Beyond the brutality, newly released images of the Idaho murders reveal something more devastating still.
Vivid, joyful lives full of friendship and potential – erased.
This week, the Daily Mail has published a series of crime scene photos – all previously unseen and only briefly released online by police before being swiftly taken down. We downloaded the files in full before they disappeared.
Bryan Kohberger, now 31, killed four people on the night of November 13, 2022: best friends Kaylee Goncalves and Madison Mogen, both 21, and Xana Kernodle and her boyfriend Ethan Chapin, both 20.
The new images confirm what friends and family have long said: these four University of Idaho students lived loudly, loved openly and wore their hearts on their sleeves.
Inside their off-campus home in Moscow, Idaho, the walls are lined with affirmations and hopeful slogans.
Photos of friends and family are pinned up in bedrooms. References to love, joy and belonging appear throughout the home.
Many of the nearly 3,000 images show not violence, but exuberant life.
Ethan Chapin 20, a freshman from Mount Vernon, Wash, Kaylee Goncalves, 21, a senior from Rathdrum, Idaho, Xana Kernodle, 20, a junior from Post Falls, Idaho and Madison ‘Maddie’ Mogen, 21, a senior from Coeur d’Alene, Idaho
Newly released photos show just how vivaciously the students lived, with a beer pong table at the center of a gruesome murder scene
The home on King Road was the students’ ‘happy place’ … until it wasn’t
The living space was decorated with twinkling lights and a hanging saying: Saturdays are for the girls
High heels lie scattered across floors, closets bulge with brightly colored clothes, outfits are abandoned in the rush to get ready and go out on the town.
Their house on Kings Road had a reputation for loud parties.
In some photos, a beer pong table sits ready in the lounge, red plastic cups still upright.
Empty cans of soda, beer and other alcoholic drinks lie scattered across floors and counters, boxes of Coors Light stacked like furniture.
Amid the party environment, there were personal touches everywhere.
In Mogen’s softly-lit bedroom, bright pink cowboy boots sit proudly on a windowsill.
Flowers, mirrors and books crowd the space.
Among them, a copy of Colleen Hoover’s bestseller It Ends With Us rests on a shelf, half-buried in the clutter. On her bed, a Moon Journal notebook.
In Goncalves’s room, an Idaho sweatshirt hands on a chair. There’s also crate and toys for her beloved goldendoodle Murphy – who was found unharmed the morning after the killings.
A sign on the living room of the party-loving students home promised ‘good vibes’
Mogen’s pink cowboy boots sit eerily still on the windowsill with a decorative ‘M’ initial
‘The universe has big plans for me’ ran one of the feelgood captions on Mogen’s wall, along with ‘life is made of small moments like this’
A ‘moon journal notebook’ for chronicling her thoughts was found on Mogen’s bed
In Kernodle’s room, a yellow stuffed toy recalls happier times before the fateful night.
Life moved fast in that house. It was full. Mogen and Goncalves had been best friends since sixth grade, often described as more like sisters.
Kernodle and Chapin, friends said, were the ‘perfect pair.’
Their personalities lived on the walls. Positive slogans hung throughout the home, now reading like cruel irony. In the kitchen, a sign declares: ‘This is our happy place.’
An illuminated piece in the lounge reads: ‘Good vibes.’
In Mogen’s bedroom, a postcard offers quiet optimism: ‘The universe has big plans for me and it’s time to claim them.’
Perhaps the most haunting of all is striped wall hanging that reads: ‘Saturdays are for the girls.’
It was a Saturday night when Mogen and Goncalves went out for the last time, enjoying another lively evening in Moscow before heading home. Hours later, Kohberger arrived and turned celebration into carnage.
Closets bulge with clothes, outfits abandoned in the rush to get ready and go out
In Goncalves’s room, a crate and toys for her beloved goldendoodle, Murphy
Notebooks left around the house show that they also got their heads down to study at times
Empty bottles of Bud Light from one of the last night’s of revelry ever enjoyed by the four unlucky students
The student home at 1122 King Road in Moscow, Idaho, where the murders were committed
Best friends Kaylee Goncalves and Madison Mogen
Bryan Kohberger appears at the Ada County Courthouse during his sentencing hearing
It is that contrast that sticks out.
Kohberger, dressed in black and wearing a mask, would have walked past the ‘happy place’ sign as he entered the student home through an unlocked backdoor at around 4am. Past the good vibes. Past reminders of youth, friendship and plans for the future. He ignored them all.
Other images detail what came next: obscene violence. Bloodstains. Smears. Splatter. The aftermath of an attack so ferocious it defies comprehension.
The house itself has since been demolished. Reduced to rubble. But the images ensure it will never truly disappear.