Bryan Kohberger, currently serving four consecutive life sentences for the 2022 murders of four University of Idaho students, has been granted a new evidentiary hearing. This hearing, aimed at allowing Kohberger to withdraw his guilty plea, is scheduled for June 17, 2027, as confirmed by court documents referenced by ABC News.
He claimed that his attorneys exaggerated the conditions he would face on Idaho’s death row if he went to trial and lost.
In his handwritten court filings, Kohberger alleged that his former legal team used “coercion, disinformation, false promises, and the withholding of exculpatory discovery,” which led him to enter the “bogus” guilty plea. The decision does not overturn Kohberger’s conviction or sentence. It allows a court to examine his post-conviction claims that his guilty plea was entered under coercion and without full disclosure of evidence. Those claims have been included in his petition but have not been tested in court. An evidentiary hearing thus gives both sides an opportunity to present evidence and witness testimony regarding those allegations.
Kohberger further stated that he had previously been diagnosed with Developmental Coordination Disorder and other psychiatric conditions.
Background of the Idaho murders case
In July 2025, before the case went into trial, Kohberger pleaded guilty to four counts of first-degree murder and one count of burglary. Kohberger was hence, sentenced to four consecutive life sentences without parole, plus 10 years for burglary. Under the plea agreement, prosecutors withdrew their pursuit of the death penalty.
