While Idaho Slept The Hunt for Answers in the Murders of Four College Students
By J. Reuben Appelman
Publication Date: October 3, 2023
Summary from Goodreads:
The author of the acclaimed true-crime memoir, The Kill Jar, tells the inside story of the “University of Idaho Murders,” offering a memorable, thoughtful dive into our societal fascination with true crime, the media’s seeming blood-frenzy, and the future of homicide investigations, while cultivating an intimate look into the minds and hearts of the victims and their suspected killer alike.
Just after 4:00 am on November 13, 2022, four University of Idaho students were viciously stabbed to death in an off-campus house. The killings would shake the small blue-collar college town of Moscow, Idaho, dominate mainstream news coverage, and become a social media obsession, drawing millions of clicks and views. While a reticent Moscow Police Department, the FBI, and the Idaho State Police searched for the killer, unending conjecture and countless theories blazed online, in chatrooms and platforms from Reddit and YouTube to Facebook and TikTok. For more than a month, the clash of armchair investigators and law enforcement professionals raged, until a suspect — a 28-year-old Ph.D. candidate studying criminology—was arrested at his family home 2,500 miles away in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania on the day before New Year’s Eve.
While Idaho Slept is a thought-provoking, literary chronicle of a small-town murder investigation blistering beneath the unceasing light of international interest, as traditional investigators, citizen sleuths, and the true-crime media acted—sometimes together, often in conflict—to uncover the truth.
As J. Reuben Appelman brings this terrible crime into focus, he humanizes the four victims, examining the richness of their lives, dissects the mind and motivations of their presumed killer, and explores the world of northern Idaho, a rugged, deeply conservative stronghold steeped in Christian values and American patriotism. Going deep inside the case, Appelman addresses a crucial question: With so many millions of citizens armed by access and hungry to take part in a true crime hunt of their own, has the nature of homicide investigations permanently changed?
Rising above the sensational, While Idaho Slept illuminates the intrinsic connection between today’s media, citizen sleuths, our societal mania for murder tales, and an impatient public’s insatiable appetite for spectacle as never before. Running beneath, the pulse of the story is a heartbreaking narrative of the people we love, the dreams we all share, and the uncertain time left for sharing them.
Confession:
There is always a sense of voyeurism and horror when reading a true crime book, and this was especially so with this one. This is a very recent crime, 2022, and the suspect has yet to go to trial. I was a bit surprised that this was even published at this point because there is no closure to this crime yet. There were also no new revelations about what happened that night, most of what is reported in this book, is fairly common knowledge. But what this author did was give us more of a sense of who the victims were and how their families were affected by the events on that cold November night.
Living so close to Idaho, combined with the fact that one of the victims grew up locally, this crime was very much in the local news. Probably more so than elsewhere in the country. But it was the fact that all of the information was down in one place that drew me to this book. I now feel like I have a better understanding of what happened and who the victims were. That is what I was looking for most from this book.
The account of how the police tracked down their suspect was also very interesting. They mostly withheld a lot of information from the public, with good reason. This book also goes into how social media played into the aftermath of this horrific crime. Some of that was fueled by one of the parents, who just wanted answers that the police weren’t providing. But I totally understand the investigators need to keep things close, otherwise the suspect could have gotten away.
The writing of this story wasn’t the best. There were somethings that were repeated often, and there were many awkward sentences. But the author’s goal of keeping the victims memories alive and the impact of their deaths to family and friends was achieved. He also did a nice job of portraying Moscow, Idaho. It is very much a small university town that supports and embraces the students every year. The impact of these murders was felt by everyone who lived there.
The case against the suspect is still awaiting trial. It was recently moved to a new venue, the city of Boise, because the defence team felt that he could not get a fair trial in Moscow. This is probably true. I’m not sure he can get a fair trial in Boise either, but there is a greater jury pool to draw from. Whatever happens at the trial, when it finally happens, I hope that it brings some closure to the victim’s families and friends.
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