How Bryan Kohberger Got Inside the King Road House, According to Netflix’s Idaho Murders Documentary

Netflix’s true crime slate has turned its attention to one of the most closely watched criminal cases in recent memory, and viewers are asking a very specific question after finishing the series. How did Bryan Kohberger actually get inside the house where four University of Idaho students were killed.

The three part docuseries, titled The Idaho Murders, College Nightmare and released on July 29, delves into the killings of Madison Mogen, 21, Kaylee Goncalves, 21, Xana Kernodle, 20, and Ethan Chapin, 20. It leans on interviews, bodycam footage, and personal video from the victims’ own devices to reconstruct both the crime and the investigation that followed.

The Sliding Glass Door at 1122 King Road

Investigators have said for some time that the point of entry was a sliding glass door at the back of the rental home. Idaho State Police video footage from neighborhood cameras showed that Kohberger parked behind 1122 King Road in a small paved lot overlooking the residence at approximately 4:07 a.m. on the night of the murders.

He then entered the home through the sliding glass door on the second floor and made his way through the kitchen to a set of stairs leading to the third floor, according to the state police reconstruction of the crime scene. That door has since become one of the most referenced pieces of physical evidence in the case.

Nearly 200 crime scene images and video, many of them blurred, were released through a public records request, and they show the sliding door investigators say Kohberger used to get inside along with what appears to be blood splatter on the walls. Photos of the open sliding door look unremarkable on their own, but police believe it was the exact entrance Kohberger used to get inside the house.

Responding officers documented physical traces around that same door in the hours after the killings. Moscow Police Officer Mitch Nunes wrote in his report that footsteps went to and from the rear slider door, with the trail heading away from the slider, turning right around a stump in the backyard, and leading toward the front of the house. He also noted small handprints on a window east of the slider, a damaged screen lying on the ground, and smudged fingerprints on the glass door itself.

Kohberger’s Path Once Inside the House

Once inside, investigators say Kohberger moved with purpose rather than wandering the house at random. He made his way to the third floor, where he first checked the room of Kaylee Goncalves and found her bed empty. He then moved down the hall to the room where Goncalves and Madison Mogen were sleeping together, and stabbed both women to death in the bed.

According to prosecutors, Kohberger went directly into Mogen’s room after entering, before moving back to the second floor around 4,17 a.m., where he attacked Kernodle and Chapin. Idaho State Police determined he could have carried out the killings in less than three minutes after reconstructing his route through the home using crime scene evidence, a detail that has stunned viewers who watched the documentary expecting a longer, more chaotic attack.

Kohberger is said to have used a large Ka-Bar style knife, and each victim suffered multiple wounds, with Kernodle believed to have fought back against him and suffering the most injuries. The documentary does not shy away from these details, though it frames them within the broader investigative timeline rather than as standalone shock value.

What Led Police to Bryan Kohberger

The series spends significant time on how a seemingly unrelated traffic stop became central to identifying a suspect. On August 21, 2022, roughly 84 days before the murders, Kohberger was stopped by the Latah County Sheriff’s Office for allegedly speeding and was issued a citation for not wearing a seatbelt. Moscow Police Chief Anthony Dahlinger explained in the documentary that the citation gave investigators Kohberger’s cell phone number, which they later used to obtain search warrants and phone data showing his device had pinged off towers near Moscow repeatedly in the months before the attack.

DNA evidence proved just as critical to building the case. Using DNA analysis run on a knife sheath found at the scene and investigative genetic genealogy, the FBI matched DNA from the sheath to trash collected from the Kohberger family home in Pennsylvania. Cell phone data also showed Kohberger had made several late night trips to the vicinity of King Road in the weeks before the murders, and that his phone was active and moving during the early morning hours when the attack occurred.

Investigators ultimately tied Kohberger to the crime scene through his car, his cell phone records, and DNA evidence obtained through investigative genealogy after traditional methods had failed to produce a match. He was taken into custody on December 30, 2022, in Monroe County, Pennsylvania, and was extradited to Idaho on January 4, 2023.

Questions the Documentary Leaves Unanswered

Even with a detailed reconstruction of the break in, the documentary is candid about what remains unknown. Chief Dahlinger says plainly that investigators have never been able to determine why Kohberger targeted these four students specifically or why he chose that particular house. The series does touch on Kohberger’s academic interest in criminology, including a Reddit questionnaire he posted asking formerly incarcerated people about their criminal decision making, along with accounts from former classmates describing him as someone who dominated class discussions but kept to himself otherwise.

Investigators also learned Kohberger held a master’s degree in criminal justice from DeSales University and was pursuing a criminology PhD at Washington State University, where he was already under review over complaints from faculty and students, particularly women, about his conduct as a teaching assistant. He was fired from that teaching position sometime between the murders and his arrest.

Notably, the series does not address Kohberger’s later withdrawal of his guilty plea, since that development occurred after production had wrapped. Kohberger pleaded guilty in July 2025 and was sentenced to life in prison, but he has since told the New York Times he filed a petition challenging his conviction, arguing that mistakes were made during plea negotiations and that he wants that heard.

With the sliding door, the seatbelt citation, and the DNA evidence now laid out in granular detail, ‘The Idaho Murders, College Nightmare’ leaves audiences with a clearer picture of how Kohberger got in and got caught, even as the deeper question of why still goes unanswered. What part of the break in and investigation caught your attention most while watching the series.