On October 29th, 2010, a group of four people were brutally murdered in a sleepy college town in Idaho. The only suspect is a 28-year-old man named Brian Kohlberger, who claims to have nothing to do with it.
00:15:05.700But Kohlberger was able to straighten his life out, or so it seemed.
00:15:09.540Whether his internal anguish ever abated is a much trickier question, as we discussed with Howard Bloom.
00:15:17.980Everyone has talked about how he seems to be planning the murders so carefully doing this and that.
00:15:24.840I think he was really spending the past year at least trying to overcome all his internal demons to not try to find a way to prevent himself from killing people.
00:15:42.140I mean, to this point, he's made a remarkable recovery from a young man, a teenager who used heroin.
00:15:49.600He's gotten into a junior college and succeeds to get into college and winds up at a very reputable graduate school in criminal justice where he's a teaching assistant.
00:16:47.580After Kohlberger graduated high school, he went to college at DeSales University in Pennsylvania.
00:16:53.120He got his bachelor's degree in 2020 and a master's degree in criminal justice in 2022.
00:16:58.480One professor of his, Dr. Michelle Bolger, who advised Kohlberger on his master's thesis in the criminal justice department at DeSales University, she's very well respected, told the Daily Mail reporter he was a brilliant student.
00:17:11.780Quote, in my 10 years of teaching, she raved, I've only recommended two students to a PhD program, and he was one of them.
00:17:38.000Rave reviews from The Times, The Journal, Publishers Weekly, and more, calling Diesel a wildly enjoyable ride.
00:17:44.520It is a page-turning thriller about the greatest caper of the 20th century, all involving a man whose name you likely see at the gas station every day, but probably had no idea, was at the center of one of the greatest mysteries of all time.
00:18:00.460Don't miss out on the book everyone's talking about.
00:18:02.940It will make the perfect gift, The Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel.
00:18:07.800Here's more from those who knew him, including friends and classmates.
00:18:18.860He wanted to do something that impacted people in a good way.
00:20:51.300And then about an hour later, he texted me and said I had good birthing hips.
00:20:57.520Some who observed him in his role as a teaching assistant saw a man anything but comfortable.
00:21:03.920When he was standing in front of the class, it was like he was, you know, in a box.
00:21:09.440He was very, I don't know, uncomfortable, I guess.
00:21:12.220Like, it felt like he was perpetually uncomfortable.
00:21:14.320Though Kohlberger's online postings appeared to stop, those ones we went over when he was about 16,
00:21:23.000his criminal justice studies brought more public outreach, like the Reddit post from his time at DeSales asking for research participation from criminals.
00:21:32.860Some criminologists say it's pretty standard for the field to send things like this out.
00:21:38.540But still, it's chilling when you know what he would later be accused of.
00:21:42.840Hello, my name is Brian, he writes, and I am inviting you to participate in a research project that seeks to understand how emotions and psychological traits influence decision-making when committing a crime.
00:21:56.780In particular, this study seeks to understand the story behind your most recent criminal offense, with an emphasis on your thoughts and feelings throughout your experience.
00:22:07.300In the event that your most recent offense was not one that led to a conviction, you may still participate.
00:22:14.320What sort of questions did Kohlberger ask?
00:22:17.080Here's what was uncovered from the survey itself.
00:23:05.000After committing the crime, what were you thinking and feeling?
00:23:09.560After DeSales, Kohlberger moved west, a criminology doctoral student now at Washington State University.
00:23:17.600He began the program in the fall of 2022, mere months before the murders in the neighboring state.
00:23:24.080Almost immediately upon his arrival in Washington, he applied for an internship at the nearby Pullman Police Department.
00:23:32.940In the application essay, which Idaho cops later shared, Kohlberger, with apparent self-affirming pride,
00:23:40.060wrote that he had an interest in assisting rural law enforcement agencies with how to better collect and analyze technological data in public safety operations.
00:23:49.540So what should we make of Kohlberger's interest in criminology and his attempts to work with local police?
00:23:57.160It's a question I asked CIA officer and expert in deception, Phil Houston, earlier this year.
00:24:02.800In my mind, this fits into the category of what we call countermeasure behavior.
00:24:09.320So it's starting out, you know, very early.
00:24:11.820What I mean by early is there's still months off from a killing.
00:24:16.260But in his mind, he may well have had something in his mind that he was going to do that was bad.
00:24:22.900So joining the police department or having some connection by the police department in his mind might very likely have served two purposes.
00:24:32.280First of all, from the persuasion context, he's an insider now.
00:24:38.500Why would anyone look at him, you know, immediately as, you know, the perpetrator?
00:24:44.420And then secondly, if he's inside, it's possible he may get some access to what's going on in the investigation, to details of the investigation that may give him some more early warning if the police do start to, you know, zero in on him.
00:25:04.220It does not appear Kohlberger ever landed that police internship.
00:25:10.160However, he did have a meeting with the chief of police.
00:25:13.400Inside Edition obtained an email exchange between Kohlberger and Gary Jenkins, the top cop in Pullman, Washington at the time.
00:25:21.600Quote, it was a great pleasure to meet with you today and share my thoughts and excitement regarding the research assistantship for public safety, wrote Kohlberger.
00:25:30.500Great to meet and talk to you as well, responded Jenkins.
00:25:34.220Jenkins would go on to take a job as the campus chief of police at Washington State University, the force that would later help identify Kohlberger's vehicle as the one police believed was seen leaving the murder site that evening.
00:25:47.620After the murders, Kohlberger may have returned to an old habit, posting about himself online.
00:25:54.720You see, there was massive interest in this case online, and several reporters believe Kohlberger himself was among the crew on social media openly discussing the case.
00:26:05.240One Facebook user named Papa Roger was a regular poster in a discussion group about the murders.
00:26:13.680One of his posts seemed to indicate he knew something about the circumstances of the murder, or at least took a very lucky guess.
00:26:21.420Quote, of the evidence released, the murder weapon has been consistent as a large fixed blade knife.
00:26:29.880This leads me to believe they found the sheath, he wrote.
00:26:34.440Quote, this was before there were public reports that police had indeed found the knife sheath inside that house.
00:26:42.880Meanwhile, on Reddit, in the Moscow Murders Group, Moscow being the town where the killings took place,
00:26:49.540one user named Inside Looking seemed to have inside details about the method behind the murders.
00:27:55.920With SiriusXM, you'll get more sports in one app than anywhere else.
00:28:00.340With live play-by-play from NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL, NCAA, and many more.
00:28:06.340Get the latest predictions, analysis, and fantasy all week long, including sports talk athlete-to-athlete and player-to-fan.
00:28:14.860From lifestyle, fashion, and finance, to faith and health, hear the biggest names in entertainment, comedy, and talk with A-list interviews,
00:28:21.580exclusive specials, and around-the-clock stand-up in every style.
00:28:25.000Plus, the latest headlines and in-depth reporting from around the world, including politics from every angle.
00:28:30.140All of this and more is available now.
00:28:32.260Go to SiriusXM.com slash MKShow to subscribe and get three months free.
00:31:43.180So I am wondering if he, well, there's actually a term for it, Megan, and it's in cell, which stands for involuntarily celibate.
00:31:56.180So, no lovers that we know of, never mind girlfriends, but what of his family?
00:32:01.960His mother, Marianne, worked at the same local school district as his father.
00:32:05.480She was an aide for special needs students.
00:32:08.940He has two older sisters, Amanda and Melissa, the latter of whom was a mental health therapist.
00:32:15.460Some reports indicate that both sisters were fired from their jobs after Brian's arrest.
00:32:20.980And what about his father, the maintenance worker, the one who flew out to make that long trip across the country with Brian as the FBI was tracking him?
00:32:29.420More here from my interview with Howard Bloom.
00:32:31.800Here's his father, he's 67 years old, doesn't have a ton of money, clearly he's a janitor, he's been bankrupt twice.
00:32:40.360He's going to fly out to, first you've got to go to Seattle, then you've got to fly on another flight into Washington, Pullman, go across country, and then you've got to quickly make a turnaround.
00:32:51.820And he's looking, I think, and this is what people have told me, to try to get back, make amends with his son, say, you know, you were on the wrong path.
00:33:14.660Little does he know, you know, what's going on in his son's world.
00:33:18.360I think this trip across America, this father-to-son journey, is the center of its own interesting little drama.
00:33:29.360That trip took Brian back to his childhood home and to the place where police would ultimately arrest him.
00:33:36.520Reports were that upon making their dynamic entry, police found Kohlberger awake just before 1.30 a.m.
00:33:43.540wearing rubber gloves and packing his trash into Ziploc bags.
00:33:47.280He did not resist, and the police effected a search of the premises.
00:33:52.120From his parents' home, police recovered a cell phone, a laptop, two containers of a green leafy substance, along with black face masks, a black hat, and several articles of dark colored clothing, along with a book with underlining on page 118, as well as a Glock 22, .40 caliber handgun, and empty magazines.
00:34:14.980They also found a Smith & Wesson pocket knife and more.
00:34:18.720Back at Kohlberger's student residence in Washington state, police searched as well, retrieving a stained mattress cover, a computer tower, various receipts, the dust container from a Bissell Power Force vacuum cleaner, a fire TV stick with a cord and plug, and what's described as one possible animal hair strand.
00:34:40.340His childhood home and his graduate student housing both poured through by police looking for any clue as to why, how, anything tying Kohlberger to this crime.
00:34:52.820The home of his boyhood unhappiness and the adult home to what seemed a new kind of grievance and a freedom now to act on it.
00:35:01.300Retired FBI profiler, James Fitzgerald.
00:35:06.480Ted Kaczynski was about the same age when he launched his first bomb in Chicago, and four of them right after that.
00:35:13.780Some people, it takes longer to mature in terms of their criminal sophistication or devolve in terms of their psychological disorders, and I'm not clinically saying that.
00:35:24.840So who knows exactly what happened? I think a big factor with BK is that I think he grew up in northeastern Pennsylvania.
00:35:33.780I'm from Philadelphia originally. I know that area. He went to school a little bit away from there.
00:35:38.140But look what he finally did at the age of 28 or so. He travels 2,500 miles across country.
00:35:44.380He's far away now, finally, from the tentacles of his parents, of his familial upbringing, you know, the home, the neighborhood where he grew up.
00:35:52.880And he may be thinking for the first time, I am finally on my own. I can do what I want.
00:35:58.200I don't have any daily reporting or weekend reporting to any parents or authority figures.
00:36:03.120This is my opportunity. It doesn't mean he moved out there consciously to kill four people.
00:36:07.520It's just that it was a Jupiter aligning with Mars, with a few other planets in there, and of course, not in a good way.
00:36:14.880We have really this, I say, hodgepodge or mishmash of all kinds of personality issues finally coming together for him.
00:36:22.600And again, for some people, that happens in a good way.
00:36:25.000You know what? I'm finally going to college. I'm finally going to join the military, graduate school, whatever.
00:36:29.800This guy, it was about paying back sort of a, as we call it, you know, a grievance collector.
00:36:39.180All these grievances that build up, the foundations were laid brick by brick by brick, and it's finally hit sort of this crescendo in, of all places, Moscow, Idaho.
00:36:51.800And this aligns at the same time, and these poor four victims are the ones to pay the price for his, the alleged grievances placed against him.
00:37:03.780Grievance and perhaps the related emotion of envy.