Idaho murder suspect and father pulled over and let go twice in white Hyundai after slayings

Suspected Idaho butcher Bryan Kohberger, the suspect in the brutal deaths of four University of Idaho students, was pulled over twice by police in Indiana as he traveled cross-country with his father to Pennsylvania.

Kohberger, 28, was seeking a doctorate in criminal justice at Washington State University, which is a short 15-minute drive to the house in Moscow, Idaho, where Kaylee Goncalves and Maddie Mogen, both 21, and their roommate Xana Kernodle and her boyfriend Ethan Chapin, both 20, were stabbed to death with a ‘Rambo-style’ knife.

The alleged killer’s attorney, Jason LaBar, said the father flew to Washington to help his son make the 2,500-mile drive to the family home in Pennsylvania in the white Hyundai Elantra police were searching for. Kohberger was reportedly going home for the Christmas holidays and along the way, they were stopped twice by police, according to the Daily Mail — once for speeding and the other for following too closely to a car ahead of them.

The suspect was being tracked as he made the cross-country trek — the Kohbergers arrived home around December 17, according to his attorney.

“Investigators started tracking Kohbergers movements across the US, with witnesses claiming that they saw both him and his father getting repairs done to the car on December 16,” the Daily Mail reported. “Police then impounded the vehicle from outside of his parents’ home when they swooped on the property in Chestnuthill Township, Monroe County.”

It is unclear if his father or any other family members were aware of his brutal crimes — LaBar released a statement Sunday on their behalf.

“First and foremost we care deeply for the four families who have lost their precious children. There are no words that can adequately express the sadness we feel, and we pray each day for them,” the statement read. “We will continue to let the legal process unfold and as a family we will love and support our son and brother. We have fully cooperated with law enforcement agencies in an attempt to seek the truth and promote his presumption of innocence rather than judge unknown facts and make erroneous assumptions.”

The FBI reportedly kept Kohberger under surveillance for several days before his arrest last Friday — he is due in court Thursday in Pennsylvania, as he awaits extradition back to Idaho to answer for four counts of first-degree murder and one count of felony burglary.

Tom Tillison

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