Bryan Kohberger is granted NEW hearing in battle to withdraw guilty plea for murdering 4 Idaho students

Bryan Kohberger has been granted a new hearing date as he battles to withdraw his guilty plea for murdering four University of Idaho students. 

The convicted killer, 31, will enter a courtroom again next June after he filed for post-conviction relief in Ada County District Court last month, claiming that he only accepted his plea deal because he was ‘advised to lie’ by his legal counsel. 

He has been appointed a new defense attorney, Gregory Richard Rauch, and will have a status conference and evidentiary hearing next year, Judge Steven Hippler said. 

Kohberger pleaded guilty to killing Ethan Chapin, Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, and Xana Kernodle in an off-campus apartment in Moscow, Idaho, on November 13, 2022. 

He accepted a plea deal last July, just before his trial was set to begin, and in turn, escaped a potential death penalty for stabbing them all to death. 

Kohberger was sentenced to four consecutive life terms behind bars, and as part of his agreement, waived his right to appeal. 

But the twisted killer instead filed a separate petition for post-conviction relief that is allowed under Idaho law and is not the same as a standard direct appeal.

‘My actual innocence is my truth, and the plea, hinged on by false promises and blatant disinformation, MUST be withdrawn,’ Kohberger said in a statement to The New York Times. 

If successful, the petition could allow him to withdraw his guilty plea and send the case back to trial, potentially putting the death penalty back on the table. 

His latest move came just days before a new three-part Netflix documentary series, The Idaho Murders: College Nightmare.

Kaylee’s mother, father, and sister, Kristi, Steve, and Alivea Goncalves; Xana’s father, Jeff Kernodle, and her little sister, Jazzmin Kernodle, were featured in the new show, among friends of the victims and law enforcement officials involved in the case. 

After hearing about Kohberger’s latest legal move, Alivea – who slammed her sister’s killer during victim impact statements last year in court – said she wants him ‘no longer breathing on this earth.’ 

Alivea, 29, told NBC’s Today earlier this month exactly how she feels now that Kohberger is trying to rewrite his past. 

‘The fact that someone locked behind bars still has the ability to revictimize their victims, that’s something that isn’t just very easy to get over,’ she told the outlet.

‘This will never be over for us until the defendant is no longer breathing on this earth.’

The Goncalves family has remained vocal since the day they found out they lost Kaylee and her friends. 

Alivea previously unleashed fury at Kohberger in the courtroom after he accepted a plea deal. 

‘I won’t stand here and give you what you want. I won’t give you tears. Instead, I will call you what you are: sociopath, psychopath, murderer,’ she said in the face-to-face courtroom confrontation that was broadcast live. 

‘The truth is you’re basic. You’re a textbook case as insecurity disguised as control. You spent months preparing and still all it took was my sister and a sheath,’ she added. ‘You’re as dumb as they come. Stupid, dumb, weak, dirty.’

Steve, who previously said he was frustrated that the case never went to trial, also opened up about Kohberger’s legal move. 

He said he has been ‘consistent through and through’ in wanting to see a trial take place, arguing that four life sentences are ‘not a real death penalty.’

‘It’s my child and I’m going to demand the highest standard of law and that’s not dying in prison, getting vegan meals and being treated like some kind of celebrity – that’s not even close,’ he said.

Kaylee’s youngest sister, Aubrie Goncalves, who was just 16 when her sibling was killed, also spoke out for the first time. 

‘When everything happened, I was a sophomore in high school. I was only 16 years old, and at the time I kind of just decided no words are going to bring back either one of my sisters, so I didn’t feel like saying anything,’ Aubrie, now 20, told Today. 

‘And now that I’ve gotten older, almost four years has passed, I realized still that no words are going to bring back my sisters, but words are going to keep their memories alive,’ she added.

‘I’m not really one to put myself in a situation like this, I don’t really like to, but I know that I have to keep Maddie and Kaylee’s name alive, and that’s why I’m here today.’ 

The day after Kohberger’s legal filing, Aubrie took to social media to share her anger. 

‘I wasn’t planning on saying anything today. But after seeing that the man who admitted in court to murdering four innocent people now wants to withdraw his guilty plea, I couldn’t stay silent,’ she wrote on her family’s joint Facebook page. 

‘For him, this may be another legal filing. For me, it’s another day without my sister. 

‘Why should the person convicted of taking their voices continue to have one?

‘This isn’t a Netflix documentary. This isn’t a conspiracy theory. This isn’t entertainment. This is my life. These were real people,’ she added.

‘And every time this case is dragged back into the spotlight because of another filing, another theory, or another attempt to rewrite history, families like mine are forced to relive the worst day of our lives.’

Breaking news… updates to follow.