Roommate of 4 students killed in Idaho says harassment forced her to move repeatedly

One of the roommates of the four University of Idaho students killed in their home in 2022 says she’s endured years of harassment, threats and unfounded accusations and wants to ensure her face is blurred in an upcoming release of investigative video recordings, according to court documents.

Dylan Mortensen, who told police she saw a strange man with bushy eyebrows and a ski mask in the home the night her roommates were killed, detailed the impacts the case has had on her in a court filing in Latah County, saying her life “has changed in ways I never could have imagined.”

Mortensen said in an Oct. 29 affidavit that the “amount of attention and hostility” that she’s received has “affected nearly every aspect” of her life. She said that has forced her and her family to move nine times while enduring “years of hateful messages and threats.”

Bryan Kohberger was sentenced to life in prison last year after pleading guilty in the Nov. 13, 2022, stabbing deaths that scarred the close-knit community of Moscow, Idaho. He’s currently trying to withdraw that plea.

No motive has emerged for the killings, nor is it clear why Mortensen and another roommate were spared.

Judge Megan Marshall last month ordered the release of records after EWU Media, a company that produces crime documentaries, sued the city of Moscow for them. In Mortensen’s affidavit in support of her motion to intervene in the case, she asks Marshall to help ensure her face is blurred in any police interviews, body-camera footage and other investigative recordings that will be released.

She said people can hear her statements to law enforcement through recordings that have already been released.

“I am already being recognized despite the privacy protections currently in place, and I worry that making additional footage of my face available would make it even easier for strangers to identify me in everyday situations,” Mortensen wrote.

Marshall wrote in an Oct. 20 decision that the city didn’t demonstrate that specific records were properly withheld and ordered the city to disclose them, absent any applicable exemption under the Idaho Public Records Act. Marshall said the act doesn’t broadly exempt the identity of witnesses in an investigation.

The Associated Press reached out to the city, via email and phone, Tuesday for comment. The AP also emailed EWU Media and Mortensen’s attorney requesting comment.

A motion hearing is set for next week.

Mortensen said she’s received “numerous unsolicited messages from strangers accusing me of participating in my friends’ murders, blaming me for their deaths, and making cruel statements about what they believe should happen to me.”

Mortensen said in the affidavit that she used an alias at her job and often introduces herself using a different name. She said she doesn’t use her real name for package deliveries because she doesn’t want people to know where she lives.

She said that while she knows that there are already photographs and videos online of her and that her identity is publicly known, she believes “there is a significant difference between the photos and videos people have already seen of me and the lengthy police interviews and body-camera recordings taken during one of the most traumatic and vulnerable periods of my life.”

Mortensen said that not only could the release of the “extended footage” of how she talks, reacts and expresses herself make her more recognizable, but that she also does not want her facial expressions used as fodder for people to analyze, criticize or make accusations.

“I want to be able to work, meet new people, attend concerts, celebrate important moments with friends, and enjoy ordinary experiences without constantly worrying about being recognized or confronted,” she wrote.