Speaker 1: You're listening to the Mind Over Murder podcast.
Speaker 2: My name is Bill Thomas.
Speaker 3: I'm a writer, consulting, producer, and now podcaster. I am
now trying to use my experience as the brother of
a murder victim to help other victims of violent crime.
I'm working on a book on the unsolved Colonial Parkway
murders and I'm the co administrator of the Colonial Parkway
Murders Facebook group together with Kristin Dilly.
Speaker 4: My name is Kristin Dilly.
Speaker 5: I'm a writer, a researcher, a teacher, and a victim's advocate,
as well as the social media manager and co administrator
for the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook page with my partner
in crime, Bill Thomas.
Speaker 6: Welcome to Mind Ever Murder. I'm Kristin Dilly and I'm
Bill Thomas. We're recapping the sentenccene of Brian Coberger for
the murders of Mattie Morgan, Kayleigan Salvez, then A Kernadal.
Speaker 4: And Ethan Chapin. Bill, did you have a chance to
watch the.
Speaker 2: I watched clips, but did not watch the entire thing.
Speaker 3: From what you and other people have told me, though
it was a difficult.
Speaker 6: Watch, it was but it was very worthwhile, and so
we wanted to take some time today to make sure
that we were able to share with everybody probably the
most important part of that sentencing hearing, and that is
the victim's impact statement. Before we get into it, Bill,
did you have anything we wanted to start the top
of the pod with.
Speaker 3: This reminded me more than a bit of the Golden
State Killer case in that the families were finally given
an opportunity to speak out. Those family members and the
survivors had an opportunity, through their victim's impact statements to
address the offender, but also the public and one another,
and in a way that I thought was very meaningful.
I'm so glad that in recent years there's been a
shift towards allowing these victim impacts statement and giving families
an opportunity to speak out and convey some of what
they've been through. I hope someday we can do this
in the Colonial Parkway murders as well.
Speaker 6: So this sentencing hearing, obviously just the name itself is
self explanatory. It is where the judge imposes the sentence
that's been recommended for the defendant.
Speaker 4: And we'll get into that in a couple of minutes.
Speaker 6: But more importantly, as Bill just said, it's the hearing
where the families and friends of the victims are allowed
to read victims' impact statements. As you alluded to with
the Golden State killer case. It is so very important
because it's one of the only times in the criminal
justice system where victims, surviving family, surviving friends are allowed
to speak and talk about the impact that the crime
has had on them. As both of us know, the
ripples from an act of violence spread long and wide.
Speaker 4: It's very important, I.
Speaker 6: Think, for people to underst stand the effect that violent
crime has on not just the victims, but everybody around them.
Speaker 3: One of the things that we wanted to get into
up front here is Coburger's decision not to make a
statement or to elocute as they say.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I know, that was something that everybody, including us,
was wondering, is it going to happen?
Speaker 4: Is it not going to happen?
Speaker 6: Because we know that everyone is holding their breath and
wanting to know why why did he do this? For
anybody who did not follow the sending scene hearing or
has not been aware Coburger chose.
Speaker 4: Not to make a statement.
Speaker 6: So if you're waiting the whole entire episode to hear
whether he did or didn't, don't hold your breath.
Speaker 4: He did not make a statement.
Speaker 6: We were doing a little bit of research to see
whether or not a person has to make an allocution
statement as part of a plea deal, and they don't.
Speaker 4: It's not required.
Speaker 6: We were all hoping that was going to be part
of it, and I've heard a number of people say
they wish that requirement was part of the plea deal,
that if you want to take the death penalty off
the table, you have to allocute. But as Judge Hippler
said in his own closing statement, he said, I cannot
legally compel Brian Coburger to speak, right, And I think
that's important for people to understand. There is no legal
measure which can force a person to speak about what
they have done.
Speaker 3: Like a lot of things in these cases, including our own,
we're still learning as we go along. When they first
announced that Colberger was asking for and then accepted a
plea deal, which meant that he was not going to
be facing the death penalty, I, along with millions of
other people, hoped that he could be compelled to alocute.
We've done our research now and of course we saw
what happened, and in the sentencing hearing the other day,
he actually cannot be forced to testify. So even though
I was disappointed because when I heard about the deal,
I thought, at least they'll compel him to speak about
why this happened, I've tried to get a little bit
more comfortable with this, and I've said this on mind
of a murder before. Even if he did alocute, which
is strictly voluntary, it doesn't mean that his explanation, if
you want to call it that, for what happened that night,
is going to make any sense or even be close
to acceptable for any of us that are not murderers.
I was disappointed, although now I'm trying to get to
a better place where a number of key points were made,
and I know you want to get into some of
the details about how potential allocution by Brian Coberger or
any murderer is not necessarily going to be that satisfying
and experience, because nothing this fool can say is going
to bring those beautiful young people back. There isn't ever
going to be an adequate explanation for why this happened,
and as the judge pointed out, we don't.
Speaker 2: Even know if what he would say would be even
close to the truth.
Speaker 6: The burning question of why is something we're all going
to want answered. But I think the only person who
really knows the why is Brian Coburger, and there is
absolutely no legal maneuvering that can be made to compel
him to say it. As much as we may want
the why, it is very likely that we are never
going to get it. And even if we do get it,
let's say he decides to do a Netflix special or
a book or whatever else, and we'll talk again about
this idea of a set of sam laws and profiting
from the fruits of their crime. There is no guarantee
that anything that he says, like you said, Bill, is
going to be true or rational or saying even so,
let's put him out of the way focus instead on
the victim's impact statements, because those were, for me, the
most moving part of the whole entire experience.
Speaker 2: I totally agree.
Speaker 4: What we'll do is.
Speaker 6: We'll go ahead and address each of the people who
offered an impact statement. I decided to sit down and
live stream this watch the whole entire proceeding. I did
it with a legal pad in front of me, and
I just scribbled down as much as I could remember
the most compelling important points from each of the impact statements,
and I want to make sure that I highlight some
of those. For some of these, I'll be direct quoting, others,
I'll basically just be reporting on what was said. Most
of these impact statements are probably online somewhere on YouTube.
I do know that within a couple of hours, Olivia
Gonsalvis's absolutely amazing victim's impact statement was circulating widely on YouTube,
as was Dylan Mortenson's. So I have a feeling that
most of this you can find somewhere on YouTube. At
this point, if anything that we say is interesting to you,
go explore YouTube.
Speaker 4: I'm sure it's there somewhere. So the first victim's.
Speaker 6: Impact statement came from surviving roommate Bethany Funk. Bethany had
a friend read her impact statement. We don't know if
she was unable to come to court or whether she
felt she was just unable to stand up and give it.
I wouldn't want to be in front of Brian Coberger either.
She had a friend read her impact statement through the
court and the friend definitely had a hard time with it,
as I think I probably would too. Bethany's statement largely
concerned the trauma and survivor's guilt that she has suffered
in the aftermath of that quadruple homicide of her friends.
She spoke about her regret and her guilt for not
calling nine to one one right away, and that is
something that she was excoriated for the press online. She
offered an explanation that she honestly didn't even have to offer,
I don't think, but she went ahead and gave one
in her statement anyway. She explained that morning she woke
up with a terrible toothache. She called her dad, who
was a dentist, who told her to take some advil
and try to get some sleep. She took the advil,
she went back to sleep, and she wasn't really cognizant
of anything until the paramedics were already on their way
and everything was set in motion. She spoke of the
intense survivor's guilt that she feels at having survived while
four of her friends did not.
Speaker 4: She said, I still think of it every day.
Speaker 6: Why me, Why did I get to live while they
did not. She spoke of the terrible harassment that she
suffered on social media, including death threats, harassment by the
media at large who would not leave her alone to grieve,
and who wanted her story.
Speaker 3: This, I think is one of the abst solute worst
things about our social media environment. I don't know why
in the world someone would attack Bethany or any of
the friends for their actions that evening. They did the
best they could under incredibly difficult circumstances. Now this thing
about the toothache, that's the first time I've heard about this.
It makes perfect sense, and it pains me to hear
Bethany and others talk about how they were attacked on
social media and death threats.
Speaker 2: This is insane. People.
Speaker 3: We cannot be attacking the survivors of violent crime as
if they've done something wrong. It's one thing to be
angry at Brian Coberger or any other offender, and he's
now played guilty, so there's no question that Brian Coberger
did this one thing to be angry with him. It's
another thing to be attacking someone like Bethany Funk, who
is simply a housemate and good friend to these four
young people that were murdered. I'm completely baffled that people
feel that it's okay to theorize about these roomaids and
make all sorts of false accusations and death threats.
Speaker 6: This is insane, the idea that you can Monday Morning
quarterback what somebody should have done in the event of
being at the scene of a major crime. No one
has any idea what they themselves would do in that situation.
Until they are in that situation. You can say, with
all the sort of good intentions in your heart, oh,
I would have called nine one one immediately, I would
have done this, I would have done that.
Speaker 4: You don't know until you're in that situation. You just don't.
Speaker 6: And it isn't fair to Monday Morning quarterback on somebody
for what they did in the middle of a grievous emergency.
I feel horrible, and that really toxic part of our
social media culture is just something that I would love
to see completely done away with.
Speaker 2: I totally agree.
Speaker 6: Bethany spoke about the trauma and fear that she has
lived with every day since the attack and how that
has manifested. She talked about requiring double locks on her
doors alarms in every residence that she has. She and
the other surviving room at Dylan Mortenson both said that
they slept in their parents' rooms every night for a
year after the murder because there was this fear that
they would wake up and see someone looming over them. Wow,
which I justify. I understand, that's justifiable one hundred percent.
She did finish, however, on a very determined note, she said,
I am beyond blessed to be here, and I refuse
to take that for granted. She also said of her friends,
I hope they are remembered for who they are and
not for what happened to them.
Speaker 3: And I have said the exact same thing about the
Colonial Parkway murders victims. We need to focus on these
wonderful people and our own loss as friends and relatives
and the community. It pains me to think of people
thinking of the Idaho four victims only for this one
horrible evening when four of them lost their lives. We
need to focus on the joy and the love and
the accomplishments and the friendship of these four people. There's
no question there's a dramatic loss here for all of us,
especially for the people that were close to them. This
idea that let's remember them for who they are and
not for what happened to them really resonated with me absolutely.
Speaker 6: The second victim's impact statement was from the second surviving
room made in that house, Still and Mortonson. This was
the one that affected me most powerfully on a personal level.
I cried through the entirety of her statement. She was
completely unable to stand. Her lawyer asked for a little
leeway from the judge and said she needs to be
able to sit down, and the judge was like, yes,
whatever you need, absolutely, And the judge was wonderful through
this whole entire process. He spoke to each person who
stood up very graciously and kindly, expressing his thanks to
them for standing up and expressing his condolences as well.
I was very impressed with Judge Hppler, me too. Dylan
gave her statement from one of the lawyer's chairs. She
was visibly shaken up, crying the whole time, almost hyperventilating,
but she steadied herself and she read her statement. And
I got to say, and we saw this with our
friend Kathy Kleiner, who came face to face with Ted Bundy,
it must have been a hell of a terrifying experience
to come face to face with Brian Coburger.
Speaker 4: I cannot even imagine what that was like for her.
Speaker 6: She she spoke, She said of his actions, he did
not just take their lives. He took away the light
they brought into every room. He took them from me.
They were my people and my home. He shattered me
in places I didn't know could break. He stole parts
of me I may never get back.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Wow.
Speaker 3: One thing that's worth pointing out here, particularly with the
youngest of the survivors here. These folks are college students.
They don't have that much life experience. Yet. It's one
thing like with the parents and some of the and
even grandparents and other folks that have lived more of
their lives.
Speaker 2: They've probably suffered other losses.
Speaker 3: In their lives and have grieved at different points for
any number of reasons. But for these young people, a
lot of them, this may be the very first time
they've lost their peers, and then for it to happen
in such a horrific and violent way all they've been through,
I have to give them a lot of credit for
even being able to do this.
Speaker 6: I one hundred percent agreed Dylan spoke about the trauma
and PTSD that she endures in being one of the
two survivors of that massacre. She said, I make escape
plans everywhere I go. She said, I have panic attacks
like a tsunami that hit me out of nowhere, because
my nervous system never got the message that it's over.
She said Bethany, she requires alarms and locks and finds
it too difficult to sleep in a room alone. But
also like Bethany, she ended on a message of hope.
He may have shattered me, but I am still trying
to put myself back together. I am not trying for me.
I am trying for them. Living is how I honor them.
Speaking today is how I get justice for them. He
will never take my voice from me. Bravo, Dylan. Yeah,
I cried my way through that for a reason. She
is so so miraculously strong and confident. She was amazing,
absolutely amazing. The families were up next, and we should
go ahead and acknowledge at the top that one of
the families opted not to speak, and they are well
within their rights not to do that. I was talking
to Cheryl McCollum earlier today, Mac and she said that
in her forty years have been in law enforcement and
watching victims' impact statements. She said, the Chapins deciding we
don't need to give him any more time and any
more attention.
Speaker 4: We don't want this anymore.
Speaker 6: She said it was the bosses most badass move that
she's ever seen, and she said she thinks it's important
that we acknowledge that the Chapins did not have to
participate in this if they didn't want to, and it
doesn't say anything about them or their willingness to honor Ethan.
It just shows that they don't want the spotlight on
Coburger anymore and don't want to share any more of
Ethan with him. And I understand that, and I actually
applaud that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I do too. We've talked about this this.
Speaker 3: Whole Your mileage may vary expression that I use, and
maybe I'll come up with a better expression at some point,
but it's something I've learned going through the Colonial Parkway
murders experience. Everyone is going to react to these losses
in their own way, and sometimes it'll even shift over time.
And for the Chapin family, they've actually been incredibly articulate,
as have all the families but they have their reasons
why they don't want to spend any more time worrying
about or talking about Brian Coberger, and I totally get it.
Speaker 6: When I was talking to Mac earlier today, she also
said something that I thought was very appropriate for this.
She really liked the fact that during all the victim's
impact statements, you got a wide array of responses from
the family members. Those who needed to get mad got mad.
Those who needed to cuss him out cussed him out.
Those who needed to forgive him and offer a message
of forgiveness, and through a religious lens, they did. She said,
she loved the fact that every person who spoke did
it in their own way in order to gain the
we both know closure isn't the right word here, but
to gain the closure that they needed from this experience.
Speaker 4: They got out of it what they needed to get
out of it.
Speaker 6: And so I think, Bill, it's very similar to your
knowledge may very approach. I love the fact that Olivia
Gonkalvas got up there and basically said, screw you, you
suck your basic You're terrible, and my sister would have
kicked your ass. She needed to say that, and not
everybody needed to do that, so I really liked the
fact that everybody came at it in their own way.
The first of the families to have her victims and
peck statements was Matty Morgan's family. First up was her stepfather,
Scott Laramie. He said, there are no words to act
ccurately described the pain of losing Mattie.
Speaker 4: The world was a better place with her in it.
Speaker 6: He in particular spoke of the pain of his wife
and Mattie's mother, Karen. He said, she sometimes asks, how
am I supposed to go on when I've lost my
favorite person in the world, And Bill, I know that
your mom went through a similar experience.
Speaker 3: Losing Kathy, or when I read this, this reminded me
so much of things my mom passed away some years ago, now,
what she used to say about my sister Kathy, about
how in one evening she lost her only daughter, her
youngest child, and her best friend.
Speaker 6: Mister Laramie spoke about his feelings about the Plea Deal
in response to those media stories about the division within
the families. He stated, we support the Plea Agreement. Society
needs to be protected from this evil, but this evil
does not deserve our time and attention any longer, which
I fully agree with. He ended on the powerful statement
we are done being victims. We are taking back our
lives and will endure very well. Said Yeah, this theme
of refusing to be victims, of refusing to allow Coburger
to have power over them, that was reflected in the
statements of other family members as well. And I really
think those are very strong messages to send forward to
anybody who's gone through something like this. Okay. Next up
was Karen Laramie, Mattie's mother. She did not read her
statement aloud, she passed it to her attorney, Lander James,
but she did stand at the podium with him with
tissues and watched Tim read. She echoed her husband Scott's
love for her daughter, saying Mattie was our hope and
our light. She also stated, with regards to Braying Coburger,
we will not ask for mercy for what he has done,
but we will waste no further words or thoughts on him.
So again, this continuing thread of your nothing, We're done
with you.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I like this a lot, actually.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Kim Cheley, Mattie's grandmother, spoke next. She shared her love
of her granddaughter, including sharing very personal things, Mattie's nickname
for her. She spoke of the day that they have
used as a family to honor Mattie May twenty fifth,
Mattie's birthday is Mattie May Day, a day in which
her family encourages others to do random acts of kindness
in Mattie's honor, and from the podium, Miss Cheley encouraged
everyone listening to commit a random act of kindness this
week in Mattie's.
Speaker 2: Name with great idea.
Speaker 4: I like that a lot.
Speaker 6: The last member of the Mogan family to speak was
Ben Mogan, who is Mattie's biological father. He was very
visibly moved and obviously distressed, but he stood up at
the podium because he was determined to honor his daughter.
I think the most gut wrenching thing that he said was,
she is the only great thing I ever did, the
only thing I was ever proud of. I thought her
college graduation was going to be the beginning of a
law life together, but we never got that. Wow ooh,
sorry I needed a second there. This is it's incredibly
emotional to watch these. It really is like it's a
good thing to do, and I'm glad that I did it,
But you can feel the pain coming off of these folks,
and it's so gut wrenching.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's very palpable. You're listening to Mind over Murder.
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Speaker 6: The next family to speak was that I realized that
we've been pronouncing the Gonsalvez family a couple of different ways,
and that's because I've heard it a couple of different ways.
I've heard Gonkalvez, I've heard Gonsolves. We got dinged the
other day in social media for saying it wrong. We
apologize for that, but legitimately, I've heard.
Speaker 4: It both ways.
Speaker 6: So I'm going to go with Gonsalves. And if I
mispronounce it again, and I'm sorry, it's just one of
those things I'm trying.
Speaker 4: We're out here doing our.
Speaker 3: Best, and until I heard family members say it, you
really don't know what the correct pronunciation is. Look, I
for quite a while, I thought Dylan was a man,
because in my experience, the Dylan's I've met over the
years have been men and boys. I didn't realize that
Dylan was female until further along in the process, so
apologies for any mispronunciation. So I guess we're going with Gonsalves,
which is a little bit more of an S sound.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and if I mispronounced it again, sorry.
Speaker 2: We're doing the best we can here.
Speaker 4: We're doing the best we can. We're all out here
trying to make a living.
Speaker 6: The gonsalvast family was next to offer their victim's impact statements,
and I really liked the fact that when Steve Gonsalvez
took the podium, he turned it around ninety degrees directly
to face Brian Coburger and speak to him. In fact,
all the members of his family spoke directly to Brian Coburger.
Speaker 3: Very interesting and he's been very outspoken, but he was
here too.
Speaker 6: I really enjoyed listening to him speak because he managed
to get across everything that he needed to say without
avert like out of control anger. But you could tell
this is a guy who you give him five minutes
with Coburger, there's not going to be a whole lot. Leve.
He started by again turning to speak directly to Coburger
and said, today we are here to prove to the
world that you picked the wrong families, the wrong state,
the wrong community. We are united in our disgust of you,
and united in our love for these children. He went
on to cut Coburger down to size with his words,
listing everything he did wrong in the commission of the crime,
and then every potential personal failing that he saw. He said,
for example, leaving your DNA at the scene. You were
that careless, that foolish, that's stupid. You have a master's degree,
You're a joke. He assured Coburger that the world is
watching because of these kids, not because of you, and
finished with this statement, From this moment on, we will
forget you. And again, I am sure that those are
the things he needed to say to help him sleep
better at night, and I applaud that wholeheartedly.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: What's interesting, too, is that Steve Consale has been very outspoken.
He was expressing his family's disappointment about the plebeal and
the fact that the death penalty had been taken off
the table. Obviously, the Consaldist family supported the idea of
implementing the death penalty. Other family members did not see
it that way. And I think everybody's entitled to their
own perspective.
Speaker 2: But I love this.
Speaker 3: We are united in our disgust for you and united
in our love for these children. He's I think, demonstrating
that regardless of what someone's viewpoint might be in this
case regarding the death penalty, they were still all united
as families.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and that was echoed later by many other members
of the families as well.
Speaker 4: I had said before that Dylan Mortenson was the I want.
Speaker 6: To give you a hug hero of the day, but
the I want to give you a high five and
take you out for a drink hero of the day
was Olivia A Gonsalveez, who offered a passionate confidence speech
in which she tore Brian Coburger to shreds and I
love it. I highly encourage everybody go watch this woman's
victims impact statement.
Speaker 4: It's amazing, like it's for the.
Speaker 2: Ages, good for her.
Speaker 6: I want to teach this in my rhetoric class. Honestly,
I can't even begin to hit all of the good
notes that she hit, but I'll go ahead and give
you some of the highlights. Again, she looked right at
him and said, you are terrified of being ordinary, aren't you.
You're a classic case of insecurity disguised his control.
Speaker 4: You're basic.
Speaker 6: The scariest part about you is how painfully average you
turned out to be.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 6: She stated at the top that she not only considered
Kaylie her sister, but she considered Matty Mogan to be
her sister as well, And so she said, my sisters
were not yours to study, to stock and to take.
She stated, that darkness that you carried, that emptiness, you
will sit with that for the rest of your life.
Speaker 4: That is your sentence.
Speaker 2: Very powerful stuff.
Speaker 6: Again, good for her, and she ended with a statement
that drew a round of applause from everyone in the courtroom.
Here's the statement that will be hardest for you to accept.
If you hadn't attacked them in their sleep like a pedophile,
Kayllie would have kicked your fucking ass. Wow.
Speaker 4: Oh, I cheered, I cheered.
Speaker 6: I've stood up and stood up from the dining room
table and I cheered, go off, queen. She was amazing
and I loved it. High fives and drinks all around.
She was absolutely phenomenal. I highly recommend you watch her speech.
Christy Cansavez, Kayley's mother, spoke next. She was just as
fiery as her daughter. Obviously, it's a family trait. She
denigrated Coburger about his inability to make and keep relationships,
among other things. She said, you couldn't get a job,
You couldn't even get a woman to look in your direction.
The men in prison will have their way with you
in more ways than one, and you'll finally get what
you want physical touch.
Speaker 2: Oh my.
Speaker 6: And she finished with a message from her youngest daughter, Aubrey,
who simply said, you may have received a's in high school,
in college, you'll be You'll be getting big d's in prison.
Speaker 2: Ouch.
Speaker 3: Wow, I look, I get it, and I've got no
love for Brian Coberger.
Speaker 2: I think the whole family should just say what they
really think.
Speaker 4: The Gonsalvist women a Feerce.
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 4: I thought it was fantastic.
Speaker 6: There were some additional statements from other Gansalvest family members
who could not be president the hearing. Those were read
by the family's lawyer, Shin and Gray. The general tenor
of the statements was that Brian Koberger would pay for
his crimes in the afterlife. A lot of them basically
came around to the idea that he should burn and
hell and again.
Speaker 4: If you got to say it say it.
Speaker 6: That's what the victim's impact statements are for, so they
can express to this terrible, awful, less than human person,
here's what we think.
Speaker 2: This is very powerful stuff.
Speaker 3: And the great thing about victims impact statements is that
you can deliver these things directly in the face of
the horrible monster that took your loved ones away, and
it gives you an opportunity to express your rage.
Speaker 6: I think it was Olivia who actually told him at
one point, look at me.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I saw that.
Speaker 4: It was like, you know what good for you? Good
for you?
Speaker 2: She told him to sit up straight in his chair
and look at her. It was really powerful.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 6: I think that for all that it must have been
very difficult to stand up and give those statements, there
had to be a certain sense of Catharsis in there too,
I would imagine.
Speaker 3: Oh, I would think, so, I've not been through this experience,
but we know people that have, and it seems to
have had great benefit for them.
Speaker 6: I remember watching the Golden State Kill victims impact statements.
I know you did too, and I remember being happy
that Jane Carson Sandler got the opportunity to look him
in the face and tell him to rot in hell,
you bastard.
Speaker 4: Yeah, good for you, because that has to be that
has to feel good.
Speaker 3: A couple of years ago, my partner Pamela and I
had an opportunity to go up and spend a few
days with Jane Carson Sandler and husband Roger, who were
lovely people, beautiful home up in Maine, and they asked
us to come up and visit with them, and we did.
First of all, the two of them are the most amazing, wonderful,
positive people. Even though a couple of years have gone by,
you could really tell that Jane took great pride in
what she said and how she said it to the
offender in the Golden State killer case.
Speaker 2: The victim's impact statements afford.
Speaker 3: People who are survivors an opportunity to really speak their
mind and vent some spleen if they need to. But
I think for most people, they walk away from that
experience feeling a lot better about at least being afforded
the opportunity to speak from the heart.
Speaker 6: I think that it's also an opportunity to feel as
if you gained some of the power back that you
lose when you become a victim of crime.
Speaker 4: Being victimiz is.
Speaker 6: It's a terrible thing because it makes you powerless. You
lose something when you are victimized. The ability to speak
to an offender, to tell him go to Hell or
whatever it is that you need to do, it gives
you the opportunity to take some of what you lost back,
and I think that we were seeing a lot of
that with these victims impact statements.
Speaker 2: I totally agree.
Speaker 3: Three of the four victims in this case are young women,
and I think it was incredibly important, for example, for
the consultus's sisters, surviving sisters to have the opportunity to
push back and to say something and express themselves in
the way that they did. And I think that can
be very powerful because down the road you can take
some small degree of comfort in the fact that you
face down this demon and told him what you thought
of him exactly.
Speaker 6: The final family to share their victims impact statements was
the Carnadal family. As we'd said before, the Chapin family
opted not to attend the hearing, so the Cernadal family
was the last.
Speaker 4: They had six statements.
Speaker 6: Some of which we are just going to summarize without excerpting,
because at that point I had about ten pages worth
of notes on my legal pad, and I was reaching
a point where I couldn't write everything down. So the
first to speak from the Carnadal family was in his
sister Chasmin, who spoke directly to Brian Koberger when she said,
I hope that one day you will feel the full weight.
Speaker 4: Of what you did.
Speaker 6: She also said, again speaking directly to him, I came
here to say this. I am strong, I am brave,
I am a fighter. You do not get to control
how I move forward in that sense of taking power
back exactly, And she finished by saying, Xana's story does
not end with what was taken from her.
Speaker 4: It ends with her light.
Speaker 3: I love this, and this I think is something that
I hope will provide some degree of comfort because we
feel the same way about my sister Kathy. She was
on the planet for twenty seven years and did a
lot of amazing things and made a difference in many
people's lives, and we try to focus on that, not
what happened one night in October.
Speaker 6: Yeah, there was a lot of discussion in the family's
impact statements about taking back the narrative of the story
from Brian Coberger, people saying they will not allow themselves
to be victims. They will go forward on their own terms. Bill,
as the brother of a murder victim, does that resonate
with you about being able to take the narrative and
make it about moving forward and healing?
Speaker 2: Oh very much.
Speaker 3: I think this is wonderful what they did, what they said,
this idea. I think they probably talked about it, certainly
as families, about their frustrations. Obviously they go through the loss,
which they're still recovering from, and then the insanity that
has surrounded this case. You have to feel like you've
lost control of your own life on some level.
Speaker 2: This really resonated with me.
Speaker 3: We feel the same way regarding the Colonial Parkway murders.
Speaker 2: There are some differences. They have a live.
Speaker 3: Suspect who's admitted guilt in these cases, so there's someone
to focus on.
Speaker 2: We don't have that right now.
Speaker 3: We have Alan Wade Wilmer, Senior, who's been identified as
the killer in one of our double homicides, and hopefully,
if the FBI and the Virginia State Police continue to
do their job properly, will have more information about is
it Wilmer or is it someone else? There are certainly
accomplices have been mentioned to us by the investigators, but
still nothing definitive.
Speaker 2: But the idea that these.
Speaker 3: Families and friends had an opportunity to address the killer directly,
I think has great benefit.
Speaker 6: This idea also of taking back the narrative. I feel
like for a case like the Colonial Parkway murders, where
there is so many aspects of misinformation still out that
I feel one of the ways that you, guys, although
you don't have a living perpetrator, I feel like one
of the ways of taking back the narrative is something
even as simple as correcting the misconceptions and the misperceptions
of what goes along, even when it stings as simple
as oh, all the cars.
Speaker 4: Were running when they were found on the parkway.
Speaker 6: I think that addressing the issues that come up as
the story is told year after year is certainly similar
to that kind of taking back the narrative.
Speaker 3: And something that's come up in the last months especially,
is we're seeing these horrible AI generated stories, mostly on YouTube,
but they show up on a number of other platforms.
They're voiced by a computer. They supposedly are giving you
the story of the Colonial Parkway murders. Tons of misinformation,
lots of facts wrong, mispronounced names. They failed to mention
that at least one of the Colonial Parkway murders has
been solved. They're just slocky and stupid and insulting. Those
are incredibly frustrating. Now, obviously one of my goals in
terms of our public outreach is to try to at.
Speaker 2: Least get the facts.
Speaker 3: Straight on the Colonial Parkway murders and push back against
the misinformation. Oh my gosh, this drek that comes out
with these AI generated computer or robot voices telling us
what the story of the Colonial Parkway murders is all about,
and getting fact after fact after name after place wrong.
Speaker 2: It's just infuriating.
Speaker 3: Now, I don't feel like I'm being attacked personally or
anything like that, which actually, sadly, some of these families,
particularly the roommates, were actually attacked and criticized.
Speaker 2: Which is just horrible. Why would you do that?
Speaker 3: And this is where our ongoing conversation about ethics and
true crime we have to remember these are not fictional characters. Yeah,
this isn't some made up story. This really happened to
these people, including their roommates. And why in the world
would you want to attack them and criticize them and
make death threats.
Speaker 4: And it's heartbreaking. The next family member to speak with
Jeff Cernadel.
Speaker 6: He was Zanna's father, who shared a particularly heartbreaking if only.
He said that the last time he spoke to Xana,
she told him she wasn't feeling well. He had considered
it and then ultimately opted not to go to the
King Road House to visit her that night, but he
said he wished that he had. He said that if
he had been at the King Road House, the four
victims would have had a chance.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's so hard though, because there's some self blame
being mixed in there, and I hope he can ultimately
let that go. I feel terrible for mister Carnadle. I
understand why he feels that way, but I'm hoping he
can let that go over time, agreed.
Speaker 6: Kim and Stratton carn Xanna's aunt and uncle, both spoke.
Kim acknowledged the love and support among all four families.
She expressed her gratitude for the family that they have
built in the midst of all of this horror.
Speaker 4: She said, this tragedy has united us.
Speaker 6: We are stronger together and that's something that was echoed
a number of times. She also stated that she has
tried her hardest to forgive Brian Coburger, and she said
it's not because he deserves it, but because she cannot
carry that hatred around in her heart. She actually spoke
directly to him and offered to be a sounding board
for him if he ever wished to contact her and
talk to her.
Speaker 4: Obviously, that's not something she has to do.
Speaker 6: I wouldn't be able to do that, but that feeling
of needing to not carry the hatred forward with her.
She's a bigger person than i'll than I could be,
that's for sure, But I understand why she would need
to do that.
Speaker 2: I had a similar reaction.
Speaker 3: I don't think I could do this, but I admire
her for having that room in her heart to do that.
Speaker 6: And Stratton Corn the uncle, offered his sympathy to brain
Coberger's own family. Burger's mom was in the courtroom. She
listened to the impact statements. She cried other times, she
held her head in her hands. To her credit, she
stayed there the whole time. Told brain Koberger that he
felt sorry for his family, whose name is now tainted
by their association with him. And I think he's got
a very good point. I do feel sorry for his family.
They didn't ask for their son to be a spree killer.
We have so much more that we want to continue
to talk about regarding the sentencing hearing and victim's impact statement.
So we're going to carry this over into a second episode.
Stay tuned for our next episode of mind Over Murder.
We'll continue with this conversation for now. Thank you so
much for listening. We'll see you next time.
Speaker 1: Mind Over Murder is a production of Absolute Zero and
Another Dog Productions.
Speaker 3: Our executive producers are Bill Thomas and Kristin Dilley.
Speaker 1: Our logo art is by Pamela Arnois.
Speaker 2: Our theme music is by Kevin mc out.
Speaker 1: Mind Over Murder is distributed in partnership with Coral Space Media.
Speaker 3: You can follow us on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.
Speaker 1: You can also follow our page on the Colonial Parkway
Murders on Facebook.
Speaker 3: And finally, you can follow Bill Thomas on Twitter at
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Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to mind Over Murder