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Two Roommates Survived the Night Bryan Kohberger Killed Their Housemates. Here's Where They Are Now
@Source: people.com
Bethany Funke and Dylan Mortensen's lives were forever changed in 2022.
On the morning of Nov. 14, 2022, the University of Idaho students woke up, went upstairs and discovered their roommates had been killed during the night. Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and her boyfriend Ethan Chapin, who was staying the night, had been stabbed to death the night before.
The next month, former Ph.D student Bryan Kohberger was arrested in Pennsylvania in connection with the crime, charged with four counts of first-degree murder and felony burglary. He was indicted by a grand jury in May 2023.
On July 2, 2025, Kohberger confessed to killing the four students and pleaded guilty. Just before he was sentenced to serve four lifetimes in prison without parole plus 10 additional years for burglary on July 23, Funke and Mortensen delivered victim impact statements, marking their first time publicly speaking out about the night their roommates died.
"Because of him, four beautiful, genuine, compassionate people were taken from this world for no reason," Mortensen said in her statement. "He didn't just take their lives, he took their light that carried into every room."
So, where are the University of Idaho surviving roommates now? Here's everything to know about Bethany Funke and Dylan Mortensen's lives today.
What happened on the night the University of Idaho students were killed?
On Nov. 13, 2022, University of Idaho students Chapin, Mogen, Kernodle and Goncalves were found stabbed to death in an off-campus apartment at 1122 King Road in Moscow, Idaho.
Two of their roommates — Funke and Mortensen — were home and unarmed, though police ruled them out as suspects early on. Per a press release from the time, the surviving roommates called their friends to the residence because "they believed one of the second-floor victims had passed out and was not waking up."
According to the case's probable cause affidavit reviewed by PEOPLE, Kohberger was linked to the case after his DNA matched that found on the sheath of a knife left behind at the scene.
During his trial, Latah County District Attorney Bill Thompson shared he believes Kohberger broke into the victims' home by sliding through a glass door on the second floor. Thompson said he believes Kohberger then walked past the bedroom of one of the surviving roommates before going up to the third floor and murdering the first two victims, Mogen and Goncalves, before returning to the second floor and killing the other two victims in Kernodle's room.
What did Bethany Funke and Dylan Mortensen experience the night their roommates were killed?
In James Patterson and Vicky Ward's book The Idaho Four: An American Tragedy and Prime Video's One Night in Idaho: The College Murder, new details emerged about what happened inside the house the night the four students were killed — including what Funke and Mortensen saw and heard.
Mortensen, who was a junior at the time, heard strange noises in the three-story house and swore she overheard a male voice saying, "It's okay. I'm going to help you." Amid her sleepy haze, Mortensen saw a shadowy figure in all black but thought it was a firefighter, who seemed to be holding what looked like a vacuum. At one point, they made eye contact, but the man, who also seemed to be wearing a mask, kept walking.
Mortensen returned to her room, where she frantically called Funke, who had slept through the massacre, and told her what she saw before trying to reach her other housemates. Funke tried to rationalize the situation and said that the figure dressed in black could have been one of their housemates, but Mortensen assured her it was something more peculiar.
"No it’s like a ski mask almost," Mortensen wrote. "Like he had soemtbing (sic) over is for head (sic) and little nd (sic) mouth."
She continued, "Bethant (sic) I’m not kidding o (sic) am so freaked out," with Franke replying, “So am I.”
As Funke explained during the hearing, she assumed they would go upstairs the next day and be mocked for being "scaredy cats."
Later that night, Mortensen joined Funke in her bedroom, where the two locked themselves in the room and spent the next eight hours texting their roommates. However, when they went upstairs around noon, Mortensen and Funke discovered their roommates were dead.
Did the surviving roommates serve as eyewitness accounts in Bryan Kohberger's trial?
Although Kohberger was initially linked to the crime scene from DNA and cell phone pings, per the affidavit, Mortensen and Funke also served as eyewitness accounts that helped the defense team build their case.
In March 2025, Thompson filed a motion stating that he planned to introduce the receipt from the purchase of a balaclava just months before he became a murder suspect. In the filing obtained by PEOPLE, Thompson explained that the black balaclava Kohberger purchased from Dick's Sporting Goods is the "same type of mask described by [the surviving roommate] that she witnessed worn by a male in the residence on November 13, 2022."
The eyewitness was later revealed to be Mortensen.
Where are Bethany Funke and Dylan Mortensen now?
At a December 2022 memorial for the victims, a pastor read letters from Funke and Mortensen. Per footage shared by ABC News, Mortensen said her life was "greatly impacted" by having known the four victims, while Funke wished she could "give them one last hug."
In the years to follow, the former roommates tried to maintain a life out of the spotlight amid the highly publicized trial.
One year after the massacre, Mortensen's stepmother, Patricia Munroe, told The New York Post that her stepdaughter was struggling with survivor's "guilt" and had transferred to a new school. Funke also appears to have transferred schools, as she was nominated to be an "ATO sweetheart" at the University of Nevada, per the fraternity's Instagram.
In the December 2024 post, Funke wrote in the caption that she was a senior, on the soccer team and majoring in public health. "Although I’ve only been here for a few years the men of ATO have always made me feel so welcomed and safe," she wrote.
In April 2023, Funke fought a legal request that would force her to testify in Kohberger's trial. But at his sentencing hearing on July 23, she broke her silence in the trial in a victim impact statement read by her friend, Emily Alandt, who discussed what it was like to live through "the worst day of my life."
"I was scared the person who did this would come for me next," Funke wrote in her statement, adding that she had "not slept through a single night since this happened."
"The fear never really leaves," Funke's statement read. "Every day I remind myself to live for them."
Meanwhile, Mortensen spoke directly about Kohberger's character, saying, "He is a hollow vessel. Something less than human. A body without empathy or remorse."
She later added, "He chose destruction, he chose evil. He feels nothing. He tried to take everything from me."
Mortensen also opened up about how her life was impacted in the aftermath of the massacre.
“I made escape plans everywhere I went. If something happens, how do I get out? What can I use to defend myself?” Mortensen said, adding that her "emotional pain" and "grief" are "too much to handle."
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