The sister of University of Idaho murder victim Kaylee Goncalves said everything in her body told her to “run” as she came face to face with Bryan Kohberger during his sentencing — but instead she delivered a blistering takedown of her sibling’s killer.
“I’m not intimidated by him, truly, I’m not,” she said, “but when I tell you, there’s a primal sense of alarm. My body was telling me, ‘Run, get out. This is a threat,’” Alivea Goncalves told NewsNation about the chilling moment she delivered her impact statement in front of Kohberger at his Wednesday sentencing.
“The best description I can give you is as if I came face to face with an alien,” she said. “Behind [his eyes], there’s no human being, there’s no humanity.”
Still, Goncalves remained determined to decimate Kohberger, who has dominated headlines since the November 2022 murders of Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin in their off-campus Moscow, Idaho, home.
“There was nothing that was going to make me back down from the moment … and all I felt was rage, almost from the very, very beginning,” she said.
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“My whole purpose of that speech was taking back this power,” she said. “It’s been focused around him, his name, his actions … but in my shoes, it pisses me off at times. They have names: Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle, Ethan Chapin. Say it.”
Goncalves said her father’s remarks, which came before her own and “shifted” the energy in the courtroom, gave her the strength to deliver her own.
“I feel like my dad spread his wings so I could fly,” she said. “I basically said, screw it. You felt confident in this, you’ve worked hard on this, you’re going to get up there and you’re going to do this.”
“I was ready to stand on business,” she said.
At one point during her victim impact statement, Kohberger appeared to take sick pleasure in the verbal lashing — flashing a slight grin at Alivea.
Other than that brief moment, he wore a blank expression on his face through the entire proceeding despite Alivea’s powerful statement.
Kohberger, 30, was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole or appeal at the hearing.
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