(NewsNation) — NewsNation anchor Ashleigh Banfield commented on Bryan Kohberger admitting guilt to the 2022 murders of four University of Idaho students, calling him a “sick and twisted murderer.”
“It’s breathtaking to now know after 2 1/2 years of him saying, ‘It isn’t me, it’s someone else,’ that it was him,” Banfield said. “Legally, we can say it, because he said it. It just does not get old to see a dry hearing like this where we didn’t get the details or the motive, but we now know that is the sick man that did this.”
Kaylee Goncalves, 22; Madison Mogen, 21; Xana Kernodle, 20; and Ethan Chapin, 20, were all found with fatal stab wounds in an off-campus rental home in Moscow, Idaho, on Nov. 13, 2022. In December, Kohberger was arrested at his parents’ home in Pennsylvania and extradited to Idaho.
“Maybe he thought he could get away with it, maybe he thought he was smarter than all of us, but he’s had 2 1/2 years to realize this could have been the outcome, or maybe facing down five to seven marksmen with a target over his heart in the shooting chamber,” Banfield said.
Banfield broke down new information revealed from the case, which shows Kohberger parked his white Hyundai Elantra on the side of the house the students were living in and got into the house through the kitchen door. He killed Goncalves and Mogen first on the third floor of the house. As he was coming down from the third floor, he encountered Xana Kernodle and killed her.
Kohberger then made his way to Kernodle’s room, where he killed Ethan Chapin, who is believed to have been sleeping at the time. He then left the house at 4:20 a.m. and drove away at a high rate of speed where he could have lost control of his vehicle. He did not have front plates on the car, as the state of Pennsylvania does not require them. In the week after the murders, Kohberger went to the DMV and got Idaho plates.
The prosecution also did not know if Kohberger intended to kill all four of the victims that night and that maybe Mogen and Goncalves were the only targets of his.
Banfield said even though the new information was released, it is not enough of an explanation to the families.
Kohberger’s sentencing hearing is set for July 23, and the victims’ families will be allowed to address Kohberger and the court before the sentence is handed down.