Nov. 20 (UPI) — Idaho murder suspect Bryan Kohberger can face the death penalty if convicted in the 2022 stabbing deaths of four University of Idaho students, a judge has ruled.
Bryan Kohberger, 29, could face the death penalty if he is found guilty in the stabbing murders of four college students in Idaho in 2022. In Tuesday’s ruling, a judge denied twelve defense motions that would have removed the death penalty from the case. Kohberger’s trial is scheduled to begin August 2025. Photo via Monroe County Correctional Facility/UPI | License Photo
Ada County Judge Steven Hippler denied 12 defense motions in Tuesday’s 55-page ruling after Kohberger’s defense team tried to get the death penalty removed from sentencing in the event of a guilty verdict.
Kohberger’s lawyers argued that time spent waiting on death row and the choice of execution methods, which include lethal injection or firing squad, amounted to cruel and unusual punishment. The attorneys also claimed Idaho’s death penalty laws violate an international treaty banning the torture of prisoners.
“There is no basis to depart from settled law upholding Idaho’s death penalty statute as constitutional,” Hippler wrote in his ruling. It is “consistent with contemporary standards of decency.”
Kohberger, 29, is charged with four counts of first-degree murder and four counts of felony burglary in the stabbing deaths of Kaylee Gonclaves, 21, Madison Mogen, 21, Xana Kernodle, 20, and Ethan Chapin, 20.
All four students were killed inside of an off-campus home on Nov. 13, 2022. Two other women inside the house were not harmed.
Kohberger was arrested in Pennsylvania following a six-week manhunt and extradited back to Idaho in January 2023. Six months later, prosecutors announced plans to seek the death penalty.
Kohberger, who is a former Washington State University criminology student, did not respond last year when he was asked to enter a plea in the case. A not guilty plea was entered for him by the judge.
Kohberger’s trial is scheduled to begin August 2025.
The Gonclaves family — whose daughter Kaylee was one of the four students murdered — released a statement Wednesday, responding to the judge’s ruling that leaves the death penalty sentencing option open in the event of a conviction.
“When we learned today that the motions to challenge the death penalty were denied, we were overjoyed — not just for our family, but for our friends, supporters and everyone who has shed a tear, made a donation or listened to the story of these beautiful children who were so senselessly taken from us,” Kristi and Steve Gonclaves told NonStop Local.“Justice is moving forward, and we pray that one day, in the not-so-distant future, it will be served.”