kids.

56:16

These kids' faces will come and go over the years

56:18

and probably develop relationships with them. I'm sure

56:20

that probably some of the kids decided to stay after

56:22

they graduated. I think about that were

56:24

part of the community. They wound up going to a place

56:26

of college, and they never left, you know, they just they

56:29

wind up being part and parcel of that environment.

56:31

And so when I can only

56:33

imagine that when this happened,

56:36

many moms and dads in that town and that

56:38

region there, you know, suddenly had that

56:40

parental you know, that ominous

56:43

parental feeling that comes over you when

56:45

something horrible happens.

56:46

Well both of you, your compassion and

56:49

care and how you've both treated

56:52

this case that obviously remains ongoing

56:54

and will continue with it. It's frankly

56:56

been unparalleled. Joseph,

56:59

we love you to piece it.

57:00

Hey love you guys too. It's great to be with

57:02

you all. Hanging out, thank.

57:04

You, back at You.

57:10

For more information on the case and relevant

57:13

photos, follow us on Instagram

57:15

at Kat Underscore Studios.

57:18

The Idaho Masacer is produced by Stephanie

57:20

Leidecker, Jeff Sheene, Connor Powell,

57:23

Chris Bargo, Gabriel Castillo,

57:25

and me Courtney Armstrong. Editing

57:28

and sound designed by Jeff Toi. Music

57:31

by Jared Aston. The

57:33

Idaho Masacre is a production of iHeart Radio

57:35

and KAT Studios. For

57:38

more podcasts like this, visit the iHeartRadio

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