‘Actual innocence is my truth’: Bryan Kohberger now wants a trial, per NYT report

Almost 13 months after he pleaded guilty, Bryan Kohberger claims he’s innocent and says he will fight his conviction for murdering four University of Idaho students.

For a New York Times report published Monday, Kohberger provided a statement and interview for the first time since he was sentenced to four consecutive life terms in prison in July 2025 and dating to when he was arrested on suspicion of the murders in December 2022. He has spent just over a year in segregated lockup at Idaho’s maximum security prison south of Boise.

“My actual innocence is my truth, and the plea, hinged on by false promises and blatant disinformation, MUST be withdrawn,” Kohberger said in a statement to the newspaper Sunday night. The Idaho Statesman also reached out to Kohberger regarding his hope to walk back his conviction.

On Monday, a new civil case for post-conviction relief from Kohberger posted to the state’s court records website. His handwritten filings included one in support of appointment of legal counsel. When asked what relief he seeks in one of the fillings, the 31-year-old wrote out “a withdrawal of a guilty plea,” according to his petition and affidavit.

He wrote in the petition that during his attorney-client discussions, he was convinced to “falsely confess” to capital murder and felony burglary “by coercion, disinformation, false promises and the withholding of exculpatory discovery.” He was “convinced that actual guilt was not an important factor” in his plea deal, as he could have faced the death penalty, he wrote, and was “advised to lie.”

As part of his plea deal last summer, Kohberger, 31, accepted no chance of parole and waived his appeal rights in exchange for avoiding a possible death sentence if he took his capital murder case to trial. But, like all prisoners, he maintains the right to ask a court for post-conviction relief — an appeal action that cannot be signed away — including on potential arguments that he received inadequate legal representation during his original prosecution.

At a change-of-plea hearing in early July 2025, Kohberger endorsed his public defenders under oath in court before Judge Steven Hippler of Idaho’s 4th Judicial District in Ada County, acknowledging that the legal team led by attorney Anne Taylor had performed to his satisfaction. But a U.S. Supreme Court decision in 2019, Garza v. Idaho, affirmed that a defendant can always appeal on certain Sixth Amendment grounds, regardless of whether they previously agreed to waive those rights.

Kohberger also signed a , a and a connected to the deal he accepted from prosecutors that saw him sentenced to the rest of his life in prison. Taylor also told the court she consented to her client’s entry of his guilty plea.

“I want to make sure that your plea is given voluntarily,” Hippler told Kohberger in court last summer, “and I want to make sure that you actually committed the crimes to which you’re pleading guilty, because I don’t want you to plead guilty to a crime you didn’t commit.”

“Are you pleading guilty because you are guilty?” the judge asked Kohberger at the hearing before twice reading the specific murder charge tied to each of the four victims.

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“Yes,” Kohberger responded.

The development of Kohberger’s would-be appeal suggests that what is likely the most high-profile criminal case in Idaho’s history might not be over, now approaching four years since the U of I students were found fatally stabbed in their off-campus Moscow home in November 2022. The four victims were seniors Madison Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves, both 21; and junior Xana Kernodle and freshman Ethan Chapin, both 20.

”We’re not scared of it,” Steve Goncalves, father of Kaylee Goncalves, told the Idaho Statesman by phone Monday. “I always stood by the work of the FBI agents and other people. If he wants to fight for the death penalty, that’s exactly what we’ll go for, and that’s what he’s facing. There’s so much evidence against him in this case. So we’re not scared of a trial, not one bit.”

The Latah County Prosecutor’s Office declined to comment Monday, citing “pending litigation.” Moscow Police Chief Anthony Dahlinger also declined to comment.

“My heart goes out to the families of Madison, Kaylee, Xana, and Ethan, who have already endured unimaginable loss and now must face today’s deeply painful news,” Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador said in a statement to the Statesman. “My office stands ready to do whatever is necessary to ensure justice is fully carried out.”

The Statesman also reached out to Taylor for comment.

Already, Kohberger’s case has cost taxpayers more than $8 million, a Statesman analysis found. Of that total, nearly $5.5 million covered the expense of his public defense.

Under Idaho law, a defendant must seek post-conviction relief within a year of a 42-day clock expiring from the deadline to file a direct appeal of their conviction. In Kohberger’s case, his post-conviction relief petition deadline is the first week of September of this year.

”Why am I breaking my silence?” Kohberger told The New York Times by phone. “A lot went wrong in those plea discussions. I really do want to be heard.”

Merely filing a notice to appeal does not itself violate the terms of a plea agreement, the U.S. Supreme Court said in the 2019 case out of Idaho. But Kohberger’s effort to reopen his criminal case could jeopardize his current sentence and restore the chance of the death penalty — or even the possibility of a federal case at which capital punishment also could be back on the table.

Idaho Statesman reporter Kevin Fixler has covered the Moscow college student homicides since they happened. He is working on a book about the case with Mike Baker of The New York Times.

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