A defense motion to dismiss some of the charges against the man accused in a Pacific Coast Highway crash that killed four Pepperdine University students was the subject of a pre-trial hearing Monday in the closely watched case.
Fraser Bohm was charged with murder and vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence in the 2023 crash in Malibu. The pre-trial hearing in a Van Nuys courtroom will focus on a new defense motion to dismiss the four murder charges against Bohm.
In court Monday, defense attorney Alan Jackson described the April preliminary hearing, a proceeding that usually determines whether there’s enough evidence for a defendant to stand trial, was compromised because, according to Jackson, key pieces of evidence were withheld.
Refresh page for updates on the hearing and details on the defense motion.
In November 2025, a judge refused a defense motion to dismiss the murder charges. That team of attorneys argued that there was insufficient evidence presented to support the murder charges at the preliminary hearing in which another judge found there was enough evidence to allow the case to proceed to trial.
Pepperdine University held a memorial in honor of the four students who were killed in a violent crash in Malibu. Macy Jenkins reports for the NBC4 News on Oct. 22, 2023.
Bohm was 22 at the time of the Oct. 17, 2023 nighttime crash that killed Niamh Rolston, 20; Peyton Stewart, 21; Asha Weir, 21; and Deslyn Williams, 21. All four women were seniors at Pepperdine’s Seaver College of Liberal Arts and members of the Alpha Phi sorority. They were set to graduate with the university’s class of 2024, and subsequently received their degrees posthumously.
Los Angeles County sheriff’s officials said Bohm swerved onto the north shoulder of westbound PCH and slammed into three vehicles parked alongside on the roadway. Those parked vehicles struck the four Pepperdine students, leaving them dead at the scene, according to the sheriff’s department.