The mother of Madison Mogen, one of the four University of Idaho students who were stabbed to death in their off-campus home in 2022, described the moment she ran into the local police station to try to find out what happened to her daughter.
Karen Laramie shared how the Moscow Police Department told her that her daughter had been killed in an exclusive clip from “One Night In Idaho: The College Murders,” a new documentary premiering on Prime Video on July 11.
“So we got to the police department, I remember running up the stairs and just trying to find anyone to talk, like, anyone to … just anyone,” Laramie said, becoming emotional.
“And finally, they put us in a little room, and they came in the back door and opened this file, and the officer explained, ‘There has been a homicide in your daughter’s house, and there were four victims.'”
“And instantly we were like, ‘What? It just makes no sense,” she continued, with tears in her eyes. “And he said Maddie was a victim.”
Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Ethan Chapin and Xana Kernodle. (TODAY)
Laramie said she then asked about her daughter’s best friend, Kaylee Goncalves, whom she had known since she was a child. The two lived together in the off-campus home.
“He said Kaylee was also a victim,” Laramie said, before bursting into tears.
Mogen and Goncalves, along with Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin, were found dead with multiple stab wounds in their home near the University of Idaho campus on Nov. 13, 2022.
About six weeks after the murders, authorities arrested Bryan Kohberger, a criminal justice PhD student at the nearby Washington State University, and he was later charged with four counts of first-degree murder and one count of burglary.
Kohberger pleaded guilty to all of the charges on July 2, more than two and a half years after the slayings. He will be sentenced on July 23, where he faces up to life in prison.
Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Ethan Chapin and Xana Kernodle (TODAY)
Scott Laramie, Mogen’s stepfather, said in the documentary he remembered being “so angry” when he found out what happened from police.
“This can’t be true,” he recalled thinking. “I mean, this is Idaho. Things like this, you see it on TV and all.”
“And then we found out about the other two,” he added, referring to Kernodle and Chapin, with tears in his eyes. “It was like, what is going on here? This is ridiculous, this is unbelievable. Like, no.”
Karen Laramie said police officers couldn’t tell her anything else about what had happened.
“They had no details,” she said. “So our minds were just circling. What could have happened here? What possibly happened in that house?”
