Bryan Kohberger victim’s father shares harrowing new details of her final moments and brutal injuries

The father of one of Bryan Kohberger’s victims has revealed shocking new details about his daughter’s final moments, as he hit out at the secrecy that continues to shroud the case. 

Steve Goncalves told NewsNation Thursday his 21-year-old daughter Kaylee Goncalves had ‘damage around her mouth’ indicating that her killer tried to gag and silence her while stabbing her to death.

Steve said Latah County Coroner Cathy Mabbutt, who conducted the victims’ autopsies, said her injuries were ‘like somebody had pressed in and tried to keep her quiet’ during the vicious attack.

The harrowing new details emerged as the Goncalves family prepares to deliver victim impact statements at Kohberger’s sentencing next week – but voiced frustration at being in the dark about some of the details of the murders. 

‘You only got one time to be able to be a victim’s advocate and say what you need to say and to address the courtroom and everyone in Idaho, and they’re not going to let us know exactly what happened,’ Steve said.

‘We want to make sure everything we say is exactly truthful.’ 

Kohberger is set to be sentenced on July 23 for the murders of Goncalves, her 21-year-old best friend Madison Mogen and 20-year-old couple Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin. 

The 30-year-old killer – who had spent years studying criminology -finally confessed to the murders in a stunning turn of events earlier this month.

Kohberger broke into a student home in Moscow, Idaho, in the dead of the night on November 13, 2022, and stabbed the four victims to death.

He was arrested around six weeks later but spent more than two years fighting the charges.

Just weeks before his trial was slated to begin in August, Kohberger struck a controversial deal with prosecutors, changing his plea to guilty on all four counts of murder and one count of burglary. 

Under the terms of the deal, he will be spared from the death penalty and will be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole, while waiving all rights to appeal.

The Goncalves family vehemently opposed the plea deal, with Steve protesting outside the change of plea hearing in Ada County Courthouse in Boise on July 2.

With Kohberger no longer facing trial, Judge Steven Hippler lifted a sweeping gag order Thursday, but refused to immediately unseal all records related to the case. 

In an appearance on CBS Mornings Friday, Goncalves’ parents Kristi and Steve Goncalves blasted the ongoing secrecy in the case which they claim protects the man who murdered their daughter and her friends.

‘I think by hiding the truth we are protecting our killers,’ Steve told Gayle King.

‘We have to show the ugliness of what this person did.’

Steve said the family feels the need to know all the details about how their daughter died in order to prepare to confront Kohberger in court. 

‘We’re writing our victim impact statements and we don’t even know what the impact is as they’ve hid the impact from all of us,’ he said. 

‘I need to know the facts. How many times was my daughter stabbed? Was she choked? What happened?

‘And that should be party of our victim impact statement. They’re robbing us. And they’re protecting he killer still.’

Kristi added that the victims’ families don’t know ‘any more than pretty much everybody else’ about the murders and the case as a whole.

She said she hopes that ‘with this gag order being lifted it will allow us to know more about what happened to our daughter.’

To this day, the parents said they still don’t know what the motive for the murders was. 

A gag order of some sorts – known as a non-dissemination order – has been in place since the early days blocking law enforcement, attorneys for both sides and other officials from speaking publicly about the case.

The order – together with the broad sealing of records and evidence by the court – has restricted what information the public and the victims’ families have had access to throughout the almost three-year-long proceedings.

Throughout the years-long proceedings, the court found it necessary to protect Kohberger’s right to a fair trial.

During the July 2 change of plea hearing, Judge Hippler said the gag order would remain in place through sentencing, prompting a coalition of media organizations – including the Daily Mail – to file a motion calling for it to be lifted.

‘There is no possible set of circumstances under which Mr. Kohberger will ever face a jury to determine his guilt or to determine whether the death penalty should be imposed,’ the coalition argued.

‘No trial will occur. Thus, there is no need to preserve Mr. Kohberger’s ‘right to a fair trial’ because he has already admitted guilt.’

In a brief court hearing Thursday, the judge agreed, saying that ‘the rights of the public to information in this case is paramount given the fact that a plea has been entered in this case.’

Dressed in a burgundy t-shirt, Kohberger looked on over Zoom from Ada County Jail – the first time he has been seen in public since he admitted to the murders. 

While lifting the gag order, Judge Hippler said he was ‘denying outright’ a separate motion to unseal all records in the case, calling it ‘premature.’

Instead, he said that, after sentencing, the court will begin the process to review all the records in the case to determine what can be unsealed and what should remain sealed. 

‘That process is going to take time – I’m not talking days, I’m probably not talking weeks… patience will be required,’ he said.

Despite Kohberger’s guilty plea, a lot of information about the murders remains a mystery.

The 30-year-old has not revealed a motive for the attack and there is no known connection between him and his victims.

During the change of plea hearing, Thompson revealed that Kohberger bought a Ka-Bar knife and sheath from Amazon in March 2022 – months before the killings.

In June 2022, he moved from his parents’ home in Pennsylvania to Pullman, Washington, where he enrolled on the criminal justice PhD program at Washington State University.

From the following month onwards, his cell phone pinged close to the victims’ home at 1122 King Road – indicating that he likely stalked or surveilled at least one of the women who lived there. 

At around 4am on November 13, 2022, Kohberger broke into the three-story home and went straight up to Mogen’s room on the third floor, where he murdered Mogen and Goncalves. 

On his way back downstairs or on leaving the property, the prosecutor said he encountered Kernodle on the second floor, who had just received a DoorDash food order.

He attacked her with the knife and then also murdered Chapin who was sleeping in her bed.

Kohberger then left through the back sliding door on the second story of the property, passing roommate Dylan Mortensen who had been woken by the noise and peeked around her bedroom door.

Mortensen and roommate Bethany Funke – whose bedroom was on the first floor – were the only survivors.

Prosecutors believe Kohberger did not intend to kill all four victims that night – but did enter the home intending to kill and had planned his attack for some time.

He was tracked down, after he left a Ka-Bar leather knife sheath next to Mogen’s body at the scene. Through Investigative Genetic Genealogy, the FBI managed to trace DNA on the sheath to Kohberger. 

Kohberger will return to Ada County Court for his sentencing on July 23, where the families of the victims will be given the opportunity to deliver impact statements.