Who Called 911 in The Idaho Murders: College Nightmare ? The “Unconscious Person” Report Explained

Bethany Funke, then a University of Idaho student and surviving roommate at the Moscow, Idaho, house, initiated the 911 call at 11:56 a.m. on November 13, 2022, using her phone. She was not the only person who spoke. The phone moved among Bethany, Dylan Mortensen, then a fellow student and surviving roommate, Hunter Johnson, a close friend of Xana and Ethan, and an unidentified female speaker. The “unconscious person” report began because the group described Xana Kernodle, a University of Idaho student and housemate, as passed out and not waking up. Hunter then gave the dispatcher the crucial update: Xana was not breathing. Episode 1 turns that confused medical call into the instant police recognize 1122 King Road as a homicide scene.

The following discusses the 911 call, the discovery of the victims, and Episode 1 of The Idaho Murders: College Nightmare. It contains distressing details and documentary spoilers.

Who called 911 after the Idaho murders?

Bethany Funke placed and initiated the 911 call from her own phone at 11:56 a.m. The official court order is unusually clear on this point: Bethany spoke first and tried to give the dispatcher the King Road address.

Her opening words capture how little the group understood at that moment: “Something’s happened in our house and we don’t know what.” Bethany could not continue through the address exchange, so another woman took the phone and supplied the location and Bethany’s number.

Confusion persists because Bethany did not remain the only speaker. The phone was passed among four people, and the dispatcher eventually asked the group to stop handing it around. For once, the dry court record settles what loose retellings have blurred: Bethany started the call, while several people helped finish it.

Why did the 911 caller report an “unconscious person” instead of a murder?

The group reported an unconscious person because those outside the house were working from incomplete information and initially described Xana as passed out and unable to wake. The unidentified female speaker told dispatch that a roommate had been drinking the previous night and was not responding.

That wording was not a police finding, and it did not mean the callers knew four people had been killed. It was simply the first condition reported to emergency services. Netflix’s account says officers initially believed they might be responding to alcohol poisoning, which fits the limited information dispatch had received.

My read is that “passed out” was the least catastrophic explanation anyone could reach for in those minutes. Emily Alandt, a friend of Xana and Ethan who came to the house that morning, later explained that the mind can resist accepting something unimaginably terrible when nothing like it has happened before. That does not answer every question about the morning, but it makes the language on the call far less mysterious.

Who was the “unconscious person” mentioned during the 911 call?

The “unconscious person” was Xana Kernodle, the 20-year-old University of Idaho student who lived at 1122 King Road. Court filings state that Hunter found Xana unresponsive and instructed Bethany and Dylan to call 911.

The call did not begin with a report about all four victims because the people speaking had not given dispatch a complete account of the house. Emily said Hunter tried to keep the others from seeing what he had found, which explains why he carried information the women around him did not yet have.

Once officers entered, the situation changed immediately. Police footage used in the documentary follows the discovery of Xana and Ethan Chapin, her 20-year-old boyfriend and fellow University of Idaho student, before officers find their housemates Madison “Maddie” Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves upstairs. What began as a medical response became a quadruple homicide investigation within minutes.

Why was the phone passed between four people?

The phone was passed around because each person held a different part of the emergency, while Bethany and Dylan were audibly distressed. Bethany opened the call. The female friend gave the address and described the roommate who would not wake. Dylan tried to explain the frightening events from around 4 a.m. (She had seen a masked man leaving the house.) Hunter could answer the dispatcher’s immediate medical question.

The episode does not smooth that disorder into a neat exchange. The repeated handoffs make the call harder to follow, but they also reveal a group trying to assemble one coherent account while the emergency is unfolding. This seems chaotic because it was chaotic.

The call changes when the dispatcher asks whether Xana is breathing. Hunter’s answer is simply, No. An ambulance and law enforcement were already being sent, but that answer changes the reported condition from an unresponsive roommate to a person who is unconscious and not breathing.

Did Hunter Johnson make the Idaho murders 911 call?

Hunter Johnson did not initiate the 911 call, but he prompted it and provided its most urgent medical information. The court record says he found Xana unresponsive, told Bethany and Dylan to call 911, and then took the phone after the call was connected.

Hunter came to the house with Emily after Dylan asked for help checking on the roommates. He went farther into the house, directed the others outside, and told them to contact emergency services. When dispatch asked whether Xana was breathing, Hunter answered no and passed the phone back.

That is why some accounts identify Hunter as the caller. In ordinary conversation, caller can mean the person who supplied the decisive details. Technically and chronologically, however, Bethany made the call and Hunter became one of its four speakers.

Why did the surviving roommates wait nearly eight hours to call 911?

The documentary presents the delay as the result of fear, exhaustion, confusion, and trauma, not as proof that the surviving roommates knew four murders had occurred. Shortly after 4:20 a.m., Dylan and Bethany called or messaged the other roommates, received no answers, exchanged frightened texts, and eventually gathered in Bethany’s room.

The messages show panic rather than calm certainty. Dylan wrote that she was confused and frightened; Bethany urged her to come downstairs and told her to run. The court later noted that the circumstances were potentially terrifying and that trauma and confusion could have disrupted logical decision making.

It is easy to rebuild the night afterward and imagine one clean, rational response. The people inside the house did not have the finished timeline viewers now possess. They had noises, unanswered calls, a masked stranger, exhaustion, and no confirmed understanding of what had happened. Kristi Goncalves, Kaylee’s mother, also says she asked the coroner whether an earlier call could have saved the victims and was told it would not have changed the outcome.

How does Episode 1 of The Idaho Murders: College Nightmare end?

Episode 1 ends by shifting attention from the 911 call and crime scene toward Jack DuCoeur, Kaylee Goncalves’ former boyfriend and a fellow University of Idaho student. The documentary recounts the late-night calls placed to him from Kaylee’s and Maddie’s phones, then frames Jack as an early investigative question, even though Moscow police later cleared him.

It is an effective true crime cliffhanger, but it is also a rough editorial choice. Viewers who know the case understand that the suspicion will not hold, while newcomers are asked to carry an implication that the next episode must correct.

The call at the start of 1122 King Road is full of young people struggling to name what has happened. The ending repeats that uncertainty on a wider scale, with investigators and families looking for a name before the evidence is ready to provide one. Episode 1 closes there, leaving an innocent grieving young man under a cloud while four families are only beginning to absorb an irreversible loss.