The University of Idaho student massacre survivor who encountered a masked man believed to be Bryan Kohberger is urging a Latah County judge to temporarily halt an order allowing the release of video and photographs that may reveal her face. In a firsthand affidavit, she described how the trauma has continued to disrupt her life.
“I worry that even appearing in the background of someone’s photo could lead to more people recognizing me or identifying where I am,” Dylan Mortensen wrote in an affidavit submitted to Judge Megan Marshall. She is asking the judge to reconsider the order.
Mortensen said she now uses an alias for delivery orders, at work and even when introducing herself to people she has just met.
Dylan Mortensen receives a hug after speaking during Bryan Kohberger’s sentencing hearing at the Ada County Courthouse on Wednesday, July 23, 2025, in Boise, Idaho. (Kyle Green/AP via Pool)
“Since November 2022, my family and I have had to move nine times in an effort to protect our privacy and safety,” she wrote. “Reporters and strangers investigating the case on their own have shown up outside our homes, followed family members and invaded our privacy in ways that have made it difficult to feel safe.”
Mortensen was among the first people to speak with police after officers arrived at 1122 King Road in Moscow on Nov. 13, 2022.
She told investigators that she saw a masked man inside the home after the murders, which occurred shortly after 4 a.m. She also texted another surviving roommate about what she had seen but did not call 911.
Police were not contacted until about noon, after Mortensen and the other surviving roommate, Bethany Funke, reached out to friends who came to the house. One of those friends discovered the bodies of roommate Xana Kernodle, 20, and her boyfriend, Ethan Chapin, also 20.
“Along with losing four of my friends and experiencing something incredibly traumatic, I have spent nearly four years dealing with public attention, harassment, threats and constant speculation about my involvement in what happened. People who have never met me have formed opinions about my character, questioned my actions and accused me of things I had absolutely nothing to do with.”
Responding officers also found 21-year-olds Madison Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves dead on the home’s top floor.
Surviving roommate Dylan Mortensen, shown at center with her face blurred, and other University of Idaho students wait to speak with police outside the 1122 King Road crime scene on Nov. 13, 2022. (Moscow Police Department)
“Along with losing four of my friends and experiencing something incredibly traumatic, I have spent nearly four years dealing with public attention, harassment, threats and constant speculation about my involvement in what happened,” Mortensen wrote. “People who have never met me have formed opinions about my character, questioned my actions and accused me of things I had absolutely nothing to do with.”
She later added, “It is difficult to feel completely comfortable in public when I am constantly considering whether someone knows who I am and what they might believe about me.”
According to her attorney, the remaining protection Mortensen has is the blurring of her face in redacted police videos and photographs. Releasing unblurred versions, the attorney argued, would amount to an “unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.”
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Mortensen’s attorney, Robyn McPherson, filed a motion to intervene last week after Marshall approved the release of previously withheld records sought from independent media company EWU Media LLC. McPherson is also asking the judge to reconsider the Oct. 20 order and stay its enforcement while the petition and any appeals are resolved.
The motion asks Marshall to require Moscow authorities to identify the withheld records, submit them for a private “in-camera” review and create a detailed index. McPherson argued that Mortensen cannot fully assert her privacy rights without knowing what the records contain.
She said Moscow’s city attorney told her the files were expected to include interviews, photographs and videos of Mortensen.
EWU submitted a public records request on Aug. 28, 2025, but the request was at least partially denied. The company then asked the court to order the city to release the records, and Marshall agreed to do so last month.
In a separate court filing, McPherson said she filed the motion days after learning that Moscow’s city attorney did not intend to challenge the ruling.
“D.M. seeks reconsideration of the October 20 order only on the issue of whether disclosure of the records withheld by the City [of Moscow] would constitute ‘an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy,’” McPherson wrote.
Madison Mogen, top left, smiles while sitting 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)
McPherson also contended that city attorneys did not provide the disputed files to the judge before Marshall issued her decision.
She is asking that Mortensen be allowed to join the case so she can seek a stay of the release of additional images and challenge Marshall’s order. McPherson said neither Moscow officials nor the other intervenors — including the families of Chapin and Madison Mogen — share her client’s specific privacy concerns.
Kohberger pleaded guilty in July 2025 and later tried to withdraw his plea earlier this year. The case remains before a different judge.
Bryan Kohberger appears at the Ada County Courthouse for his sentencing hearing on Wednesday, July 23, 2025, in Boise, Idaho. (AP Photo/Kyle Green, Pool)
Marshall, the original magistrate judge who oversaw Kohberger’s case before his arraignment in May 2023, approved the additional release of public records on Oct. 20.
A hearing on the records dispute is scheduled for Nov. 12.
Kohberger is scheduled to return to court on Dec. 10 for a hearing on his petition for post-conviction relief.
