Idaho murder defendant granted evidentiary hearing to challenge guilty plea
Bryan Kohberger, who pleaded guilty to the 2022 University of Idaho killings, will have a new evidentiary hearing on June 17, 2027, after filing a post-conviction relief petition.
A court has scheduled an evidentiary hearing for June 17, 2027, allowing Bryan Kohberger to contest the guilty plea he entered in 2022 for the murders of four University of Idaho students. Kohberger, who was arrested in 2022 for the stabbing deaths of roommates Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle, and Kernodle's boyfriend Ethan Chapin, pleaded guilty in July 2025, resulting in four consecutive life sentences and an additional ten-year term for burglary. The plea agreement removed the possibility of the death penalty. In a recent petition for post-conviction relief, Kohberger, then a criminology student at Washington State University, alleges that he was misled and pressured into a false confession and that exculpatory information was withheld, though he has not presented new evidence. The hearing will determine whether the plea can be withdrawn.