Shakeup hits Bryan Kohberger’s defense after judge rules to keep DNA for Idaho murder trial
The defense team for Moscow college student homicides suspect Bryan Kohberger is undergoing a shakeup. Jay Logsdon, North Idaho’s state public defender and co-counsel for Kohberger’s defense, will be replaced for his capital murder trial, a Thursday court order said. Taking Logsdon’s spot is a Northern California attorney who specializes in DNA and previously testified as a paid consultant for the defense in the case.
Bicka Barlow, formerly of the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office, joins the trio of lawyers defending Kohberger. Since 2013, she has run a private law office with a focus on cases that involve forensic DNA evidence, according to her website.
No reason was listed for the attorney substitution in the high-profile case. Patrick Orr, spokesperson for the Idaho State Public Defender’s Office, where Logsdon is employed, declined to comment to the Idaho Statesman on the move, citing the standing gag order in the Kohberger case.
The timing of the attorney swap, about five months ahead of trial, doesn’t come as a shock, Joshua Ritter, a criminal defense attorney in Los Angeles and host of true crime podcast “Courtroom Confidential,” told the Statesman. Instead, the action represented the defense “fine-tuning who will be the in-court attorneys,” he said.
“To me, it’s a swift battle strategy change,” Ritter said by phone. “They realized this front of get the DNA kicked out from a legal standpoint has now been foreclosed, and now it’s time to pivot and focus on trial. And, in doing so, they needed to reorganize their trial team.”
“The heart of the prosecution is also the antithesis of the defense,” she said by phone, “and that’s, ‘How do you explain that his DNA was there on this knife sheath?’ ” she said in a phone interview with the Statesman. “So absolutely, bringing in somebody to defend against this critical piece of evidence makes sense.”
Kohberger’s attorneys have their work cut out for them now that Hippler ruled that the knife sheath DNA said to be the defendant’s will be included at trial, he said. But with her inclusion, Barlow can be expected to lead arguments about the case’s key piece of evidence to convince jurors that the crime scene DNA may not be what it appears, as Simpson’s defense succeeded in doing, Ritter said.
