Episode Details

Katherine Ramsland was one of Bryan Kohberger’s professors at DeSales University in Pennsylvania, where he studied psychology and later earned a master’s degree in criminal justice before beginning his doctoral program at Washington State University. Ramsland was particularly notable because her academic specialty was forensic psychology and extreme offenders; she had written extensively about serial killers and had worked directly with Dennis Rader, the BTK killer, on a book about his crimes and psychology. Kohberger took multiple courses with Ramsland, including classes dealing with forensic psychology, death investigations and antisocial or violent behavior. She later described him as an engaged, intense and curious student who appeared genuinely interested in research and a career in criminology, and said that she had not observed obvious warning signs suggesting that he was capable of committing the murders for which he was later convicted.

Their relationship drew enormous attention after Kohberger’s arrest because of the disturbing overlap between the subjects he had studied and the crimes he was accused of committing. Ramsland’s work with BTK fueled speculation that Kohberger might somehow have communicated with Rader through her, but Rader later denied having any contact with Kohberger, and no evidence established such a connection. Ramsland initially declined to discuss her former student publicly while the criminal case was pending, but after Kohberger pleaded guilty in 2025 she said his arrest had initially shocked her because the student she remembered had not presented himself as violent or threatening. She also acknowledged wrestling with the uncomfortable question of whether anything in the material she taught could have influenced him, while emphasizing that studying violent offenders is a legitimate part of forensic education and does not make instructors responsible for what a student later does. Their actual documented relationship was therefore that of professor and student, but Ramsland’s expertise in serial murder and Kohberger’s intense academic interest in criminal behavior made that relationship one of the more unsettling coincidences surrounding his background.


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