Brian Kohbarger appeared in court as potential jurors threatened to ‘burn down the courtroom’ if he was acquitted, prompting lawyers to seek a transfer. Today we will discuss about Bryan Kohberger wikipedia: Murder trial,killing Ethan Chapin,Xana Kernodle,Reddit.
Bryan Kohberger wikipedia: Murder trial,killing Ethan Chapin,Xana Kernodle,Reddit
A judge is considering whether a criminology student accused of murdering four University of Idaho students in the fall of 2022 can get a fair trial in the same county where the murders took place.
Latah County District Judge John Judge heard arguments Thursday about whether Brian Kohbarger’s trial, tentatively set for next June, should be moved to Ada County, about 300 miles south and across the border from Idaho. Boise is home to the capital of. At the end of the hearing, the judge said that this would be one of the most important decisions he would make and that he would study the law and arguments before delivering the verdict.
Attorneys for the 29-year-old Kohbarger called defense experts who said potential Latah County jurors were likely to have biased views of the case because of the intense media coverage and would be unable to render an impartial verdict.
One of the experts, a social psychologist at Eastern Washington University, said research has shown that the best way to avoid a potentially biased jury is to change venues.
Amani Al-Alayli, a psychologist, recommended that the trial be moved as far away from Latah County as possible.
In a filing this month, attorneys said media interest and severe “mob mentality” against Kohbarger within Latah County were sufficient justification for a change in venue. He included some responses received from a telephone survey conducted as part of the request to move the lawsuit forward.
According to the defense expert who conducted the survey, one respondent said, “Chances are there will be a riot and he won’t be out long because someone will bring the good guy to justice.” Another commented: “They’ll burn the court down.”
Kohbarger’s public defender, Anne Taylor, wrote in her request for a change of venue that “the copious media coverage in Latah County is not just a passing story.”
“The content is not benign, but rather inflammatory, emotion-fueled and often misleading, false and poorly sourced,” he said. “There is no reasonable belief.
Murder trial
Attorneys for Brian Kohbarger, accused of murdering four University of Idaho students in 2022, argued Thursday to move his trial out of Latah County, saying he was unable to provide an impartial jury for his long-awaited trial. Will be.
The hearing is the latest update in a tough two-year legal battle to get Kohlbarger’s case before a jury, which has seen multiple pre-trial hearings and complaints of the slow pace from victims’ families. The trial, in which Kohbarger could face the death penalty, is currently scheduled for June 2025.
Kohbarger has pleaded not guilty to four counts of first-degree murder.
Attorneys for Kohbarger, 29, argued in court that the trial should be moved out of Latah County because of the “mob mentality” that threatened the safety of their client and the court. They’re hoping to move testing more than 300 miles away to Ada County, home to Boise, the state’s capital and largest city.
“The traumatized city of Moscow is filled with deeply prejudiced opinions of guilt,” the defense wrote.
Thursday’s hearing ended without a decision from Judge John Judge, who said he would review “everything” and “study the law again,” which he said would take time.
“I will try my best. This is a challenge,” the judge said at the end of the hearing.
Bryan Kohberger wikipedia: Murder trial,killing Ethan Chapin,Xana Kernodle,Reddit
The defense says unidentified residents of Latah County, where the murders took place, told defense experts in telephone surveys whether Kohlbarger should be convicted:
• “They will burn the court. Outrage would be a mild description.”
• “They’ll probably find him and kill him.”
• “Chances are there will be a riot and he won’t be able to hold out much longer because someone will bring that good boy to justice.”
Defense witness Amani Al-Alayli, a professor of social psychology at Eastern Washington University, told the court that it would be almost impossible to find potential jurors in Latah County not tainted by media coverage of the case.
killing Ethan Chapin
Brian Kohbarger, the suspect in the murders of four University of Idaho students, returned to court Thursday as a judge considered whether to change the venue for his trial.
Kohbarger’s lawyers hope to move the trial to a different county, arguing that the local jury pool in Latah County, which covers the college town of Moscow, was tainted by pre-trial publicity.
Defense attorneys surveyed Latah County residents and said their results showed Kohbarger was under “pressure to convict” so severe that the venue could not possibly be fair.
Bryan Kohberger wikipedia: Murder trial,killing Ethan Chapin,Xana Kernodle,Reddit
The defense said one defendant replied that they would “burn down the court” if he was not convicted. According to the defense, the same survey received “very few emotional” responses from people living close to Boise, where Kohbarger’s attorneys had suggested moving the trial.
“The traumatized city of Moscow is rife with deeply prejudiced opinions of guilt,” defense lawyer Alisa Masoth said in a filing this month.
Prosecutors have said that the case is of national and international interest and that the case has been widely covered in Boise, so changing the venue would not solve any problems.
Prosecutors argued in a filing this month that the defense “failed to establish that a fair and impartial trial could not occur in Latah County.”
The family of victim Kaylee Goncalves wants the trial to remain in Latah County.
For Kristy Goncalves, mother of Kaylee Goncalves, all citizens of Lata County are victims.
He remembered seeing huge crowds of people, some of them crying, at the University of Idaho’s Healing Garden, which opened to the public last week.
“Local residents deserve a degree of healing and a degree of justice,” he told ABC News on Thursday.
Steve Goncalves, Kaylee Goncalves’ father, said, “Anybody can find 12 people who can go into that courtroom without a verdict. This is America.”
Moscow Mayor Art Betge
Xana Kernodle
Idaho murder suspect Brian Kohbarger appeared in court Thursday as his lawyers argued for his trial to be moved — after it was revealed that potential jurors threatened to “burn down the court” if they found him not guilty. Had given.
Kohbarger sat at the defense table inside a Moscow, Idaho courtroom — wearing a blue shirt and black jacket — as his lawyers called witnesses to move his trial from Latah County, where the brutal murders occurred 300 miles away, to Ada County. Were. ,
Kohbarger’s defense attorneys said there was no way for their client to get a fair trial in the sparsely populated county because they had conducted a survey of residents there who said they would rather be convicted if he were not convicted in the fatal stabbing. They would riot and “burn the court”. Four University of Idaho students in 2022.
The first three expert witnesses called by the defense included a media monitoring analyst, a psychology professor, and a trial consultant, who testified about how the sheer volume of media reports and the proximity to where the murders took place resulted in an impartial jury. It will be difficult to choose members. ,
James Todd Murphy – who is president of a media monitoring and analysis service – said that due to the relatively small population of 25,000 potential jurors in Latah County, it is more likely that they will be exposed to large amounts of reports by local media outlets. Have come. That compares to the much larger 300,000 population of potential jurors in Ada County.
Dr. Amani El-Alayly, a psychology professor at Eastern Washington University, testified that people who are exposed to publicity about a case are more likely to be convicted, even if they claim they were impartial. Can happen.
He said that due to the fact that Moscow is a small community shaken by the murders, it would be “difficult” if not “arguably impossible” to select jurors from the jury who might be objective.
Third Witness, Dr. Brian Edelman – Nearly 30 Years of Trial Advice
El-Alayly said jurors exposed to publicity before a trial are more likely to convict because they superficially process media coverage, including fear-inducing headlines.
Additionally, the professor said, people in smaller communities like Latah County are more likely to be influenced by statements from people in authority. He said a police chief publicly expressing certainty about capturing the right suspect is automatically taken as the truth.
“Do you mean that when we go to trial in a room full of potential jurors, a vast majority of them will have a prejudice against Mr. Kohbarger, even before we seat him?” defense attorney Anne Taylor asked.
“Yes, I do. And we’ve seen the pictures, these ominous headlines. He can’t help but make that connection,” Al-Alayi said.
Bryan Kohberger wikipedia: Murder trial,killing Ethan Chapin,Xana Kernodle,Reddit
Another defense witness, James Todd Murphy, president of media monitoring and analysis service TrueScope, said the company has been collecting data on the case from multiple news sources and markets since February 2023.
Murphy told the court that his analysis showed that media coverage in Latah County on the Kohbarger case generated twice the number of views per capita than Ada County. This is due to the smaller pool of eligible jurors as well as the greater amount of coverage in the county.
Bryan Kohberger wikipedia: Murder trial,killing Ethan Chapin,Xana Kernodle,Reddit
“You may have heard the phrase ‘This story has legs’ – a story that’s extreme, unique, unusual, has bigger legs than, say, the high school football score you’d hear on the Friday night 10 o’clock news. Are,” he said. , “This type of story will stick in the mind and be of interest up to and beyond the conclusion of this case.”
Media coverage of the Kohbarger case — from January 2023 to August 2024 — in Ada County has lagged Latah County by 50% or more in terms of the amount of coverage for most cases, Murphy said. And interest in the story is not waning, he added.
Under questioning by prosecutor Ashley Jennings, who cited charts from her research, Murphy admitted.
