What began as an ordinary fall semester for four University of Idaho students ended in an unthinkable tragedy. On November 13, 2022, news broke that Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin were found murdered. Their off-campus home was located at 1122 King Road in Moscow, Idaho. Their deaths left classmates, families, and the entire community searching for answers.Â
 The Lives Behind The Headlines
The four students who lost their lives that day were far more than a headline. They were loved, vibrant individuals with bright futures ahead. Three of the four victims lived at the King Road house: Madison, Kaylee, and Xana. The fourth, Ethan Chapin, was known as “basically living at the house” with his girlfriend, Xana.
Madison Mogen, 21, was a senior from Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. She was majoring in Marketing at the University of Idaho’s College of Business and Economics. Known for her warmth, loyalty, and radiant personality, she brought positivity to everyone around her. Friends described her as a compassionate and loyal person with a talent for making people laugh and feel cared for. Her lifelong best friend, Kaylee Goncalves, also attended the University of Idaho alongside her.Â
Kaylee Goncalves, 21, was a senior from Rathdrum, Idaho, preparing to graduate that December. She was remembered as a strong, determined, and loving individual. She was always up for an adventure, didn’t hold back on life, and protected the people she cared about. After accepting a marketing position in Texas, she moved out of the King Road house. That weekend, she came back to Moscow to visit friends and show Maddie her new car.
Xana Kernodle, 20, was a junior studying Marketing and was known for her lively, caring spirit. She was known for lifting the mood of a room and being loved by everyone, impacting those around her positively. Everyone around her admired her ability to balance school, work, and a busy social life. Xana shared a close and loving relationship with Ethan Chapin, who was also among the victims.
Ethan Chapin, 20, was a freshman majoring in Recreation, Sport, and Tourism Management. He was described by those who knew him as cheerful, kind, and adventurous. Deeply connected to his triplet siblings who also attended the university, Ethan brought positivity and light to everyone around him. His mother Stacey said “I mean, that kid has touched more lives,” she said. “We say in our family if we touch as many lives as he did in his 20 years, this world would be a better place. He was an amazing kid.”
The Timeline of That Night
On November 12, 2022, in Moscow, Idaho, the roommates returned home to King Road after enjoying game day activities. Some decided to stay in and rest while others got ready to go out. That evening, Ethan Chapin attended a formal event with his triplet siblings. He then dropped his sister off at her sorority house. Around the same time, B.F. and Maddie went to a Sigma Chi party where Ethan and Xana were also staying.
Later, D.M., one of the surviving roommates, left for the same event, passing Maddie on her way home. Kaylee was waiting for Maddie so they could go downtown together, and the two eventually made their way to the Corner Club. They stayed out until about 1:30 a.m., grabbed food from a truck, and got a ride home, arriving around 1:56 a.m. Ethan and Xana returned shortly before them, while B.F. and D.M. came home a little later.
At 3:41 a.m., an outdoor security camera picked up a female voice calling for “Murphy,” Kaylee’s dog, who was missing at the time. A few minutes later, at 3:56 a.m., a white Hyundai Elantra was seen entering the neighborhood, driving by the King Road house several times before leaving. Everyone in the house was said to be asleep, with the exception of Xana. Around 4:00 a.m., Xana’s DoorDash order arrived at the house. The driver reportedly spent a few minutes trying to find the correct address before marking the order as delivered. At 4:05 a.m., the same white Elantra was seen returning to the area, moving slowly before turning around and leaving again. By 4:07 a.m., the car was captured heading quickly back toward the King Road house.
At approximately 4:12 a.m., Xana’s phone showed brief activity on TikTok. A few minutes later, at 4:16 a.m., the same outdoor camera recorded the sound of soft whimpering and a loud thud. At 4:17 a.m., Murphy began barking, and the sound appeared to come from outside. Around 4:19 a.m., one of the surviving roommates, D.M., heard noises and opened her door to check. Between 4:19 and 4:20 a.m., she saw an unknown man dressed in black inside the home. Frightened, she quickly locked herself in her room and called B.F. to tell her what she had seen. During that same moment, at about 4:20 a.m., the white Hyundai Elantra was seen speeding away from the neighborhood.
Later that morning, around 11:45 a.m., the surviving roommate’s friends Emily Alandt and her boyfriend, Hunter Johnson, arrived at the house after receiving a call from D.M.. Emily later explained that they didn’t think anything serious was happening, and thought nothing about it because they had been called before. However, when they arrived, the situation was far worse than they could have ever imagined. Hunter went inside to check and discovered Ethan and Xana on the second floor. He told them very nicely to call 911 to report an unconscious person, trying not to alarm them. At 11:56 a.m., B.F. made the 911 call.Â
The Morning That Everything Changed
The reality of the tragedy became clear at that moment. When checking on the others in the house, Hunter came upon a heartbreaking scene where Ethan and Xana had been tragically stabbed to death—Xana on the floor, and Ethan still in the bed. In shock but trying to stay calm, he told the girls to get out of the house and call 911, telling them only that there was an unconscious person so they wouldn’t have to see what he had witnessed.
The group waited outside, scared and confused, until police arrived and searched the home. When officers entered, they found Maddie and Kaylee upstairs on the third floor, both tragically killed in Maddie’s bed. During the police’s search, the friends received no answers. Word got out about Xana and Ethan, but they still had no idea where Maddie and Kaylee were. Their phones were still pinging in the house, but they had not heard anything.
Ethan Chapin’s siblings had gotten the news that something horrible had happened, so they came to wait at the scene, along with other friends who arrived after seeing the commotion at the house. While sitting outside the King Road home, they got alerts on their phones from the University, issuing a shelter-in-place due to a homicide on King Road. They still wondered where Maddie and Kaylee were—until the second alert went out. This alert announced that four people had been murdered, this was the first way many of their friends and family learned what had happened.
The Tragedy That Unfolded
At approximately 4:07 a.m., a white Hyundai Elantra was seen traveling quickly toward the King Road house after making several passes through the neighborhood. According to court documents, the white Elantra parked in the parking lot behind the house, and the suspect entered through the sliding glass door on the second floor of the house. He then went up the stairs to the third floor, and fatally stabbed Maddie Mogen and Kaylee Gocavles, according to the prosecutor Bill Thompson. Then, at around 4:17 p.m., a security camera less than 50 feet from Xana Kernodle’s room picked up the sound of Murphy barking and distorted audio of what sounded like voices or a whimper followed by a loud thud, according to court documents.
It is said that Xana was still awake when Maddie and Kaylee were killed, and as the suspect was “either coming down the stairs or leaving, he encountered Xana and he ended up killing her,” Thompson ended up stating. After attacking Xana, the suspect turned to Ethan Chapin, who had been asleep in Xana’s room, taking his life as well.
After hearing the commotion, B.F. called D.M. and asked if she had heard the commotion. When that call ended, they tried calling two of the roommates, not knowing what had just unfolded. D.M. had opened her door a couple of times to try to see what was going on. The first time she opened her door, she thought she heard a voice saying “someone is here” but she saw nothing. The second time, she heard what she thought was crying coming from Xana’s room and an unknown male’s voice saying something like “it’s okay, I am going to help you.”
Soon after, “a 5 ’10” or taller, male not very muscular, but athletic build with bushy eyebrows” walked past her. She stood in a “frozen shock phase” as the suspect walked out the sliding glass door. She then began immediately texting B.F. and referencing someone in “like a ski mast almost” to which B.F. responds “Stfu.” After this B.F. texted D.M. and told her to “come to my room,” “Run.” D.M. was in B.F.’s room until their friends arrived to check out the house.
The EvidenceÂ
When the detectives entered the horrible crime scene, they discovered a major clue, a Ka-Bar knife sheath lying on the bed next to one of the victims. On this knife sheath there were traces of a male’s DNA, who couldn’t be identified – at first. They decided they were going to send it to a private lab to see if they could find a match on a public ancestry database, and it worked. Within a few days, a family tree of the DNA was being built. In the meantime, detectives noticed that surveillance footage caught a white Hyundai Elantra driving around the crime scene at the time of the murders. Four days after police asked other law enforcement to keep a lookout for this car, Washington State University Police said that they found at least one – registered to Bryan Kohberger.
Back in the lab, the family tree being built lead to the Kohberger family and their only son Bryan, whose car has already been discovered. Over a month after the murders, he became a prime suspect, leading detectives to gain search warrants for his phone and started tracking him.
At the time he was located in Pennsylvania, home for Christmas at his parents house. This is when agents retrieved some of the family’s trash. They ran DNA on it, and found that Kohberger’s father was likely the father of whoever left DNA on the knife sheath. With all of this evidence, Bryan Kohberger was arrested the next day, on December 30th, 2022. He had his first court appearance in January of 2023. It later came out that cell phone records revealed that he was “stalking the neighborhood,” and was possibly the unidentified person who had been watching at least one of the victims, as detailed in interviews police conducted with the two surviving roommates as well as a friend of that victim and the victim’s ex.
According to Thompson, phone records showed that he was in that area more than 20 times before the murders. He went on to say that these visits all occurred after 10 p.m.. “When there would be no legitimate reason for him to be over here to shop.” These trips were likely for “looking, surveilling, and stalking.” On the night of the murder, however, Kohberger turned off his phone before the crime and switched it back on shortly after, trying to avoid detection in the area. Thompson believes that Kohberger had previously broken into the home. Doing this, he knew exactly where to go, since the layout of the house is confusing. However, there is no evidence to prove this theory.
Court & Conclusion
In June 2023, prosecutors decided to pursue the death penalty. The trial was set to begin on August 18, 2025 after months of delays over what evidence would be admissible. Time crept closer and closer for trial, the world was waiting for justice. However, on July 2, 2025, Bryan Kohberger entered a guilty plea and accepted a plea deal. This ultimately spared him from the death penalty, leaving him with four life sentences. The deal was announced with a letter sent to the victims’ families, according to the Idaho Statesman. The Goncalves family, described the announcement as “very unexpected” and said they were “furious at the State of Idaho.”
“They have failed us. Please give us some time,” reads the post. In a statement shared with CNN, the Goncalves family said that they “weren’t even called about the plea; we received an email with a letter attached.” “After more than two years, this is how it concludes with a secretive deal and a hurried effort to close the case without any input from the victims’ families on the plea’s details,” reads the statement. They said victims’ families had been “treated as opponents from the outset.”
The hearing was set for July 23, 2025, where Kohberger got four consecutive life terms without the possibility of parole. The surviving roommates and victims’ families delivered emotional statements during the sentencing hearing held in a Boise courtroom. When given the opportunity to speak, Kohberger declined to do so.Â
If you want to learn more about the person responsible for taking these innocent lives, you can read here. What we know about Bryan Kohberger, the man charged in the Idaho quadruple murders
If you are interested in other mysteries, check out our latest blog on Who Assassinated President John F. Kennedy? & as always, check out our socials @UATwitch.
