Internal WSU Emails Show Officers Located Bryan Kohberger’s Car Within 16 Hours of Tip

Internal Washington State University emails released through a public records request show campus police identified a white 2015 Hyundai Elantra linked to Bryan Kohberger within 16 hours of receiving a tip on the morning of November 28, 2022. The records clarify the timeline and credit two campus officers for locating the vehicle prior to Kohberger being publicly identified as a suspect.

In a January 5, 2023 message to Washington State University Police Department staff, then-Chief Gary Jenkins wrote that Officer Daniel Tiengo and Sergeant Curtis James Whitman tracked the Hyundai Elantra after the department received information about a possible suspect vehicle. Jenkins said the arrest-warrant affidavit released to the public on December 29, 2022, misstated when law enforcement agencies were asked to be on the lookout for the car.

"Note that the timeline for locating the vehicle is not entirely correct in the affidavit. The affidavit indicates that area law enforcement agencies were asked to be on the lookout for the suspect vehicle on November 25 [2022] when, in fact, they did not ask for that until the morning of November 28 [2022]."

Jenkins praised Officer Tiengo and Sergeant Whitman for their fast work and urged staff to use the episode to improve public perceptions of the WSU Police Department. The emails explicitly commend the officers for locating the vehicle quickly and said their efforts reflected positively on the agency.

Bryan Kohberger appears at the Ada County Courthouse for his sentencing hearing on July 23, 2025, in Boise, Idaho. Kohberger pleaded guilty in exchange for being spared the death penalty for the stabbing of four University of Idaho students nearly three years ago.(Getty Images)

A separate internal message from then-Moscow Police Department Lead Detective Corporal Brett Payne, dated Nov. 27, 2022, informed local law enforcement that the white Hyundai seen in an investigative flyer was of official interest but ordered that officers must not stop, detain, or contact the driver unless there was a life-or-death emergency.

Timeline Released In Records

• 4:00 a.m.: Suspect arrives at the house
• Between 4:00 and 4:17 a.m.: Time window of the murders
• 4:19 a.m.: Roommate calls three victims; no answer
• 4:22–4:24 a.m.: Surviving roommates exchange texts from inside the house
• 4:27 a.m.: Roommate calls victims again; no answer
• 4:32 a.m.: Roommate texts Kaylee Goncalves, "Pls answer"
• 10:23 a.m.: Surviving roommate texts victims again; no answer
• 11:39 a.m.: Roommate calls her father
• 12:00 p.m.: 911 call placed from the roommate's phone

The four University of Idaho students—Ethan Chapin, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Kaylee Goncalves—were found dead at their Moscow, Idaho, home on November 13, 2022. Kohberger was arrested on December 30, 2022.

According to the released documents, Kohberger later pleaded guilty on July 2, 2025, to four counts of first-degree murder and one count of felony burglary in a plea agreement that removed the death penalty as a sentencing option. Under the deal he will serve four consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole.

Note: This article focuses on the newly released internal communications and the clarifications they provide about law enforcement actions and timelines in the case.