The voice of experience speaks.
I arrived at the gym a couple days ago and found a very upset young woman at the entrance. Her car had disappeared. She was texting her dad. She had left the key fob in the car and the car was unlocked. She was a college student home on spring break.
She had not called the police. She could see where her car was because it had a gps tracking system installed. It was about 30 miles away.
I told her to get off the texting and call 911. I asked one of the female staff members to come out and wait with her.
It’s been a long time since I was 19-20 years old, but at that time finding my car missing, presumably stolen, would have me looking for a pay phone or landline to call 911 immediately.
Unfortunately I can see my daughter texting me or my wife in an emergency too, instead of calling 911 or going to a campus security phone.
If I saw a masked guy in my house today, I would immediately call 911. But when I was in college, living in a group house with multiple other people, some of whom I had only a passing acquaintance with, seeing a stranger in the hall wouldn’t alarm me at all. I’d think it was probably a friend of one of my housemates. Ok, the mask would be weird, but even that may not have been enough to make me call 911 without further evidence that something was wrong.
Ì can’t see what bearing this has on Kohberger’s guilt or innocence. Someone was in the house and killed those kids. Evidence apparently points to Kohberger. So a survivor didn’t call 911 as quickly as she should have. So what, who cares?
If the defense can show suspicious behavior on the part of the surviving housmates it opens the possibility of them being the guilty party instead of the defendant. The defense will try whatever they can no matter how unlikely it is to work.
Yes, it seems to me they were never considered to be suspects, and there are still those two bloodstains from unknown males the prosecution needs to investigate and explain.
If the defence tried that argument I’d be more inclined to believe in Kohberger’s guilt. “The housemates had all got along, more or less, and then one went crazy, she stabbed the others and called 911 much later.” That’s not just a hail Mary, that’s a hail Mary from the stadium parking lot.
She saw the killer in the hall and leaving.
EMT’s could have been there 10 mins later. Maybe, a trauma unit could have saved one of the four victims. I’ve heard the knife wounds were very vicious.
No one will ever know since 911 was called at least 6 hours later
Typical roommate:
I was so-oo drunk. I got up to pee, fell twice on the way back to bed. The next morning I had a vague recollection that I thought I saw somebody in the hallway during my pee break. Almost too tall to be a woman, so probably a guy. It didn’t really register at the time.
Sorry Mr. Detective, that’s all I know.
It’s unclear to me whether you’re trying to blame the roommates for not promptly calling 911 or you’re trying to exhonerate Kohlberger from the murders. Either way it’s rather offensive.
I don’t know about “offensive,” but the fixation on the roommates certainly is perplexing. In the real world, people often respond to emergencies in unintuitive ways, possibly because they didn’t register the existence of an emergency to begin with. Whether because they are startled, intoxicated, or just exhausted, it’s kind of a red herring.
I think (very much IMHO territory) that part of the reasons is that most people no longer expect such things to be like “in the real world”. Far too many procedural TV shows and movies, or out and out action flicks where there’s some missing clue, or offhand remark that is perfectly remembered and comes up.
IE life has become Reality TV (look at our government) and we expect everything to be part of the story. So if the roommates didn’t notice something, there’s a twist we’re missing. The witness doesn’t remember? Conspiracy.
We’ve very much post factual, though I expect that once at trial, the carefully selected jury, the solemnity, and the effort to focus on evidence will outweigh said social drift.
In other words, good writing is bad reality.
Not really. At least not IMO as a juror, admittedly in lesser cases.
The jurors want to solve the mystery. Of necessity, both the prosecution and defense cases are sort of dotted outlines of whatever actually occurred in all its intricate detail. The jurors desperately want to fill in those details with what they think most likely happened. Then once they’ve constructed a strawman that’s 2/3rds their conjecture, 1/3rd witness testimony, they evaluate their strawman and render a verdict.
At least that’s what they do if there’s nobody forceful on the jury to keep bringing them back to how they’re supposed to do their role in a trial, not their role in TV watching.
I got a different perspective from a well-respected Crown prosecutor. She thought that it was important to give the jury the entire Crown theory, but she expected and wanted the jury to put the case together in their deliberations. “You have to give the jury something to do. They’re not just dummies sitting there. They have to work through the case and be satisfied with their conclusion, unanimously, not just accept the Crown or defence case.”
Kohberger bought a Ka-bar knife from Amazon a few months before the killings.
Would it be advisable for the attorneys to get his eyebrows plucked?
Doing so could be seen as manipulation.
But, the attorneys don’t want the jury fixated on his unique appearance either.
Look, I want false hope, I realize there’s no real hope available for our society. Why do you keep supporting my worst fears and suspicions? Wait, where am I posting? Oh yes, a board that favors actual real insight and information.
Excuse me, I need to go weep quietly for a while.
And @Northern_Piper isn’t helping, despite their best efforts. We already know our esteemed Northern neighbors (now being treated so poorly) are more sane and rational than USAians.
On to @aceplace57’s article. For those who didn’t read it:
A roommate who was in the rental home, sleeping and intoxicated, told police she woke up and saw a man she didn’t know — someone with “bushy eyebrows” who was wearing a face mask. Defense attorneys have asked the judge to exclude from the trial any description of the attacker having bushy eyebrows, saying that could prejudice the jury.
“If evidence of ‘bushy eyebrows’ is presented to the jury, the jury might well believe that Mr. Kohberger is guilty simply because of ‘bushy eyebrows,’” defense attorneys wrote.
But prosecutors say the roommate’s description is credible, and they want to introduce Kohberger’s selfie because it shows his appearance shortly after the killings. “Whether or not Bryan Kohberger can be described as having ‘bushy eyebrows’ is a factual determination to be decided by the jury,” they wrote.
Thus the comments about whether or not to have their eyebrows plucked. IMHO (and IANAL) the detail is part of a greater body of circumstantial evidence trying to further reduce the shadow of doubt, but isn’t in and of itself in any way a direct identification. But I fully feel the defense can and should (in terms of impartial justice) protest it as a conclusive identifying mark. But having him pluck his eyebrows would, IMHO, be playing games with the court. Not that it’s exactly unknown.
Not to try to hijack this too far but what type of cosmetology services are typically offered to a defendant in jails beyond basic hair cuts? Coloring? Perms? Extensions? Blow drying?
I don’t have particularly bushy eyebrows but if I did I know I can go to the maul & sit in a chair & have some woman sculpt my eyebrows using a piece of thread with one end in her mouth (Yeech!) because I’ve seen that being done. However, Mr. Kohberger, being held on no bail doesn’t have that option available to him even if he wanted it. Would he have to pluck his own? Are tweezers made available to inmates?
Plucking eyebrows or manicures is an interesting question. Would that fall under grooming?
I only brought it up earlier because it’s such a prominent feature on Kohberger. Motions have already been made about eyebrows in testimony. There are a lot of men with bushy eyebrows.
It’s important that the trial is fair and not easily reversible on future appeal.
The trial is going to be very difficult for the 4 families. No one wants to go through it a 2nd time because of an appeal.
I’m 6’7". If I commit a murder and an eyewitness describes the perpetrator as tall, do I get to have that testimony suppressed?
This is nothing more than “this testimony makes my client look guilty.”
Yeah, “I saw someone with bushy eyebrows” isn’t nearly enough, by itself, to convict anyone, but then, any single piece of evidence very rarely is. It’s certainly relevant, though, and if it weren’t present, the defense would be harping on the fact that nobody saw the guy and got a description of him.