(Photo credit: Kyle Green-Pool/Getty Images)
One year after Bryan Kohberger was sentenced to life in prison for the 2022 murders of four University of Idaho students, a new Netflix documentary examines the brutal crime. It comes as Kohberger, in an interview with the New York Times, proclaimed his innocence and said he had filed a petition to withdraw his guilty plea.
The Idaho Murders: College Nightmare, which dropped on Netflix on July 29, chronicles the crime and its aftermath, including the weeks-long manhunt for the then-suspected killer. It pays special attention to the victims — Madison Mogen, 21; Kaylee Goncalves, 21; Xana Kernodle, 20; and Ethan Chapin, 20 — who were found stabbed to death in their off-campus home in the quiet town of Moscow, Idaho, according to Netflix’s Tudum.
“At a time when so much attention has been focused on the case itself, I felt it was important to create something that brings the focus back to who they were, the lives they lived, and the love that still surrounds them,” director Skye Borgman, whose previous documentaries include Unknown Number: The High School Catfish, told Tudum.
Here’s a refresher on the Idaho murders case and where it stands now.
The night of the murders
On Nov. 13, 2022, just after 4 a.m., investigators say Kohberger, then a 28-year-old criminology PhD student at Washington State University, entered the off-campus rental house at 1122 King Road in Moscow through a sliding kitchen door.
Kohberger went up to the third floor and killed Mogen and Goncalves with a knife, leaving the knife sheath — which would later connect him to the crime — next to Mogen’s body. After killing Mogen and Goncalves, he encountered Kernodle, who had recently received a food delivery, and killed her. He then killed Kernodle’s boyfriend, Chapin, who had been sleeping in her room.
From left to right: University of Idaho students Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin.
(Idaho Statesman graphic/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
There were two other roommates in the house that night: Dylan Mortensen and Bethany Funke. According to court documents, Mortensen said she woke up to crying and strange noises. She opened her bedroom door and saw a man dressed in black walking toward her, prompting her to lock herself in the room.
Phone records show Mortensen tried calling and texting the victims, but got no response. She then woke up Funke, who slept through the stabbings, with text messages telling her that a man wearing what looked like a ski mask had been in the house, CNN reported. Mortensen joined Funke in her room, and the two tried texting and calling their roommates, who did not respond.
A 911 call was placed just before noon to report that Kernodle was unconscious. Moscow police arrived to find the four victims dead.
How was Bryan Kohberger caught?
To this day, investigators have not identified any known connection between Kohberger and the victims.
The DNA found on the knife sheath did not initially match anyone in the FBI’s database. Investigators sent the DNA sample to a private lab to search for genetic relatives through publicly available genealogy databases. The search was successful, and investigators began building family trees to identify possible suspects, WPBF 25 News reported.
Meanwhile, in mid-November, investigators were also looking for a white Hyundai Elantra that surveillance cameras captured driving around the crime scene at the time of the murders. Washington State University police identified one registered to Bryan Kohberger, making him a key suspect.
A makeshift memorial at the site of the quadruple murder in Moscow, Idaho.
(David Ryder via Getty Images)
Using search warrants for Kohberger’s phone records, investigators tracked him to his parents’ Pennsylvania home, which he visited in late December. They recovered trash from outside the home and a lab confirmed that the DNA found on the trash belonged to the biological father of the male whose DNA was found on the knife sheath, according to ABC News. Kohberger was arrested on Dec. 30, 2022.
Kohberger’s trial
Kohberger was charged with four counts of first-degree murder and one count of burglary, charges that made him eligible for the death penalty. He accepted a plea deal on June 30, 2025, and formally pleaded guilty in court on July 2, 2025.
Kohberger spoke publicly in court for the first time at the July 2 hearing, answering “yes” when the judge asked whether he had killed each of the victims and “guilty” when asked for his pleas to the charges.
On July 23, 2025, the families of the victims spoke directly to Kohberger during his sentencing.
“You’re a delusional, pathetic, hypochondriac loser who thought you were so much smarter than everybody else,” said Alivea Goncalves, sister of Kaylee Goncalves. “You aren’t special or deep, not mysterious or exceptional. … No one thinks you are important.”
Kohberger was sentenced to four consecutive life sentences for the murders, as well as the maximum penalty of 10 years for burglary. He did not receive the death penalty.
Has Kohberger ever explained his motive?
No, he has not. Although prosecutors could have required Kohberger to explain his motive as part of his plea deal to avoid the death penalty, they ultimately chose not to.
“I don’t believe there is anything that would come out of his mouth that would be the truth,” Thompson said at a news conference after Kohberger’s sentencing. “I don’t believe there is anything that would come out of his mouth that wouldn’t be self-serving, and I don’t believe that there’s anything that would come out of his mouth that would not further victimize the families.”
What is Kohberger saying now?
Just over a year after he was sentenced, in an interview with the New York Times published on July 27, Kohberger proclaimed his innocence and said he was filing a petition to withdraw his guilty plea, claiming he was misled into confessing to the killings.
“My actual innocence is my truth, and the plea, hinged on by false promises and blatant disinformation, MUST be withdrawn,” he said in a statement provided to the newspaper. It marked the first time that he had commented on the case since his sentencing.
Speaking by phone from the Idaho Maximum Security Institution, Kohberger told the Times that “a lot went wrong” during plea negotiations and that now he “wants to be heard.” He also said he has an “absolute claim of innocence.”
In a statement responding to Kohberger’s claims, the Goncalves family compared Kohberger to a “mosquito you just can’t seem to swat.”
“The real tragedy is this: If even a fraction of the energy spent trying to free a guilty man were directed toward honoring the victims, there would be statues of them on every corner, parks bearing their names, and days set aside to remember the lives they lost at the hands of a narcissist,” the Goncalves family said.
The Idaho Murders: College Nightmare is on Netflix now.