Newly released crime scene photos give a chilling look inside the off-campus home where four University of Idaho students were brutally killed. The images show blood-stained rooms, underscoring the violence of the attack allegedly carried out by Bryan Kohberger.
Nearly 3,000 never-before-seen photos tied to the November 2022 killings were briefly posted by Idaho State Police on Tuesday before being swiftly removed, according to the Daily Mail, which managed to view the images before they disappeared. The newly surfaced photos paint a deeply unsettling picture of the crime scene. Blood can be seen across almost every surface—doors, walls, furniture, mattresses, bedding, and floors—inside bedrooms left in complete disarray.
Blood and Gore
The scenes stand in stark contrast to the home's otherwise ordinary appearance as a typical college house in Moscow, Idaho, making the violence that unfolded there all the more disturbing.
Other disturbing photos captured the victims' personal belongings — cell phones, laptops, shoes, and clothing — all stained with blood inside the wrecked bedrooms where Xana Kernodle, Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, and Ethan Chapin were fatally stabbed in their sleep on November 13, 2022.
One especially disturbing photo appeared to show smeared, bloody fingerprints on a white nightstand in one bedroom, while another room showed blood running down the walls.
Other photos reflected the house's life before the tragedy, revealing what looked like the remnants of a college gathering — red Solo cups scattered around, beer cans lining the staircase, and a folding table still set up for a game of beer pong.
Goncalves' grieving family spoke out after the shocking images began circulating, issuing an emotional plea to the public.
In a heartfelt statement shared on Facebook Tuesday night, they asked for compassion and restraint. "Please be kind & as difficult as it is, place yourself outside of yourself & consume the content as if it were your loved one," the family wrote.
They also urged people to remember the human cost behind the images, adding, "Murder is not entertainment, and crime scene photos are not content."
Haunting Images
The family said they were told Tuesday morning that the disturbing photos were going to be released, but by the time the phone call ended, the images were already circulating online just 12 minutes later. "That was the 'heads up' we were given," the family wrote in their statement.
It remains unclear why the large batch of photos was briefly posted and then taken down from the Idaho State Police website.
Kohberger, now 31, shocked many last July when he unexpectedly agreed to a plea deal just weeks before his long-awaited trial was due to begin.
He admitted responsibility for the four killings, but the deal spared him from facing the death penalty. That outcome angered some of the victims' families and left them without the answers they had hoped a trial might provide — especially about why the brutal attacks happened.
Kohberger is now spending the rest of his life behind bars, serving four consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution.
