I really don't understand what is feared contrary to the vehicle evidence per the probable cause affidavit (PCA) outlined below. BK owned a white, 2015 Hyundai Elantra which was recovered by police.
Knowing today the vehicle tip came from neighbors' video surveillance collected by MPD, I think it's evident images captured by surveillance were limited to the vehicle's side profile versus the front/back ends where tags are located. The MPD public request dated Dec 7-8, 2022 clearly stated the tag number of the white vehicle was not available.
Also, had the vehicle's front end been captured, I think it likely police would have included the 2015 model per the (revised) front grill.
As for the NYT reporting the vehicle as a Sentra, I'm paywalled and also can't determine if MSM date is post Dec 8, 2022 (MPD Bolo date) but it's obviously bogus reporting. It's also easily verifiable that MPD never put out a BOLO for a Nissan Sentra!
MPD BOLO
Further to the vehicle registered to BK in police custody, sources told
News Nation that an ID belonging to somebody who lived in the Moscow residence was found inside the vehicle (gag order on the trial has stopped police from confirming any details about the card). If true, this would certainly be difficult for the defense to discount, especially given their recent statement that BK had no connection to the victims. MOO
IMO, any vehicle discussion contrary to the white, 2015 Elantra owned by the defendant can safely be put to rest.
Police say cell phone records show Kohberger's phone near the murder scene at least 12 times before the night of the stabbings, starting in August.
www.cbsnews.com
Jan 6, 2023
The affidavit in the case details more about how Kohberger was found after a wide search for a white sedan seen on surveillance videos multiple times near the students' rental home, a gray, three-story building on a dead-end street in Moscow, Idaho.
It was unusual behavior in the residential, hillside neighborhood in the quiet hours before dawn. And according to the affidavit, surveillance videos showing the vehicle that November night were key to unraveling the gruesome mystery of who killed four University of Idaho students inside the house.
With little else to go on as a panicked community demanded answers, investigators canvassed
security footage from the neighborhood — including one recording of the car speeding away after the slayings — to get a sense of the killer's possible movements, the affidavit said.
Eventually, the document said, police were able to narrow down what was at
first known only vaguely as a white sedan to a 2015 Hyundai Elantra registered to
Kohberger, a 28-year-old doctoral student in criminology at Washington State University, just across the border in Pullman, Washington. Further investigation matched Kohberger to DNA at the crime scene, it said.
[..]
The car's first pass by the home was recorded at 3:29 a.m. on Nov. 13 — less than an hour before Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin were stabbed to death in their rooms, Moscow Police Cpl. Brett Payne wrote in the affidavit.
The vehicle drove by twice more and was recorded a fourth time at 4:04 a.m., Payne wrote. It wasn't seen on the footage again until it sped away 16 minutes later.
"This is a residential neighborhood with a very limited number of vehicles that travel in the area during the early morning hours," Payne wrote. "Upon review of the video there are only a few cars that enter and exit this area during this time frame."
A forensic examiner with the FBI determined the car to likely be a 2011-13 Hyundai Elantra, though subsequently said it could be a model as late as 2016, according to the affidavit.
Surveillance footage from the Washington State University campus offered further tantalizing information: A similar vehicle headed out of town just before 3 a.m. on the day of the killings and reappeared on cameras in Pullman just before 5:30 a.m., the affidavit said.
On Nov. 25, the Moscow Police Department asked regional law enforcement to look for a white Elantra. Three nights later, a WSU police officer ran a query for any white Elantras on campus.
One came back as having a Pennsylvania license plate and being registered to Kohberger. Within half an hour, another campus officer located the vehicle parked at Kohberger's apartment complex. It came back as having Washington state tags. Five days after the killings, Kohberger had switched the registration from Pennsylvania, his home state, to Washington, the affidavit said.