The knocking at the front door of the small Idaho Falls home was polite but purposeful, a routine welfare check that would soon unravel into one of the most chilling confessions local law enforcement had ever recorded. When officers arrived on that summer day to ask about missing 33-year-old Kaylin Blue, the man who answered, her boyfriend of five years, Philip Schwab, greeted them calmly, his voice flat, his demeanor eerily detached. Within minutes, their conversation would spiral into a nightmare of buried secrets, bloodstained carpets, and a shallow grave just steps from the back door.
The officers had been called by Kaylin’s friends and coworkers after she failed to show up for work. Calls to her phone went straight to voicemail. Concern turned to panic.
When police arrived at the home she shared with Schwab, body camera footage captured the first moments of the encounter. “Hey, Phil. Yeah.
How are you doing? Good. Good.
Can we come in and talk for a minute?” the officer asked. Schwab agreed, his voice betraying no emotion.
The officers explained they were there to check on Kaylin. “Where is she at?” they asked.
Schwab’s response was disjointed, rambling. “I think I heard her… I don’t remember her… I thought my hand was doing that,” he muttered. The officers quickly realized something was deeply wrong.
As they entered the home, the officers noticed Schwab’s unusual behavior. He appeared confused, his answers nonsensical. When asked when he last saw Kaylin, he said, “Two nights ago, I think.”
But his next words were chilling. “In the garbage can. I’ve looked everywhere.”
The officers pressed further, asking if anyone else was home. “Just my mom,” Schwab said. Then, without prompting, he added, “Kaylin lives in the backyard.”
The officers asked to search the house. Schwab led them downstairs, pointing to a bedroom. “This is her room.
Yeah, our room. All her stuff’s here,” he said. But the officers saw something else—dried blood on the floor.
The body camera footage, later released by Law & Crime, shows the officers growing increasingly suspicious. Schwab’s answers became more erratic. “I think she’s outside,” he said, referencing his shoes having dirt on them.
“I don’t remember.” The officers had already seen Schwab’s Facebook posts from the previous 48 hours, a disturbing string of messages that included “She deserved quicker,” “Yeah, try snitching now,” and “Still smells better than you, B-word.” They knew this was not a simple missing person case.
They had probable cause to search the home and the backyard.
Inside the house, the scene was gruesome. Bloodstains marred the carpet. The officers asked Schwab if he had any weapons.
He mentioned knives in the kitchen. But when they asked about Kaylin’s phone, he said she always took it—except this time, it was left behind. The officers continued to question him, and Schwab’s composure began to crack.
“I think I did it,” he said. “I think I heard her.” The officers asked where Kaylin was.
“She’s in the ground. You buried her. Yeah,” Schwab replied.
“All right. Go and turn around. Put your hands behind your back,” the officer ordered.
Schwab was detained.
The officers then discovered what they had feared: Kaylin’s body was buried in a shallow grave in the backyard. Police later confirmed that she had been stabbed multiple times, with wounds to her neck, head, and torso. Schwab admitted to the crime, claiming it was self-defense during a night of heavy medication and blackouts.
“I probably stabbed her,” he said. “I don’t know which one I used.” He described a struggle that began in the bedroom, where he grabbed a knife from the basement.
“I panicked and didn’t know what else to do,” he told officers. The horror did not end with Kaylin. Police also discovered that Schwab had stabbed the couple’s two dogs to death that same night.
Schwab was charged with first-degree murder. In court, the victim’s brother delivered a searing impact statement, describing how Kaylin, a woman who was terrified of sharp objects—she had never even pierced her ears—was killed in a way that was “beyond horrifying to her.” He recounted sleepless nights, nightmares, and the trauma of seeing his sister’s body.
“Those that don’t care about their own lives don’t have the capacity to care about the life of another,” he said, quoting a wise man.
Schwab’s defense attorney argued that his client was a man with a history of mental health issues and medication misuse, not a cold-blooded killer. “He’s not those type of killers that we see,” the attorney said. “He’s a man who’s been bullied and neglected basically his whole life.”
But the judge was unmoved. “This was a horrific crime that was 𝓈𝒽𝓸𝒸𝓀𝒾𝓃𝑔 in its wantonness,” the judge said. “This one makes no sense.”
He sentenced Schwab to 25 years to life in prison, with eligibility for parole in 2044, when Schwab will be 58 years old.
The case remains a haunting example of how a seemingly routine missing person report can uncover unimaginable darkness. The body camera footage, with its eerie wind chimes and the calm, emotionless voice of a man who had just buried his girlfriend, serves as a stark reminder of the fragility of life and the depths of human depravity. Kaylin Blue, remembered as loving, compassionate, and full of life, deserved far better than the shallow grave in her own backyard.
