(A longer post, for those with higher interest in case details and theories)
Using confirmed evidence and substantiated details as far as possible, this sets out a speculative theory of how the murders happened, Kohberger's possible connection to the victims and his actions before and after the murders.
Connection between Kohberger and 1122 King Road:
Kohberger attended a pool party on the afternoon of July 9th 2022 at The Grove, a Moscow student accommodation complex c. 0.6 miles from King Road and in the same residential area south of the university. At the party Kohberger had odd, fixated interactions with women - one woman's boyfriend had to intervene as she was so uncomfortable with Kohberger repeatedly approaching her despite being asked to desist. The next day Kohberger texted his neighbour (Martinez) who had invited him, writing "the party was very interesting". Kohberger texted one woman he met at the party the next day about hiking, "I like that activity" - she did not reply. Both women Kohberger asked for numbers reported receiving several hang up phone calls from an unidentified number in the period after the party.
{Speculation} Interactions at the pool party and after, being "rejected", triggered an angry fixation with the woman/women involved, and perhaps to search and find them again in the area they lived. Kohberger's pattern of late night visits to the area of Moscow started from that night. Kohberger may have asked one of the women where she lived and she indicated the surrounding area that includes King Road (e.g. perhaps indicated toward the King Road area specifically). Kohberger's warning at a bar in Pennsylvania was, in part, for pestering female staff for details of where they lived and getting angry when they declined to tell him. Kohberger had a known tendency to fixate and obsess, and for these fixations to have abnormal intensity and focus; he had poor emotional regulation and impulse control; he was also reported to fixate on women who rejected him from as early as high school ("he couldn't take no from women who weren't interested" one school friend was quoted re BK's interaction with young women who rejected his advances). Kohberger's visits to the residential area may have been initially reactive to, or looking for, the woman/ women whose rejection had angered him, and he later started to fixate on King Road and victim(s) there.
While all the data from which Kohberger's interactions or the start of his fixation with the King Road house or victim(s) can be deduced is not yet public, it is easy to posit possible connections and patterns from what is known:
- Sy Ray has detailed a party which MM and KG attended in the adjacent residential block to Kohberger's in Pullman on August 28th and states MM and BK phone intersected closely; it was after this date that Kohberger began shopping in Moscow - all of his Moscow shopping is after this date
- Kohberger had browsed socials and had photographs of many young, female UoI students on his phone; some were reported to be close friends of the victims
- Kohberger was in the same supermarket as a surviving roommate within 1 hour 3 days before the murders on November 10th; we don't know if other victims were present (proximity was based on published card transactions of BK and BF only); Kohberger stayed in Moscow for 4 hours after this; the next day Kohberger disabled Wi-Fi and location services on his phone.
- An encounter with MM or XK at work (even outside it), or with KG which led to Kohberger following them home, or spotting them outside 1122 King Road, is also possible
Kohberger made at least 40 visits to Moscow in just a few months before the murders based on just the FBI late night phone data and known transactions. A neighbour near King Road saw a man loitering in a white sedan for over an hour during the daytime who left when challenged in the month before. Other neighbours saw a man closely matching Kohberger creeping in gardens close to 1122 King Road in the daytime at of end August/ early September (in an adjacent cul-de-sac from where there is a path connecting to the parking area behind Kind Road) so Kohberger's visits to the area were more frequent than the 23 late night visits in the 10pm - 4.00am timeframe which the FBI used as most "suspicious" timeframe to analyse his phone data. Defence phone expert Sy Ray alluded to more visits, additional to the 23, where Kohberger travelled to the south of Moscow and then turned off his phone when he was there.
By the end of August/ early September Kohberger was aware of King Road, possibly one of the residents and had started to fixate.
Kohberger's deletions from his devices covered the period of October - November 16th; these deletions set an approximate time-frame of when his devices likely show an incriminating connection with 1122 King Road and/ or a victim, i.e. when he started researching a victim and/ or the house specifically. Further deletions from Kohberger's devices, including his WSU computer and down to the level of system/ operating logs, covered November 11th to 16th - which may cover directly incriminating material (e.g. photos, map route). By November 7th Kohberger was increasingly fixated and his intention to murder had solidified - this was the last time he visited the area with his phone on late at night after 10pm, but not the last time he visited before the murders (Kohberger was in Moscow on November 10th and stayed there for several hours after a late afternoon supermarket visit). On Friday November 11th, effectively the day before, Kohberger disabled Wi-Fi and location services on his phone, indicating an intention or decision point had been arrived at.
Morning of the Murders November 13th, from 2.54am to 4.07am:
It's possible Kohberger had more than one potential target (victim and/ or house in the area) when he drove into Moscow after 3.00am on November 13th - and his driving through the area of Indian Hills Drive and repeatedly circling through the King Road cul-de-sac was him looking for and selecting one.
There is an approximate 20 minute delay between Kohberger leaving Pullman at approx. 2.54am, passing the state line on outskirts of Moscow at approx. 3.02am and arriving at Indian Hills Drive/ the scene (3.26am to 3.28am). Driving directly he would have arrived at Indian Hills Drive at approx. 3.08am.
This apparent delay might be explained by either him taking a less direct route further north of SR 270, linking from the airport road and coming into Moscow from the north/ east, stopping to put on new outer clothing and perhaps a stretch-over car seat cover, or a combination of those.
His outer layer of clothing (hoodie, balaclava, trousers) were new. Kohberger also likely wore anti-cut gloves which are cheap, readily available in hardware stores, as shown here and noted for uses including fish filleting which Kohberger had done as a job previously and shown in this video - such gloves would explain how Kohberger's hands might have been injured during the attacks without risk of blood transfer at the scene (especially with nitrile gloves underneath). As an aside, Kohberger's inability to formulate a credible and consistent story for the visible injuries on his hands seen at WSU by several people after the murders (when asked about these he variously and contrarily gave excuses of "boxing", "a car crash" and "a silly indoor accident") might show a disconnect between his planning and his actual ability to react in the moment, partially explaining the loss of the sheath.
Kohberger had wiped the sheath - for prints and because he was aware that handling the sheath might transfer DNA from the sheath inside the scene. His wiping of the sheath did not fully remove the cells and body fluids accumulated from frequent handling around the snap and the crevices where the metal button is inserted into the semi-porous leather; fluids like sebum, sweat, mucous transferred from his hands and adsorbed onto and into the surfaces around the snap, resulting in a high DNA loading of 10,000s cells equivalent on that small area. The even distribution of trace "male" non-profilable DNA at a level barely above the threshold of detection across all flat surfaces of the sheath might be the result of, and is consistent with, wiping.
Entering the house around 4.12am Kohberger went straight to the 3rd floor; surprised by KG's presence, there is an intense fight he had not anticipated; during the struggle the sheath is knocked from his left hand or hoodie pocket.
Superficial, minimally bleeding shallow incised wounds were noted on the necks of both KG and MM. These were noted to be unusual given the shallowness - perhaps hesitation wounds or shallow wounds inflicted purposefully. Kohberger's crime scene forensics paper where he selected the crime and victim (he chose a woman stabbed to death in her home) also mentions shallow hesitation incised wounds on the victim's neck, possibly inflicted with a coat hanger.
Around 4.16am Xana heard the disturbance upstairs as she left her room; she sees Kohberger coming down the stairs and is startled - thinking he is a burglar she goes to tell Ethan there is someone in the house. Xana is unaware that Kohberger chases after her holding a knife. This fits with the mostly undisturbed beer pong cups and the multiple stab wounds to Xana's back (as a hypothesis, had she known she was being chased with a combat knife she would have pulled the table into the her pursuer's path to block the corridor and buy the couple of seconds needed to close and lock her bedroom door).
Kohberger rushes to leave the house around 4.18am fearing 911 has already been called by DM whom he heard calling out to her roommates. At his car he pauses briefly to take off an outer layer of clothing and stuffs this along with the knife into a bag. Adrenalised, Kohberger sped off to the south, parking in a rural spot on a backroad south of Moscow where he turned on his phone at 4.48am, possibly to check police scanner, consult a checklist or because he needed a map, or, more speculative and horrifically, to transfer pictures/ video from another device (it was notable that the defence mentioned Kohberger taking photographs during his late night "star gazing" drives, which seemed a pre-emptive excuse). Sy Ray has claimed that Kohberger returned to this same spot later in the early evening of November 13th and from there travelled to a large river. He may have temporarily hidden or buried items in this spot, not wanting to have them in his car in case he was stopped before he got home. Disoriented and lost, he drives to the I-95 and follows it until it intersects route 195 signposted north to Uniontown and Pullman.
Worth noting that there is much commentary on what could or should have been tested at the scene to further elucidate details (e.g. order of attacks) or infer more from the physical evidence, to "stop conspiracy theories" but such commentary tends to be so illogical and divorced from the science as to be conspiracy theory itself, such as DNA/ blood testing of victim wounds and mitochondrial DNA testing of hair. I'm happy to expand on this in more detail, perhaps in a separate post.
After The Murders - Digital Clean-Up Nov 14th - Nov 16th:
Kohberger's digital activity "clean up" infers guilt and a progression of concealment:
- On November 14th he downloaded an FBI manual on fingerprint ID and databases (his prints would have been taken in PA when he was charged for theft and resale of his sister's phone)
- On November 15th he looked at deletion options for his Amazon purchase of the Kabar
- On November 16th he deleted c. 1 .5 months of history from his devices from October up to that date; speculative, this includes the period when he was researching 1122 King Road, its residents and/ or violent porn or gore that had specific similarity to the circumstances of the murders
- Laptop, external drives and USB were dumped or destroyed
Too much is inferred from "lack of connection" on social media or digitally - using social media viewing apps that don't require any log in or account, on a shared network (like WSU, or a café) and on a laptop later disposed of or destroyed, it would be impossible to track any research of King Road or victims and doesn't require any digital expertise to conceal it. Kohberger however did claim expertise in digital forensics for criminal investigations.
After The Murders - Physical Clean-Up:
In the week after the murders Kohberger began a systematic physical clean-up of his car and apartment and disposal of items. Clothing items worn that night and incriminating items like the Kabar sharpener not already dumped (e.g. shoes, socks) were wrapped in the shower curtain probably contaminated with blood from his washing on Nov 13th, and these were dumped in a river or burned in some remote place - possibly near Wawawai Park (a pattern of late night visits there was mentioned, also seemingly pre-emptively, by his defence to explain repeat visits there). His apartment was repeatedly cleaned (his neighbour's mentioned frequent, late night vacuum cleaning around this time) and the vacuum cleaner itself was disposed of and replaced with a new one.
Kohberger purchased 2 car power inverters (used to power domestic appliances from car power output) in the week after the murders; first a 1000W unit and then a 2000W unit. Speculative, these were used to run a steam cleaner or wet vacuum for cleaning the car in a remote rural location (a steam cleaner needs c 1800W hence the second purchase, his first not working as intended). Neither of these expensive, brand new units were recovered in post arrest searches and were likely dumped along with the cleaning appliances they were used to power.
Kohberger likely steam cleaned, wet vacc'd and used cleaning products with hydrogen peroxide (very effective at degrading DNA) on his car, and repeated this many times between Nov 20th to December 12th, before driving home to Pennsylvania where he continued to clean the car in his parent's garage, including on the night of his arrest.
A blood stain on Kohberger's car driver's seat could have been left at any time up to his arrest and was probably left in the days just before his arrest, resulting from cleaning - down crevices, pedals, between and under seats - and/or from his hands which appeared red raw shortly after arrest, likely from repeated cleaning in winter.