TWO pieces of evidence that Bryan Kohberger’s defense team is fighting to include in their case for trial could potentially mislead the jury and cause confusion about the defendant, a legal attorney has warned.
New evidence in the quadruple murder case against Kohberger, 30, are coming to light as the high-profile trial is scheduled to begin later this summer in Boise, Idaho.
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With less than five months before opening statements are slated to begin, Kohberger’s defense counsel is fighting tooth and nail to convince Judge Steven Hippler to allow them to present their alternative perpetrators argument at the trial over the deaths of four students in their college home.
The defense claims that because DNA from five different individuals was found on one of the victims and at the scene, the actual perpetrator may have planted Kohberger’s DNA on the knife sheath found in one of the bedrooms.
Mark NeJame, a Florida-based trial attorney, told The U.S. Sun that the argument by the defense is a stretch.
ALTERNATIVE PERPETRATORS THEORY
“The sheath with his DNA on it is critical. Why would the sheath of a knife that has his DNA be in their place,” NeJame, who gained notoriety in 2008 by representing the parents of Casey Anthony in their murder trial, told The U.S. Sun.
“The defense has got a hard road. They’re in their position is somebody just set this guy up.
“But then you got to have a basis, why would they set them up. Why would they go to that particular individual.
“They said they set up the accused and left that sheath there. That’s a stretch.”
The touch DNA found on the knife sheath was a 99.98% match to trash Kohberger disposed of at his family’s house in Scranton, Pennsylvania.
In addition to the knife sheath, investigators recovered two blood samples at the off-campus home in Moscow, Idaho, on the morning of November 13, 2022.
Blood was found on a handrail inside the home where roommates Madison Mogen, 21, Kaylee Goncalves, 21, Xana Kernodle, 20, and Ethan Chapin, 20, were fatally stabbed to death in November 2022.
Moscow investigators recovered more blood on a glove outside the home.
The blood samples came from two unidentified but different men, not Kohberger’s.
Recent court filings also showed that DNA evidence from three different men was allegedly found under the left fingernails of Mogen.
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DNA EVIDENCE
Tests showed a three-person mixture and none of the DNA was linked to Kohberger.
NeJame told The U.S. Sun those details are critical areas for the defense to include to create reasonable doubt.
“By showing that other people could have or would have been there, that arguably starts casting doubt on the suspect, the primary suspect, the accused, as to whether it was him who did it, ” he added.
“It does bring in an ancillary area and that is, were there more than one person who was involved in in this situation, in this these horrific murders.”
NeJame believes the judge may allow the DNA evidence from the blood samples to be present at trial, but questioned the findings collected from Mogen’s fingernails.
“Blood is a critical part of the evidence here. Sadly, it’s gruesome, but you had blood splattering throughout the bedrooms of the victims,” NeJame said.
“You have clear DNA it is going to be your breadcrumbs that are going to lead you to either the person or people that did it or didn’t do it.”
NeJame called the fingernail DNA unrelated in the case because the four victims were out the night before and in various places.
“It’s entirely possible when you hug somebody, when you give them a light scratch or when you’re just affectionately when you’re dancing, and if you’re holding hands, and in a fun situation, all those things can potentially leave DNA,” NeJame said.
“We don’t know if it was fresh skin, which would arguably be much more critical than some shedding, that simply happened because somebody went and got their nails done earlier that day by a nail tech.
“You could have that person’s DNA under your nails and just because you’re going to have some minor shedding.
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“But nevertheless, with the complexity and the technology being what it is today, you could arguably pick up some DNA from some ancillary sources that are completely unrelated.
“So again, I think that without us knowing more, both sides are going to be making their arguments because obviously the defense wants it in, [but] the prosecution would say it’s irrelevant in material and they want it out.”
Nevertheless, NeJame believes state prosecutors have built a strong case to score a conviction despite the murder weapon never being recovered.
“The state’s done a really strong job of making sure that they’ve dotted their eyes and crossed their T’s,” he said.
“They’ve gotten search warrants across the board. It doesn’t look like they tripped over themselves.
“From what I can see, we don’t know everything, we’re not in the courtroom every day, but from all that I can see is they covered themselves.
“They got warrants. They got it done properly. They collected the evidence properly.
“With that said, they even went as far back as getting the search records on the computer, and showing that Amazon purchases were made of the knife, that unique knife, and that sheath.
“And so those are links which put a case together for the prosecution. I think, the prosecution has done its homework.”
Kohberger was arrested and charged with the murder of the four students in early 2023.
A judge entered a not guilty plea on Kohberger’s behalf during his arraignment in May 2023.
His trial is currently scheduled to start in August 2025.
University of Idaho murders timeline
On November 13, 2022, a brutal home invasion claimed the lives of four University of Idaho students.
Kaylee Goncalves, 21; Madison Mogen, 21; Xana Kernodle, 20; and Ethan Chapin, 20, were stabbed to death in their Moscow, Idaho, off-campus home.
A six-week manhunt ensued as cops searched for a suspect.
On December 30, 2022, Bryan Kohberger, 30, was arrested at his parents’ home in Pennsylvania – 2,500 miles away from the crime scene.
He was taken into custody and has been charged with four counts of first-degree murder.
Kohberger, a former criminal justice student at Washington State University, has been linked to the crime scene through phone records, his car’s location, and DNA evidence found at the home where the murders took place.
The house was demolished in December 2023 despite backlash from the victims’ families.
Kohberger is being held at Latah County Jail while he awaits trial.
On September 9, 2024, an Idaho judge ruled to move the upcoming murder trial out of Moscow after Kohberger’s lawyer argued that the town was prejudiced against him.
The state Supreme Court will decide the new venue and judge for the trial, which is expected to start in August 2025.
