Idaho Murder Case: Ethan Chapin’s Mom Tearfully Shares How She Finds Comfort After His Death

Stacy Chapin knows her late son Ethan Chapin isn't alone. 

A year and a half after the 20-year-old, his girlfriend Xana Kernodle, 20, and their fellow University of Idaho students Madison Mogen, 21, and Kaylee Goncalves, 21, were murdered while sleeping at a Moscow, Idaho, house, Stacy likes to think that wherever Ethan is today, he's with someone who loved him. 

"I'm not sure where he is," she told Tay and Taylor Lautner during her appearance on the June 5 episode of The Squeeze podcast. "He's up in Heaven somewhere, he's happy. We're glad Xana is with him."

"We were fortunate to spend a summer with Xana," Stacy continued, while noting the family has made it a policy not to speak of the other students publicly—much as they wouldn't want others to speak about Ethan—though she did add, "She was beautiful. Whatever makes you comfortable in the process, so the fact that they're together, that's wonderful."

Stacy—who is also mom to surviving triplets Maizie and Hunter—went on to explain how she and her husband Jim recently learned they'd each separately found the same way of honoring Ethan.

"Jim and I were talking the other day and I didn't realize that we were doing the same thing," she said. "But he drives a half hour to to the warehouse where I know our work is. And it's funny, because we were just the other night we were like, 'That 30 minutes that it takes us to drive to town is 30 minutes that we just try to to give to Ethan."

She continued, "You play his favorite song, you just go there. You don't want to forget. Just give him a half hour every day."

And while Stacy admitted there are a few songs that are "hard to get through," she added, "I don't ever want to forget he was such a huge part of our life, but it dims a little bit and that scares me. I don't ever want his light to go out. So you look for little things to try to make you feel better."

In 2022, Bryan Kohberger, 29, was charged with four counts of first-degree murder and one count of felony burglary for the deaths of the four University of Idaho students—to which he has pleaded not guilty. After waiving his right to a speedy trial in August, his trial has not been given a start date.

But as Bryan's case plays out, Stacy and her family have directed their energy to honoring Ethan's memory, and one way they have chosen to do so is in the children's book written by Stacy, The Boy Who Wore Blue. 

Titled in honor of the color Ethan wore most as a child, Stacy was inspired to write the story after learning a book was being written about the murders. 

"I'm the one who raised him and it just sparked something in me," she told Jenna Bush Hager in June 2023. "It just came to me in the middle of the night. It's the best I can do for him."

The family also created a foundation—Ethan's Smile—which gives scholarships to local students to attend the University of Idaho. 

"What we find more interesting is how many lives he touched that we didn't even know existed," Stacy explained of her son's legacy. "It's incredible. I tell people if I touch as many lives in my lifetime as he did in twenty years. He just swarmed every room. He had a wonderful smile."