Inside the Idaho ‘party house’ where four students were murdered in a ‘personal’ attack

DailyMail.com can share the first photos of the Idaho party house where four students were murdered on Sunday in what coroners are describing as a brutal, ‘personal’ attack carried out with a ‘long knife’. 

The six-bedroom, three-story house on King Road in Moscow was a popular choice of party venue for University of Idaho students until the gruesome killings. Now, the property is a blood-soaked crime and the community of college kids is petrified. 

It is where Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin were found dead on Sunday after a friend found their bodies. 

All four were murdered in their beds, according to the coroner, who said they suffered multiple, deep wounds which suggested the attack was ‘personal’. 

‘It was late at night or early in the morning so it seems likely that they were sleeping. There were multiple stab wounds on them. Most of them had one [wound] that was the lethal wound. 

‘It was to the chest or the upper body,’ Coroner Cathy Mabbutt said during an appearance on NewsNation.

This is the sliding door that one of the girls’ fathers believe may have been used by the killer to gain access to the home in the early hours of Sunday morning. All four victims were stabbed in their beds

Another sliding door in the home opens into the master bedroom. It’s unclear where exactly each student was sleeping, but they were all in their beds 

The second floor of the house. All four of the victims were asleep at the time of the murder. It remains unclear how the killer gained access

Xana Kernodle and her boyfriend Ethan Chapin (left) were both killed Sunday along with best friends Madison Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves (right)

The only way for the killer to have gained access to the house is with the code to the keypad lock on the front door, or through the sliding door at the back of the house which opens into the kitchen. 

Kaylee’s sister Alivea has revealed that ‘a lot of people’ knew the code to the home because it was such a social house. 

Dakota Sparks, a neighbor who lives on the street, said she was awake on Sunday between 3am – around the time the killings took place – but heard nothing. 

Police will not confirm whether Dylan Mortensen and Bethany Funke – the two other girls in the house at the time of the murders – are being treated as witnesses, or as suspects. 

‘These are people who may have seen the crime but on the flip side may have committed the crime,’ Aaron Snell of the Idaho State Police told Fox. 

During an appearance on ABC, he said: ‘No one has been included or excluded as a person of interest or a suspect. They are taking with detectives and they have been very cooperative.’ 

The families of the murder victims are growing increasingly frustrated with the lack of information. 

One of the bedrooms in the home. The six bedroom property was rented out by the girls for $2,500 a month and is a 15 minute walk to campus 

‘I know my sister and I know for a fact they locked their doors. They did everything right. 

‘There was a keypad on their front door… due to the closeness of that community, a lot of people had access to that door – but that door had a keypad code on it,’ she said. 

Their families are now begging the police to be more transparent with their findings, telling them to ‘speak the truth’ and find the students’ killer. 

In a statement, Ethan’s father Jim said: ‘The silence further compounds our family’s agony after our son’s murder. 

‘For Ethan and his three dear friends slain in Moscow, Idaho, and all of our families, I urge officials to speak the truth, share what they know, find the assailant, and protect the greater community,’ he said. 

Kaylee’s sister said she was equally frustrated. 

‘Until we have someone in custody, there’s no way with any amount of confidence to say this is isolated.

‘Someone did this with a purpose — not once, not twice, not three times, but four. I don’t know of anything scarier than that,’ Alivea Goncalves told NBC affiliate KHQ. 

‘It was late at night or early in the morning so it seems likely that they were sleeping. There were multiple stab wounds, yes, on them. Most of them had one [wound] that was the lethal wound. 

‘The fatal [wounds] were to the chest or upper body area. It was a pretty large knife. It’s hard to call them puncture wounds because it was a large knife. It has to be somebody that’s pretty angry in order to stab four people to death,’ Coroner Latah County Coroner Cathy Mabbutt told NewsNation’s Banfield. 

The victims’ families have begged police to be more transparent with their investigation. 

‘There is a lack of information from the University of Idaho and the local police, which only fuels false rumors and innuendo in the press and social media. 

‘The silence further compounds our family’s agony after our son’s murder. 

‘For Ethan and his three dear friends slain in Moscow, Idaho, and all of our families, I urge officials to speak the truth, share what they know, find the assailant, and protect the greater community,’ Ethan’s father Jim said in a statement. 

An exterior of the off-campus Idaho home leads out onto bushes and the backyards of surrounding homes 

Eyes all round: There are multiple homes near the property but so far, no neighbors have come forward with any information that has led to the killer 

Blood drips down the outside of the wall of the house the four students shared. Investigators describe it as the worst crime scene they have ever seen

The coroner did not elaborate on why she thought the killings were ‘personal’, but she said the wounds were multiple and ‘extensive’. 

She added that she does not believe it was a murder suicide, and that the toxicology results for each victim will be irrelevant.  

Police have not yet made any arrests and they are yet to find the murder weapon. 

It also remains unclear whether they are hunting one person, or if multiple suspects are being considered. The house sits among a row of other off-campus college homes. 

So far, none of the other students have come forward with any information that could lead to the killer. 

Xana’s father Jeffrey has revealed his theory that the killer may have slipped into the house through a sliding door off the kitchen.

‘The door locks with a number code. Every time you go, you have to go around the house because of the number code so they either knew that or went around and maybe found the slider door open,’ he told Arizona Family. 

Kaylee’s sister Alivea said ‘a lot of people’ had access to the house and the code to the front door because the girls were so sociable

Coroner Cathy Mabbutt told Banfield on NewsNation that the kids were all killed with a stab wound to the chest or upper body, and that they were likely sleeping when it happened

‘THEY COULD HOLD THE KEY’: TWO IDAHO STUDENTS WHO SURVIVED STABBINGS ARE PICTURED

The two University of Idaho students who survived the crazed knife attack that left four of their friends dead at their shared off-campus rental house are students Dylan Mortensen and Bethany Funke, DailyMail.com can reveal.

On Wednesday, police revealed both Dylan and Bethany were in the modest Moscow home at the time of the attack but miraculously survived the carnage.

Speaking to DailyMail.com, Idaho State Police spokesman Aaron Snell said the two survivors are helping police with their investigation but would not give further details of how they survived or whether either Dylan or Bethany called 911 later on Sunday morning.

DailyMail.com can reveal the two roommates who escaped death while their four friends were knifed at their off-campus house are Bethany Funke (left) and Dylan Mortensen, (right)

He also told DailyMail.com the pair are not suspects but said every possibility is being looked at by the investigative team which now includes detectives from the Idaho State Police and the FBI as well as the Moscow Police Department.

Neither Dylan, 19, who is from Boise, Idaho, nor Bethany, a member of sorority Phi Beta Phi, have responded to messages from DailyMail.com and both have locked their social media profiles.

But both girls appear frequently on accounts that belonged to Madison and Kaylee – including a poignant Instagram post made by Madison on August 16 that shows all five girls together posing happily on the back porch of the home where three of them died on Sunday.

The two girls also appear in photos posted by Kaylee hours before she died which she captioned: ‘One lucky girl to be surrounded by these ppl every day’.

Another set of photos showing Dylan and Kaylee together was posted last Friday night and shows the pair dressed up for a night out.

Dylan Mortensen (left) and Bethany Funke (middle) lived in a modest Moscow rental house with fellow University of Idaho students Xana Kernodle (second from left) Kaylee Goncalves (second from right) and Madison Mogen (right)  

 

There are two sliding doors at the property. One is off the kitchen and opens out onto the back of the house. There are fences and bushes next to it, and other off-campus properties nearby are clearly visible.

The second sliding door is attached to a balcony off the master bedroom. 

‘There’s quite a bit of blood in the apartment and it was a pretty traumatic scene to find four dead college students in a residence,’ she said earlier this week in an interview with KXLY. 

Maddie’s boyfriend, Jake Schriger, is not thought to have been in the home when an unidentified killer murdered his girlfriend along with Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle and her boyfriend Xana’s boyfriend Ethan Chapin, in the early hours of Sunday morning. 

It’s unclear if Jake has been interviewed by police, or where he was on Sunday when his girlfriend was killed. 

Jake Schriger is not thought to have been in the home when an unidentified killer murdered his girlfriend along with Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle and her boyfriend, Ethan Chapin, in the early hours of Sunday morning

Jeffrey Kernodle (left) the father of victim Xana Kernodle (back right), revealed that his daughter’s body showed signs that she had defended herself from her killer

His mother Stacy told The New York Post that she was expecting Maddie to travel home with him for Thanksgiving. 

‘Her and Jake were like peanut butter and jelly. We were expecting her for Thanksgiving. Whenever we talked on the phone, she always said I love you,’ she said. 

Jake and Madison had only just attended a formal together. Jake has not yet made any public comment about his girlfriend’s death. 

Xana’s father Jeffrey reveals that she died fighting for her life.  He told CBS 5 that autopsy reports showed that his daughter Xana’s skin showed ‘bruises, torn by the knife.’

Kernodle also questioned how the killer got inside the house since the front door locks with a number code.

He said: ‘Every time you go, you have to go around the house because of the number code so they either knew that or went around and maybe found the slider door open.’

He added: ‘I think midnight was the last time we heard from her, and she was fine.’ 

Students held a vigil for the murdered youngsters on Thursday. Many are now fleeing campus out of fear that the killer remains on the loose