Male DNA left on a button snap of a knife sheath was used to link a doctoral student in Washington state with the slayings of four University of Idaho students in November — and a surviving roommate came basically face-to-face with him the night of the killings, according to court documents unsealed Thursday.
A probable cause affidavit prepared by Moscow, Idaho, police Officer Brett Payne lays out how investigators used video surveillance in the area to connect the quadruple homicide with a white Hyundai Elantra driven by Bryan Kohberger, 28.
Upon arriving at the off-campus apartment house on Nov. 13, Payne wrote that he noticed a tan leather knife sheath laying on the bed next to one of the victims, Madison Mogen.
“The sheath was later processed and had ‘Ka-Bar’ ‘USMC’ and the United States Marine Corps eagle globe and anchor insignia stamped on the outside of it,” Payne wrote. “The Idaho state lab later located a single source of male DNA (suspect Profile) left on the button snap of the knife sheath.”
Investigators said they tracked Kohberger’s movements through his cellphone and also collected trash from his family’s residence in Pennsylvania. The DNA obtained from the trash and the sheath showed a connection, according to the affidavit.
Payne also said one of two other housemates who were inside the home at the time of the killings came in contact with the suspect, described as a “figure clad in black clothing and a mask that covered the person’s mouth and nose walking towards her.”
The roommate said she didn’t recognize him and she stood in “frozen shock phase” as he walked toward the back sliding glass door.
Kohberger was arrested Friday at his family’s home and charged with four counts of first-degree murder and burglary, after allegedly breaking into the students’ house with the intent to commit a felony.
The arrest of a suspect about seven weeks after the killings of the students — Mogen, 21; Kaylee Goncalves, 21; Xana Kernodle, 20; and Ethan Chapin, 20 — capped a period of fear and frustration in the college community of Moscow.
The murder weapon, believed to be a large fixed-blade knife, has still not been recovered, Moscow police said.
Kohberger, who was a doctoral student in the criminal justice and criminology department at nearby Washington State University at the time of his arrest, was not immediately known to have a connection with the victims.
The newly released court documents also don’t suggest a motive for the attack, which Moscow police have said from the beginning appeared to be “targeted,” although they didn’t know if it was a particular occupant or the home itself that was the killer’s focus.
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Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
