Anyone been following the investigation into the Idaho student murders?

Absolutely bonkers and seems to be a twist with every new bit of information that's released.

Sorry for the extremely long post but I think it's really interesting what's happened in a morbid way.

For those who aren't familiar and are interested, in November 4 students were stabbed in a student house in Idaho in the early hours of the morning and in the last few days they've arrested a suspect who they are absolutely certain is the killer.

5 students lived in this house (and a bf was staying over too) and originally the information given was that 2 were on the top floor, 2 on the first floor, and 2 surviving housemates who weren't attacked at all were on the ground floor. They were all out partying etc till somewhere after 1am when in stages they all went home. Sometime between 4am and 4:30am someone broke in and murders 4 of them leaving a scene so gruesome that blood was seeping out of the walls and could be seen outside of the home dripping down. The 2 surviving housemates were asleep at the time and woke up hours later, found the bodies and called their friends over for some reason and then called 911 to report what they believed to be a housemate passed out.

Then police released information about a white car that had been seen in the area around the time and asked for people's help identifying it which they continued to do right up to last week.

It was claimed that one of the girls possibly had a stalker and this may be a motive and internet detectives have been speculating about who could have done it. An ex bf? Someone who gave them a lift home? A 'creepy' guy seen at a food stand? Even a university worker who a psychic has named as the killer many times. So many theories. We're the roommates in on it? How could they sleep through four bloody murders and when they finally awakened at 11am only think someone was passed out if there was so much blood that it was seeping through the walls?

Anyway fast forward to this week and someone has been arrested and suddenly everything that anyone thought they knew has been shown to be false.

The killers white car had actually been tracked by police almost immediately after the murders and had been tracked on CCTV driving all the way to another town. The license plate had been confirmed as to who owned it.
As it turned out this car had been stopped by police many times in the past for various things and the driver had given his mobile number. The police checked his number to see where it had been at the time of the murders and it showed it leaving home in the early hours and then being turned off until around 30minutes after the murders when it was turned back on and followed a route from the victims home to his home following the exact route of the white car police had been tracking.
On further inspection it also showed he'd been to the victims home 12 times in the previous months, all during darkness and that he went back to the scene of the crime while the bodies laid undiscovered.

A knife cover had been found on one of the victims beds and DNA had been taken from it. In December they had been to the car owners home and taken DNA from the trash (hey it's America) which had shown the trash belonged to the father of the killer.

But what about the surviving housemates? How did they not notice the murders and sleep through it? Well it turns out they didn't as police have now said that contrary to previously released information one housemate was awake throughout. In fact 1 of the victims had a food delivery at 4am and was on tiktok at 4:12am (and police know the murders were complete at the latest 4:25am) Everyone was under the impression the survivors were on the ground floor and the victims on first and second (and the killer went in through a door on the first floor as the house was built into a hill so both ground and first floors had access). Nope.

One survivor was on the first floor with the victims. She heard a sound like one of the victims on the third floor was playing with her dog. A short time later she heard the same victim say that someone was there so went out of her room to check but saw nothing untoward. A bit later she heard crying and a male say "it's ok I'm going to help you". Again she went out of her room to check but saw nothing odd so went back in.
At quarter past 4 a security camera at a nearby home faintly picked up whimpering and a loud thud with a dog barking loudly. At this point the housemate says she opened the door for a third time and saw a man with a mask on walking towards her close enough for her to say he had bushy eyebrows beneath the mask. She stood frozen in fear as he walked past her and towards the exit door. At this point she went into her room and locked herself in.

All scary stuff but the new information comes with even more questions. Why did they say she was on the ground floor when she was on the first floor? Possibly so that the killer didn't know there was a witness? Why did she lock herself in the room and not call 911 for 7 hours? Why was the 911 call about a passed out person? Why, if he had just murdered 4 people did he walk straight past her sparing her? Where was the 5th housemate while all this was happening? Remember the whimpering, thud and barking was so loud it was heard on a security camera at another house but this housemate slept through it.

Then there's more random theories and weirdness. A vigil was held for the victims and someone looking suspiciously like the suspect is seen on video attending. Not only that but when he walks passed some people who are standing separately they walk together and have a little chat. The speculation being that they were agents monitoring his movements.
There have been several podcasts and internet live streams with people discussing the investigation and in one of them a caller called (as it's what callers tend to do). He said that he lived in a college town had often been asked how he would get away with murder. I'm not sure if it's the same podcast or another one but someone sounding the same called and asked the host something along the lines of "if you were talking to the killer now what would you say?" The host replied with "are you the killer?" And the caller laughed and denied it.

Oh and the killer? He's studying criminology at college (different one to the victims) and posted a survey on Reddit aimed at murderers with questions like "how did you choose your target?" "Before making your move how did you approach your target? What were you feeling?" "After committing the crime what were you feeling?" And "how did you leave the scene"?

It's all bizarre and a really fascinating case with so many unanswered questions and things that don't make sense. Not that murder ever makes sense but things like why did he let one person live? How did he kill so many people so quickly? How was he not seen by the delivery guy? Is it his first killings or is he a serial killer? Was anyone else involved?

I think once all the details come out it will be regarded as one of those infamous murders like the white house farm murders. Hopefully he'll rot in hell anyway.

 

Sounds very strange as you say, but after all it is the USA !!!

if you think this is strange, try and get a copy of ‘Fatal Vision’ by Joe McGinnis (not Paddy’s dad!!!). Now that takes some explaining!

 

I was vaguely aware, but I’ve read a bit this morning and it’s absolutely bizarre