Smoking Gun Evidence Found in Bryan Kohberger's Home—Report

• Bryan Kohberger, 28, is charged in the deaths of four University of Idaho students.
• Unsealed court documents say police seized ID cards that were inside a glove in a box during a search of Kohberger's parents' home.
• One ID that was found is reportedly connected to someone in the home where the slayings occurred.
• Former FBI agent Jennifer Coffindaffer said there was no reason to explain why Kohberger had the ID.

An ID card connected to the murder of four University of Idaho students was reportedly found when authorities searched Bryan Kohberger's home.

Kohberger, 28, is accused of breaking into a rental home near the university campus in Moscow in the early hours of November 13 and fatally stabbing Kaylee Goncalves, 21, Madison Mogen, 21, Xana Kernodle, 20, and Ethan Chapin, 20.

Kohberger, then a graduate student at Washington State University, was arrested at his parents' home in Albrightsville, Pennsylvania, on December 30.

He has yet to enter a plea to four counts of first-degree murder and one count of felony burglary but a lawyer who represented him in Pennsylvania prior to his extradition to Idaho said he was "eager to be exonerated."

According to court documents unsealed last month, ID cards inside a glove inside a box were among the items police seized during a search of Kohberger's parents' home in Albrightsville.

NewsNation reported that an ID connected to someone from the home where the slayings took place was found during a search.

In an appearance on NewsNation, former FBI agent Jennifer Coffindaffer said that the ID in question was found concealed inside a glove in a box.

"If you go to the search warrant return, sure enough, there are these IDs that were concealed in a glove in a box," she said.

"Now, this is just unusual. Most people don't keep IDs hidden in this fashion. So to me it was something that certainly corroborated the source information and seems suspect from the beginning."

Coffindaffer said it's not clear who the ID card belonged to, but if it was one of the murder victims then it could be a smoking gun.

"If indeed, he had that ID in that glove, this is smoking," she said. "There is no reason to explain it other than he was in that house and took that during the commission of that crime.

"It's super strong... especially when you combine it with the sheath that was found next to Maddie Mogen with his DNA on the clasp." Coffindaffer has been contacted for further comment.

Michael McAuliffe, a former federal prosecutor and elected state attorney, told Newsweek that any items connected to the murders being found in Kohberger's parents' home, which is across the country from the scene of the crimes, "would be significant, even damning.

"The reports that IDs were hidden in a box or glove compartment could meet that standard, but we need to know the specifics."

McAuliffe said the IDs "were only generally described on the inventory list for the search so the connection is to the murders is unclear."

But if the ID is for one of the victims, it would "match the importance of the defendant's DNA evidence being found on the knife sheath next to one of the victims at the scene," he said. "The potential information is tantalizing in its newsworthiness, but the gag order prevents it from being confirmed. Eventually, the evidence will become public because the prosecutors have the burden to prove guilt in an open court before a jury."

Neama Rahmani, an attorney and former federal prosecutor, agreed that the ID card would be "'smoking gun' evidence if it belonged to someone else who lived in the Moscow home."

Rahmani told Newsweek: "Aside from the single source of DNA evidence in the knife sheath at the scene and the cell site evidence showing Kohberger near the home before and after the murders, the state hasn't revealed much evidence that ties Kohberger to the home."

Kohberger's defense team "will argue the DNA was planted or transferred and that the cell site evidence does not put Kohberger at the scene when the murders happened," he said. "It will be more difficult for the defense to explain an ID that was transported thousands of miles away and hidden in Kohberger's parents' home."

A probable cause affidavit said DNA found on a knife sheath connected Kohberger to the crime through DNA from his father that was retrieved from trash outside the family's Albrightsville home.

Legal experts told Newsweek that Kohberger's attorneys may seek to sow doubt about that DNA evidence after it was reported that the sheath was sent out of Idaho to be tested by a startup in Texas.

A judge in early January issued a sweeping gag order, barring attorneys, law enforcement agencies and others associated with the case from talking or writing about it.

A preliminary hearing in the case is scheduled to begin on June 26.

Update 4/11/23, 9:30 a.m. ET: This article has been updated with comment from Michael McAuliffe.

Update 4/11/23,11:50 a.m. ET: This article has been updated with comment from Neama Rahmani.