Latest / The Epstein Chronicles / Murder In Moscow: Bryan Kohberger's Psych Evaluation Has Been Unsealed (8/17/26)

Transcript

Murder In Moscow: Bryan Kohberger's Psych Evaluation Has Been Unsealed (8/17/26) · The Epstein Chronicles

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome back to the program. During
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: the lead up to the Brian Coberger trial that never came,
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: there was a lot of talk about the different conditions
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: that he was suffering from, and according to his psych evaluation,
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: he was diagnosed with autism, OCD and anorexia. And if
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: you remember, there was a battle going on inside the
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: courtroom between his legal team and the state about these
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: conditions and if they would be mitigating factors when it
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: comes to the death penalty, and the judge, Judge Hitler,
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: ruled against the defense in every single one of them,
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: saying that none of these conditions raised to a level
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: that would prevent a capital punishment sentence from being handed down.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: But now those evaluations have been unsealed, and for the
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: first time, the public's getting a look at what the
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: defense expert had to say. So in this episode, we're
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: going to dive into an article from People and the
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: headline psych evaluation diagnosing Brian Coberger with autism, OCD and
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: orexia unsealed. This article was authored by Chris Spargo. Brian
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: Colberger revealed that he had been diagnosed with four mental
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: health disorders in a twenty twenty five cord filing autism
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: Level one, OCD, ADHD, and ar FID. There was no
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: additional information on those disorders including in that filing, but
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: Coberger did note that he had been diagnosed with all
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: four in February of twenty twenty five. Now the detailed
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: neuropsychological evaluation that resulted in those diagnoses have been unsealed
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: by the court, providing details about the four disorders while
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: also revealing for additional diagnosis that were previously unknown. So
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: here's the question. Was Brian Colberger going through a psychiatric break?
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: Was he having some kind of issue, you know, like
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: they're saying with Lindsay Clancy. So I guess what I'm
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: getting at is where do we draw the line? Because
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: couldn't you use that same defense for Brian Colberger? Oh,
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: he was suffering from AB and C. I mean, look,
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: I'm just playing Devil's advocate here. As you all know,
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: I think this dude is as guilty as it comes.
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: And when it comes to these conditions, I don't really
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: have any sympathy for him or empathy. He was able
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: to function in society for all these years, right, was
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: able to go to college, was able to get you know,
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: a ba was working on his PhD. But all of
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: a sudden, now we want to rely on these conditions
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: when it comes to him being in trouble. Now you
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: can miss me with that. Now. I know that there's
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: a lot of people that are down with that shit
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: these days, but not me. Guess what if you kill somebody,
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: you need to pay the price. Now we can talk
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: about mitigation when it comes to the penalty phase one
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: hundred percent. And if somebody is going through a mental episode,
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: then yeah, there should be some concessions. But the million
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: dollar question at this point is where's that line drawn.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: Is it drawn at some woman who says that she's
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: suffering from postpartum depression who has been obviously over medicated,
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: or do we draw the line at Brian Colberger saying
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: that he has these disorders? And if one's acceptable, why
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: isn't the other? You know they're going to make that
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: argument in court right. The evaluation was done by Rachel Lawson,
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: an expert hired by Colberger's defense team. She was brought
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: in by Colberger's attorney Ann Taylor as she and prosecutors
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: butted heads over Coburger's mental health, which he argued should
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: be a mitigating factor, but prosecutors wish to classify as
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: an aggravator according to emotion in lemonae filed by the
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: defense at the time. And remember this is about mitigation, right,
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: not about if he's guilty, you're innocent, And that's when
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: this comes into play. So do you give somebody the
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: death penalty who has all these conditions? Or as a
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: jur do you say, you know what, I don't think
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: that I can go through with that. I don't think
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: that he meets the standard in my opinion, considering the
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: issues that he has and considering how he was able
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: to function, it would be a non starter. If I
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: was a jur that narrative would be away with me.
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: And I try to put myself in the jury box
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: when we're talking about this, because that's what really matters, right,
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: What would the jurors think? And in my opinion, the
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: jerry is not going to be buying any of this nonsense.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: She also provided the court with Or's evaluation of Coburger,
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: which had remained under steal until now. The defense made
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: it clear that the evaluation was not done to pursue
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: a mental capacity defense at trial, but rather to put
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: Or on the stand if needed, so she could respond
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: to claims made by prosecutors. It's all about mitigation again. Remember,
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: it's all about Brian Colberger not getting the death penalty.
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: That's what they were trying to do. And I think
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: that when we look back at this in retrospect, it's
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: obvious that Ann Taylor knew that Brian Colberger was cooked.
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: She saw all the evidence, she saw the discovery, she
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: saw all of the information that was going to be used,
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: and she knew that her client was in big trouble.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: That's why she told him to take the plea. Not
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: because he got bad counsel, not because Ann Taylor's a
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: bad lawyer, it's anything. But he took that plea deal
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: because he knew that the gag was up and that
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: if you went to trial, a jury in Idaho was
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: going to find his ask guilty and give him the
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: death penalty. Colberger ultimately met with ORR on six separate
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: occasions over three months for testing, evaluations, and conversation. According
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: to the evaluation, a copy of which people obtained, one
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: of the first things that Or noted to a report
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: was Coberger's restricted range of facial expression with stoic effect
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: at baseline and look, there's a lot of people out
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: there that are really suffering from these conditions. So I'm
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: not trying to make light of that. But what I
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: am saying is I'm not buying it. It's not enough. Okay, cool,
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry you have these conditions. Why did you kill
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: those four kids? It's really what it comes down to
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: for me, and frankly, I'm not interested in excuses or
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: reasons why. She wrote that smiles were often slight, his
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: social smiling was either inconsistent or absent, and the manner
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: in which he often furrowed his eyebrows during more like
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: conversation contributed the awkward engagement. So what, he's a weird dude.
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: That means he should kill people? We should just you know, Ah,
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: I get it. He was a social misfit, So the
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: fact that he killed those four kids, we should just
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: you know, be more understanding of that. No, I'm not
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: more understanding of it, and I don't care. Coburger also
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: exhibited a number of atypical social behaviors, she said, which
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: included lack of descriptive or emphatic gestures, a typical speech
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: tone and cadence, awkward interaction, lack of fluidity, awkward delivery
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: of humor at times, awkward comments eg. I had a
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: lot of fun doing the XX cognitive text, inconsistent understanding,
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: acknowledgment of humor, poor reciprocity of interaction, including very frequently
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: refocusing of conversation back on his own experiences, or unusual
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: responses to my sharing. Okay, so the weird kid, that's
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: basically what he was. How many people like that? Do
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: you know how many people did you go to school
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: with like that? And how many of them ended up killing?
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  Speaker 1: Four kids who are sleeping? Reduced social qualities at times
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: without awareness, primarily through matter of fact comments or directives
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: e g. Replying firmly I'll tell you when I'm done,
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: one prompted for anything else during cognitive measures, or an
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: abrupt response, unusual observations he made during testing, occasional intense gaze.
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: So what about any of that tells us that he
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: shouldn't be held to the fullest extent of the law
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: for what he did. Well, according to Judge Hipler, none
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: of it. Or also wrote in our evaluation that Colburger
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: has impulse tendencies throughout evaluation, pointing out that he violated
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: rules and rushed through tests. Additionally, he had an overall
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: poor insight, according to Or, except for a few moments
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: of fleeting acknowledgment one explicitly challenged to consider his role
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: in certain situations. Oh give me a break. He was
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: socially aware enough to make it through college, socially aware
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: enough to get there, and socially aware enough to become
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: a TA. But all of a sudden, Brian Colberger is
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: a vegetable sitting around drooling on himself with a helmet.
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: I'm not buying any of it. Save the emotional terrorism
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: for somebody else. I've had my fill. Much of the
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: behavior that Or witnessed were also reported by Colburger's parents
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: and two sisters, who were interviewed on multiple occasions as
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: part of the evaluation. Or wrote that Coburger's family noted
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: that his struggles with everything from deficits in nonverbal communication
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: and a limited range of facial expressions to rigid thinking
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: and behavior, along with trouble coping with changes in routine
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: and welcome to the real world. Who the fuck wants
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: their routine changed? Not me? So does that mean he
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: should get off on murder? His family members also described
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: engaging in extensive social coaching add provision of social feedback
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: to Noah Vail. According to the evaluation, this led to
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: a diagnose of Coburger with four mental health disorders. The
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: first was autism spectrum disorder level one without any accompanying
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: intellectual or language impairment. Individuals that are diagnosed tend to
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: be high functioning and display only a few symptoms of
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: the disorder and often require no assistance to perform everyday
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: tasks like I said nothing, Burger. She also diagnosed Coburger
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: with obsessive compulsive disorder, which is typically characterized by an
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: individual engaging in repetitive behavior in an attempt to shut
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: out on wanted intrusive thoughts. Coburger also received an attention
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: deficit hyperactivity disorder diagnosis, which is one of the more
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: common developmental disorders and can manifest in a number of ways,
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: varying from person to person. A majority of those diagnosed
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: struggle to pay attention, while others struggle to stay organized,
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: keep a schedule, or stay focused on a specific task. Lastly,
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: she diagnosed Coburger with an eating disord arfied or avoidant
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: restrictive food intake disorder, most common in children. This disorder manifests,
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: and highly selective eating habits that greatly limit in individual's
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: diet and can result in malnutrition and limit a person's
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: physical growth. Or also said that Colberger had met the
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: criteria before additional diagnosis in the past developmental coordination disorder,
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: an unspecified depressive disorder, anorexia nervosa, an opioid use disorder.
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: That last disorder or result of the heroin addiction Colburger
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: developed in his teenage years is in sustained remission or
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: noted in the evaluation. Okay, none of that meets the
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: bar for him not to get the death penalty. And
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: now that we actually have the report and I've looked
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: at it, I feel the same way. This man should
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: have stood trial and in my opinion, should have been
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: found guilty and he should have faced the firing squad.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: Colberger did not attempt to claim he was not the
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: mind due to any of these diagnoses when entering his
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: guilty plea to the four charges of murder. He wrote
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: in his own filing that he was aware of the
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: fact that if the judge accepted his plea, he would
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: likely be sentenced to serve four lifetimes in prison along
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: with an additional ten years on a burglary charge. Four
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: life sentences still not enough, because those four lives that
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: he took, they're never coming back, no matter how many
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: years this idiot does. Colberger then appeared in court on
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: July second, twenty twenty five, and confessed to killing the
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: four University of Idaho students Madison Mogan, Kayley Gunsalvis, Xana Kernodle,
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: and Ethan Chapin. Three weeks later, he was back in court,
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: at which time he was sentenced to serve four lifetimes
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: in prison for those murders. Then, in July of twenty
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: twenty six, Coburger filed the motion with the court asking
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: that his guilty plea be tossed out and that he
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: be allowed a trial on account of ineffective council. Prosecutors
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: have yet to respond to the filing. Ineffective council. That's
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: some of the biggest horseshit I've ever heard. This dude
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: has not had ineffective council. Okay, and Taylor killed it
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: for him. She was great. And you know how you
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: know she was great because everybody was criticizing her at
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: the time. She's going too far. There's too many filings, etc. Etc.
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: So that whole entire argument just doesn't hit. And I
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: think that the court is going to recognize that, and
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: I think that this appeal is going to be smacked down.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: But like usual, we'll keep following along and we'll see
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: what the prosecution has to say. In response to Brian Coberger.
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: All the information that goes with this episode can be
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: found in the description box.