This is a true crime in real time update from True Crime Today and the Hidden Killers podcast.

It was a ruling that set the course for one of the most anticipated trials in recent memory.

Brian Koberger accused of the brutal murders of four University of Idaho students

will face the possibility of the death penalty of convicted.

Judge Stephen Hippler's decision landed with

the weight of a gavel slamming down, not just on legal arguments, but on the very questions of

morality and justice. Idaho's courts will now navigate. The judge's 55-page ruling, released to the

public late Wednesday, dismantled the defense's multifaceted argument against capital punishment.

Hitler's rejection wasn't a mere dismissal. It was a resolute affirmation of settled law,

grounded in precedent from both Idaho and the U.S. Supreme Court's. The message was clear.

The death penalty remains a lawful and viable consequence for the most heinous crimes.

And according to prosecutors, Koberger's alleged acts committed in the quiet sanctity of a rental home

near the University of Idaho campus more than qualified.

The defense team had hoped to sideline the death penalty with a legal chess match.

They argued that Idaho's system was riddled with inconsistencies

unconstitutionally applied and failed to meet modern standards of decency,

citing international human rights norms and pointing to the state's inability

to carry out executions over the past 12 years.

They sought to portray capital punishment as an anachronistic

and broken mechanism. But Hitler's response was surgical. In his order, he noted the absence of

significant societal shifts or legislative actions that could justify departing from established law.

Relief in the defendant's favor is not warranted on any of the motions, he wrote,

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