Bryan Kohberger Seeks to Overturn Guilty Plea in Idaho University Murders

A man serving four consecutive life sentences for murdering four US university students is seeking to overturn his guilty plea, claiming he was coerced into confessing to crimes he says he did not commit, the New York Times has reported. Bryan Kohberger, who admitted last year to the November 2022 murders of University of Idaho students Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin, reportedly filed a petition for post-conviction relief in an Idaho court on Monday challenging his conviction. In a handwritten filing obtained by the NYT, the 31-year-old accused his former defense lawyers of providing ineffective counsel and using “coercion, disinformation, false promises, and the withholding of exculpatory discovery” to persuade him to accept the agreement. Kohberger claimed he had been “advised to lie” and told that whether he was actually guilty was unimportant. He also alleged that his lawyers frightened him and his family with what he described as “fabricated” stories about confinement in an “actual 8X8 death row cell,” while assuring him he would receive better treatment in prison if he admitted responsibility. “My actual innocence is my truth, and the plea, hinged on by false promises and blatant disinformation, MUST be withdrawn,” Kohberger said. He also cited what he described as previously withheld exculpatory evidence, including unidentified clumps of hair reportedly found in Chapin’s hand. The agreement spared Kohberger a possible death sentence by firing squad. He was sentenced to four consecutive life terms without parole and an additional ten years for burglary. He has never publicly explained a motive for the killings. The four students were stabbed to death at an off-campus home in Moscow, Idaho, on November 13, 2022. Kohberger, then a PhD criminology student at nearby Washington State University, was arrested weeks later. Kaylee Goncalves’ family rejected Kohberger’s latest claims, saying he had previously “never claimed he was uninformed or pressured” and describing renewed attention on the convicted killer as “the real tragedy,” according to the BBC. In a separate statement criticizing the New York Times for giving him a platform, the family reportedly called Kohberger “the mosquito you just can’t seem to swat.” The Goncalves family has long opposed the plea agreement, while the families of Chapin and Mogen reportedly supported it to avoid a lengthy trial.