UPDATE (September 12, 2:42 p.m. ET): After the judge in Latah County, Idaho, presiding over the murder trial of Bryan Kohberger, granted the suspect his release, motion to change locationthe Idaho Supreme Court on thursday said the new location will be Ada County, the site of the state capital, Boise. The state Supreme Court also assigned the case was brought before a new judge in that district, Steven Hippler.
In the latest twist in the Idaho quadruple murder case of Bryan Kohberger, a judge has ordered the trial in the deaths of four University of Idaho students to be moved to a county other than the county where the killings took place.
Latah County District Judge John Judge warned that the defense would be prejudiced if the trial were to proceed in the close-knit community that has been awash in media attention since the 2022 shooting deaths of Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin at an off-campus home in the Latah County town of Moscow. (In May 2023, Kohberger pleaded not guilty to four counts of first-degree murder and burglary. He could face the death penalty if convicted.)
The judge deplored, among other things, “the continued dissemination of biased disinformation, rumors and clearly false theories about the case on social media such as Facebook, podcasts and blogs.”
While the parties agreed that the case had received a lot of media attention, they disagreed on how to ensure a fair trial. Kohberger argued that the trial should be moved away from the crime scene. The prosecution, meanwhile, said that extensive questioning of potential jurors could help ensure fairness.
In granting the defense’s request to change the venue, the judge noted that Latah County is relatively small and that, “While the issue of extensive, sensationalistic reporting is not unique to Latah County, it has the potential to be more impactful given the volume of reporting combined with the smaller population.”
“Given the uncontested evidence presented by the defense, the extreme nature of the reporting in this case, and the smaller population in Latah County, the defense has met the relatively low standard of showing ‘a reasonable likelihood’ that prejudicial reporting in Latah County would jeopardize a fair trial,” the judge wrote.
He added that the location also needs to be changed for practical reasons. He said Latah County does not have the resources to ensure safety and does not even have the space to hold such a large trial there.
“While it is indeed inconvenient for the attorneys, the court, some of the victims’ family members, and some of the witnesses to travel to another county for three months, holding the trial in the Latah County courthouse would also be inconvenient in several ways and would pose serious security risks,” the judge wrote, adding that the interest of justice “requires that the trial be moved to a location with the resources, both personnel and space, necessary to effectively and efficiently handle a trial of this size and length so that the parties and the court can focus on the case and not on side issues.”
The judge’s order does not say where the new venue will be. Instead, it says that, under state rules, the court will refer the case to the administrative director of the courts so that the state Supreme Court can assign it to an appropriate venue in another district. NBC News reported that the trial was tentatively scheduled for June of next year.
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This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
