BOISE, Idaho — Attorneys for Bryan Kohberger, who is serving life in prison for killing four University of Idaho students, are protesting a request to tack on additional restitution paid by their client to cover expenses for two of the victims’ families and will make arguments in court in two weeks.
Prosecutors submitted financial compensation filings to the court last month and sought a combined $27,330 for the families of homicide victims Kaylee Goncalves and Madison Mogen. An itemized statement with receipts for the expenses was filed under seal but relates to travel and accommodations, Kohberger’s defense wrote.
Kohberger, 30, reached an agreement in July to plead guilty to four counts of murder in exchange for avoiding a trial and also dropping a possible death sentence. In the deal, he also agreed to pay about $29,000 in restitution between the families of victims Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin and reimbursement of the state’s crime victim’s compensation fund.
The four University of Idaho undergraduates were stabbed to death at an off-campus home in Moscow in November 2022. Kohberger, then a graduate student at nearby Washington State University across the Idaho-Washington state line, was arrested about seven weeks later and sentenced to prison for the violent crimes.
Kohberger’s plea agreement eliminated any chance of parole and his rights to appeal his four consecutive life sentences. He also pleaded guilty to one count of felony burglary and received an additional decade in prison, as well as $270,000 in fines. With the agreed-upon restitution, the total is more than $300,000.
Led by Anne Taylor, Kohberger’s public defense team argued in its objection to the additional restitution that he has “no ability now or in the future to pay” because of his sentence. The state’s request was also filed more than 60 days after Kohberger was sentenced, they wrote.
The Goncalveses and Mogen’s mother, Karen Laramie, already received a combined $208,000 in assistance through GoFundMe fundraisers to offset such costs, the defense attorneys added. In addition, the crime victim’s compensation fund already covered a combined $3,000 for urns for Goncalves and Mogen’s remains, their objection said.
A virtual hearing over the additional restitution request has been scheduled for 10 a.m. on Nov. 5.
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