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As digital forensics experts analyzed the cellphone of Bryan Kohberger, the 30-year-old failed criminologist turned convicted murderer, they drew similarities between him and the fictional main character of the book and movie, “American Psycho,” the narcissistic banker Patrick Bateman – and they discovered that he spent Christmas night a month after the slayings reading dozens of articles about serial killers.
“I watched ‘American Psycho’ back in the day, and how vain he was, where he would always take like naked photos of himself flexing, similar to that, like with him just in pants, but topless from the waist up, flexing [in] a mirror forward, backward, making different expressions, but just for himself,” said Heather Barnhart, the senior director of forensics research with the internationally known digital investigations firm, Cellebrite. “It was like he admired his body.”
Her husband, Jared Barnhart, a former Maryland police officer who also works at Cellebrite, also worked the case.
Bryan Kohberger appears at the Ada County Courthouse for his sentencing hearing, Wednesday, July 23, 2025, in Boise, Idaho, for brutally stabbing four University of Idaho students to death nearly three years ago. (AP Photo/Kyle Green, Pool)
“He takes his shirt off, flexes his muscles, and takes a picture of himself, and then just goes back to whatever he was doing before,” he said of Kohberger. “Nonsense.”
The Barnharts said they did not have the authority to share the photos, but they described them as narcissistic and strange. He even took photos at bizarre angles, highlighting himself from behind and in profile.
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Prosecutors allege Bryan Kohberger took this selfie photo at 10:31 a.m. on November 13, 2022 – about 6 hours after the murders of four University of Idaho students he is accused of committing. (Ada County Court)
One selfie, previously unveiled after prosecutors included it in court documents, showed Kohberger smiling and giving a thumb’s up in his bathroom hours after the slayings. He had a bandaid on his knuckles, the Barnharts noted, and his hands were red from apparent scrubbing.
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In another revealed through the media, he also posed in a black hooded sweatshirt.
Actor Christian Bale on the set of “American Psycho,” based on the novel by Bret Easton Ellis and directed by Canadian Mary Harron. (Eric Robert/Sygma/Sygma via Getty Images)
“He takes selfies all the time and seemingly does nothing with them,” Jared Barnhart said. “They just are in his phone.”
It would make more sense if he shared them with other people or posted them online, he said, but Kohberger didn’t do that. In fact, he barely spoke with anyone, aside from his mom and dad, whom he referred to as “Mother” and “Father.”
“He seems obsessed with himself, with his parents, with his body,” Heather Barnhart said.
Kohberger took efforts to minimize his digital footprint before the murders, according to the Barnharts, and also successfully wiped important information from his laptop. However, they uncovered other damning evidence – including that he spent Christmas night reading about serial killers online.
One of his key mistakes, the couple said, was that he downloaded some of these websites instead of just reading them online, leaving an obvious trail for them to analyze.
Madison Mogen, top left, smiles on the shoulders of her best friend, Kaylee Goncalves, as they pose with Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle, and two other housemates in Goncalves’ final Instagram post, shared the day before the four students were stabbed to death. (@kayleegoncalves/Instagram)
“All this stuff was sitting there,” Jared Barnhart told Fox News Digital. “You know he’s a criminology major. Could you excuse it? Maybe. But not at this point – not for this guy.”
But despite some damning evidence, Kohberger successfully hid all traces of why he might have committed the crime, according to the Barnharts.
“I think that’s the most important point to me, is he cleaned up what was probably the story all the victims’ families need to hear, right? The why, the how, why my kid? All of that is gone,” Jared Barnhart said. “And we tried like crazy to find something, you know, to tell these families, and it just isn’t there.”
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A watchman parked outside 1122 King Road on Dec. 11, 2022, four weeks after four students were stabbed to death inside. The house has since been demolished, and Bryan Kohberger pleaded guilty to the slayings. (Michael Ruiz/Fox News Digital)
His search history included searches for the term “psychopath,” which his lawyers didn’t want used at trial, and about serial killers. Prior to his arrest but after reading a news report about how police had identified a white Hyundai Elantra as the suspect vehicle in the student murders, Kohberger appeared to panic and searched auto detailers and for a replacement car, according to the Barnharts. He also spent a lot of time streaming videos on YouTube and TikTok, they said.
“On his PC [personal computer], ‘psychopath’ was a normal word that he typed into a browser, but he could have said it was for his major or research,” Heather Barnhart told Fox News Digital.
However, he cleared his browsing history for roughly a month leading up to the murders, from Oct. 12, 2022 to Nov. 16.
Bryan Kohberger is seen in a selfie that was taken on Dec. 28, 2022. (Dateline)
He carried out the slayings on Nov. 13, in a 4 a.m. home invasion attack, stabbing all four victims repeatedly. They were Madison Mogen, 21, Kaylee Goncalves, 21, Xana Kernodle, 20, and Ethan Chapin, 20. All but Kernodle are believed to have been asleep at the start of the attack.
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Kohberger pleaded guilty to four counts of first-degree murder and one of felony burglary last month. He received four consecutive sentences of life with no parole, plus another 10 years. The plea deal required him to waive his right to appeal and his right to seek a sentence reduction.
While Kohberger is being held in isolation at the Idaho Maximum Security Institute, a state prison near Boise, he is already reportedly the target of harassment and mockery from fellow inmates.
