How gruesome murder-mystery of Idaho university students gripped USA
How gruesome murder-mystery of four Idaho university students has gripped America: Housemates were knifed to death in their beds as they slept in bloody massacre but police still have NO leads after three weeks
- Four students were knifed to death in their beds in the early hours of Nov. 13
- But the police are yet to find a suspect, motive or even the murder weapon
- The case has stunned Moscow – a small college town which had not seen another murder since 2015
A quadruple murder. No suspect. No murder weapon. Nothing but questions.
This is the gruesome murder-mystery that has gripped a nation and terrified students of the University of Idaho in the northwestern U.S., where four housemates were brutally stabbed to death in the early hours of November 13.
Kaylee Goncalves, 21; Madison Mogen, 21; Xana Kernodle, 20 and Ethan Chapin, 20, were slain in their beds by a silent killer who slipped into their three-story, six-person student house just off campus and seemingly vanished without a trace.
Cops discovered their blood-soaked bodies later that day just before noon after Dylan Mortensen and Bethany Funke – two housemates who survived – awoke around 11am to find their friends were dead.
The savage killing stunned Moscow, a small college town surrounded by rolling wheat and bean fields that had not seen a murder since 2015.
Officials have insisted the quadruple stabbing was a ‘targeted’ attack, with Idaho State Police spokesman Aaron Snell, 49, telling DailyMail.com in an exclusive interview that all four of the victims could have been the intended targets.
But two and a half weeks on from the tragic incident, police are still yet to identify a suspect, and despite claiming the murder weapon was likely a fixed blade, have not turned up any leads.
Cops were forced to walk back their statement the victims had been targeted, conceding they could not say there wasn’t a threat.
This prompted many of the university’s 11,000 students to flee the campus and a significant proportion of them will not return until the murderer is caught, with the university preparing to offer remote learning.
For those who remain, candlelit vigil to honour the young lives lost takes place tonight – but this will provide little comfort to the families and friends of the victims whose killer remains in the wind.
Pic shows: (L-R) Housemates Dylan Mortensen, Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen (on Kaylee’s shoulders) Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle and Bethany Funke – four victims and two survivors of mysterious murders at their home near the Idaho University campus
Goncalves and Mogen, pictured here, had spent much of the night before their deaths at the Corner Club — a Moscow dive bar popular with University of Idaho students
This July 2022 photo provided by Jazzmin Kernodle shows University of Idaho students Xana Kernodle, right, and Ethan Chapin on a boat on Priest Lake, in Idaho. Both students were among four found stabbed to death in an off-campus rental home on Nov. 13
Blood still visible at the back of the house where four Idaho students where murdered as they slept.Moscow, Idaho, Monday, November 21, 2022
Police sources told DailyMail.com that the scene inside the home was ‘the worst they’ve ever seen’ with the victims left to bleed out following the brutal early morning attack
According to investigators, Madison and Kaylee had been out at the Corner Club bar – a popular Moscow dive bar – before returning home at about just before 2am on Sunday, November 13.
At approximately 1.30am, the pair were caught on camera purchasing a portion of carbonara pasta from Grub Wandering Kitchen – a food truck that offers late-night eats on weekends.
Couple Xana and Ethan meanwhile had been at a fraternity house, but returned home about the same time.
The two remaining housemates Dylan and Bethany were also out for the evening but got back to their house around 45 minutes earlier, just after 1am.
Later that day, cops reported they received a 911 call from the phone of one of the surviving housemates describing the horror they had discovered in the house.
Officers found the four students dead; two on the second story and two on the third.
Post-mortem results showed all four died from stab wounds to the chest, with police saying the murder weapon was a large military-style knife which still hasn’t been found.
Goncalves and Mogen were found on the top floor in their beds. College lovers Ethan Chapin and Xana Kernodle were found in a second floor bedroom while survivors Dylan Mortensen and Bethany Funke were sleeping on the first floor
This schematic of the house shows where Ethan, Xana, Kaylee and Madison were found dead
All four of the students were said to have been murdered in their sleep on November 13
Madison and Kaylee had been out at the Corner Club bar – a popular Moscow dive bar – before returning home at about just before 2am on Sunday, November 13
The bodies of Madison and Kaylee, who slept on the top floor of the house, were found still in their beds, cops maintaining the pair were almost certainly still asleep when the unknown assailant plunged a blade into them.
Xana and Ethan were found in their room on the second floor, with officers claiming some of the housemates sported defensive wounds – though they declined to specify which.
It is believed the assailant may have gained access to the house via a sliding glass door that leads from an outdoor patio to the kitchen on the second floor because Dylan and Bethany, who slept on the ground floor of the house, were untouched.
Thousands of tips have flooded in to both the police and the FBI from Moscow residents since the killings, police said, including hundreds which suggest Kaylee Goncalves may have had a stalker.
But detectives said they were unable to verify the information and haven’t been able to identify a stalker, the Moscow Police Department said last week.
‘We still believe it was a targeted attack based on the evidence at the scene and how everything developed, what we know. We believe that’s accurate,’ police spokesman Snell told DailyMail.com.
Still, he refused to say which of the victims police believe to be the target, describing it as a ‘delicate question’.
Police reported that two of the victims likely fought back and suffered defensive wounds trying to ward off the slasher
From the back of the house, it appears to have only two stories. It is possible the killer might haven not have known about the first floor if entrance was made from the rear via the sliding glass doors
This is the sliding door that one of the girls’ fathers believe may have been used by the killer to gain access to the home in the early hours of Sunday morning. All four victims were stabbed in their beds
Students have started to return to the University of Idaho, where a memorial has been set up for the college students following a Thanksgiving break
A memorial has grown at the residence of the four students who were killed on November 13
The vehicles towed away from the residence belong to the four victims and the two survivors
‘You can’t lay all your cards out at once. We’re trying to find the various potential participants,’ he said.
‘Is there somebody out there? Yes. Our goal is to find that person and bring them to justice.’
For Madison’s family – and those of the other murdered students – that day can’t come soon enough.
Scott Laramie, 52, who is married to Madison’s mother Cheryl, 45, said: ‘Now that the FBI is helping out, we’re confident that they’ll find out who did this. Because there are more resources, more expertise focused on it.’
Grandfather Michael added: ‘It’s just so unbelievable that she could be involved in something like this.
‘We’re still just trying to process the whole thing. And it’s painful watching this thing drag out with no answers.
‘If somebody dies in a car wreck or something, you don’t have all these other ongoing things to deal with.
‘How this could possibly happen? It’s the farthest thing from what I could ever imagine.’
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