Sister of Idaho murder victim speaks out as perpetrator seeks to withdraw plea

Aubrie Goncalves, 20, spoke to TODAY on Aug. 4 about her decision to speak publicly nearly four years after her sister Kaylee and three other students were killed in an off-campus house in November 2022. She said she had remained silent as a teenager but now wants to keep her sisters’ memories alive as Kohberger seeks to withdraw his guilty plea and pursue a trial.

Kohberger, who pleaded guilty in 2025 and received four life sentences, filed a handwritten petition in Ada County District Court asking the court to vacate the plea, claiming he was misled into entering a false plea. He is represented by a public defender and told The New York Times that “my actual innocence is my truth.”

“I wasn’t planning on saying anything today, but after seeing that the man who admitted in court to murdering four innocent people now wants to withdraw his guilty plea, I couldn’t stay silent,” Aubrie Goncalves wrote in a Facebook statement.

“For him, this may be another legal filing. For me, it’s another day without my sister,” she added.

Aubrie’s older sibling, Alivea Goncalves, also commented, saying the defendant’s continued legal actions “revictimize” the victims’ families and that the case will not be resolved until the defendant is no longer alive.

The family participated in a three-part Netflix documentary, “The Idaho Murders: College Nightmare,” released shortly before the petition. Their father, Steve Goncalves, reiterated his desire for a trial, arguing that the plea deal prevented a full accounting of the crime and that the state missed an opportunity to set a legal precedent.

Kohberger’s petition arrives as the family continues to seek justice and public attention to the victims’ lives, while the case remains under review by the Idaho courts.