New details emerge surrounding Pennsylvania man and University of Idaho slayings

Text messages from the night four University of Idaho students were fatally stabbed more than two years ago provide new details about a gruesome case with a Pennsylvania man at the center.

“I’m freaking out,” Dylan Mortensen texted her roommate, Bethany Funke, around 4:30 a.m. on Nov. 13, 2022. A masked man was moving through their rental home, located just across the street from campus.

Prosecutors say that masked man was Bryan C. Kohberger, then 28 and a Pennsylvania native and Washington State University graduate student.

Mortensen and Funke holed up in one bedroom while unsuccessfully trying to reach their other roommates and figure out what was happening.

Court documents released Thursday show Mortensen’s texts to her roommates, frantically asking if they were awake, eventually begging them to answer their phones. Mortensen and Funke were the only survivors.

Ethan Chapin, 20; Xana Kernodle, 20; Madison Mogen, 21; and Kaylee Goncalves, 21; were stabbed to death — likely while sleeping, an autopsy report said — in the early morning hours of Nov. 13 in what police have called an “isolated” and “targeted” incident. Chapin, Kernodle’s boyfriend, was visiting. The roommates were friends and members of the university’s Greek system.

Their deaths left a close-knit community stunned and grieving. Over a month later, on Dec. 30, police announced Kohberger’s arrest on a fugitive from justice warrant at a residence in Chestnuthill Township, Monroe County. He was extradited to Idaho in January 2023.

» READ MORE: Suspect arrested in Pennsylvania for killings of 4 University of Idaho students

A trial is scheduled to start in August. Few additional details had been made public thanks to a wide-ranging gag order surrounding the case.

An unsealed court hearing transcript and Kohberger’s hiring of a new attorney with a specialty in forensic DNA hint that his defense team will likely focus on challenging DNA evidence recovered from the crime scene, which includes DNA taken from a knife sheath, CNN reported.

But until now, little had been revealed about the two surviving roommates and their actions the night of the slayings. Both Mortensen and Funke are expected to be called to testify at the trial.

Here’s what else we know.

Ethan Chapin, 20

Chapin was a member of the university’s Sigma Chi fraternity. He was a triplet and attended the University of Idaho with his two siblings. He had turned 20 in the weeks before his death. His fraternity established a memorial scholarship in his honor. Chapin and Xana Kernodle were dating. He was staying the night when they were killed. Chapin’s family also established the Ethan’s Smile foundation and scholarship program in his memory.

Xana Kernodle, 20

Kernodle was a junior majoring in marketing and a member of the Pi Beta Phi sorority. She grew up in Idaho but had also spent recent years in Arizona, her father told a local broadcast station. He added that his daughter was strong-willed and enjoyed college life and spending time with her friends.

Madison “Maddie” Mogen, 21

Mogen, 21, was a marketing major and member of the Pi Beta Phi sorority along with Kernodle. Her mother called her a “joy” and said she was struck by the kindness she showed everyone she encountered. “She just had that genuine love that’s just impossible to describe,” her mother said in an interview with the Today show. She had been best friends with Kaylee Goncalves since childhood.

Kaylee Goncalves, 21

Goncalves was best friends with Mogen. Their families described the duo as “completely inseparable.” She was set to graduate early and planned to move to Austin, Texas, where she had secured a job at a marketing firm, according to friends.

The roommates have been honored with the Made With Kindness foundation, which partners with colleges and universities to provide scholarship funds, grief wellness seminars, and campus safety resources.

University of Idaho students from the school’s College of Art and Architecture also designed and built a memorial garden on campus to honor the victims.

Kohberger, now 30, is a Pennsylvania native who’d been living in an apartment in Pullman, Wash., in 2022.

He was a graduate student and working as a teaching assistant in WSU’s criminology department. According to NewsNation, he was under investigation by the university for “behavioral problems” and a “sexist attitude towards women.”

In the late 2010s, he was enrolled as a psychology student at DeSales University’s Lehigh Valley campus, said Boyce Jubilan, an associate professor and chair of the school’s psychology program. Jubilan said Kohberger had an interest in forensic psychology.

Kohberger has a master’s degree and a bachelor’s degree from DeSales. The master’s degree is in criminal justice.

Kohberger’s family lives in Monroe County, in the Poconos north of Allentown.

That information has not been made public.

Prosecutors charged Kohberger with four counts of first-degree murder and one count of felony burglary with intent to commit murder. He could face the death penalty if convicted.

Recent court filings include prosecutors’ evidence for trial, including a mix of surveillance footage, phone records, and Kohberger’s banking details. A bank statement shows he made purchases from businesses including Dick’s Sporting Goods, Under Armour, and Walmart.

Court records also show that the DNA of three people was found under Mogen’s fingernails after she was killed, but it’s unclear if one of those three is Kohberger. Kohberger’s defense team says the DNA evidence is inconclusive and presenting this information at trial could confuse a jury.

Kohberger’s lawyers have asked the judge to rule out the death penalty, citing Kohberger’s having autism spectrum disorder.

Trial is scheduled to start Aug. 11 and is expected to last months.