Decades ago, University of Idaho President C. Scott Green’s family owned the property at 1122 King Road in Moscow, where this week the house in which four students were stabbed to death was demolished.

Jodi Walker, a spokesperson for the university, told the Idaho Statesman by email that Green’s father owned and sold several properties in Moscow in the late 1960s and early 1970s — including the King Road parcel. Walker said it was sold 50 years ago, in 1973.

“President Green has no memory of the house and did not grow up there,” Walker said.

Spokane-based station KXLY first reported Green’s connection to the site.

Former Washington State University graduate student Bryan Kohberger is accused of killing Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle, Madison Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves in the off-campus home. Kohberger was arrested Dec. 30, 2022, and faces four counts of first-degree murder in the November 2022 stabbings.

The news about the Green family’s connection came just a day after the six-bedroom rental home was torn down, despite pushback from at least two of the victims’ families, the Statesman reported.

“We all along have just wanted the King Road home to not be demolished until after the trial and for us to have a trial date so that we can look forward to justice being served,” the Goncalves and Kernodle families said in a statement issued by their attorney. “Is that really too much to ask?”

The university planned to demolish the house, which was donated to the school, in August before the fall semester started, but that got delayed. University officials announced earlier this month that the home would be demolished Thursday while students were out on winter break.

“It is the grim reminder of the heinous act that took place there,” Green previously said in a news release. “While we appreciate the emotional connection some family members of the victims may have to this house, it is time for its removal and to allow the collective healing of our community to continue.”

In an interview with the Statesman on Thursday, Green again acknowledged the families’ concerns but said the university has been in communication with the prosecution and defense to make sure demolishing the home wouldn’t affect the criminal case.

“We didn’t, of course, want to do anything that would endanger the court case, so we made sure we were very careful,” Green said. “So the mood of our community and the essential healing that has to happen here together with doing no harm to the case, this just made sense to us at this time.”

Reporter Kevin Fixler contributed.