MOSCOW, Idaho — “I know Bryan Kohberger murdered my daughter,” Kristi Goncalves explained. “[It’s] the way he looked directly in our eyes at sentencing, not blinking, absolutely no remorse.”
More than 6-months after Bryan Kohberger pled guilty in court to the murders of Maddie Mogen, Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle and Kaylee Goncalves, investigative documents continue to make rounds online.
“Now we’re dealing with all these conspiracies and all this noise and all this misunderstanding,” Steve Goncalves told NonStop Local.
The conspiracies, continuing to surface, as the Goncalves continue to mourn Kaylee.
“There are so many different ones, and some of them are just the wildest things you’ve ever read in your life,” Kristi Goncalves explained. “I mean, just wild.”
The facts, Steve Goncalves explained, lost behind people’s desire for a Hollywood ending.
“There’s always a whodunit at the end that is a twist where you are like, I thought I knew where this was going.” Steve explained. “People want that in real life. They don’t want to be like, this is boring. It’s this guy’s fingerprint. There’s DNA at the crime scene.”
Information revealed in the now public documents, at the center of it all.
“They build on these fake foundations and they want to ignore a lot of the other facts,” Steve Goncalves said.
But not all documents are the same.
“A lot of the stuff now is about, you know, defense experts versus prosecution experts,” the Goncalves family explained. “So it’s a battle of the experts, and they’re leaving them to internet trolls who are not experts at putting on their shoes.”
The killer’s plea deal, meant the information in the documents was never presented in a courtroom. The context behind the expert opinions, never shared.
“I said, this isn’t going to work,” Steve Goncalves recalled. “You need more details or otherwise we will be dealing with these conspiracies for years to come.”
He says his family remains opposed to the deal.
“I’m telling you right now, this needs all the details you can get,” Steve Goncalves explained. “You say, where is the kill kit? You say, where is the knife? All you had to do was get one or two of those details, and it would make all those details go away.”
And when the documents are released, the Goncalves family said, they don’t know what will be revealed.
They just made it worse for us,” Steve Goncalves said.
“Every week is a little bit,” Krist Goncalves added. “We don’t know what’s coming.”
For a few months, the Goncalvez family took a break from interviews. But they say during that time, the conspiracies only got worse.
“Even though it’s uncomfortable and we don’t want to, we’ll start doing interviews again, just to dispel some of it,” Steve Goncalves said.
Standing up to some of the misinformation, a way they’re advocating for Kaylee’s memory.
“These guys aren’t worth your time, but it’s still very hurtful to the case because it creates a cesspool of people who spew lies about your own child who was sleeping in a bed and got murdered,” Steve Goncalves said. “And to hear somebody tell lies about them, it’s painful. It’s very difficult to deal with. And it motivates a guy like me to get up and do something about it.”
But despite the constant misinformation, the Goncalves family says they try to ignore as much as possible.
“Our family is not consumed by the conspiracy theories,” Vicki Goncalves said.
And they advocate for future victim protection legislation.
Last week, the family met with Idaho Governor Brad little to discuss some policies, including preventing crime scene photos from being released.
“I mean obviously it’s too late for us, but we can protect the next family,” Vicki Goncalves said.
And as they continue to advocate for their daughter, the family explained they are still hoping that the invesitgators will correct the misinformation and help dispel rumors.
“I know that we’re all trying, you know, and just let it blow over,” Vicki Goncalves said. “I just don’t know when that’s going to happen, or if that’s going to happen.”
