Speaker 1: In this Idaho murder case, the decision was made right
Speaker 1: or wrong to demolish that house. Do you have an
Speaker 1: opinion on that.
Speaker 2: I can see no viable, tangible reason for that home
Speaker 2: to be destroyed before the trial is complete.
Speaker 3: Is there an immediacy for a jury going to a house?
Speaker 3: Psychologically speaking, I would say yes.
Speaker 4: This is the Idaho Massacre. A production of KAT Studios
Speaker 4: and iHeartRadio, Season two, Episode two, Murder House. I'm Courtney Armstrong,
Speaker 4: producer at KATI Studios with Stephanie Leidecker and Gabe Castillo.
Speaker 4: We were reminded last episode of the details of the
Speaker 4: grotesque horror that occurred at eleven twenty two King Road
Speaker 4: on November thirteenth, twenty twenty two, when Madison Mogan, Kaylie Gonzalvez,
Speaker 4: Ethan Chapin, and Xana Kernodle lost their lives. After the murders,
Speaker 4: it was seen by some as a forensic scene or
Speaker 4: a tomb, or a macabre reminder of the horrors that
Speaker 4: happened there. But before all that, the house, located just
Speaker 4: off campus and on fraternity Row, was full of life.
Speaker 4: It was a party house where friends gathered. Here's on
Speaker 4: air reporter Antonette Levy, who has covered the case on
Speaker 4: the ground since the very beginning. I asked her to
Speaker 4: describe the house and what it felt like standing in
Speaker 4: front of it.
Speaker 5: This house makes me sad, and it made me sad
Speaker 5: because it was frozen in time. I'm standing there looking
Speaker 5: at the window and there's a pair of pink cowboy
Speaker 5: boots in the window. When I was there in December
Speaker 5: of twenty twenty two and then returned in early January
Speaker 5: after the arrest.
Speaker 6: What made me so sad is there was this string
Speaker 6: of lights across the back porch and they were on.
Speaker 6: They were on. There was a couch out there, like
Speaker 6: this leather couch. As a mom, I'm like, what are
Speaker 6: you doing with a couch outside? But you know that
Speaker 6: you're they're college kids. You know, it's a college house
Speaker 6: and this is a place where you know, it was
Speaker 6: a party house. But it was frozen in time in
Speaker 6: the worst possible way. The lights were on the entire time,
Speaker 6: from the night this happened till I got back in January,
Speaker 6: and there's the couch covered in snow, and you know,
Speaker 6: you could kind of see into the kitchen. Everything stopped
Speaker 6: because this awful thing happened at this house that should
Speaker 6: have just been full of kids and laughter, and if
Speaker 6: they were going to not be there, it should have
Speaker 6: been because they were going home for Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Speaker 6: Everything was shattered. That was my impression of it. I
Speaker 6: have mixed feelings about the demolition of the house. I
Speaker 6: understand that Ethan Chapin's family supported the demolition of the
Speaker 6: house because it had become this horrible, macabre tourist attraction,
Speaker 6: which I think is horrific. But at the same time,
Speaker 6: I would hate for something to come up at the
Speaker 6: trial where it was needed. So I see both sides
Speaker 6: of the coin.
Speaker 4: As Angeinette says, there are two sides to this coin,
Speaker 4: and most people fall strongly on one side or the other.
Speaker 7: The family of the only male victim, twenty year old
Speaker 7: Ethan Chapin, saying in a statement, we're supportive of the
Speaker 7: decision to take down the King Street House for the
Speaker 7: good of the university, it's students, including our own kids,
Speaker 7: and the community of Moscow.
Speaker 3: The house was considered the largest piece of evidence that
Speaker 3: they had.
Speaker 4: The university defending their decision to move forward.
Speaker 8: Well, I understand he's from a legal standpoint.
Speaker 6: Everyone was finished with the house.
Speaker 9: You kind of want to scream from the mountaintops, just
Speaker 9: let be leave it alone, don't touch it until the
Speaker 9: trial's over.
Speaker 4: The house was ultimately demolished on December twenty eighth, twenty
Speaker 4: twenty three. It took one day and occurred to thirteen
Speaker 4: months after the murders. Shortly after the demolition, Stephanie has
Speaker 4: a discussion with forensic expert Joseph Scott Morgan and data
Speaker 4: analysts body move In. You may remember her from Netflix's
Speaker 4: Don't Have with Cats.
Speaker 1: That particular house that they were murdered in was very specific.
Speaker 1: It was a unique layout, but the house itself was
Speaker 1: owned by the campus and highly debated turn of events.
Speaker 1: They decided to destroy the house to get rid of
Speaker 1: it altogether over winter break, and it's been a really
Speaker 1: heated discussion. On the one hand, you know that for
Speaker 1: the university, it's a bit of a real heartbreak on
Speaker 1: the town, on the school, also for students who went
Speaker 1: there who were maybe triggered emotion only by this heinous
Speaker 1: crime that happened while they were attending school. Just generally speaking,
Speaker 1: probably just feels hideous to have this marker exist. And
Speaker 1: on the flip of that some of the family members
Speaker 1: and including some people participating in the trial, say that
Speaker 1: this is an active investigation site and that from a
Speaker 1: forensic standpoint, it has to stay intact at least until
Speaker 1: after the trial.
Speaker 8: I spend a lot of time on the Internet, as
Speaker 8: you all know, That's what I do. And I talk
Speaker 8: to a lot of people who live in Moscow and
Speaker 8: they are all affected by this house. They have to
Speaker 8: drive by it. It's in a really dense neighborhood. The
Speaker 8: jury is never going to be allowed to go in there.
Speaker 8: They're never going to be allowed to go in there.
Speaker 8: There's no the acoustics are different, flooring's been removed, walls
Speaker 8: have been removed. I have photos and you can see
Speaker 8: all the dry wall that's been cut out of Maddie's room. Like,
Speaker 8: they're not going to go in there. It's just not
Speaker 8: going to happen. It's so uncommon for a jury to
Speaker 8: visit a crime scene so on com.
Speaker 1: But it happens though. By the way, sidebar one of
Speaker 1: the victims has a sister and a brother who do
Speaker 1: it also still attend the university. So if I'm a
Speaker 1: family member of one of the victims, I want justice,
Speaker 1: or if I'm even a family member of the accused,
Speaker 1: and i want justice. How can we destroy the forensicstru.
Speaker 10: Here's my real problem with it is the fact that
Speaker 10: there are homicides that take place every single day. There's
Speaker 10: a homicide going on right now as we speak somewhere
Speaker 10: in America. I can promise you that they're not going
Speaker 10: to go out and tear down that structure. This is
Speaker 10: an outlier. As far as tearing down a structure.
Speaker 4: It is incredibly rare for a jury to visit the
Speaker 4: side of a murder. It's also rare for a building
Speaker 4: where a murder took place to be demolished. However, the
Speaker 4: ones that fall into either category are usually multi victim
Speaker 4: murders that are exceptionally heinous and highly publicized. Some cases
Speaker 4: where the juris did go back to the literal scene
Speaker 4: of the crime can often include cases where they may
Speaker 4: hinge on some form of integral spatial logistics. For example,
Speaker 4: Michael Peterson, where jurors walked the stairs where his wife died,
Speaker 4: Alex Murda so jurors could appreciate the scale of the
Speaker 4: large property, and the twenty eighteen Parkland school shooting, which
Speaker 4: Joseph tells us.
Speaker 10: About I even reflect back to Parkland, which I covered extensively,
Speaker 10: and look, I understand that the interior of Parkland was
Speaker 10: not changed at all. One of the most moving moments
Speaker 10: is where they talk about how when they led the
Speaker 10: jurors into that structure. Remember Parkland had taken place on
Speaker 10: Valentine's Day. There were dried, crumbling roses laying on the floor,
Speaker 10: teddy bears with hearts on them, there were still blood
Speaker 10: stains on the floor. And it too is government controlled.
Speaker 10: And let's face it, the University of Idaho's a government
Speaker 10: entity and it is owned by the University of Odaho.
Speaker 4: Of all the divisive factors in this divisive case, it
Speaker 4: seems the homes demolition drew more opposing opinions than almost
Speaker 4: anything else. Here's journalist Chris Bargo, who spent a lot
Speaker 4: of time covering the case. I started by asking him
Speaker 4: about the money spent on security of the home leading
Speaker 4: up to the demolition. It was seven hundred dollars a
Speaker 4: day for securing the home alone, clocking in at one
Speaker 4: point two million dollars months before the home was even
Speaker 4: torn down. Here's Chris.
Speaker 9: The brunt of that is really being absorbed by the university.
Speaker 9: The university has really kind of cost a lot of
Speaker 9: money for them because of security reasons. You know, obviously
Speaker 9: when the house, the house was up for so long
Speaker 9: and that house had to be protected that entire time,
Speaker 9: people they had twenty four seven watch dealing with this
Speaker 9: influx of people on campus. You know, safety measures for students,
Speaker 9: but there's not really much you can do to get
Speaker 9: around those costs. And because it took place in a university,
Speaker 9: there's a lot of costs that come along with that
Speaker 9: because they want to make sure the students feel safe.
Speaker 9: They want to make sure the students protected, and they
Speaker 9: also want to make sure that this major piece of
Speaker 9: evidence is house is left untouched. When there are thousands
Speaker 9: of people descending on this town who probably want to
Speaker 9: do nothing more than to get inside it or take
Speaker 9: a look around. They have to make sure no one
Speaker 9: get went in that house. So that was a really
Speaker 9: really big cost to bear.
Speaker 11: What are your thoughts on the demolition of the house.
Speaker 9: I do not think that the defense of prosecution would
Speaker 9: be okay with it if they thought there was any
Speaker 9: possible chance there was even like a little piece of
Speaker 9: evidence inside there. I think on the most sort of
Speaker 9: human and basic level. The last thing in the world
Speaker 9: do you want those kids to deal with, which we
Speaker 9: are already dealing with so much, is have to see
Speaker 9: that house. It's probably a horrible reminder. So for that reason,
Speaker 9: I'm really glad you know that it's not there. I
Speaker 9: don't know how much the scene was going to be
Speaker 9: helpful in that case. At this point, it seems like
Speaker 9: they're in trouble even placing him at the scene, So
Speaker 9: I don't know what was going to be accomplished. Maybe
Speaker 9: by having anyone visit the house, But like I said,
Speaker 9: I think that if there's any sort of bit of
Speaker 9: evidence that prosecutor saw that could get out of it
Speaker 9: or bring people to the house, they would have kept
Speaker 9: it up. And clearly they didn't think there.
Speaker 7: Was out there.
Speaker 4: The FBI prosecution and defense teams had access to the
Speaker 4: home on multiple occasion. The prosecutor's last visit was just
Speaker 4: one week before the demolition. The president of Idaho University,
Speaker 4: Scott Green, released a statement on December fourteenth, twenty twenty three.
Speaker 4: He wrote, it is the grim reminder of the heinous
Speaker 4: act that took place there. While we appreciate the emotional
Speaker 4: connections some family members of the victims may have to
Speaker 4: this house. It is time for its removal and to
Speaker 4: allow the collective healing of our community to continue. Let's
Speaker 4: stop here for a break. We'll be back in a moment.
Speaker 4: Stephanie continues her conversation with forensic expert Joseph Scott Morgan
Speaker 4: and data analyst Body Movin.
Speaker 10: Once it's gone, it's gone. The most intriguing images that
Speaker 10: I saw of the entire coverage relative to Idaho was
Speaker 10: there was a snap moment where you had agents that
Speaker 10: were back in the brush line rear of the second
Speaker 10: floor where the sliders are, and they were squatted in
Speaker 10: the brush and they were looking back towards the building.
Speaker 10: They were looking for fields of view. At that point
Speaker 10: in time, What could you observe from this low growth
Speaker 10: scrub that was back there, these trees. Is it a
Speaker 10: location where the perpetrator could have parked. Is it an
Speaker 10: observation point where they could have seen people moving around
Speaker 10: at night? Is it at that key moment that he
Speaker 10: decided that when those lights went down, that he was
Speaker 10: going to make us move and make entry into that environment.
Speaker 10: All reference for that is gone now.
Speaker 1: Not to mention a big piece of the defense's case
Speaker 1: right now is that Brian Coberger claims to have an alibi. Again,
Speaker 1: we're talking about potentially more than one person being there
Speaker 1: or a different set of people being there where there
Speaker 1: are multiple attackers. It was Brian not even there in
Speaker 1: the first place. Why would you destroy something? And I've
Speaker 1: learned this from you, by the way, the plumbing could
Speaker 1: have evidence in it. The concrete in an around the
Speaker 1: location and could have evidence in it.
Speaker 10: Yeah, let me say something about the plumbing real quick.
Speaker 10: And this brings the car into play. You know, they
Speaker 10: think they've got a timeline settled here, but let's just
Speaker 10: say that an individual may have taken time to have
Speaker 10: gone and clean themselves. Did you take drain traps out?
Speaker 10: Did they run a camera down in the drain? I
Speaker 10: think my big thing is in anybody that's kind of
Speaker 10: listening to us, our friends out there. If you live
Speaker 10: in a home that has a stair an internal staircase,
Speaker 10: what does footfalls sound like on the treads on the
Speaker 10: interior staircase? Can you hear that? Can you hear somebody
Speaker 10: wrestling about if you're on the second floor and it's
Speaker 10: going on the third floor, can you hear it? If
Speaker 10: you're in the basement. We don't have a point of
Speaker 10: reference anymore. Still, can't take the jury back out there.
Speaker 10: You can't have them go into any one of these
Speaker 10: rooms where these ghastly murders were committed and asked questions.
Speaker 10: Jury can't ask a question based upon well, gee, look
Speaker 10: at that window and how you can see and from
Speaker 10: there to here, and how far away is the distance
Speaker 10: from the entrance to the bedroom room to the fly
Speaker 10: stairs down to the second floor. Who would it take
Speaker 10: me to egress from the third floor to the second
Speaker 10: floor landing and then down the hallway.
Speaker 1: You think about the feeling it a clown jurs. You know,
Speaker 1: we saw that in Pike County.
Speaker 4: Stephanie's referencing the murders of eight members of the Rodent
Speaker 4: family that occurred in Piked in Ohio. It's the topic
Speaker 4: of another Katie Studios podcast and a case we worked
Speaker 4: closely on with Joseph.
Speaker 1: After the massacres occurred there and right before the trial,
Speaker 1: the jury was.
Speaker 4: Put on a bus and set.
Speaker 1: Yes, they were out to observe the landscape where the
Speaker 1: homes where those murders happened had occurred. And you know,
Speaker 1: we were always told it was extremely powerful. There's nothing
Speaker 1: like being in the location, especially when it's still furnished,
Speaker 1: and those personal belongings that have now been removed for
Speaker 1: sentimental reasons, they should remain in that crime scene to
Speaker 1: really make it personal.
Speaker 9: That's part of it.
Speaker 1: This is the most personal thing imaginable. Why would you
Speaker 1: make a game day decision a year before the game
Speaker 1: by destroying what could potentially be relevant. Doesn't this speak
Speaker 1: to the original point that the house should not have
Speaker 1: been destroyed.
Speaker 8: This is just my opinion, but these scans are so
Speaker 8: advanced and so well done. The house is unsafe for
Speaker 8: people to be in. And I don't know what kind
Speaker 8: of situation the rooms are in, but I can't imagine
Speaker 8: they didn't remove pieces of the floor from the both bedrooms.
Speaker 8: It's not safe for this jury to be in well,
Speaker 8: and that's what the documents say. The documents say the
Speaker 8: house is too dangerous and that both the defense and
Speaker 8: the prosecution agreed that this is not a place that
Speaker 8: they're going to be bringing the jury.
Speaker 10: I do hope that it was sufficiently documented. I know
Speaker 10: that they did do Pharaoh images within that structure and
Speaker 10: also externally.
Speaker 4: We asked Joseph for clarification on what Pharaoh images are
Speaker 4: and how the Pharaoh system works.
Speaker 10: You first see the earlier iterations of these things when
Speaker 10: they're referred to as total stations. They were made famous
Speaker 10: by accident reconstructionists, where you have this one machine that
Speaker 10: they could essentially plot in it from a digital standpoint,
Speaker 10: a motor vehicle accident, because to work a motor vehicle
Speaker 10: scene is to say the very least time consuming and
Speaker 10: the calculations are mind blowing. So they took that platform
Speaker 10: and expanded it relative to this Pharaoh device Faro. But
Speaker 10: you can take this Pharaoh device and place it at
Speaker 10: a scene and just imagine it's got the ability to
Speaker 10: spend on its axis thousands of different directions and all
Speaker 10: of the while it's shooting out these little lasers and
Speaker 10: it's taking thousands of photos, and so it can digitally
Speaker 10: take those images and compile them and it gives you
Speaker 10: very detailed information. It also has GPS that's in it.
Speaker 10: You take it into a confined space like a built
Speaker 10: dwelling like this, and the detail is very remarkable, and
Speaker 10: you can create this three D world. It is quite
Speaker 10: fascinating to see. So that's what a Faro station is essentially.
Speaker 10: There's been some talk of some three D model that
Speaker 10: may be created by the FBI lab in Quantico and
Speaker 10: be presented for the court. But I got to tell you,
Speaker 10: I've been out on a number of visits to homes
Speaker 10: where homicides have taken place, and I've been there when
Speaker 10: the juries are there, and it is the real dose
Speaker 10: of reality for them when they show up. From an
Speaker 10: investigative standpoint, if you have it, don't throw it away.
Speaker 10: I'm not a junk collector personally, but this ain't junk.
Speaker 10: This is where these lives ended.
Speaker 1: And just you know, to piggyback on that, some of
Speaker 1: the other victims' families were very against it for this
Speaker 1: very reason. What if there is one little morsel of
Speaker 1: something that could bring justice to them or frankly, get
Speaker 1: a guilty man off.
Speaker 8: There's other cases where they've torn the apartment down, like
Speaker 8: for instance, Jeffrey Dahmer. However they waited for the trial.
Speaker 8: Yeah that's the rub, you know, So yeah, I get it,
Speaker 8: I get it.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I mean John Wayne Gacy's house is gone. You know,
Speaker 10: there's nothing.
Speaker 8: But Pharaoh didn't really exist like it does now back then.
Speaker 8: You know, it's a different time, and I would imagine
Speaker 8: at some point, you know, it's going to be virtual reality,
Speaker 8: you know, where these juries can put on a headset
Speaker 8: and walk through the house at their leisure.
Speaker 10: They can. But you know you had mentioned earlier about
Speaker 10: the acoustics might not be the same. However, people that
Speaker 10: are impaneled on juries, they're not AI. I mean, they
Speaker 10: are living, breathing human beings that know what it's like
Speaker 10: to walk into a house in that sense that you
Speaker 10: get that auditory sense of a footfall, you know, and
Speaker 10: I know that part of the floor has been removed
Speaker 10: and all this. But when you think about just the
Speaker 10: timing element, if I were asked how long would it
Speaker 10: take me to make it from the sliders to that
Speaker 10: weird that if we just go on a limb here
Speaker 10: and say, enter through the sliders, how long would it
Speaker 10: take to make it from there to the interior staircase
Speaker 10: and twist and turn and get up there. And also
Speaker 10: in the darkness, I think about all these in the
Speaker 10: relationship spatial relationships and all these sorts of things. And yeah,
Speaker 10: I know Pharaoh is great and it's going to be fantastic.
Speaker 10: I'm sure the presentation will blow everybody away if we're
Speaker 10: permitted to see it, but there's still that one little
Speaker 10: splinter in my brain feeling.
Speaker 8: I often equate it to like I like to read books,
Speaker 8: like the actual book. I don't want to read it
Speaker 8: on a kindle. It's like I like to touch the paper,
Speaker 8: like to turn the pace.
Speaker 1: So it's maybe the.
Speaker 8: Same kind of lake right right thing where you're there
Speaker 8: in person and you can smell and use all all
Speaker 8: your senses to get an idea of what happened, and
Speaker 8: you're not going to be able to have that with
Speaker 8: a three D scan.
Speaker 4: The draw to the house after the murders is one
Speaker 4: of the reasons it was demolished. People were coming from
Speaker 4: far and wide to view the house, somewhat the horrible
Speaker 4: intention of taking a souvenir from the scene. We felt
Speaker 4: it was something important to try and understand, so we
Speaker 4: reached out to psychiatrist doctor Gail Saltz, Clinical Associate Professor
Speaker 4: of Psychiatry at New York Presbyterian Hospital and host of
Speaker 4: the podcast how Can I Help. Doctor Salts have been
Speaker 4: quoted in an article we found about our culture's obsession
Speaker 4: with murder houses. Here's doctor Saltz with some information about
Speaker 4: the phenomenon followed by Stephanie.
Speaker 3: The house is sort of like the museum of it.
Speaker 3: It's easier to imagine being part of it or in it,
Speaker 3: thinking about it the horror of it, much like if
Speaker 3: you said, here are the clothes of the people, or
Speaker 3: here is the weapon that was used, and you can
Speaker 3: physically look at it and hold it. And of course
Speaker 3: homes represent all kinds of things. Homes represent the place
Speaker 3: where these people lived and had lives, and most people's
Speaker 3: homes means feeling safe and feeling a joy of you
Speaker 3: know whatever. It might be their family, their friends, I
Speaker 3: mean in this case right, their friends being in college,
Speaker 3: feeling invincible at that age. And of course most people
Speaker 3: are not thinking about you could be a victim in
Speaker 3: your home.
Speaker 1: It's like, how do we prevent these kinds of things
Speaker 1: from happening, or how do we maintain our own sense
Speaker 1: of safety when sometimes the perpetrator is so ordinary.
Speaker 3: Many people have a desire to feel a little scared
Speaker 3: in a safe way, and we are naturally curious. The
Speaker 3: identification is partially with a victim of like, how horrible
Speaker 3: the horror of that is? Right to feel like at
Speaker 3: that last moment, you know somebody stabbing me with the
Speaker 3: you know, like those kinds of thoughts and imagining what's
Speaker 3: inside that guy's head that he would plot this and
Speaker 3: plan this and want to do something terrible.
Speaker 1: In this Idaho murder case, interestingly, the decision was made
Speaker 1: right or wrong to demolish that house. Do you have
Speaker 1: an opinion on that?
Speaker 3: I mean, there are rules and regulations about what can
Speaker 3: happen with evidence that it can't be brought into a courtroom,
Speaker 3: and that seems like more of a legal question.
Speaker 4: To get that legal opinion. I spoke with KIRKNRMI, legal
Speaker 4: analyst and former defense attorney for Jody Aarius. Jody Aarrius
Speaker 4: was on trial in twenty thirteen for murdering her ex
Speaker 4: boyfriend Travis Alexander. The trial was televised worldwide and became
Speaker 4: known as a circus in the press.
Speaker 2: Here's Kirk, I can see no viable, tangible reason for
Speaker 2: that home to be destroyed before the trial is complete.
Speaker 2: The jury may have questions. Part of the evidence against
Speaker 2: mister Kolberger is this eyewitness testimony of seeing someone with
Speaker 2: bushy eyebrows. There's been talk of hearing footsteps from upper levels,
Speaker 2: things of that nature, and those could be issues and
Speaker 2: questions that the jury has in their mind. How could
Speaker 2: someone see these eyebrows under these circumstances? Could they really
Speaker 2: hear this? All these different things? And there could be
Speaker 2: dozens more that I have not thought of. And here
Speaker 2: you have this piece of evidence and it is destroyed
Speaker 2: for no logical reason. Let's say something came up with
Speaker 2: defense case and the defense said, hey, we need to
Speaker 2: look at this, and that becomes a sixth Amendment issue.
Speaker 2: Is mister Colberger getting a fair trial based on these circumstances?
Speaker 2: And that could result in a death verdict getting overturned.
Speaker 2: But right now, until the case is over, it seems
Speaker 2: nonsensical to say the least to destroy the building.
Speaker 11: Well that's a concrete answer, but it seems like the
Speaker 11: people who might have most wanted it taken down might
Speaker 11: then impact the victims negatively if, for example, a sentence
Speaker 11: is overturned because of it.
Speaker 2: Yes, we don't know what could pop up, what could
Speaker 2: be of evidentiary value down the line when things are challenged,
Speaker 2: when things are questioned, So yeah, to me, it just
Speaker 2: makes no sense at least as it relates to the
Speaker 2: case in.
Speaker 10: General, and could only serve to harm the gates.
Speaker 4: Let's stop here for another break. We'll be back in
Speaker 4: a moment. Stephanie and Joseph Scott Morgan discuss how items
Speaker 4: from the now demolished house might be used during the trial.
Speaker 10: One other thing that's very compelling about this case is
Speaker 10: that they hauled off the mattresses in the back of
Speaker 10: a pickup truck. They can still bring these items into court,
Speaker 10: and that has occurred. They can actually have been in
Speaker 10: courts where they set beds up before. Here's the real
Speaker 10: rub with that. If you're talking about dynamic blood stain,
Speaker 10: you can say, here's the mattress that we recovered, here's
Speaker 10: the bed frame that we recovered. We see this deposition
Speaker 10: of blood on the surface of the mattress. Maybe they
Speaker 10: hold up a bloody sheet. If that happens, you're going
Speaker 10: to hear the defense scream from the rooftops over this,
Speaker 10: because they're going to say it's prejudicial. The prosecution is
Speaker 10: going to have to justify their rationale for bringing each
Speaker 10: one of these items in there, and the defense, I guess,
Speaker 10: could see it as prejudicial, but they could also argue
Speaker 10: the idea that now that they are absent, that that's
Speaker 10: something that they cannot go back and collect. It's really
Speaker 10: important that we remember. I think that they were so eager,
Speaker 10: they being the investigative authorities, to get this place cleaned out,
Speaker 10: that they had called a cleaning crew to come and
Speaker 10: clean up the structure before. Right, it almost happened simultaneously
Speaker 10: with the arrest of Coberg in Pennsylvania.
Speaker 4: Joseph is referring to when Brian Colberger's defense attorney, An Taylor,
Speaker 4: filed a court motion to stop the cleanup operation to
Speaker 4: preserve the scene of the crime. This motion was filed
Speaker 4: on December thirtieth, twenty twenty two, just hours after Colberger's arrest.
Speaker 10: If I remember correctly, it was his counsel, it said, whoa,
Speaker 10: throw the brakes on. We're gonna we need to get
Speaker 10: a team out there to take a look. And I'll
Speaker 10: never forget seeing that image of the plastic that had
Speaker 10: been taped up over the door so that they could
Speaker 10: go in and move out and all this stuff. And
Speaker 10: then there was a controversy of taking out quote unquote
Speaker 10: personal items. And you know, once you've kind of breached,
Speaker 10: you know that threshold so quickly in this environment, there's
Speaker 10: not a damn bit of sentimental material that is out
Speaker 10: there that's worth compromising this because, yeah, I know that
Speaker 10: it's ghastly, it's a horrible thing, but life is full
Speaker 10: of all kinds of horrible things. This I think is
Speaker 10: potentially a diminishment of the memory of these kids that
Speaker 10: were killed there. But now it's too late. At this point,
Speaker 10: you can't go back and unring the belt.
Speaker 4: Stephanie continues her conversation with psychiatrist doctor Gail Saltz on
Speaker 4: how a jury might be impact by the homes demolition.
Speaker 4: Here's doctor Saltz.
Speaker 3: Is there an immediacy for a jury going to a house?
Speaker 3: Psychologically speaking? I would say yes, that it's going to
Speaker 3: stir their thoughts in a more emotionally galvanizing way, and
Speaker 3: that that will draw them in. But it doesn't tell
Speaker 3: you whether it will draw them in and make them
Speaker 3: say guilty or innocent. And now where I think it
Speaker 3: could affect them is if they are convinced that this
Speaker 3: person is the perpetrator and they are brought into a
Speaker 3: circumstance that makes them feel more emotionally distraught. I think
Speaker 3: that could affect a sentencing, a sentencing like death no death.
Speaker 3: And this is why prosecutors bring in photos and movies
Speaker 3: and voice recordings, because you know, they are trying to
Speaker 3: not only deliver content, but they are trying to deliver
Speaker 3: more immediacy, deliver more empathy to a jury, and have
Speaker 3: them feel more intensely and stronger about what's happening. I
Speaker 3: think being in a house certainly could add to that.
Speaker 3: It's not the only thing that could add to that.
Speaker 3: I think there was a point made that the house
Speaker 3: didn't look at all inside anymore the way that it looked,
Speaker 3: and so that could have the opposite effect. Right, They
Speaker 3: could go in expecting to see something that looks like
Speaker 3: college students are living there and see none of that,
Speaker 3: see a sterile space, and that could have the effect
Speaker 3: of making them feel like what was so bad? You know,
Speaker 3: what was so terrible. So it's hard to predict whether
Speaker 3: that would be helpful or harmful.
Speaker 1: I hadn't thought of it that way. True, The disassociation
Speaker 1: from what is now a different space is a really
Speaker 1: good point.
Speaker 3: What I would say is virtual is always one step
Speaker 3: from moved from being in person, you know. I think
Speaker 3: courts have discovered that putting things in a video format
Speaker 3: absolutely makes an impact. Is it eked out by the
Speaker 3: idea that you're coming out of the courtroom and into
Speaker 3: this space. I know that you're standing on the spot
Speaker 3: where this thing happened. I think that has a more
Speaker 3: emotional impact. Is it necessary if you have the video?
Speaker 3: Might the video of what the inside looked like at
Speaker 3: the time that it actually looked that way, which was
Speaker 3: at the time of the crime, have more impact than
Speaker 3: the physical plant that doesn't look anymore like it did
Speaker 3: at the time of the crime. It might.
Speaker 4: Next time on the Idaho Masacer an exclusive interview with Cassie,
Speaker 4: a former student of accused murderer Brian Koeberger's. She is
Speaker 4: speaking out for the first time.
Speaker 1: What was the class about? We covered literally how to
Speaker 1: get away with murder? Did he have any friends and
Speaker 1: not that I saw, but kept to himself anytime I
Speaker 1: saw him on campus or in class or office hours.
Speaker 1: So this man potentially murdered four people and then he
Speaker 1: went back to class. Yes.
Speaker 4: For more information on the case and relevant photos, follow
Speaker 4: us on Instagram at kat Underscore Studios. The Idaho Masker
Speaker 4: is produced by Stephanie Leideger, Gabriel Castillo and me Courtney Armstrong.
Speaker 4: Editing and sound design by Jeff Toois, music by Jared Aston.
Speaker 4: The Idaho Masker is a production of Kat's Studios and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 4: For more podcasts like this, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 4: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.