It happened to serial killer Ted Bundy and family murderer Chris Watts.
Now Bryan Kohberger, the man accused of stabbing to death four University of Idaho students, is also allegedly attracting attention from female love interests.
That’s according to TMZ, which reports that at least one woman has expressed a disturbing affection for Kohberger on social media.
A Facebook account identified by the news outlet contains numerous posts exclaiming love for Kohberger, whom the posts describe as a “perfect man,” TMZ reports. The user said they even affixed hearts and lip stickers to his mugshot.
“My love interest . . . is named Bryan and is accused of murder, and I just wish to connect with him above anyone else,” one of the posts reads, according to TMZ.
“One way to describe my feelings for him over the last week or so . . . is kind of like being lovesick,” another post reads, TMZ reports.
Posts on the Facebook account describe the user as a 35-year-old Kentucky woman who has a 16-year-old son. Crime Online has not independently verified whether the posts are genuine or were actually written by the person whose name is used in the account. There appears to be another Facebook account using the same name and similar photos of the user but without their middle initial.
The user claims to have written letters and sent photos of herself to Kohberger at the Latah County Jail in Idaho. Latah County Sheriff’s Capt. Shane Anderson declined to confirm to the New York Post whether Kohberger had received letters from the user, and the user did not respond to multiple inquiries from the Post, according to the news outlet.
However, if the posts are genuine, the phenomenon could be what’s known as hybristophilia, a “sexual interest in and attraction to those who commit crimes,” according to the American Psychological Association.
According to TMZ, the posts began appearing shortly after police arrested Kohberger in connection with the slayings.
In one of the posts, the woman said that she and Kohberger are both Scorpios and that their birth charts are similar, which she said means Kohberger is her “divine masculine counterpart,” according to TMZ.
“With me being deprived of a love and sex life for so long, and only wanting one with someone I truly want wholeheartedly, with my feelings for Bryan I’ve had to be true to myself in reaching out to him,” the woman allegedly wrote, the Daily Mail reports.
“Thoughts of being with him also give me sensations that I wouldn’t get when thinking of someone else, because I have deep feelings for Bryan and am fixated on him although I don’t know how he feels about me and if there’s someone else he wants instead, even though that wouldn’t be ideal for my divine masculine counterpart to be that way.
“Although when I have thoughts of being with him in certain ways it gives me bodily sensations that are real, although you may not understand what I’m meaning, I also feel a love for him that isn’t just sexual in nature.”
The woman also referenced a love scene in the 1987 vampire movie “The Lost Boys,” according to TMZ. She allegedly wrote: “Although it’s not very explicit, I’d want to be with my love interest Bryan in those ways.”
Kohberger faces four counts of first-degree murder and one count of felony burglary in connection with the deaths of Kaylee Goncalves, Maddie Mogen, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin, who were found stabbed to death inside an off-campus residence on November 13 in Moscow, Idaho.
Authorities arrested Kohberger on December 30 at his parents’ home in Pennsylvania, more than 2,000 miles away from the crime scene.
At the time of the killings, Kohberger was a first-year Ph.D. student at Washington State University in Pullman, Washington, in the school’s Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology. Pullman is located about 9 miles across the Washington-Idaho border from Moscow.
Kohberger is scheduled to appear in court for a preliminary hearing on June 26.
Listen to a previous “Crime Stories with Nancy Grace” episode on the case below:
[Feature Photo: Bryan Kohberger, who is accused of killing four University of Idaho students, is escorted to an extradition hearing at the Monroe County Courthouse in Stroudsburg, Pa., Tuesday, Jan. 3, 2023. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, Pool)]
