One of two Idaho students who survived the massacre in their shared home is emerging from self-imposed isolation, new photos show, a year after the attack.
Dylan Mortensen, 21, is plagued by “survivor guilt,” her stepmother said earlier this month. Her father said in October that she had become withdrawn, staying home and playing video games.
But newly surfaced photos show her at a sorority initiation on September 15 with her friends from the University of Idaho, and at a Halloween party on October 31, wearing a gold, sparkly outfit.
Mortensen’s stepmother, Patricia Munroe, said earlier this month that she had dropped out of the University of Idaho and changed schools, so it was not clear if she was visiting again or if Munroe’s information was incorrect.
Dylan Mortensen, far left, is seen at a sorority initiation – known as the Big Little Reveal – with her University of Idaho friends Jessa Patnode (center) and Makenah Jackson, in an Instagram photo posted on September 15.
Mortensen and her friends all shared photos in honor of the September 15 dedication ceremony
Mortensen and Jackson can be seen at the September 15 meeting
Dylan Mortensen (left) partying with a friend on Halloween 2023
Mortensen and her friends celebrate on October 31
Mortensen, second from left, is pictured with her friends celebrating Halloween
Mortensen (right) is seen in a photo with her sorority sisters, taken a month before the murders, on October 13, 2022
The Idaho housemates, from left: Dylan Mortensen, Xana Kernodle, Bethany Funke, Kaylee Goncalves and Madison Mogen. Only Mortensen and Funke survived the attack
Mortensen has seen her life turned upside down since the November 2022 murders of her four roommates – Madison Mogen, 21; Kaylee Goncalves, 21; Xana Kernodle, 20; and her boyfriend, Ethan Chapin, 20.
The four were stabbed to death in their beds early on Sunday morning.
Mortensen said she saw a man leave the house MoscowIdaho, in the wee hours, but only realized hours later that four of her housemates had been murdered.
Bryan Kohberger, a 28-year-old criminology student, has been charged with four counts of murder and has pleaded not guilty. He remains in jail without a trial date set.
Mortensen left Moscow earlier this year, said Munroe, Mortensen’s stepmother.
Dylan Mortensen is one of two who survived the Nov. 13, 2022, slayings at the Idaho sorority house
Mortensen, far left, is seen with her roommates: Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen (on Kaylee’s shoulders) Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle and Bethany Funke
Munroe was married to Mortensen’s father Brent and helped raise Dylan from the age of seven until almost her high school graduation.
She told The New York Post that she remained close to the family, and that Mortensen was “okay.”
Munroe, 53, said: “There’s a lot of guilt because if someone says, ‘Oh, well, Dylan was so lucky,’ you know, you don’t want to take that luck on yourself – because all the kids deserved happiness.
“They all deserved to be spared from that.”
Mortensen told police she was in “frozen shock” when “a figure dressed in black clothing and a mask walked up to her,” then “to the sliding glass door in the back” and left the house.
She then locked herself in her room and did not come out until the next morning.
Mortensen and Bethany Funke, the other roommate who survived the attacks, did not call the police until noon the next day, prompting online trolls to attack Mortensen and Funke and claim they were involved in the murders.
Bryan Kohberger, who is accused of killing four University of Idaho students in November 2022, is pictured in Latah County District Court on September 13
“You never really think about online comments and trolls until you interact with them, and it’s just really hurtful,” Munroe said.
“I challenge anyone to be in a position where they wake up with four of their roommates gone and, you know, not even realize it.
‘People have to understand that these children are still very young. . . You know, they’re just young kids, and it’s just very traumatizing. I just think people need compassion.
‘There must be space and time to reveal all the details during the trial.’
Mortensen’s father Brent told author and private investigator J. Reuben Appelman that she isolated herself and played video games to cope with the stress.
Appelman told NewsNation, “In the first weeks after those murders, she was essentially hounded on social media.
“This was part of the trauma she experienced.
‘Dylan himself has withdrawn from the public eye, very few people see her.’
Mortensen keeps to herself, her father said, and has switched colleges
Mortensen’s father told Appelman that his daughter is healing despite being hunted by bullies.
“She’s doing some kind of trauma therapy, she’s getting help from the spiritual community,” he said.
‘She is isolating herself, but is stepping out little by little, she is gaming online with peers in a group gaming session.
“She does what she can without going public.”