Father of Idaho victim says daughter may have been prime target and ‘means of death’ don’t all match

‘So I’m using logic that he chose to go up there when he didn’t have to’

The grieving father of one of the four slain University of Idaho students said his daughter and her best friend may have been prime target as the perpetrators 'chose to go upstairs' where they were sleeping.

Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin were stabbed to death in their off-campus home in Moscow on 13 November. Three weeks later, the police are yet to name a suspect.

Steven Goncalves, father of 21-year-old Kaylee, said that the suspect went upstairs where his daughter and her best friend Mogen, 21, were sleeping on the same bed on the top floor, which was out of the way of the killer's entry point.

Authorities said that the perpetrator entered the house through a sliding glass door or window on the second floor of the home, which meets a hill on the ground level in the backyard.

The other two victims — Kernodle and Chaplin — were found dead on the second floor of the house.

Mr Goncalves said the entry point was the middle floor. "So, to me, he doesn't have to go upstairs. His entry and exit are available without having to go upstairs or downstairs," he told Fox & Friends on Sunday.

"Looks like he probably may have not gone downstairs. We don't know that for sure, but he obviously went upstairs. So I'm using logic that he chose to go up there when he didn't have to."

The bereaved father earlier said that the means of the death of the two women don't match. “They don’t match,” he said. “Their points of damage don’t match.”

He added: “I’m just going to say it. It wasn’t leaked to me. I earned that. I paid for that funeral.”

“I sent my daughter to college — she came back in a box,” he said. “I can speak on that.”

His remarks came days after the local police retracted their previous statement about the target being one or two residents of the house. Authorities later clarified that they were unsure if specific individuals or the entire house were targeted.

Mr Goncalves revealed that the investigators have been "tight-lipped" about the probe into the homicide and "keeping everything close to their vest".

He added: "... I understand that, and I'm probably not the right person to share all these things with."

"So, I'm just trusting … that their case is super tight, and they don't really need to reach out to the community, and … all the evidence is right there in that home."