The booming business of true crime suffered a setback last week, when Bryan Kohberger, the man accused of the 2022 mass slaying of University of Idaho students Kaylee Goncalves, Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle, and Madison Mogen, changed his plea to “guilty.” Social media users who built their summers around commenting on—or even traveling to—his trial appear at a loss, seemingly unaware that August in Idaho is far less fun than it sounds. But those whose business model revolves around online speculation about every move Bryan Kohberger makes will only have one more chance: His sentencing hearing on July 23, after which he’s expected to serve four consecutive life sentences at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution, notorious as one of the most unpleasant prisons in the US—and as a place where visitors are tightly restricted.
Kohberger likely made that plea deal to avoid the death penalty, but it also has an unintended consequence: It’s put an endpoint on a media circus that’s plagued Moscow, Idaho since November 13, 2022, when four students were stabbed to death in their college residence. In the days that followed, amateur sleuths descended on the small town virtually and in person, falsely identifying suspects and spinning theories.
It was professional detective work and science that led police to their suspect, not TikTok. Genetic genealogy tools were used to link DNA on a knife sheath to Kohberger, a PhD student in criminology at nearby Washington State University. That discovery was made almost seven weeks after the crime, and by then, rumors had reached a fever pitch.
Kohberger’s arrest did little to quell the media obsession with the case, as Kathleen Hale reported for Vanity Fair at the time. That he “stood silent” instead of entering a plea when he was arraigned in 2023 took speculation to yet another level.
By the end of 2023, the house where Goncalves, Chapin, Kernodle, and Mogen died had been demolished, an effort, University of Idaho officials said, “to decrease further impact on the students who live in that area.” The vacant residence had become a true crime tourism destination, as well as a stop for certain types of social media users; it was also “the grim reminder of the heinous act that took place there,” University of Idaho President Scott Green said in a statement.
That left Kohberger as the sole remaining representation of the crime, as conspiracy theorists grew inflamed by delays for his trial. But a little more than a week ago, Fourth District Judge Steven Hippler ruled that a delay requested by Kohberger’s defense team was denied, and opening arguments would begin on August 18. Hippler even acknowledged that the time between his arrest and trial are why misinformation and conspiracy theories continue to circulate.
“The longer the public is made to sit and wait for the facts to come out at trial, the more time there is for inflammatory, speculative stories, movies and books to circulate and more time for prior ones to be rebroadcast, purchased, viewed and consumed by the public,” he wrote. Kohberger’s plea arguably turns that firehose of content off—or at least, way down. And his incarceration should slow it to a trickle.
In Idaho, people convicted of crimes as serious as his are typically sent to IMSI, which per its website is intended “to confine Idaho’s most disruptive male residents.” According to the Idaho Statesman, the Kuna, Idaho prison was the site of an inmate uprising last year over claims of filth, lack of medical care, and mandated recreation time spent instead in “cages.” Claims about conditions within the maximum security facility were considered serious enough that the prison scored a spot on Security Journal Americas’ 2024 list of the “15 Worst Prisons in America.”
It’s also a place where true crime podcasters and their ilk are unlikely to tread, assuming Kohberger agreed to an interview (unlikely!). According to the Idaho Department of Corrections, anyone who seeks to visit any of IMSI’s 549 inmates must first submit to a background check and submit a visiting application.
If approved, the rules get even stricter: The only personal possessions visitors are allowed are their photo identification, money for vending machines, and their car keys. Layered looks, such as coats or sweatshirts over t-shirts, are not allowed, as the outer garments could conceal contraband.
Most importantly, “No cell phones, beepers, laptop/palm computers, cameras, or other electronic equipment is allowed,” which means no recordings, no selfies…and if you’re stuck in a pre-visit line or waiting area (which, in my experience, often happens), no phone to scroll through while you cool your heels. You’re trapped with your own thoughts, sometimes for hours. One wonders how many aspiring true crime influencers could handle such a challenge.
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From the Archive: The Idaho Murders
The post Bryan Kohberger Likely To Spend The Rest Of His Life In One Of The “Worst Prisons in America” appeared first on Vanity Fair.
