Will Idaho murder convict Bryan Kohberger win bid to withdraw guilty plea and face trial?

Idaho Students Murder Update: Bryan Kohberger, convicted of murdering four University of Idaho students, is now seeking to withdraw the guilty plea that spared him the death penalty, claiming his attorneys pressured him into the deal by warning about death row conditions and promising better treatment in prison, a move that legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani claims faces steep hurdles and is unlikely to succeed,

Kohberger, 31, filed a hand‑written petition on Monday from the Idaho Maximum Security Penitentiary, where he is serving four consecutive life sentences for the 2022 murders of University of Idaho students Kaylee Goncalves, Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle and Madison Mogen in a rental home near campus.

Just over a year after pleading guilty to the stabbing deaths that devastated Moscow, Idaho, he now argues his attorneys failed to adequately represent him and that his plea was not knowingly or voluntarily entered because it “was induced by unkept promises” and threats.


He also wrote that the attorneys insisted that his plea “need not be truthful, despite petitioner’s vehement denial of actual guilt,” that they promised life in prison would come with “immediate contact visits, freedom of movement, employment” and that they told him “elaborate lies of DR (death row) life.”

What Idaho Murders convict Bryan Kohberger said in his petition

In the petition reviewed by PEOPLE, Kohberger alleges he was “convinced to falsely confess” through “coercion, disinformation, false promises and withholding of exculpatory discovery.” He claims his attorneys failed to tell him about “unknown hair in Ethan Chapin’s hands,” insisted his guilty plea “need not be truthful” despite his “vehement denial of actual guilt” and made false promises about what life in prison would be like if he accepted the plea agreement.

He further reiterated those allegations in an accompanying affidavit, in which he claims his attorneys misled him about the conditions he would face if he rejected the plea deal and ended up on death row.

What did Rahmani say on Kohberger’s plea

While those allegations raise constitutional issues, Rahmani tells PEOPLE that complaints about prison conditions alone would not be enough to withdraw a guilty plea. “Obviously him not liking his cell, him not liking his job in prison, that is not a legal basis to withdraw a guilty plea,” Rahmani says.

What did Kohberger say at his plea hearing?

Previously, Kohberger waived his right to directly appeal his conviction as part of the plea agreement. On July 2, 2025, he told 4th District Judge Steven Hippler that he was pleading guilty “freely and voluntarily” because he was, in fact, guilty, and not because he had some other incentive, according to news agency AP.

As part of that process, he had to agree to waive his rights to appeal, confirm that he understood the punishments on the table for the crimes and assure the court that he wasn’t coerced by his attorneys or anyone else to make the plea.

According to Rahmani, Kohberger now must show that his conviction was undermined by a constitutional violation because the deadline for a direct appeal has passed. “The time for him to file an appeal has passed, and that is a strict statutory deadline,” Rahmani says, as quoted by PEOPLE.

Rahmani explains that constitutional challenges to guilty pleas typically fall into four categories: that the plea was not entered knowingly or voluntarily, that the defendant is actually innocent, that prosecutors withheld evidence favorable to the defense, or that defense attorneys provided ineffective assistance of counsel.

“I think this petition is going to be denied,” Rahmani says. “But if he’s going to try to thread the needle, it’s got to be one of these four.” He notes that the allegation of unidentified hair found in Ethan Chapin’s hands could potentially support either a claim of withheld evidence or ineffective assistance of counsel, depending on what prosecutors disclosed to the defense.

Under the Supreme Court’s Brady rule, Rahmani adds, prosecutors must disclose evidence favorable to the defense when it is material to guilt or punishment, and failing to do so can violate constitutional rights. Still, he cautions that it remains unclear whether prosecutors disclosed the evidence during discovery. “Obviously we don’t know what the prosecution knew about the hair, when and if they told the defense,” he says. “That’s not public.”

Rahmani further points out that if Kohberger’s attorneys believed prosecutors had failed to disclose exculpatory evidence, they likely would have challenged it before advising him to plead guilty, since that could have removed the death penalty while preserving his right to trial.

“If the defense knew that the prosecution failed to disclose the existence of this hair or any other exculpatory material, they would have filed their own motion, because that was a way they could’ve gotten the death penalty struck from the case,” Rahmani says. “Bryan Kohberger would be freerolling. He would roll the dice and go to trial.”

“Anne Taylor [and the rest of Kohberger’s defense team] knew exactly what they were doing,” Rahmani continues. “If you save your client’s life in any death penalty case, that is a win, even if your client spends the rest of his or her life in prison.”