0:04

Moscow Police are investigating a homicide

0:06

on King Rhode.

0:08

Cause and manner of death was homicide

0:11

by stabbing.

0:12

This is terrible.

0:13

It's a blood death.

0:20

This is the Idaho Massacre. A

0:24

production of KT Studios and iHeartRadio,

0:28

episode three In

0:30

Search of a Connection. I'm

0:34

Courtney Armstrong, a television producer

0:36

at KT Studios. With Stephanie Leidecker,

0:38

Jeff Shane, and Connor Powell.

0:43

An unthinkable nightmare comes to life

0:45

in the small college community of Moscow.

0:49

Four students at the University of Idaho

0:51

butcher to death in the early hours of Sunday,

0:53

November thirteenth.

0:56

The gruesome murders spark a multi state

0:58

investigation stretch from Washington

1:01

to Idaho to Pennsylvania. The

1:05

forty eight day investigation ends it on the

1:07

other side of the country with the stunning arrest

1:10

of a PhD criminal student and would

1:12

be law enforcement officer named Brian Coberger.

1:16

Moscow Police James fry On the arrest.

1:20

These tragic murders took four young,

1:23

vibrant lives from our community.

1:25

These murders have.

1:26

Shaken our community and no arrest

1:29

will ever bring back these young

1:31

students. However, we

1:34

do believe justice will be found through the criminal

1:36

process.

1:38

Was there some sort of connection.

1:40

I think that it is likely

1:42

that there's a relationship between

1:45

these four students and this

1:48

person. From

1:50

the first hours of the investigation, law

1:52

enforcement officials described the murders

1:54

of Kaylee Gonsalvez, Madison

1:57

Mogan, Xana Kernodle, and

1:59

Eitha Chapin as a targeted attack,

2:02

but police offered no other information.

2:05

Shannon Gray, an attorney representing

2:07

the family of soon to graduate senior

2:09

Killie Gonsalvez, said publicly

2:12

that none of the victims knew Brian Coberger,

2:14

leaving the question how is this a targeted

2:16

attack? Here's Stephanie Leideker,

2:19

Jeff Shane and producer Connor Powell.

2:26

I think when we all picture a murder of this size,

2:29

we picture a masked killer like you see

2:31

in the movies, But in reality, stranger

2:33

homicide is extremely rare. This

2:36

changes from year to year, but typically around fifty percent

2:38

of all murder victims are killed by someone they know.

2:40

So it begs the question, how did the accuse, Brian

2:42

Coburger know the victims.

2:44

It does feel like there has to be some connective

2:47

tissue in some way either maybe

2:49

they met in passing or maybe they had

2:51

some sort of class together.

2:53

Social media allows people to know

2:56

people but not actually know them, that they can

2:58

follow them, they can essentially digital stock

3:00

them. So he might have known them

3:03

and they might never have known him.

3:05

And that's actually a parasocial relationship,

3:07

which is this one way relationship we have with it

3:10

used to be people on TV, in the movies, but now

3:12

with the social media, you really can

3:14

intimately know someone without ever having

3:16

met them.

3:17

And you can also see the layout

3:19

to their home. We're on social media and

3:22

we're doing it in our houses or outside

3:24

of our houses, and that can be a real tell

3:26

for anybody who's a predator.

3:29

As we know, the victims were frequently posting

3:31

on social media, which oftentimes showed

3:34

the layout of their home.

3:38

The six bedroom house on King Road is

3:40

tucked away in a residential area of

3:42

Moscow. It's surrounded by an

3:45

eighteen hole golf course, the University

3:47

of Idaho's fraternity row, and other

3:49

residential homes. It sits

3:51

about two miles from the large commercial

3:54

shopping area where the Target and Walmart

3:56

are and about two miles from the main downtown

3:58

bar area.

4:03

About four years before the crime, I

4:05

was in Moscow, Idaho, for homecoming.

4:08

I was campaigning for Congress in the first

4:10

District of Idaho, so participated

4:12

in the homecoming parade, passing

4:15

out literature, shaking a few hands, waving

4:17

at the crowd. At the conclusion of

4:19

the parade, one of my good supporters

4:21

who was also in town, a

4:23

friend of mine and a law office client

4:25

of mine, had a son who was one

4:28

of the rental residents leasing

4:30

that particular property.

4:32

That's David H. Leroy speaking to producer

4:34

Jeff Shane. Leroy is a former

4:36

local prosecutor turned defense attorney.

4:39

He served as Idaho's Attorney General.

4:41

He's also a graduate of the University

4:44

of Idaho College of Law and has been

4:46

in the house where the murders happened.

4:50

So we went over to the house,

4:53

ended up on the second floor in a living

4:55

room area, and chatted

4:58

with his son and the other two three

5:00

residents who were students

5:02

at the university at that time living

5:04

in the house where the crime would be committed. About

5:06

four years later.

5:07

What was it like being in there?

5:09

A gray, three story building

5:11

set in a relatively hard

5:14

to get to backwater street

5:16

up against a hill, so that you have

5:18

a couple of different levels of entry

5:21

in the house. To go into the lowest

5:24

level is basically almost

5:27

a daylight type basement,

5:30

and then you must walk up a stairway

5:32

to get to the second floor, where bedrooms

5:35

and the living room area

5:37

occupy the front of the house. Upstairs,

5:41

there are additional bedrooms. We didn't visit

5:43

those, but it's a three story set

5:45

against the hill structure that

5:47

has multiple entrance levels and

5:50

multiple exit levels.

5:52

You were a student there, so you've I imagined

5:54

lived in different places. It was this house

5:56

typical of where a student might live

5:58

in Moscow.

6:00

This house was probably built

6:02

in the nineteen seventies,

6:04

no later than the eighties, in an

6:07

area that's immediately adjacent to campus,

6:09

literally the campus boundary and the

6:13

fraternities and sororities that ring

6:16

the center of the campus against

6:18

a large hill which is topped

6:20

by the University of Idaho's water

6:22

tower with a big emblematic eye

6:25

on the exterior of the structure.

6:28

Is no more than a quarter of a mile off campus.

6:31

It's against a hill with

6:33

single family residences and other

6:36

student population apartment

6:39

buildings, and it's perhaps

6:41

no more than half a mile from

6:44

the center of the campus. Two

6:46

thirds of a mile from the student union

6:48

itself.

6:49

When they weren't sure who did it, they thought this

6:51

couldn't be that random because this house was kind

6:53

of tucked away. It was a little bit on It's not

6:55

like a cul de sac, but it's a little bit of a

6:58

dead end, like it's on a major thoroughfare.

7:00

What's your take on that.

7:01

Now, there's no immediate arterial approximate

7:04

to this house. You must turn

7:06

off an arterial and then

7:08

off a sub arterial, and then

7:11

off that sub arterial to go

7:13

up a hillside almost

7:15

to a dead end about one hundred

7:18

or one hundred and twenty five yards before you get

7:20

to this house. To get to this structure

7:22

where the killings took place, you

7:24

have to work at it, and you don't immediately

7:26

pass by it on your way to anything else.

7:29

So it stands to reason that whomever did

7:31

this did not just stumble upon the

7:34

house.

7:35

A lot of the issues that was of great

7:38

concern semantically as

7:41

these investigations were

7:43

developing was whether these children

7:46

and whether this house was

7:48

quote targeted in some way. The

7:51

initial observations of the

7:53

law enforcement officials the prosecutor

7:56

included with it there was some kind

7:58

of targeting, and it was a lot logical conclusion,

8:01

given where this event happened

8:04

and the fact that so many students

8:06

were involved as victims. But it

8:10

is some place that you need to

8:12

work to get to and would not

8:14

necessarily happen upon even

8:16

if you were looking for a random place to commit

8:19

a crime.

8:24

Here again, Stephanie, Jeff

8:26

and Connor.

8:27

I want to Google Maps. I just want to map out where

8:30

this house on King Road was. And it's

8:32

really not a part of the city of

8:34

Moscow where people would just sort of end

8:36

up. It's not near the main bar area,

8:38

it's not near the commercial shopping area.

8:40

It is a really secluded, little sort of neighborhood.

8:43

A lot of people live there, but it's not the type of place

8:45

that you would just sort of drive.

8:46

By, and that's been confirmed

8:49

by a few people that we've talked to who have actually been

8:51

to the house, that it's a truck

8:53

to get there and you wouldn't just stumble upon it.

8:55

I think one of the things that is sort of interesting

8:58

about the house is it really was considered

9:00

a party house, which really isn't all that surprising

9:03

given the fact that there's a bunch of upperclassmen living

9:05

in there. Some seniors soon to be graduating seniors.

9:07

It's close to Toney Row, And I think the real question

9:09

is is like, is there any possibility that Brian

9:12

Coburger would have ever have been in that house

9:14

for some other reason?

9:15

And if Brian Coburger, you know, is

9:17

a PhD student, whether he was invited

9:20

or not, maybe he could have sort of slipped in the

9:22

back door and without being spotted or

9:24

would that be unusual.

9:26

We know that the house had parties where even

9:28

the girls weren't always at the parties. I mean there's a police

9:30

record of police showing up and none

9:32

of the residents of the house or even there, and they're

9:34

talking to some people who don't live there, and the police are

9:36

like, well, you got a noise complaint. We really need

9:38

to talk to somebody who's on the lease. And so people are

9:40

always coming and going from this house. But still,

9:43

how do you get from Pullman as a

9:45

PhD criminology student too, as you said,

9:47

somebody who's kind of creepy. How do you end up at an

9:49

undergraduate house in a totally different

9:52

university. It just doesn't seem likely that Brian

9:54

would have ended up there unless somebody invited

9:56

them.

9:59

If the house on CA Road was targeted, as

10:01

police say, was it because of who lived there?

10:04

Here's Jeff Shane speaking with reporter and

10:06

Jeannette Levy from the Law and Crime Network.

10:09

Does it matter how he knew them?

10:11

I think it becomes relevant if he knew

10:13

them, because it's just another dot

10:15

to connect. I mean, if he didn't know

10:18

them, if he actually had never interacted

10:20

with any of them, that's so terrifying.

10:23

If he's indeed the guilty party, what

10:25

in the heck is going on? Like why did

10:28

you kill these people?

10:29

You know?

10:30

It just I think it's more of like an understanding

10:33

it does. It's an explanation, not an

10:35

excuse, Like, but I think you have to look

10:37

at had he ever interacted with them?

10:39

Because he's like, I don't.

10:40

Know who these girls are.

10:41

I don't know who these people are, and I have no clue

10:43

what's going on. Why would I have anything

10:45

to do with these kids? They're way younger than

10:47

I was. I'm a twenty eight year old PhD

10:50

student. I mean, I think it

10:52

connects a dot if you if

10:54

he had indeed interacted with any of them.

10:59

Brian Kobak moved to Pullman, Washington

11:01

to begin his PhD studies in June

11:03

of twenty twenty two. According to a

11:05

police have of David, cell phone data

11:07

showed he was in the area of the home on

11:10

King Road at least twelve times

11:12

between August twenty twenty two and

11:14

the murders. But

11:17

did Brian Coburger know or have

11:19

a connection to any of the victims?

11:22

Here again, Jeff Connor

11:25

and Stephanie by.

11:26

All accounts, Ethan being

11:28

at the house was kind of just chance. Yes,

11:30

he stayed with Xana a lot, but Zana would also stay

11:33

at his fraternity house, So based

11:35

on what we know now, it's stands to reason

11:37

he didn't know Ethan would even be home that night.

11:40

Evan's Instagram profile was

11:42

set to private, but it seems unlikely

11:44

that Ethan was the target given

11:46

the fact that his social media presence

11:49

was pretty limited and there's no connection between

11:51

Ethan and Brian Koberger.

11:54

What a horrifying thought too, that this

11:56

could have been a missed night for him, you

11:58

know, the sliding.

11:59

Door of that.

12:00

What was it about that particular day in

12:03

the alleged assailant's life

12:05

that said, today's the day.

12:08

It just makes you think if he had gotten

12:10

a flat tire, or if he had

12:12

caught a cold, or if the light

12:14

was red and not green, something

12:16

maybe could have shaken him out of this morning,

12:19

and who knows, maybe four people could

12:21

still be alive. You know, this is the stuff nightmares.

12:24

Are made of. All

12:28

three of the female victims, twenty

12:30

one year old Kaylee Gonsalves, twenty

12:32

year old Xana Kernodle, and twenty

12:34

one year old Madison Mogan, had

12:36

public Instagram accounts, and all

12:38

three roommates regularly posted to social

12:41

media, including TikTok. It

12:43

doesn't appear that Madison, Kaylee, Zena,

12:45

or Ethannu Cooburger. None

12:47

of them followed anyone by the name of Brian Coberger

12:50

on social media. However, Kaylee

12:52

Consalvas's father, Steve, has said

12:54

there are connections between his daughter and

12:57

Coburger, but he has not commented

12:59

on the possible connection.

13:01

With so little information coming out at the beginning,

13:03

there was so much speculation about

13:06

the victims and the accused and their movements

13:09

around the murders. As we know, Maddie

13:11

and Kaylee spent their final night at the Corner

13:13

Club, which is a popular bar in downtown Moscow,

13:16

and people had speculated that maybe Coberger

13:18

had been there, he was a regular, that he met

13:21

them there, he saw them there. There's been nothing

13:23

to say that that's true. It's possible.

13:26

Yeah, it's not addressed at all in the probable

13:28

cause affidavit. It's not addressed by

13:31

investigators in anywhere. It's

13:33

just pure speculation. Sure, anything is

13:35

possible, but there's nothing linking Brian

13:38

Koberger to the Corner Club, either

13:40

that night or previous nights. And

13:42

you know, that's one of those sort of rumors that I think has kind

13:45

of been shot down, But it doesn't seem

13:47

that that is the connection between Brian

13:49

Coberger and the four victims.

13:51

There was also a rumor or there

13:53

were reports that Xana and

13:56

Maddie, as we know, were both waitresses

13:58

at the same restaurant, and one

14:00

of the unidentified workers from that

14:03

restaurant claimed that they remembered

14:05

Coburger attending there because he

14:07

had a very strict diet and

14:09

had very specific diet requests,

14:12

but that ended up becoming unfounded as well.

14:16

Reporter an Jeannette Levy also went to the

14:19

Mad Greek restaurant and spoke to people there.

14:21

I have been to the Mad Greek, and nobody

14:24

at the Mad Greek that I spoke to recalled

14:26

ever seeing him there, and they knew

14:29

the young woman who worked there, you know, Sannah

14:31

worked there and Maddie worked there. So

14:34

the people I talked with at the Mad Greek

14:37

did not recall ever seeing him there.

14:40

The owner of the Mad Greek, Jackie Fisher,

14:43

also issued a statement that said there is

14:45

no evidence that Coburger ate at the restaurant.

14:50

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

14:52

a moment. Online

15:01

in media, speculation about a possible

15:03

connection between Coburger and the victims

15:06

has largely focused on some type of social

15:08

media connection. Did Brian Coburger

15:11

digitally stock Xana, Maddie

15:13

and Kaylee again

15:16

Stephanie, jeff and Connor?

15:18

According to People magazine, Coburger

15:21

followed Maddie, Kaylee and

15:23

Xana before the account was actually

15:25

deleted, meaning his account was deleted.

15:30

There's no mention of the other two roommates.

15:32

Is that enough of a connection? And

15:34

again, is this just rumor? The

15:37

outlet also reported that Coburger message

15:39

at least one of the victims. They

15:42

didn't respond, but then apparently

15:44

Brian Coburger reached out again

15:46

and again and again and again and again.

15:49

Is that Stocker mentality or is

15:51

that just somebody on social media who wants

15:53

an answer on something and now

15:56

that's getting blown into something larger.

15:58

I actually looked for myself in terms

16:00

of did Brian follow them, because,

16:02

as we know, the victims' profiles were mostly

16:05

public, and if you search

16:07

through Kayley's followers, for example, there are

16:10

Brian Coberger profiles who follow her, but

16:12

now there's a bunch of them. So it's clear that there

16:14

are people out in the world who are making accounts

16:16

with Brian Coberger's names following these

16:18

victims, which that level of depravity is

16:20

disgusting, But to me, that indicates that

16:22

we as the public don't know for sure if you followed

16:25

them. Of course, officials might know something we

16:27

don't because what People magazine reports

16:29

that two weeks prior to the murders

16:31

in late October, he allegedly sent a message

16:33

to one of the victims, basically just saying,

16:36

hey, how are you, but he didn't get

16:38

a response, and kept repeatedly messaging them

16:40

over and over again.

16:42

What is a person supposed to do? Somebody

16:45

reaches out to them on social media or dms

16:47

them and they don't want to engage,

16:50

so they just ignore. But yet that

16:52

ignoring somehow gets potentially

16:55

obsessive for the person who's not getting a response.

16:58

There's no right or wrong answer.

17:00

It seems very plausible, and

17:02

it makes sense that Brian Coberger was probably

17:05

using social media to contact him. I mean

17:07

that just as we're trying to find an answer

17:09

for what's the connection, that seems like very

17:11

likely, right, But you know, an unnamed source

17:13

in People magazine like, how much do you

17:15

want to actually grab onto that and say

17:18

yeah, this is this is concrete. It still

17:20

feels like until we get it from investigators,

17:23

it still feels like just a theory and just

17:25

an idea as opposed to something that you can be like, oh yeah,

17:27

that definitely happened. That is for

17:30

a fact, you know the connection.

17:34

Here's Jeff Shane speaking with Antonette

17:36

Levy from the Law on Crime Network.

17:39

Knowing him, though, was such a loose term. I mean, she could

17:41

have matched with him on Tender and said,

17:43

oh, no thanks, I don't want to go out with you, and

17:45

he latched onto that and she wouldn't have known

17:48

him.

17:49

You're right, And I was actually told

17:51

that some of the people on Tender. I was

17:53

told that some of the kids in that area

17:55

use tender for networking and stuff like that, not

17:58

just for dating. But I don't know whether

18:00

that's true or not. Maybe there could have been some type

18:02

of tender connection, I don't know, But as

18:05

far as them interacting and you know, hey

18:07

we went on a date or we're friends or what have

18:10

you, I'm not aware of any connection like that.

18:12

And frankly, I think the fact that he went to Maddie's

18:14

room first, that to me says

18:17

a lot. So was she the

18:19

target? Did he somehow interact with her

18:21

at some point in time? I don't think we know these things.

18:24

Could Brian Kobecker have seen one of

18:26

the women online and tried to start a relationship,

18:29

only to be ignored and rejected.

18:34

They don't consider murdering women a hate crime, but I think

18:36

a lot of these cases are pretty much fall into that sort

18:38

of category where you have white men who are rejected

18:41

or you know, not they don't get what they want when they want

18:43

it, and that's why they do it, and it's just such a like

18:45

this inceell mentality, like where they're just so

18:47

like women should just be like, you know, falling out their news

18:49

to me and that's not the way the world works.

18:51

And then they're just so bitter about it that you know everything is working

18:54

out for them that suddenly the world's against them, and you know they're

18:56

a victim, and it's, you know, poor me.

19:01

Chris Bargo is a reporter with the TV

19:03

magazine show Inside Edition and

19:05

has been covering the Idaho murders. He

19:07

spoke to Stephanie and Jeff about Brian Coberger's

19:10

dating life and what he found out about Coburger's

19:12

often creepy interactions with women.

19:16

Have you heard that he was an inceell?

19:18

Because Jeff and I were talking about that and it

19:20

seemed like it was a bit of a perfect

19:22

example.

19:23

And in cell is an Internet term that describes

19:26

young men who are frustrated by their lack of

19:28

sexual experiences. It stands

19:30

for involuntary celibate. Inceels

19:33

have often been known to lash out at women when

19:35

rejected.

19:38

Okay, it's me the girl that went on

19:40

a tender date with Brian We

19:43

matched on Tinder.

19:44

Chris Bargo interviewed a woman named Haley

19:46

Willett, who went on a blind date with Coberger

19:49

when they were both college students. She posted

19:51

on social media about her disturbing interaction

19:54

with Coburger and his inappropriate in

19:56

cell like behavior.

19:57

It recognized them immediately in my heart, just

20:00

because I couldn't believe that, like

20:02

I was face to face.

20:03

With this guy.

20:06

So about two weeks after the arrest of Brian Coburger,

20:08

a young woman named Haley shares her

20:11

story on TikTok that she went on a date with

20:13

Brian Coburger about seven years prior.

20:15

She said they matched on Tinder. They talked for a few

20:17

hours, they went to the movie. It was pretty

20:20

inconsequential. They drove back to her

20:22

dormitory, he parked, and she said that she thought

20:24

they were maybe going to talk. She then said she's gonna

20:26

go up to her dorm room, and that's when she said he invited

20:28

himself up with her. Now, Haley's very

20:30

clear that she didn't really feel threatened and she

20:32

wasn't scared. She just kind of thought he was a very clingy

20:35

sort of guy. So she said, because

20:37

she's socially awkward, she didn't really know how to say no, and she

20:39

let him come up, and that's when she said things

20:41

really started to change. She suddenly became very

20:43

pushy and he's kept trying to

20:45

touch her, and when he would touch her, she would

20:47

say what are you doing and he would say, I'm not touching you and

20:50

then get very serious about it, and she just said

20:52

it got to the point where she didn't know what else to do, so

20:54

she excused herself to go to the bathroom

20:56

and then made it sound like she was loudly throwing up.

20:59

But instead of leaving, he just stood outside the door.

21:01

So she just stayed in there and waited until he finally

21:03

left. Then when he did finally leave,

21:06

he texted her that she had great birthing hymns. Haley

21:09

did not ever speak to him again, and she really posted

21:11

this as just sort of a message to women saying,

21:13

like, you know, trust your gut. If you think something's

21:15

off, do the right thing and just get rid of the guy.

21:17

And again she said she wasn't afraid of him. She just thought it

21:20

was an awkward, kind of clingy

21:22

guy that was probably more into her than she

21:24

was into.

21:24

Him, wildly creepy and

21:26

tell us like what was her disposition?

21:28

Like Haley just seemed like someone

21:30

who was trying to make a point of sort of sending

21:33

out a message to other women that you

21:35

know, like she said, just trust your gut. She did

21:37

not seem to be looking for any sort of fame or

21:39

notoriety. She wasn't out courting, you know, interviews or

21:41

anything of anything. She was turning most of them down. And

21:43

she, of course was dealing with a horrible backlash

21:46

of people trying to dos her and people

21:48

saying horrible things about her, wanting to know what

21:50

she looked like back then versus now, grossly

21:53

misogynistic things that happened to pretty

21:55

much any woman who comes forward in any of these cases, even

21:57

if they're not involved. It

22:02

seemed like at one point she was getting more hatred

22:05

for this murder than the actual suspect.

22:07

But she know, she was very clear that something was off about

22:09

him. And this is one of the few people we had spoken

22:12

to or seen in the media at that point who

22:14

wasn't from his hometown that just kind of knew him as

22:16

a one off, And there were very few people that

22:18

we could get like that.

22:20

Just the idea that you can go in a blind

22:22

date with a person who you know seems

22:25

nice enough to your point, seems to come from

22:27

a nice family, not a bunch

22:29

of zombies. You know, you check a bunch

22:31

of boxes. He's educated, he's on the right track,

22:34

and come to find out, you just dodged

22:36

a real bullet by locking

22:39

yourself in the bathroom.

22:44

Coberger's troubled relationship with women

22:46

only seemed to continue and often

22:48

even escalate during his brief time

22:51

at Washington State University. In

22:53

addition to being kicked out of a bar in Pennsylvania

22:56

for harrassing the waitresses, Coburger

22:58

lost his teaching assistant to job at WSU

23:01

around the time of the murders.

23:08

Brian Cooberger's behavior at the school

23:11

had been flagged by Washington State

23:13

University.

23:14

This is a really big deal.

23:16

The out of state tuition is fifty thousand

23:18

dollars at Washington State University,

23:21

so his teacher's assistant job was a really big

23:23

deal and very important to him. This

23:25

going away is a real life

23:28

changer for him.

23:29

Coburger didn't come from money, right His parents had filed

23:31

for bankruptcy at least once, and

23:34

to have your tuition paid for

23:36

for a PhD program is a pretty big

23:38

deal. But over the course of the fall, what

23:40

we really see, according to all these reports

23:42

is that his professors in

23:44

the criminology department are really troubled

23:46

by his behavior, and it seems like some

23:49

of that behavior is how he treated undergraduate

23:51

female students and other women in the PhD

23:54

program.

23:54

And is that because he's just odd

23:57

and awkward and doesn't really have a

23:59

great sense of social cues, or

24:02

again, is this a tale of a real psycho in training.

24:05

But there are some things we do know. Coburger

24:08

was not the most inspiring educator and

24:10

had a tendency to talk down to people, especially

24:12

female students. He would grade them harder

24:14

and kind of be demeaning to them.

24:15

We know that.

24:16

On September twenty third, about a month into

24:18

his role as a TA, there was

24:20

an altercation between him and his professor,

24:22

John Snyder, who was kind of effectively

24:24

his boss. Then just a couple weeks

24:26

later, on October third, Coburger and

24:28

members of the faculty of the School of Criminology

24:31

had a discussion about the norms of professional

24:33

behavior and what to expect moving forward.

24:36

Yeah, I mean norms of professional behavior.

24:38

That's the phrase we've heard a lot. There's other reports

24:40

that he gets into a screaming match with

24:43

another female student who leaves the room

24:45

because of the way he's talking down to her. So

24:48

I mean, when you talk about norms of professional

24:50

behavior, it just doesn't sound

24:53

like he's acting in an appropriate

24:55

way. And I think that really is

24:57

what we're talking about in this entire

25:00

story of Brian Coburger, is the way

25:02

he views women, the way he treats women, and then ultimately

25:04

what he does to women.

25:07

It's interesting because by all accounts from what

25:10

we've heard, he comes from a very loving

25:12

family. So again, it doesn't really fit

25:14

the familial mo for someone

25:16

who's air quotes anti women.

25:19

No, not at all. But by the end of December,

25:22

by the end of the first term, Washington State

25:24

University pulls his TA position funding

25:27

and you know, he essentially has to now come up

25:29

with that tuition that fifty thousand

25:31

dollars to cover his program.

25:34

He's terminated from his teaching assistant position,

25:36

and so his behavior, imagine

25:39

what you have to do to get

25:41

that teaching position just

25:43

you know, yanked from underneath you.

25:49

Someone allegedly broke into the woman's apartment

25:51

and move things around. Instead of

25:53

calling police, the coworker called Coburger,

25:56

who suggested and helped her install

25:58

security cameras.

26:00

Investigators are looking into if Coburger

26:02

was behind the break in and use the cameras

26:04

to spy on his colleague Stephanie

26:07

and Connor. Can

26:09

you imagine if this is actually accurate.

26:12

I know all of this is unanswerable in this regard,

26:14

but we want to be able to know

26:17

that the scary person is obvious

26:19

and this doesn't seem obvious enough to me.

26:22

It doesn't seem obvious. But there definitely is a pattern

26:24

here. I mean this behavior towards women,

26:27

whether it was when he was home in Albrightsville,

26:29

Pennsylvania, in getting kicked out of the bar

26:31

there, or it's at WSU.

26:34

You know the way he's interacting with undergraduates and other

26:36

PhD students. Oh and by the way, he

26:38

also got kicked out of a program in high school

26:41

as well. So when you see him on paper,

26:43

he looks like a really well

26:45

put together person. But there's a lot of

26:47

these stories that are coming together that really fit

26:49

a pattern of somebody who has real serious

26:51

problems.

26:56

But the allegations of Brian Cooberger's

26:58

disturbing behavior at w AS you don't

27:00

in there. Police are investigating

27:03

a break in at the home of a female coworker.

27:08

Let's stop here for another break

27:20

If Brian Coburger was digitally stalking

27:22

one of the women in the house. Many have

27:24

speculated that either Kaylee Gonsalvez

27:27

or Madison Mogan were his primary

27:29

targets, since they were killed first.

27:33

Kaylee was set to graduate early and

27:35

had actually moved out of the house and was only back

27:37

in town to visit her friends, show them her new

27:39

car, and just have a fun weekend, so

27:42

she's not living in this house. We know

27:44

that Kaylee was sleeping in Maddie's bed because

27:46

we know that that's where she was found. They were both

27:48

found in her bed. So if Coburger

27:51

had been digitally stalking or physically

27:53

stalking any of these girls, he would have seen

27:55

on social media that Kaylee was back in town.

27:57

Could this have been the reason why he struck

27:59

on that night in November?

28:01

There's multiple photos from that weekend

28:04

of all of the roommates together with Ethan

28:06

as well, And so if you're digitally stalking,

28:08

you see that Kaylee's in town. The roommates

28:11

are essentially all back together, which is kind of what they were saying

28:13

was how great it is to be all back together,

28:15

And he might have seen that.

28:18

Can you imagine too? Again, maybe

28:20

had they not posted on social media the

28:22

car or where they were, or

28:25

just how happy they were to be together.

28:28

Maybe he wouldn't have known.

28:32

Here's Stephanie speaking with Chris Spargo.

28:35

If you don't like gay people and you commit

28:37

a crime against a gay person, it's a hate crime. If you

28:39

don't like people have a certain race and you commit a crime against

28:41

them, it's a hate crime. But what if

28:43

you hate women? What if you are like

28:46

these young men who feel so

28:48

entitled to female affection and then when they don't

28:50

get it, they carry out these crimes. Why

28:52

isn't that a hate crime? And why aren't we focusing

28:54

on that aspect of it, because that seems to get

28:56

lost in the mix. And being a woman in the

28:58

same age is just negotiations.

29:00

Especially when you're with men, it seems like you know how you're

29:03

going to behave, how you're going to treat them. You modify

29:05

your behavior based on the way they're behaving to

29:07

protect yourself. If you're on a date with someone for

29:09

the first time, if you're maybe going to go home with someone,

29:12

you have to sort of map out all these things because you

29:14

don't know the person they might become once you

29:16

get into their apartment, or they get into your apartment. It's

29:18

very, very scary, and even on a more sort

29:20

of casual level, if you're talking

29:22

to someone and you just don't want to be mean, or

29:24

you just don't want to be outwardly rejecting of

29:26

them, and you're just nice, that niceness

29:29

can get misconstrued and then used against

29:31

you as some sort of leading them on or and it's

29:33

it's ridiculous.

29:34

The relationship between them, well

29:37

him, I should say, and is it Kaylee.

29:39

We still don't know for sure that there

29:42

was any specific target. It would

29:44

seem, however, that early suggestions,

29:47

for whatever reason, have focused on Kaylee.

29:49

And Kaylee was getting ready

29:51

to move out. She got a job in Texas, she just bought

29:53

a new car, She's gonna be working at an IT firm.

29:56

Everything is sort of coming together for

29:58

her, like she was beginning her life as any adult. And

30:00

then she went out with her friend Madison. That night,

30:03

Zanna had gone out with her boyfriend. The other two roommates

30:05

were also out. They'll get back to their apartment and then

30:07

where it gets crazy as the timeframe, because

30:10

Xanna gets his door dash delivery at four or five

30:12

am, and at four twenty am. The suspect

30:14

car scenes speeding away. How

30:17

do you murder four people

30:19

in fifteen minutes?

30:24

Kaylee's father, Steve Gonsalvez,

30:26

has said in several interviews that his daughter's

30:28

wounds were significantly more brutal than

30:30

Madison Mogen's.

30:33

I'll cut in the chase.

30:35

Yeah, their means

30:37

of debt don't match. I don't match.

30:39

There are points of damage don't

30:41

match. According

30:44

to her father, the knife wounds were deep

30:46

and slashed open Kayley's liver and lungs.

30:49

This type of attack is often described

30:51

as an overkill. It's typically

30:53

a sign that the victim was an intended target,

30:56

rather than someone who just happened to be there.

31:02

Xana's dad told the press that when she was

31:04

killed, she had defensive wounds, some of

31:06

which were so bad that her fingers were almost cut

31:08

off, implying that at some point Shed maybe tried

31:10

to grab the knife as it was being kind

31:13

of lunged at her. So is it possible

31:15

that maybe she surprised Coburger after

31:17

hearing the other people were killed and he was on his way out.

31:20

We also know that Ethan's neck was slashed,

31:22

which would imply that he was not in bed, but maybe

31:24

somewhere in the room and the doorway is what we've

31:26

heard. So while Kaylee had the deepest wounds

31:29

in comparison to Maddie, without other

31:31

information, it's hard to know exactly

31:33

what that means.

31:34

Yeah, Kaylee's dad has mentioned that her

31:37

wounds were way deeper

31:39

than the other roommates. That's obviously

31:41

something that investigators are looking at.

31:46

Well.

31:46

Impossible to know yet who Brian Coberger

31:48

was specifically targeting. There are disturbing

31:51

details about his final days in Pulman,

31:53

Washington before driving home. Here

31:55

again is reporter Chris Bargo.

32:00

I personally think that he knew he was not going to be able to

32:02

go back because he wasn't getting out of the

32:04

program, but he lost his TA position. And if

32:06

you are a TA, you get an in state tuition and they waive

32:08

it for a year, and there's all these sort of allowances, but if

32:10

you're not a TA, you have to pay full out of date. And

32:13

suddenly he's pay like forty thousand dollars to go back in the

32:15

spring. That's a huge leap for someone who didn't

32:17

really have a job before that. So I don't know that he would be able

32:19

to do it. So either he moved everything out

32:21

of that apartment knowing he wasn't coming back, or he actually lived

32:23

like that where there was no shower curtain, there was

32:26

you know, like a stripped mattress.

32:28

It was no furniture in there, like one

32:30

TV. And I think that when the

32:32

public defender came to get the stuff, she took like a TV,

32:35

a CD tower, and like a monitor.

32:37

That was it.

32:38

So it's just sort of a very bare bones, chilling

32:40

sort of setup.

32:46

More on that next time. For

32:49

more information on the case and relevant photos,

32:52

follow us on Instagram at kt

32:54

Underscore Studios. The

32:56

Idaho Mascer is produced by Stephanie Laidecker,

32:59

Jeff Sheene, Connor Powell, Chris

33:01

Bargo, Gabriel Castillo, and

33:04

me Courtney Armstrong. Editing

33:06

and sound designed by Jeff Toi. Music

33:09

by Jared Aston. The

33:12

Idaho Massacre is a production of iHeart Radio

33:14

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33:55

I'm Diana h You may Knows, Body Moving, My

33:57

Friend, and I John Green were featured in

33:59

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34:02

On our new podcast, True Crimes with John,

34:04

Indiana were turning our online investigative

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skills to some of the most unexplained, unsolved,

34:09

and most ignored cases.

34:12

Police say thirty three year old Bride Again was

34:14

shot dead.

34:15

Gunned down in front of his two year old daughter.

34:18

Detectives confirmed that it was a targeted

34:20

attack.

34:21

It appears to be an execution style of

34:23

assassination.

34:24

This is very active, so we have to be careful.

34:26

I've heard that there's a house that has some

34:29

bodies in the basement.

34:30

I knew, I just knew the move was wrong.

34:33

Maybe there's something more sinister at play

34:35

than just one young girl going

34:37

missing. If you know something, heard

34:40

something, please it's

34:42

never too late to.

34:43

Do the right thing.

34:45

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