13 Complaints In 3 Months: The Bryan Kohberger Warning Signs WSU Ignored Before The Idaho Murders
Hidden Killers With Tony Brueski | True Crime News & Commentary
True Crime Today
3.3 • 910 Ratings
🗓️ 18 January 2026
⏱️ 42 minutes
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Summary
Women on the Washington State University campus built survival systems to avoid Bryan Kohberger. A tally board tracking his comments. Emails with "911" in the subject line. Security escorts to their cars. A door strategy so no one would be trapped alone with him.
According to a 126-page lawsuit filed by the families of Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin, at least 13 formal complaints were filed against Kohberger in just three months during fall 2022. A professor who worked with predators urged colleagues to cut his funding. She told them directly: "If we give him a Ph.D., that's the guy we will hear is harassing, stalking, and sexually abusing his students."
The university didn't act. Five days before four students were murdered, WSU held mandatory discrimination training for Kohberger's cohort — because of him. Less than two weeks before the killings, faculty met with him about his behavior. No decisive action was taken.
Meanwhile, Bryan's sister Mel Kohberger has broken three years of silence in a New York Times interview. She describes Christmas 2022 — warning her brother about the "psycho killer on the loose" near his apartment, never imagining he was the suspect. She talks about his heroin addiction, his recovery, the childhood bullying that shaped him, and the heart she drew for him that tabloids called a "creepy drawing."
The lawsuit alleges WSU calculated that a potential discrimination lawsuit from Kohberger was a bigger risk than the violence he might commit. The families of four murdered students are now demanding transparency, accountability, and reform.
This wasn't a case of warning signs being missed. According to the lawsuit, they were documented and ignored.
#BryanKohberger #WSULawsuit #IdahoMurders #KayleeGoncalves #MadisonMogen #XanaKernodle #EthanChapin #MelKohberger #HiddenKillers #TrueCrime
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is the big breakdown. A long look back at some of the biggest stories we're covering for you at the Hidden Killers podcast and true crime today. |
| 0:09.2 | This is Hidden Killers with Tony Bruske. Here now, Tony Bruske. |
| 0:15.8 | Remember these words? Mark my word. I work with predators. If we give him a phd that's the guy that in many years |
| 0:25.5 | when he's a professor we will hear is harassing stalking and sexually abusing his students that's a |
| 0:32.2 | direct quote from a washington state university faculty member said to colleagues in the fall of 2022. |
| 0:41.0 | It wasn't speculation, wasn't being dramatic. |
| 0:43.8 | It was issuing a warning, urging them to cut Brian Koberger's funding and remove him from the |
| 0:50.6 | program before it was too late. |
| 0:53.4 | They didn't listen. Five days before the college |
| 0:57.2 | students were stabbed to death in their beds. WSU held a mandatory discrimination training |
| 1:01.7 | session for Koeberger's entire doctoral cohort because of him, because of the complaints |
| 1:09.8 | have been piling up since the day he arrived on campus. |
| 1:17.4 | And now more than three years later, the families of Kelly |
| 1:20.5 | Gonzalez, Madison Mogan, Zanerkernodal, and Ethan Chapin |
| 1:23.7 | have filed a 126-page lawsuit against Washington State University. |
| 1:29.1 | The allegations inside that complaint aren't just damning they're enraging. |
| 1:34.5 | Because this wasn't a case of warning signs being missed. |
| 1:38.4 | According to the lawsuit, those warning signs were documented, reported, tracked on a literal |
| 1:44.0 | tallyboard, and systematically ignored |
| 1:46.8 | by an institution more concerned with liability than safety. Where have we seen this before? |
| 1:54.4 | Passing the trash around from place to place. Between August and November of 2020, a span of just three months, at least 13 formal complaints |
| 2:05.4 | about Brian Koberger were filed in WSU's Office of Compliance and Civil Rights. |
... |
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