Stacy Chapin Shares Tribute After Skipping Bryan Kohberger's Sentencing

In the wake of one of the country's deadliest tragedies to hit a college campus in recent years, Stacy Chapin is speaking out for the first time since her son's killer was sentenced. While she and her family decided not to attend the July 23 hearing in which Bryan Kohberger was sentenced to life for the University of Idaho murders, Stacy is now speaking out on how it feels having missed such a pivotal moment, and ET has an exclusive supertease.

Ethan was among four students, the others were Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, and Xana Kernodle, who were slain in a brutal attack in November. From the beginning, Claus's parents decided to conserve their emotional energy by staying out of the courtroom. At the time, Stacy was very blunt about why she felt going would be "energy that doesn't feel like it's well spent," as she told reporters.

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Now that the trial is behind them and justice has been done, though, Stacy has posted an Instagram reflection about their long road. "We've given a lot of thought to what we should say since 7/23 and have edited this a million times," she wrote on July 31. "The entire situation has been a tough pill to swallow but at the end of the day, we believe the outcome is the right one." But it was her personal address to Ethan that reduced many of those inside to tears. In her eulogy, Stacy wept love that only a mother can bear, even death cannot end. She did not remember Ethan as the boy who died, but for how he had lived with joy and kindness in an "unshakable light."

For Stacy, speaking up was about reclaiming her son's legacy. In choosing not to attend the sentencing, she opted for peace over pain and now, in her words, has chosen remembrance over rage. This public message is part reading of the final chapter in a terrible ordeal, and partly a eulogy to a son who will forever be loved. The world is reminded, in the quiet strength of a grieving mother, that Ethan Chapin's story remains filled with love.