'Shattered' Roommate of Idaho Murder Victims Breaks Silence at Sentencing

The two surviving roommates of the four University of Idaho students who were killed by Bryan Kohberger in 2022 commented publicly for the first time since the murders at Kohberger's sentencing on July 23.

Kohberger pleaded guilty earlier to the murders of Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Kernodle’s boyfriend, Ethan Chapin, which happened Nov. 13, 2022 at their off-campus home. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

A second surviving roommate, Bethany Funke, did not appear in the courtroom. Instead, she had her written statement read aloud by a friend.

Funke and Mortensen were in the basement of 1122 King Road when the killings took place. Below, find a summary of what they shared in court on July 23.

‘Shattered and heartbroken’

Mortensen, her voice breaking, told the court that the murders “shattered” her.

“What happened that night changed everything. Because of him, four beautiful, genuine, compassionate people were taken from this world for no reason,” said Mortensen, sobbing.

Dylan Mortensen, one of the two surviving roommates of the four University of Idaho students murdered by Bryan Kohberger in 2022, speaks at Kohberger's sentencing in a Boise courthouse on July 23. (Kyle Green / AP)

“He didn’t just take their lives. He took the light they carried into every room. He took away how they made everyone feel safe, loved, and full of joy," she added.

She went on to say that losing the four people she "adored more than anyone" in such a horrific manner took away her "ability to trust the world" around her.

“What he did shattered me in places I didn’t know could break,” Mortensen said. “I was barely 19 when he did this.”

"They say I’m a survivor, but they don’t see what my new reality looks like. They don’t see the panic attacks, the hyper vigilance, the exhaustion, the way I scan every room I enter, the way I flinch at sudden sounds," she told the court. "They don’t know how heavy it heavy it is to carry so much pain and still be expected to keep going. That's because of him."

Bryan Kohberger appears at the Ada County Courthouse for his sentencing hearing on July 23, 2025 in Boise, ID. (Kyle Green/Pool / Getty Images)

Kohberger, a former Ph.D. student who was studying criminology at the time of the murders, sat, expressionless, at the defense table wearing an orange prison jumpsuit.

"He is a hollow vessel, something less than human, a body without empathy, without remorse," Mortensen said, adding, “He chose destruction. He chose evil. He feels nothing."

Mortensen also told the court that a year ago, she dreamed she had to say goodbye to Goncalves, Mogen, Kernodle and Chapin.

“They all kept asking, ‘Why?’” she recalled. “And all I could say was ‘I can’t tell you, but I have to.’”

Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Ethan Chapin and Xana Kernodle. (TODAY)

She added, “When I woke up, I felt shattered and heartbroken.”

After the dream, she said, she felt ready to let go of some of her pain and focus on getting “justice” for her friends.

“He tried to take everything from me: my friends, my safety, my identity, my future,” she said of Kohberger. “He took their lives, but I will continue trying to be like them, to make them proud.”

“Speaking today is to help me find some sort of justice for them,” Mortensen said.

Mortensen cries after sharing her impact statement. (Kyle Green / AP)

‘Why did I get to live?’

Funke also shared that she has felt "guilty" that she survived Kohberger's bloody rampage.

“I hated and still hate that they are gone, but for some reason, I am still here, and I got to live. I still think about this every day. Why me?" she wrote. "Why did I get to live and not them? For the longest time, I could not even look at their families without feeling sick with guilt."

Funke also listed for the court what she believed was each of the victims' most admirable qualities and called Chapin and Kernodle’s relationship proof that “storybook love and true romances really do exist.”

“Who they were was so beautiful," she wrote of the victims, "and they deserve to be remembered in the highest way."