Bryan Kohberger’s defense lawyers: Keep gag order in place

Bryan Kohberger’s lawyers are going up against 30 news organizations by asking the Idaho Supreme Court to keep a gag order in place — accusing the media of “twisted” coverage of the case.

Kohberger, 28, a criminal justice doctoral student, has been charged in the Nov. 13 stabbing deaths of the University of Idaho students Kaylee Goncalves, 21, Madison Mogen, 21, Ethan Chapin, 20, and Xana Kernodle, 20.

Kohberger’s team said in a court filing in response to a challenge mounted by the news outlets that they should have first asked the magistrate judge who issued the gag order to reverse it.

“What the media really seeks here is a procedural victory, knowing full well it cannot win on the merits of any test, given the pervasive and grotesquely twisted nature of media coverage that has occurred thus far,” Jay Weston Logsdon, with the Kootenai County Public Defender’s office, wrote in the court document.

Logsdon did not mention any examples of alleged “twisted” media coverage.

Prosecutors have yet to reveal if they intend to seek the death penalty for Kohberger.

Here’s the latest coverage on the brutal killings of four college friends:

The bodies of Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin were found on Nov. 13, 2022, at a rental home across the street from the University of Idaho campus. Kohberger was a graduate student studying criminology at Washington State University just across the state border.

In January, Latah County Magistrate Judge Megan Marshall issued the sweeping gag order, barring attorneys, law enforcement agencies, and others associated with the case from talking or writing about it.

The coalition of news organizations, which includes The Associated Press, contends the gag order violates the right to free speech by prohibiting it from happening in the first place.