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Judge Sentences Idaho Students Killer to Life in Prison. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired July 23, 2025 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[14:00:00]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": -- speaking right now.

TULSI GABBARD, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: -- that Russia and Putin had which include -- on Hillary Clinton, which included possible criminal acts like secret meetings with multiple named U.S. religious organizations in which State Department officials offered, in exchange for supporting Secretary Clinton's campaign for the presidency, significant increases in financing from the State Department.

They also had documents that showed the patronage of the State Department to State Department employees who would go and support Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. There were high level DNC emails that detailed evidence of Hillary's "psycho emotional problems, uncontrolled fits of anger, aggression, and cheerfulness." And that then Secretary Clinton was allegedly on a daily regimen of heavy tranquilizers.

Then CIA Director Brennan and the intelligence community mischaracterized intelligence and relied on dubious substandard sources to create a contrived false narrative that Putin developed a "Clear preference for Trump." Brennan and the IC misled lawmakers by referencing the debunked Steele dossier to assess, "Russia's plans and intentions," falsely suggesting that this dossier had intelligence value when he knew that it was discredited.

The intelligence community excluded significant intelligence and ignored or selectively quoted reliable intelligence that contradicted the intelligence community assessment's key findings on Putin's alleged support for Trump, including this intelligence reporting would've exposed the ICA's claim as implausible, if not ridiculous. The intelligence community assessment omitted reliably sourced information such as how some Russian intelligence officials were, "Planning for candidate Hillary Clinton's victory." While others assessed neither Trump nor Clinton would respect Russia's interests.

As was reflected in the ODNI documents that we released on Friday, multiple intelligence community assessments released in the months leading up to the November 2016 election concluded that Russia had neither the intent nor capability to impact the outcome of the U.S. election. On December 5th --

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": We've been listening there to the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, continuing on what has now been a multi-day effort, not only with public statements like this, but release of documents to attempt to back up the quite extreme allegation that President Obama is guilty of treason and that he worked in some sort of conspiracy with Hillary Clinton, et cetera, in the assessment by the intelligence community at the time that Russia interfered in the 2016 election. And part of that assessment at the time was that the Kremlin had a preference in that election for Donald Trump.

There's a lot of conflation going on here and going beyond what the intelligence showed. I should note, having covered that election quite closely that the assessment never said that Russia changed the outcome of the election, accessed voting systems votes, et cetera. We're joined now by CNN's Jeff Zeleny, but also CNN's Daniel Dale. Daniel, you've been doing a great job of quite meticulously fact checking each of the claims here. Can you help us by fact checking some of the things that the DNI, Tulsi Gabbard said just now?

DANIEL DALE, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Yeah, so obviously, I haven't seen all the materials that she in that position has seen, but she has been attacking this intelligence assessment from early 2017, put out by the intelligence community and suggesting that it contradicted previous findings that the intelligence community had previously concluded that Russia could not alter vote counts and so on.

As you said, that early 2017 assessment did not find that there was any alteration of vote counts, that Russia had changed the outcome. Rather, it found that Russia had made this kind of effort through hacking democratic organizations through a social media influence dissemination organization. And I think it's very important to note that the Republican-controlled Senate Intelligence Committee reviewed these findings about Russia's actions and found that not only were they well supported, but also that there had not been political interference by the Obama administration with the intelligence community in developing these conclusions.

So, this suggestion that there is some treasonous activity by former President Obama, basically in simply asking the intelligence community or directing the intelligence community to come up with an assessment of Russia's well-documented activities, is simply not borne out by the evidence that DNI gathered and President Trump have presented so far in the last week.

SCIUTTO: I mean, we should note that there were multiple findings of that intelligence assessment. One was, and this one is not -- really never been disputed by Republicans or Democrats, was that Russia interfered in the election via disinformation, that then you had other elements, one of which was that the preference of the Kremlin was for Donald Trump.

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And that was based in part on sources in Russia, but it was also based on the nature of the interference, stealing Hillary Clinton emails, John Podesta emails from the DNC, and then releasing those during the campaign, particularly at times where it might have impact. One of which was after the release of the Access Hollywood tape, right? That lots of focus at the time was on that tape, damaging to Donald Trump. And then you had this release of emails. There were a number of things that went into that assessment, but we should note that intelligence assessments often have layers one and different degrees of confidence with each of the findings.

KEILAR: Yeah. And Jeff Zeleny, let's pull a couple of threads on this or maybe follow some breadcrumbs back. The other day, President Trump was asked about Jeffrey Epstein in the Oval Office and what did he do? This was when he was meeting with the Head of the Philippines. He takes this detour off into Russia Gate, Hillary Clinton at length, at considerable length. And we've seen him trying to change the topic on Epstein, and this was something he was trying to chum the waters with.

And we also should note, Tulsi Gabbard as she's here, she's showing up and saying these things, some of which are questionable. She's also someone who perhaps, when it comes to where she is on Trump's list, let's say, has to perhaps get a little bit higher. She's had some recent appearances, her testimony over Signal Gate, her statements on where Iran was on its nuclear weapons capability that appeared recently to put her at odds with Trump that he was asked about repeatedly.

Talk us through, a little bit about this issue, but also what it's distracting from.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, you summed it up quite nicely there. The bottom line to all of this is, this is the retribution campaign that President Trump has long promised, and it's a new distraction campaign that he is eagerly hoping works to avoid questions and move on from questions about Jeffrey Epstein. That's exactly what it is. Retribution, obviously to Hillary Clinton and distracting, trying to change the subject.

But at the same time, having a Tulsi Gabbard, who is speaking at this moment, as you can see there on screen in the White House Briefing Room, there's no better way to get back in the good graces, or try at least to do so than embrace one of the president's largely conspiracy theories and just a favorite old tropes going back to the 2016 campaign. I mean, this is what the White House has decided to put forward today as their message of the day, if you will, by having Tulsi Gabbard, the Director of National Intelligence, speak at the White House press briefing about this.

So this is what the White House believes is the most important pressing topic of the day, not the economy, not what is happening on Capitol Hill, not what's happening in Ukraine, not is what is happening in so many other places, but talking about the 2016 campaign. So look, we have reached out to representatives of the former Clinton campaign, which you and I covered at the time, Brianna. We will let you know if we hear back from them on these new allegations.

But we should point out that, these are some pretty far out there allegations, is saying the Russian intelligence community had information that Hillary Clinton was on tranquilizers at the time. This was in no way verified. We have no idea. I mean, this is hardly information that we should even be repeating. Nevermind that it's some years after the fact, eight years more than that after the fact, but also just look at the source.

But look, this is the -- what this White House wants to, talk about. And I'm not sure that we should spend that much more time on it, frankly.

SCIUTTO: Yeah, I mean, listen, that -- certainly the first time I've heard that allegation that Russians had information about Hillary Clinton using psychotic drugs of some kind. But, Daniel Dale, this claim about election rigging in 2016. The other point we should make is that, and we could call up the sound, Republicans and Democrats endorsed the intelligence community's assessment about Russian interference in the election many times over and quite publicly in and after 2016. But, tell us about that specific claim of the election somehow being rigged, which is an election by the way that Donald Trump won, as I remember.

DALE: Donald Trump won that. That's point number one. He won the election. But second of all, just to emphasize how little there is to that allegation that the president made yesterday, that President Obama was caught rigging the election. This intelligence assessment that President Trump is suggesting was evidence of some election rigging effort came out after the election, after his victory in early 2017. So, the previous allegation had been, well, they put this out to try to preemptively discredit the incoming Trump Administration, which again, very little basis for that.

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But at least it has the timeline right. So to suggest that something post-election is evidence of election rigging is pure nonsense. But when President Trump makes the claim, he doesn't lay out the timeline for his supporters. So, people may have a disordered impression.

KEILAR: All right. Daniel Dale, Jeff Zeleny, thank you so much to both of you. And ahead on "CNN News Central," we will be going back to Boise, Idaho and our breaking news this afternoon. Bryan Kohberger sentenced to life in prison for the murder of four Idaho college students. Stay with us.

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[14:15:12]

KEILAR: And our breaking news, a judge has just sentenced the killer in the slayings of four University of Idaho students to life in prison without the possibility of parole. The killer given an opportunity to speak in court to possibly explain his motive, he declined. Here's how the judge responded.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JUDGE STEVEN HIPPLER, IDAHO 4TH JUDICIAL DISTRICT: And in the end, the more we struggle to seek explanation for the unexplainable, the more we try to extract a reason, the more power and control we give to him. In my view, the time has now come to end Mr. Kohberger's 15 minutes of fame.

I'm unable to come up with anything redeeming about Mr. Kohberger because his grotesque acts of evil have buried and hidden anything that might have been good or intrinsically human about him.

His actions have made him the worst of the worst. Even in pleading guilty, he's giving nothing hinting of remorse or redemption, nothing suggesting even a recognition or understanding, let alone regret for, the pain that he has caused. And therefore, I will not attempt to speak about him further other than to simply sentence him, so that he's forever removed from civilized society

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Our Jean Casarez is outside the court. You know, Jean, in listening to those victim statements, the emotion certainly clear throughout, a clear attempt to take power away from him as well. Right? Jean, can you hear me?

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I can. You know, the emotion in the courtroom was I think unequaled in what we have heard at sentencings of this type. I mean, it started from the very beginning. Even the judge, if you watched him, he was rubbing his eyes and this judge was so emotional as he was talking. I do want to tell you what just finished out here because I know you took some of it live, which was very important.

Steve Goncalves was speaking, he really changed this sentencing because everyone was directing their comments to the judge. But when he stood up there, he moved that podium and he turned it, and he faced Bryan Kohberger. And he said outside just a minute ago that they had a stare down and that he was looking into his eyes, and he said he saw demons when he looked into those eyes, and he wanted to make sure that he heard what he had to say.

And from then on out in the sentencing, people directed it toward Bryan Kohberger. It all started this today though, with those two surviving roommates. The one was too emotional to speak, so her best friend spoke. But you see what happens to someone who survives a crime like this. They are forever impacted. And that came through their words of having to spend the night in their parents' bedroom, of falling down on the floor and just crying. But then, you got to the families and Xana Kernodle's mother, who really has not spoken out. We have not truly heard from her, but she stood up with that courage and she spoke in court today. Here is some of what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARA NORTHINGTON, XANA KERNODLE'S MOTHER: I'm not going to share memories of Xana or anymore of the goodness of her with you because I do not want that to be in your head. I don't want it to be in your head. You don't deserve that. You don't deserve our good memories that we have. I do pray for you. I pray that you come to the end of yourself. I pray that before this life is over, that you ask our Lord and Savior in your heart to forgive you. I do pray for that. But after today, I wash my hands of you and you are no longer a thing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: Mr. Goncalves had said when he walked into the courtroom that he had hoped there would be enough pressure on Bryan Kohberger, that he would answer questions, that he would speak, that he would say why this happened, why he chose those four particular victims that were just starting their life. But the judge in his remarks right before sentencing said something, I think, to try to bring some peace to that.

He said that as you continue to ask those questions, you are continuing to give Bryan Kohberger the power. And even if he had said something today, how would we know that someone like that would say the truth? One thing the judge said he is very concerned about, he had heard something about Kohberger collaborating with those that are making movies on this case, on his life. And the judge hoped that people would not stoop to that.

[14:20:00]

That he wants psychotherapists and forensic psychologists to look at and try to figure out his brain. But none of that should ever be public. And so now, at this point, what will be happening is that Bryan Kohberger is now the custody of the Idaho Department of Corrections. So, he is no longer in state custody at this point where the sentencing is now completed. So, he will be taking a long ride. They will assess him. There was no pre-sentencing report, but they will determine what facility he goes to.

But in Idaho, there obviously is that one facility that is for the worst of the worst, the maximum security prison. And this is for someone that is a quadruple murderer.

SCIUTTO: Consecutive sentences too, consecutive life sentences for him with no possibility of parole.

CASAREZ: Consecutive sentences, and no appellate rights.

KEILAR: That's right. Jean Casarez, thank you so much. Let's talk now with Criminal Defense Attorney and Former Prosecutor, Mark O'Mara. First, just your reaction to these victim impact statements and just how emotional they were, and how some of them were really targeted at Bryan Kohberger.

MARK O'MARA, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY AND FORMER PROSECUTOR: So difficult to listen because you're truly talking about people, families, who will never be the same for having lost not only someone, but the way they lost someone. Very difficult. Now, I've represented people facing death row. I've represented victims of people on death row. Look, it is a horribly difficult process to go through, but I will tell you this, closure comes very slowly. It doesn't come with this day. It wouldn't have come with the imposition of a death penalty -- sentence. And it doesn't even come if the death penalty was imposed on somebody. I understand the family's frustrations. But I will tell you, this family, every family, have gone through this, will be better off because this case ends in 2025 than they would be if it ended in 2040. Because on average, these death penalty case reviews, the appellate process lasts about 15 years. And I will tell you from my experience with victim's families, they don't get the closure until that last day is done. So, though they don't like the decision to avoid death today, I do think that it'll help with their healing and they won't feel it today, but they might feel it in a year or maybe in two or three years, but not 15 or 20 years.

SCIUTTO: Yeah, Steve Goncalves, I mean, he said negotiation is injustice. That's been his and his family's consistent position about this plea deal. But to your point, Mark, Bill Thompson, the prosecutor, he made that point about the length of a potential appeals process had it gone to trial, when he was in effect making the case for the plea deal, almost defending the plea deal, right, in the courtroom before the victim's families. And he said those appeals could go years, decades, et cetera. So you're saying he was right about that, right about the potential timeline?

O'MARA: Well, he really is. First of all, remember 95, 98 percent of all cases in the system resolve themselves short of a trial and criminal as well. But also realize that it is excruciating to have an appellate process last for 5, 10, 15 years because one mistake by the judge, one mistake by the prosecutor, even sometimes one mistake by the defense attorney can cause it to start all over again. Because when the death penalty is imposed, the process has got to be as perfect as it can be, which means if there is a mistake, we start over and that family goes through yet another trial, yet another potential sentencing.

And I'm telling you, I know it's harsh to say, but the victims' families will heal quicker without the specter of a death penalty on the table. And now that he is sentenced, and as the one mom just said, he is no longer an issue in her life. That allows for the healing, that will not happen with an appellate process that can last a decade or more.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

KEILAR: I thought it was, interesting, as the judge asked Bryan Kohberger if he was declining to speak, because he had the chance to, and he said this thing, he said that he respectfully declined which, Mark, seems so incongruous with what he's done, with what we heard in that courtroom. What did you make of that?

O'MARA: So, it was such a difficult process. And again, I've been in that position with clients. What do you say in a massive tragedy that it was caused by him? How do you -- an apology, as Jean said, is an apology ever accepted? It wouldn't be. It wouldn't be seen as sincere.

[14:25:00]

There's nothing that Kohberger could have said to lessen any of the pain that he caused. Why even give him the opportunity, quite honestly? Why give him the right to lessen his own guilt by saying something to the family? I think the fact that he made no statement -- again, I know the family would love to have some type of additional closure, some type of explanation. But quite honestly, it wouldn't have been believed. It wouldn't have been understood, wouldn't have been accepted. So, I think rather than giving Kohlberg that opportunity to say anything, to blame it on his mental health, to blame it on drug, whatever he might've come up with, I'm OK on behalf of the victims' families to leave it just the way it was done.

SCIUTTO: So, a concern that the judge expressed and that the family has expressed previously is what can Kohberger do now in terms of speaking out, right? You mentioned the possible collaboration, the judge did, with someone making a documentary about the murders. I know the family is concerned he might write a book. What are the laws, right? What can he do? What can't he do?

O'MARA: He can say basically whatever he wants to say. There are laws that disallow him from profiting from what he has done. Son of Sam law in New York was one of the first ones that came out that stopped him from making any money (inaudible). But, they can't stop him from talking. They can't stop him from having somebody come visit him and write out letters or do whatever because, unfortunately, there's no further sanction that can be imposed on him. He has already got four life sentences.

So the only meter, the only governor on him is unfortunately himself. And I guess, those people who are willing to interact with him and then take his message somewhere, movie, book, story, psychological evaluation, whatever it might be, the hopes is -- or the hope is that he will learn some sense of decorum in doing it in a way that doesn't damage the families any more than he already has.

SCIUTTO: Yeah.

KEILAR: Mark O'Mara, great to get your perspective. Thank you so much.

Still to come, President Trump is hailing a new trade deal with Japan as "massive." But the three biggest U.S. carmakers, who Trump has said he wants to help, are pushing back on the new agreement. Why they call it unfair?

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