A motive for the murder of four Idaho students? Read Dostoevsky or the Loeb/Leopold case

All the details from the recent Idaho student murders haven’t come out yet but it appears very possible, based on DNA findings and other findings, that the culprit is a student, Brian Kohberger. What officials lack, at present, is a motive, any connection between the young man and the four victims.

But what if the motive is simply that the victims were available at the time and place that the killer wanted to commit a murder? What if he possessed an urgent need to show off his intellect and know-how and that trumped the humanity of his victims and justified to him this horrible crime.

His guilt has not been proven but murders of this type have happened before — in both fiction and fact.

In Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevsky’s best-known novel, the protagonist Raskolnikov is also a student. Raskolnikov plans the killing of an old woman who hides valuables in her decrepit flat. He justifies her murder as the means for him to free himself from poverty and do great deeds. He initially believes he’s an extraordinary person and it’s permissible for extraordinary men to do odious things — like killing someone — for what they perceive is the greater good. For Raskolnikov, however it doesn’t work out. Once he’s murdered the landlady, he’s tortured by his crime and filled with paranoia and dread. Finally he admits his guilt goes to jail, relieved that he’s taking responsibility for his actions.

Another Dostoevsky novel, possibly his greatest — The Brothers Karamazov also features a murder — in this case it’s patricide. The father was an atrocious, womanizing drunk. His three legitimate sons: Demitri, Ivan and Alyosha each have a motive. Alyosha, however, is practically a saint so no one really suspects him. Meanwhile Ivan was nowhere near the scene of the crime which rules him out. So the eldest, Demitri who’s most like his father in his unbridled erratic, emotional behavior, is the prime suspect.

Yet there’s another son, Smernikov who figures in the plot. Smernikov is illegitimate — possibly the offspring of a rape between the father and a servant girl. He still acts as a servant to the father and is the one who has access to the murdered man (though he claims he was unconscious at the time). Yet even when the proof of his guild is evident, he doesn’t believe he’s responsible for the killing. In his mind, he was only obeying the (unspoken) directives of Ivan. Ivan is a brainy intellectual who eschews both emotions and religion — like a forerunner of today’s computer nerds — Ivan believes in an entirely material world — life can be analyzed and dissected and humans can operate effectively without morality.

What has this got to do with the accused Brian Kohberger? He’s a very bright student of forensics, in particular the collection of data or information from a crime scene. He might believe he is a superior being. The crime might, in his view, be an elaborate ruse to show how simple it is to stump the authorities. Also, by thinking of himself as a superior person, he might imagine he can operate above good and evil.

That’s where the infamous Loeb/Leopold murder of the 1920’s comes into play. In this famous case, two handsome, intelligent, wealthy young men murdered a boy they knew just to prove they could carry out a perfect crime. Demonstrating their so-called superiority (gleaned from Nietzasche’s concept of the uber-mensch or super-man) was their only motive. The boy just happened to be a convenient victim — they had no other reason to kill him; he was the hapless target of their diabolical, ruthless plot. The two were caught, convicted and due to the amazing skills of their attorney, Clarence Darrow, sentenced to life in prison rather than the death penalty.

Beflore long we may learn of the guilt or innocence of Brian Kohberger. He claims he’s innocent. And, I think, he probably believes he is. Smernikov also never took responsibility for the death of his father/employer because he believed he was obeying a higher order of commandments, a set of amoral precepts. He chooses suicide rather than admit his wrong-doing.

No one at present knows \the fate of Brian Kohberger and I hesitate to jump to conclusions — but I fear his story may be prove as tragic as those we read about in novels or old newspapers. ##