ID - 4 University of Idaho Students Murdered - Moscow # 17

[Deleted member 718]

Perhaps a silly question but what if the victims had locked their bedroom doors? Especially X having E as an overnight guest.

 

[Balthazar]

I mean the house was the target like the Manson case. So if you don't live there, your home won't be attacked. I'm not saying that's what happened but it's possible, IMO. The house could have been the target and for some reason the surviving roommates were unreachable. Locked door?

In the Manson case, Doris Day’s son, Terry Melcher, a music producer who turned Manson down was the target at Ciello Drive. Manson didn’t know Melcher had moved out. The La Bianca muders the next night did target a random house, however.

 

[mayhem911]

A friendly dog will have zero social anxiety and just be excited to see everyone. Some large dogs are confident, love everyone and bark very rarely. But with all the action and moving around that night you got figure if the dog saw it all happen then the dog likely would have interpreted the situation as play time so still surprised the dog didn't interfere with the killer or killers.

 

[doublestop]

All I know is that every minute they spend talking to the press, they are not doing their job. Imo.

Talking to the press IS part of their job, so they are doing their job when talking to the press. Talking to the press can help the investigation.

 

[layer]

I mean the house was the target like the Manson case. So if you don't live there, your home won't be attacked. I'm not saying that's what happened but it's possible, IMO. The house could have been the target and for some reason the surviving roommates were unreachable. Locked door?

Locked doors, interruption, or possibly the killer had only viewed the house from the back where it's not obvious that there is a first floor. Interestingly, in both the Sharon Tate and the Omega Chi cases there were survivors that went untouched.

 

[Sandy007]

Do you think the killer had an excuse to be at the property in case he got discovered before he could kill? What would an excuse be? Hey your dog got out so I returned it? or hey I am here to do some repairs? Did the landlord use a property management company for this property?

I was writing today along the same lines. Or he pretend that he was delivery man, searching around in the house to find the person 'who made the order'. A delivery man who will be ready to apologise that he got the wrong address and to walk away if the housemates start being suspicious.

 

[itsrak]

The following Johnny Law youtube was originally posted by Mayboy1998 earlier today but because it was not a podcast host we were familiar with and we did not have time to view it in its entirety, it was removed. Having now had time to view it, it is being approved on a one-time basis because it does seem to provide an excellent analysis of the layout of the house, where individuals may have been sleeping, and it speaks to the location of the red liquid in relation to the overall layout of the house.

Regarding what surviving RM's may have, given location of BRs in relation to BRs abobe, been able to hear of the murders - there may have been little to hear if killer's attacks were initiated with slashing of throats, which I'd think is likely.

 

[MesquiteO21]

Perhaps a silly question but what if the victims had locked their bedroom doors? Especially X having E as an overnight guest.

not silly, it's a pretty important question. were the surviving roommates spared only because they locked their doors? or would they have been spared regardless?

 

[Dysfunkshun]

If it hasn't been ruled out by LE then it is possible but that would be taking a huge risk. It was a known place for parties etc. If the person had laid in wait and all of a sudden the rooomates brought people home for drinks/a party and everything else that goes with that then that person would then leave themselves in a seriously compromising and dangerous position.

Yes, I’ve gone back and forth w this. The only reason I think maybe no is because it seems none of the closets had doors! At least on the Zillow pics. Maybe they were added.. not sure.

 

[SouthAussie]

A friendly dog will have zero social anxiety and just be excited to see everyone. Some large dogs are confident, love everyone and bark very rarely. But with all the action and moving around that night you got figure if the dog saw it all happen then the dog likely would have interpreted the situation as play time so still surprised the dog didn't interfere with the killer or killers.

There was a murder here in Australia (Toyah Cordingley) where her large dog was present. The murderer (a complete stranger) tied the dog to a tree, and killed Toyah. Not much the dog could do about it once he was isolated from the murder.

 

[Lamima]

I see it that one was the main target but maybe the others intervened in the situation and made him angry, making them sub targets as well.

 

[TheBorez]

We can expect an update later to clarify the ‘target’ issue.

 

[SuziQ]

Agree but this is a very different crime. I believe we will come to be given evidence that proves one person was the target. Perhaps there are indicators of this already by each persons wounds. E.g. if one person had multiple facial stab wounds and the others didn’t, LE could quickly determine that this person was likely the target.

Or maybe the killer got tired after going all out on the first victim and did the minimum attack on the others. Targeted is a vague word. Unless you know the killers motive you do not know if anyone else is in danger or not. I have posted numerous times about a random break in and stabbing hear me. Perp just wanted to kill someone. Jiggled doorknobs till he found an unlocked house. He didn't know the occupants or the house. Totally random and targeted because of his motive. Imo..

 

[cottonweaver]

Perhaps a silly question but what if the victims had locked their bedroom doors? Especially X having E as an overnight guest.

I don't think it is silly. Maybe this perp has a record or a history of other crimes and can bust a lock too?

Even if the couple didn't lock their doors because they were very relaxed around friends in their home & felt safe with Ethan there, there's plenty of sexually-motivated perps who have skills with breaking & entering.


when they find him, he's surely going to have a history of something ( peeping, burglary, DV)

edited to add
forgot to say, yesterday it had crossed my mind that the perp was somebody who worked night shifts and coincidentally that would include a locksmith with a call-out service. ( Realistically it would be far too neat a coincidence but I do still think this is somebody who has a cover story for being out at night. Has vehicle, can cruise around areas & likes the cover of darkness. )

 

[Emerald1328]

I agree. I can certainly understand the frustration of friends and family of the victims. We are starting to see more and more criticism of law enforcement on this case. People want answers.
A few things to consider when we discuss the early days of the investigation; what was said, what was done, was the crime scene compromised, etc.:
When LE are dispatched to a scene, they basically arrive with a blank slate. They are responding to the information given by the 911 caller. This is why the call is so important. There would certainly be a different approach to, “My roommate is unconscious.” as opposed to “My roommate is locked in the bedroom and there is blood everywhere.” The number 1 priority for LE is always preservation of life. Did an officer approach one of the victims to see if he could get a pulse? It’s very possible. In doing so did he step in some blood or other evidence? Maybe. Does that make him useless or stupid? I don’t think so. If your loved one was laying on the bed unconscious wouldn’t you want them to be checked, just in case?
Now we have LE’s earliest statements. When you arrive on scene, you use your training and experience to make a preliminary assessment of what happened. A patrol officer in this situation would immediately call a supervisor and detectives to the scene. Within a short time the word has gotten out, you have 4 dead students, people are alarmed. You have to say something so you make a statement releasing basic facts and present your earliest theory of what you think happened. After a vicious quadruple homicide you can’t go out and say “No comment.” so you tell them your best theory based on what you know at the time.
An investigation is a fluid journey taking twists and turns as evidence is gathered, suspects are ruled out, and new information comes to light.
What is taking so long? These cops must be incompetent.
Sure, if you go to a scene in a pristine environment with a single victim and find dna and fingerprints and know there has been a recent bad divorce and the ex’s cellphone was at the home at the time of the homicide and he has no alibi, you might get a quick solve. Or what if you arrive at the scene and a suspect is standing over a dead body with the proverbial smoking gun?
But what if you go into a fairly large home, that is known to be a gathering spot and it is filled with red cups and party remnants and you have four victims spread out over two floors, and there’s dna but it doesn’t match anyone and you have to wait for all that digital data to come back and you start the labor intensive task of identifying friends, acquaintance, stalkers, exes and most of these people have left the area due to the Thanksgiving holiday or just because they are scared it could happen to them? Will that take some time? You betcha.
And you can also believe that these LE officers are working their butts off to identify this killer because they never ever want to have to respond to a scene like this one ever again.

Can I ask you your opinion on something? The fire chief said the police were first to arrive on scene, which makes sense. They are a volunteer fire department and the two times I’ve had to call an ambulance, police showed up first, I’m assuming because they’re already patrol on the area. The fire chief said that the first responders from the fire and EMS didn’t go inside or transport anyone. I’m assuming because police knew it was a crime scene, the victims were beyond saving and they didn’t want them to contaminate the crime scene.

Does fire/EMS always wait for police to go inside and clear a scene before letting them in? I’m just wondering how that initial response from the police would have looked like and what would have made them wait to let fire/EMS go inside, especially based on the 911 call. If someone on the call said there was someone not moving, would they have fire/EMS wait for them to check everything? Would they make them wait if the caller said someone wasn’t moving and they saw blood? Would they make them wait if they said the doors were locked and they couldn’t get ahold of their roommates?

I understand that we don’t know how long there was between when the police got there vs. when fire/EMS got there, especially since it is a volunteer fire department, but I can’t imagine there was more than 5 minutes or so between the two, especially since it’s not a rural VFD. I could be wrong about that though!

Link to fire chief statement:

Police identify 4 University of Idaho students found dead inside a home near campus; homicide investigation underway

"An event of this magnitude can understandably have significant impacts on those left behind," the university's president wrote.

www.cbsnews.com

 

[10ofRods]

I think the killer is a small man, juvenile or a woman. I think this because the killer only felt comfortable killing folks that were asleep. They needed the element of surprise to do it. The reason the the downstairs folks were not killed is because they were awake. Then the killer fled so they would not get caught once the downstairs folks were awakened. This killer does not like locked doors and does not like a conscious victim.

I had all those same thoughts.

 

[dub]

Very fair point but my only thought on that one that would support he did is he knew to enter through the sliding glass door which was in close proximity to KG/MM vs. entering on the ground floor where the two surviving roommates were. This is under the assumption that KG or MM were the target.

Also, the layout of the home with detailed floor plans are very easily accessible on real estate sites and online with high-resolution pictures of each of the rooms. So even if the killer had only been in there once he would have a mental picture that could be verified by using sites like MLS.

I thought the bottom floor had a keypad lock which would preclude him from entering there either way, unless he had the code (which I doubt he did). But maybe I misread that.

But yeah I do think the killer had a BASIC idea of the layout of the house, whether from being in there once, real estate sites, etc. I just don’t think he had detailed info, like who slept in which bedroom.

I actually have never seen the interior layout of the house, so I thought about what I’d assume about it just by looking at it from the outside. I bet my guess would be generally accurate, but the one thing I’d be likely to miss is that there were bedrooms on the first floor. Which is incidentally where the survivors were.

 

[Warwick7]

I'm behind on the threads...

https://twitter.com/x/status/1598035885408546816

 

[North_Idaho_Nony]

Post in thread 'ID - 4 University of Idaho Students Murdered - Moscow # 16'

Lordy, I hope I managed to link to a comment in the previous thread correctly because I thought it raised good potential proactive steps going forward!

Subsequent comments pointed out some of the problems with the suggestions. AFAIK, University-owned buildings, including university-owned student housing, fall under the Risk Management department, which seems to to an excellent job (ie, no drunk students falling from sleeping porches). They also have onsite RAs who seem to do a good job.

Things get fuzzier w/Greek Houses on campus. Some are actually owned by their national orgs, others were given like 99 year leases for $50.

And off-campus housing is completely privately owned by a multitude of private individuals, investment companies, absentee landlords, etc, which complicates things.

Not sure what our volunteer fire department’s role would be, but I think there could well be improvement for larger public safety presentations. At the beginning of each academic year, students attend presentations on a number of pertinent issues, so if improving the safety of living situations isn’t included, perhaps something could be added. I know MPD does regular presentations to living groups, so perhaps that’s another place for improvement.

And, the last I knew, MPD offered security checks & suggestions for those in the community. I don’t know if that service is still available.

One thing to remember is this is a relatively small community with a relatively small force responsible for a LOT. As those who have looked at MPD’s DAL have likely noticed. So individual living safety checks for thousands just isn’t feasible. Maybe scheduled community meetings might be helpful.

On a brighter note, here’s a story of an alum effort:
University of Idaho alum raises more than $18,000 to buy students personal alarms | Local News | idahopress.com

Alums are very involved when it comes to sports, so I’d love to see a similar effort when it comes to student health & safety!!!

I think I had an initial suggestion to toss out, but it escapes me. If I neglected to address any of your suggestions, my apologies & PLEASE ASK AGAIN.

 

[Strong1]

Perhaps a silly question but what if the victims had locked their bedroom doors? Especially X having E as an overnight guest.

Are you talking about after they got home? I feel that the three girls were extremely close and probably never locked their doors. So it probably wasn't even a thought.