(NewsNation) — A year after the deaths of four college students in Moscow, Idaho, no trial date has been set for suspect Bryan Kohberger as the defense and prosecution argue over pretrial motions in court.
Kohberger, a 28-year-old former Ph.D. student at a nearby Washington State University, is facing four first-degree murder charges in the stabbing deaths of Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin.
The four students were found dead in an off-campus house, where the three women lived along with two other roommates who survived. Chapin, Kernodle’s boyfriend, was staying at the home the night of the stabbings. After a seven-week search, police arrested Kohberger at his family home in Pennsylvania. He was later extradited to Idaho.
Kohberger waived his right to a speedy trial, leaving the timeline for the case to make it to court unclear. A gag order in the case has also prevented the parties involved from speaking out, leaving most information to be gleaned from public hearings and court documents.
Judge John Judge denied one attempt by Kohberger’s team to dismiss the indictment based on what the defense team said were errors and irregularities in the grand jury process. Judge has yet to rule on several other procedural motions filed by the defense, which were not argued in open court.
Recently, Judge ruled that the defense team does have a right to review some of the DNA evidence used to identify Kohberger as a suspect. Police used a method called investigative genetic genealogy, which involves using public DNA sites, like Ancestry.com and 23andMe, to build a family tree and then narrow down a likely suspect. The technique has raised privacy concerns since a family tree could include the names of people who have no connection to a crime.
Judge set a Dec. 1 deadline for prosecutors to turn over reports on the genetic genealogy used for him to review and determine which would need to be turned over to the defense as part of discovery. He acknowledged that deadline may change since prosecutors reported delays in obtaining reports from the FBI and private labs they used.
Prosecutors have said that when the case does go to trial, they intend to seek the death penalty.