MOSCOW, ID (AP) – Attorneys for the man charged in the 2022 stabbing deaths of four University of Idaho students have asked a judge to move the trial to a larger city, citing widespread media coverage of the case.

Bryan Kohberger’s defense team says strong emotions in the close-knit community and constant news coverage will make it impossible to find an impartial jury in Moscow, ID.

They want the trial, set for June 2025, to be moved from Moscow to Boise or another large city.

Kohberger, a former criminal justice student at WSU, faces four counts of murder in the deaths of Ethan Chapin of Skagit County and three Idaho women.

The students were killed on Nov. 13, 2022, in a rental house near the campus.

The killings prompted widespread media coverage, much of which Kohberger’s defense team says was inflammatory and left the community strongly biased against their client.

The president of media tracking company Truescope testified on Thursday, Aug. 29, saying that coverage of the case has been more saturated near Moscow than it has been in other parts of the state.

The media coverage of the investigation into the killings was not limited to local and national news outlets.

True crime-style television shows, books, podcasts and YouTube broadcasts also focused on the case, as have social media groups on sites like Facebook, Reddit and TikTok.