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EXCLUSIVE: A forthcoming book sheds light on how Bryan Kohberger’s defense strategy might have unfolded in the Idaho student murders case, had he not altered his plea just weeks before the trial. The book suggests that the defense could have contested the admissibility of critical evidence, specifically a Ka-Bar knife sheath.
Christopher Whitcomb’s “Broken Plea: The Explosive Search for Truth Behind the Idaho Murders” relies on previously undisclosed expert analyses and documents that were not brought to light in court after Kohberger admitted guilt shortly before his trial was set to begin.
In an exclusive discussion with Fox News Digital, Whitcomb disclosed that a defense specialist had identified substantial issues with the chain of custody concerning the sheath discovered on victim Madison Mogen’s bed.
Bryan Kohberger was seen arriving at Monroe County Courthouse in Pennsylvania for his extradition hearing before being transferred to Idaho. On July 2, 2025, he confessed to the murders of University of Idaho students Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin, after spending over two years in custody pending trial. (The Image Direct for Fox News Digital)
“One could argue convincingly that the chain of custody potentially posed major challenges for the prosecution regarding any DNA evidence,” Whitcomb noted. “Without such evidence, the case would largely rely on the presence of a white car and cell phone tower pings.” He further explained, “This custody issue represents the most significant hurdle the prosecution might have faced.”
Brent Turvey, a criminologist and forensic scientist hired by the defense, said he became aware of the chain of custody issue after filing his expert report to meet a court deadline.
Bryan Kohberger appears at the Ada County Courthouse in Boise, Idaho, on July 2, 2025, charged in the murders of four University of Idaho students. (Kyle Green/AP)
“If this had gone to trial, this piece of evidence should have, by any competent jurist, been ruled inadmissible,” he said of the sheath. “In most cases, in most jurisdictions, it would be.”
No judge or jury has evaluated that claim.
“The problem is a chain of custody form is supposed to be something that is created live,” Turvey said Wednesday. “So, if I take a bag of evidence and I retrieve it, I sign that I’ve retrieved it, put my signature on it, the date, you know, that kind of stuff.”
The evidence bag appears to have been filled in twice. Once on the bag itself, and later on a sticker attached to the front.
This split image shows two undated photos of an evidence bag that author Christopher Whitcomb says contained the Ka-Bar knife sheath, the prosecution’s main physical evidence against Bryan Kohberger. The earliest date written on it, along the evidence sticker, is 11/14/22, signed with the initials “BP” — likely lead detective Brett Payne. Whitcomb’s new book, “Broken Plea,” raises concerns about the chain of custody of this evidence. (Courtesy of Christopher Whitcomb)
The earliest date visible on the bag are the initials “BP,” likely belonging to lead detective Brett Payne, and the date “11/14/22,” written over the evidence tape sealing the bag. Another signature appears to be from Shannon Arredondo, a forensic specialist with the Idaho State Police crime lab, signed and dated the bag again on Nov. 16. The label, affixed sometime later, has six recorded exchanges between Nov. 13 and Nov. 16 written by a single pen in similar handwriting, according to Turvey.
Kohberger’s defense team, led by Idaho attorney Anne Taylor, did not pursue his findings before the plea deal, however, Whitcomb said. She did not respond to a Fox News Digital request for comment.
There are significant issues with motive, means, mechanism. There are so, so many screaming questions that nobody will ever have answers to.
If the paper trail is flawed as alleged, that doesn’t necessarily mean investigators botched the case, said Paul Mauro, a retired NYPD inspector and Fox News contributor.
“But what it could point to is that is a vulnerability in the case, so they take a plea,” he said. “They could have been concerned about losing a juror on that. On the other hand it’s very indicative of what you do when you have absolutely no defense, you put the procedure on trial, instead of the facts.”
Mauro, after reviewing images of the evidence bag, said he didn’t see a significant problem for the prosecution.
That’s just one element of Kohberger’s defense that never faced jury scrutiny, and Whitcomb said he reviewed thousands of pages of additional documents that he didn’t have room to write about.
University of Idaho students Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle, and two other housemates pose in the final photo shared by Goncalves on Instagram before four students were fatally stabbed in November 2022. (Facebook)
A second key element in “Broken Plea” is speculation surrounding wisps of hair photographed at the crime scene in, or at least beneath, Ethan Chapin’s hand.
“To the best of my knowledge, that hair to this day has never been processed or tested,” Whitcomb told Fox News Digital.
Turvey, a senior partner at Forensic Solutions LLC who has testified at more than 70 trials, found the hair when he traveled to Moscow, Idaho, to review evidence in person.
A watchman is parked outside 1122 King Road on Dec. 11, 2022, four weeks after four students were stabbed to death inside. The property is scheduled for demolition a year later, though critics say it should remain until the suspect’s trial. (Michael Ruiz/Fox News Digital)
“The FBI lab said Kohberger is excluded,” Turvey told Fox News Digital. “This is not his hair.”
As to who it belongs to, the answer remains unclear.
“When I saw this information, it changed my perspective on everything, and that’s how it started,” Whitcomb said, describing his motivation to write the book.
Fox News Digital has reached out to Idaho State Police and the Moscow Police Department for comment.
The author is a former member of the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team and early member of the bureau’s Violent Criminal Apprehension Program. He plays in a band, spent years as a journalist and congressional speechwriter, and has written a half-dozen other books.
An evidence photo from the Moscow Police Department shows a KA-BAR knife sheath believed to have housed the knife Bryan Kohberger used to murder four University of Idaho students in November 2022. (Moscow Police Department)
“I don’t feel it’s my place to challenge what [Kohberger] told the world,” he said in an interview Tuesday. “I’m not saying this is a wrongful conviction. He pleaded guilty. He’s a well-educated, intelligent, grown man.”
Jurors never had a chance to weigh in after Kohberger’s unexpected guilty plea last year, when he admitted to the Nov. 13, 2022, murders of Mogen, 21, Kaylee Goncalves, 21, Xana Kernodle, 20, and Chapin, 20.
The plea landed him in prison for the rest of his life, with no chance of parole, but he avoided the death penalty. He offered no explanation for the crimes, shared no motive and offered no new information.
Prosecutors have said Kohberger remained inside for about 15 minutes, although the initial police affidavit doesn’t describe the exact time he went into the house. Whitcomb notes the defense narrative that the attacks took place in less than five, inconsistent with the hours Turvey suspects the crime scene cleanup would have taken.
While there were many outside experts on the case, Whitcomb focuses on three, T. Paulette Sutton, a forensic scientist specializing in blood spatter analysis for the prosecution; Turvey, for the defense; and Christopher Holland, a retired FBI agent and forensic criminologist also working for the defense.
Sutton, who did not respond to a request for comment, concluded in her peer-reviewed report that there was “no physical evidence to exclude a single perpetrator causing the death of these four individuals.” Turvey believes there were at least two.
Both of their reports have been reviewed by Fox News Digital. They contain graphic crime scene images not suitable for publication.
Bryan Kohberger is housed at the Idaho State Correctional Complex in Kuna, Idaho, after being sentenced for the 2022 stabbing murders of four University of Idaho students. (Derek Shook for Fox News Digital)
Whitcomb also obtained access to materials not mentioned in the book, which he told Fox News Digital include images of the evidence bag containing the Ka-Bar sheath, one with a chain of custody form attached and one without.
Whitcomb raised a number of issues that Taylor and the rest of Kohberger’s defense team never got a chance to present to a jury.
Kohberger pleaded guilty on July 2, 2025, admitting to all four murders and felony burglary in a deal that spared him from the potential death penalty.
On the night of the murders, he searched Google for local police dispatch audio, according to public records tied to the case. He powered off his phone before the murders and turned it back on after them. While investigators found none of the victim’s DNA in his car after they seized it in Pennsylvania, an FBI analyst determined soil on a shovel found inside it matched dirt from the Moscow area.
At sentencing, he sat through victim impact statements showing no emotion, as the victims’ families and surviving roommates excoriated him in their impact statements.
“Truth be told, I’m unable to come up with anything redeeming about Mr. Kohberger,” Judge Steven Hippler said at the hearing. “His grotesque acts of evil have buried and hidden anything that might have been good or intrinsically human about him.”
Cpl. Brett Payne of the Moscow Police Department and Lt. Darren Gilbertson of the Idaho State Police speak to the media during a press conference at the Ada County Courthouse after Bryan Kohberger’s sentencing on July 23, 2025. (Kyle Green/Associated Press)
Hippler handed down a sentence of four consecutive terms of life in prison with no parole, plus another 10 years.
As part of the plea, Kohberger forfeited his right to appeal.
The case’s lead detectives, Idaho State Police Lt. Darren Gilbertson and Moscow Police Cpl. Brett Payne, said afterward they still didn’t know his motive.
“Why did he take the plea?” Turvey asked in a conversation Wednesday. “I don’t know. I never met him.”
By design, he does not meet with defendants whose cases he’s working on, he said. But he is aware the defense made arguments about Kohberger’s mental health and capacity.
“He was not in a good space to make those kinds of decisions, and that was their argument the whole time,” he said. “So the idea that you would go in and get him to take a plea when he doesn’t know everything, doesn’t understand it… Well that’s a problem.”
“Broken Plea” is in stores on April 28.
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