January 2, 2026 • 44 mins
True Crime Documentary - Delphi Murders The Case Against Richard Allen
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
That's okay.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Having Joyce Williams getting scared. Now it's getting a cold.
Speaker 3 (00:08):
Liberty rose Lynn.
Speaker 4 (00:10):
German missing abducted.
Speaker 5 (00:12):
We don't know for sure.
Speaker 6 (00:15):
At the high Bridge in Delphi, Indiana.
Speaker 7 (00:18):
Delphi is just not one of those places where any
of us ever thought that something like.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
This would happen.
Speaker 5 (00:29):
Despite that video, despite that audio, nothing happens seemingly for
six years.
Speaker 8 (00:35):
That just did find probable cause for arrest of Richard Allen.
He's been charged with two counts of murder for the
murder of Abba Williams and Liberty German.
Speaker 9 (00:44):
Richard down murder.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Why would you do it? They got the wrong guy
in no way.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
There are other people who were looked at for this.
Speaker 10 (00:55):
Yeah, it's some sort of a religious sect slash holder
that follow od.
Speaker 11 (01:06):
I believe they sacrificed a girl and killed another one, and.
Speaker 12 (01:11):
Law enforcement insists no one's ever been cleared.
Speaker 13 (01:14):
When can you provide any kind of journalism?
Speaker 5 (01:16):
It's time for you guys to start being journalists. Delphi
(01:46):
is a small town. The downtown is two blocks. It
has a main street literally a main street, old courthouse,
wonderful restaurants called the Stonehouse Girl, which has amazing breakfasts,
and it just has a regular America small town cliche,
(02:08):
almost flavor and field.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Downtown is surrounded by lots of fields, corn and soybean,
and lots of farmland.
Speaker 5 (02:24):
The Historic Trails of Delphi is a popular spot in
town for people to go to. It's a little bit
outside of town. It's just a beautiful place filled with trees.
You could hear nature, you could hear the birds chirping.
It's a very serene place.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
I live pretty close to the trails.
Speaker 7 (02:42):
Dropping your kids off at the trails was just something
that you did.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
It was just what kents did.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
And just off the trail, there's an abandoned railroad bridge,
the Monon high Bridge, sixty three feet above Deer Creek.
Speaker 5 (02:55):
The Monon high Bridge is not that serene. It's this
old rickety bridge, or it was at the time, right
the rail ties are falling apart. It's you know, you
could look down, take a step, a couple steps and
look down and see one hundred foot drop below you.
Speaker 7 (03:12):
I mean, it was a very high bridge. The name
definitely applies. I grew up watching people post on their
Snapchat stories like going to the bridge to like read
a book or things like that, and they'd have their
feet like swinging over the edge. My name is synth
Rossi and I was best friends with Abby and Libby.
(03:35):
I first met Abby when we were in preschool together.
I spent my entire childhood basically at her grandparents' home.
We just loved being little girls and just sitting on
my bed reading magazines, playing with makeup.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
She loved playing dress up. That was one of our
favorite things to do together.
Speaker 7 (04:00):
I first met Libby when we were in classes together
in elementary school. She just had such a spunky personality.
She was constantly saying the funniest things I've ever heard
in my entire life. I've seen this picture a lot.
It was during one of her swim meets. She loved
(04:22):
swimming and how much she was such an active kid.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
She seemed to never run out of energy. She was
constantly going.
Speaker 7 (04:30):
Oh, the picture that I'm often cropped out of. So
this was our solo and ensemble competition with the song
Home on the Range that we could not agree how
to play. And Abby's actually wearing a dress that my
mom had gotten her for Christmas. I'll never forget that day,
February thirteenth.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
It was around two pm.
Speaker 7 (04:54):
I saw the picture of Abby on the bridge on
their Snapchat stories, and I immediately just knew that.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
Something was wrong. Taken by Liberty.
Speaker 7 (05:04):
It should have just been them being kids on a
day off from school, but unfortunately turned.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Into a lot Why.
Speaker 6 (05:13):
Until okay two minute in juveniles Liberty Rose Lynn German,
but being at a high bridge in Delphi, Indiana, A
personally thirteen hundred hours second juno, I would you know
Joyce Williams last name? Where I've braved it up to
twit shirt and a rich shirt with the rich or
(05:36):
under his engine.
Speaker 5 (05:38):
On the afternoon of February thirteenth, twenty seventeen, Abby and
Libby were dropped off at the trails that lead to
the Monon Highbridge. They're supposed to be picked up by
Libby's father at three pm. They never turned up. The
search started around five point thirty.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Well upset, confused, obviously, very de strong, just worried.
Speaker 7 (05:59):
All I want to do is have the girls get.
Speaker 14 (06:00):
Home safe, missing, abducted.
Speaker 5 (06:03):
We don't know for sure.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
There's a cell phone tower, but the pain was last
noted about five or six hours ago.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
I say the phone's now dead.
Speaker 5 (06:10):
Words spread quickly that help was needed, that these girls
needed to be found. Hundreds of people turned out and
searched through the night. Becky Patty, Leeby's grandmother would say
that you could see flashlights everywhere, like stars in the sky,
like fireflies. It was a full town effort.
Speaker 15 (06:27):
Ravin's ditches, trash cans for phones, any sign of the girls.
Speaker 7 (06:34):
I was like, I think one of them just like
fell off the bridge and maybe broke their leg, and
then the other one went down to help them, and
maybe they got hurt.
Speaker 5 (06:42):
All options around the table. Did they run away, did
they go to a party, did they fall off the bridge,
did they get injured? No one had any idea what
had happened to them, but the official search was halted
that night and picked up the next morning.
Speaker 7 (06:56):
The next day, I went to school and it was
just gloomy.
Speaker 5 (07:01):
Hundreds of people showed up searching all over the place.
Hope was high, and then the word came.
Speaker 7 (07:09):
I learned that Abby and Libby had been found. When
I saw everybody in the hallway just crying. No one
said the exact words to me, and we just sat
on our phones and watched the news headlines start to
come in.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
We have found two bodies about a mile east of town.
We are investigating this as a crime scene. We suspect
bout play.
Speaker 5 (07:44):
They didn't identify them as Abby and Libby, but everyone.
Speaker 7 (07:48):
Do I knew it was them.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
I wasn't in a position to hear it.
Speaker 7 (07:54):
I just was truly traumatized, like my body was just
in fight or flight. Didn't know exactly what all foul
play entailed.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
But when my.
Speaker 7 (08:05):
Mom started to tell me someone hurt them and someone
wanted them to die for me, it was so difficult
to process. New stations started showing up to my house.
I couldn't enter my home without someone asking what happened?
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Do you have any information?
Speaker 7 (08:23):
And I'm just trying to process the fact that my
two best friends were just murdered, let alone trying to
balance a media presence at thirteen like it was so terrifying.
Speaker 3 (08:38):
Basically, we have identified the bodies of the two females
that were found out yesterday, Epicgail J. Williams, thirteen of
the Delphi area and Liberty rose Land German, fourteen at
the Delphi Area. Family has been notified. This is considered
a double homicide investigation.
Speaker 7 (09:00):
Yeah, I had known that Abby and Libby were active
on some kind of sites where you could meet new people,
and part of me thought that that might have something
to do with it, that maybe they had met someone online.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
We have nobody in custody at this time.
Speaker 5 (09:25):
The next day, police released a picture of a man
on the bridge. He appears to be wearing a blue coat,
blue pants, and boots. They don't say where this picture
comes from, but they do say that they are looking
for this person and they want to.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Talk to him.
Speaker 7 (09:42):
When I first saw that image, I just wanted to
solve it.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
Immediately.
Speaker 7 (09:48):
I was flipping through every single person I'd ever seen
in my entire life, who might walk like that, who
might appear like that? And the first thing that I
noticed when I saw it was the pockets, that they
were filled, that there was something along like the waste
(10:11):
area into me. I just immediately was like, that's either
a knife set or a gun.
Speaker 5 (10:19):
At this point, no one knows where this picture had
come from, so speculation was rampant. Was he caught on
a trail cap and if they had that image, what
else did they have? This picture had actually come from
Libby's phone. She had captured that image. Not only that,
she had also captured his voice, and.
Speaker 12 (10:42):
For the first time we hear that this man is
the prime suspect in the murders of Abby and Libby.
Speaker 7 (10:49):
Finding out that Libby had recorded him, I felt proud
of her.
Speaker 5 (10:54):
And then in July twenty seventeen, police release a composite sketch.
They say that the man they're looking for. The sketches
between five six and five ten, weighs between one hundred
eighty and two hundred and twenty pounds, and has reddish
brown hair.
Speaker 7 (11:07):
I couldn't think of anyone that I thought looked like that,
But then again, I thought of everyone who looked like that,
Like he just looked like every other guy I'd ever
seen in this town. I couldn't place anyone specific to
(11:27):
the sketch, and that was frustrating.
Speaker 5 (11:32):
Who was this person? Was he a trucker passing through?
Could he have been a drifter? Was he a serial killer?
This is really when the people in town started to
pay attention and start to look around.
Speaker 7 (11:46):
I've done numerous interviews with police officers, FBI investigators, and
they all, I mean, when you get asked, do you
have any answers?
Speaker 2 (11:56):
You just want to have an answer.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
But I didn't and then two years into the investigation,
a whole new direction.
Speaker 15 (12:07):
To the killer, who may be in this room. We
believe you were hiding in plain sight. We likely have
interviewed you or someone close to you, and you want
to know what we know. One day you will.
Speaker 12 (12:28):
A couple of new things come out of that pressor
they add one word to the audio from Libby's phone.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
They also released this much younger sketch, saying that he
could be as young as sixteen at the time of
the murders.
Speaker 7 (12:45):
I thought to myself, Oh my gosh, they have no
clue who did it. And I was like, if they
don't know if the age range is from sixteen to
forty like, I was like, do they know anything about him?
Speaker 2 (13:01):
Do they have anything at all?
Speaker 7 (13:05):
I was hopeless, and that, to me was my worst fear,
that they wouldn't end up arresting anyone and they would
just become another case.
Speaker 5 (13:18):
Despite both of those faces, despite that video, despite that audio,
despite the fact that Indiana State Police Superintendent Doug Carter said,
this person probably lives here, he's probably a neighbor of yours.
No arrests are made for six years coming up.
Speaker 15 (13:33):
I am proud to report to you an arrest has
been made.
Speaker 5 (13:37):
I think everyone's first reaction was, who.
Speaker 16 (13:56):
Here we are guys on Ron Loggan's property Steer Creek.
I'm on on high bridges over that way, and over
here is where the bodies were.
Speaker 5 (14:15):
This case has been going on for a long time
and a lot of names have come up over those
years as potential people who could have been involved in
this crime, and none of them have been cleared. Ron
Logan was one of the first people that police took
an interest in for many reasons. One guest, the girl's
bodies were found on his property, that's going to raise questions.
But also he was out there on TV early doing interviews,
(14:37):
giving tours of the crime scene, telling people where he
was and when.
Speaker 14 (14:42):
Who would have thought they let their children out to
do something spatial that day, take a trip down and
turn out a disaster like this.
Speaker 12 (14:51):
Within weeks of the murders, there were two search warrants
executed ron Logan's property. The first one was just looking
for guns and they found a hundred and fifty six.
The second search was directly related to the murders. Ron
Logan gave me a copy of the probable cause that
was used to get that second search warrant for the
(15:12):
search of his property, and in it the FBI writes
that they believe he is responsible for the murders.
Speaker 5 (15:20):
There are a couple key pieces of the ron logan
probable cause EFFI David. Perhaps the most compelling part of
it is that he constructed an alibi for a crime
that had not yet been discovered.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
He lied about when he left his house to go
by Tropical Fish. He had a suspended license. He shouldn't
have been driving at all.
Speaker 17 (15:43):
Detectives with the Carroll County Sheriff's Office and then Danta
State Police have uncovered an online profile named Anthony Shotts.
The fictitious Anthony shots profile used images of a known
male model and portrayed himself as being extremely wealthy and
owning numerous sports cards.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
The creator and the.
Speaker 17 (16:02):
Fictitious profile used this information while communicating with juvenile females
to solicit nude images.
Speaker 12 (16:09):
We know that Libby was at least friends on social
media with the Anthony Schottz profile, and that he at
least liked or commented on some of her posts. Kegn
Klein from Peru, Indiana, about forty minutes away, admitted he
created that fake profile, and I spoke to him from jail.
Are you aware whether you may have talked to Libby
(16:32):
on the thirteenth.
Speaker 7 (16:34):
That's what they said, and that's what the police tell
me that you did.
Speaker 12 (16:39):
Yeah, And do you have any recollection of that?
Speaker 8 (16:43):
Not atlone.
Speaker 12 (16:45):
Did you have anything to do with the murders of
Abby or Libby?
Speaker 7 (16:49):
Not at all.
Speaker 18 (16:49):
And I've gave up my DNA a hair follical test.
Speaker 8 (16:52):
I've done everything they wanted me to.
Speaker 5 (17:04):
In October of twenty twenty two, surprisingly we got word
that there was an arrest.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
What you know, disbelieve Like, Okay, I'm hearing this.
Speaker 15 (17:17):
But.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
It's a process.
Speaker 5 (17:22):
Like the rest of national media, I showed up to
watch that press conference to announce the arrest, not knowing
what to expect.
Speaker 15 (17:28):
Today is not a day to celebrate, but the arrest
of Richard m Allen of Delphi on two counts of
murder is sure a major steppard leading the conclusion of
this long term and complex investigation.
Speaker 19 (17:43):
We expected to be excited and happy and like overjoyed
that he's arrested, but now we're we're dealing with understanding
that there's a lot of reopening wounds that's.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Coming with that.
Speaker 5 (17:58):
My name's Dan Simtobe which I'm the producer and co
host of Down the Hill, the Delphi Murders podcast. My
first reaction, I think everyone's first reaction was who. We
had no idea who this was.
Speaker 6 (18:10):
Richard?
Speaker 4 (18:10):
Now you job murder? Why did you do it? Same
on you.
Speaker 8 (18:16):
My name is Nicholas Mclearlin. I'm the Carroll County prosecutor.
Mister Allen has had his initial hearing. He's in an
a preliminary plea of not guilty, and he is in custody.
He's being held currently without bond.
Speaker 14 (18:28):
Here comes a guy that has never ever been announced there.
Speaker 9 (18:33):
He was nobody's radar.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
It was like, where did this guy come from?
Speaker 1 (18:37):
Richard Matthew Allen was fifty years old, had no criminal history,
and worked as a farm tech over at the local
CBS in Delphi.
Speaker 12 (18:46):
I was surprised because he seemed like a real nice
guy and everything waiting on us in the drive through
and everything.
Speaker 7 (18:52):
I had not interacted with him, but I everyone knew
who he was.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
I mean, he worked there for so long and I
when I.
Speaker 7 (19:00):
Found out who it was, I never in a million
years thought that it would have been him, not someone
so integral to the community and to the Delphi experience.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
Richard Allen has been married to Kathy for thirty years.
Speaker 5 (19:18):
They have one daughter. Ellen was raised in Mexico, Indiana,
about forty miles from Delphi.
Speaker 12 (19:24):
Mexico is a very small town, smaller than Delphi, with
the population of about twelve hundred people.
Speaker 4 (19:36):
That's where Ricky Ellen lived there in that yellow house
early on, and I think when he first.
Speaker 5 (19:44):
Got married they moved in there, if I remember right.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
Very very nice, very respectable young man. He always has been.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Yeah, my name is David Yoda, and when I knew
Ricky his.
Speaker 4 (19:58):
Entire life, very loyal to dog. He's a quiet kind
of He's very polite, always has been respectful to me
and all. He'll go out of his way and say hi,
you know, just to say hello to me. Very friendly, sociable.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Hey.
Speaker 4 (20:15):
I really can't speak highly enough about the man. I
just can't believe it this that he did this, and
I don't believe it for a minute.
Speaker 12 (20:24):
People who have talked to who shopped at the CVS
and dealt with Richard Allen described him as friendly. In fact,
after the murders, Libby's aunt went in there to have
some pictures printed for Libby's memorial. She said Richard Allen
helped her and at the time she thought he was
helpful and kind.
Speaker 7 (20:42):
I just wanted to ask him, why would you do
something like that? Why would you take such too innocent
people from this world?
Speaker 2 (20:52):
Why?
Speaker 7 (20:53):
What was your motive? What did you want to do?
What were your intentions? Did you know all along if
that's what you were going to do?
Speaker 5 (20:58):
But we still didn't know why he had been arrested,
and they said in that press conference that everything about
that was still under seal. This is really important.
Speaker 15 (21:09):
While I know you are all expecting final details today,
it's sending this arrest today is not that day.
Speaker 20 (21:18):
It's very unusual for what happened in this case to happen,
and especially a case of this magnitude, which is why
that's the reason why when a case is so high profile,
a case that's gone cold for so many years, and
there are obviously things that for some good reason we
as members of the public just shouldn't be privy to prosecutor.
Speaker 12 (21:41):
Nicholas mcleland also said there could be other actors involved
in this crime.
Speaker 5 (21:46):
Where are those people? Where's that second person? Why haven't
we heard anything about it.
Speaker 12 (21:52):
Then Sheriff Tobe Lesanbie of Carroll County asked the court
to move Richard Allen out of the Carroll County Jail,
saying they couldn't ensure his safety. So the judge agrees,
signs off on that and sends him to the Department
of Corrections. And then the judge immediately steps down from
the case.
Speaker 14 (22:11):
And what happens is he's moved without a judge who
had accused himself, claiming that the blood lost of the
case was just too much for him to handle and
he didn't think that he'd be able to sit on it.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
Allan has moved to the Westville Maximum Security Prison. That's
pretty unusual because usually suspects are held at the county jail.
Speaker 12 (22:33):
With Allan in prison without defense attorneys and now no
judge on the case, the Indiana Supreme Court steps in
and they appoint Special Judge Francis Gull, who's from Allen County,
about two hours away.
Speaker 10 (22:48):
Coming up.
Speaker 9 (22:49):
Richard Allen has a message for the judge.
Speaker 5 (22:52):
He writes a letter to Judge Gull, throwing himself on
the mercy of the court.
Speaker 12 (23:12):
Richard Allen is in custody without bond after being charged
with the murders of best friends Abigail Williams and Liberty German.
Speaker 5 (23:27):
So in November of twenty twenty two, we finally hear
from Richard Allen. He writes a handwritten letter gives it
to Judge Gall throwing himself on the mercy of the court,
asking for help paying for his defense.
Speaker 14 (23:39):
Allen had originally when he made his first appearance and
told the judge that he was going to try to
get private counsel. I don't think, realizing how much a
case like this would cost in terms of hiring private counsel.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
Carroll County is too small to have its own public defenders,
So Judge fran Gall she appoints two private attorneys, Brad
Rosie and A Andrew Baldwin.
Speaker 14 (24:01):
Both of these guys have vast experience, I mean collectively
they've been trying cases for fifty years, both very experienced
trial lawyers.
Speaker 5 (24:08):
His new defense attorneys, Baldwin and Rosie, immediately release a
statement saying he is not guilty, he has nothing to hide,
is one hunch percent innocent.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
We also learn more about why Richard Allen was arrested
in the first place when the probable cause affidavit is
released to the public.
Speaker 14 (24:25):
That is what the public is going to be basing
their initial opinion as to innocence are killed on.
Speaker 12 (24:31):
We learn that the evidence shows that Abby and Libby
are dropped off at the trails at one forty nine PM,
and we already knew that Libby's video recording that man
on the bridge happened at two thirteen. Just twenty four
minutes later.
Speaker 5 (24:47):
We learned that the video has one of the girls
saying the word gun. We also find out about some
physical evidence. An unspent, unfired forty caliber round is found
in between the bodies.
Speaker 14 (24:59):
They then brought or had examined by Indiana State trooper
who had some training with tool markings. He gave a
subjective opinion that he thought that the gun that they
recovered in Richard Allen's home pursuant of the search was
a match.
Speaker 20 (25:15):
To me, the most damaging piece of evidence that the
State of Indiana has against Richard Allen is the unspent
round that cycled through his gun found just two feet
away from Libby Jerman. He is either the unluckiest guy
in the world or he was there at the scene
(25:35):
when those two girls were murdered.
Speaker 5 (25:37):
The probable Cause reveals at least four witnesses, three teenage
girls and one adult woman saw someone generally matching the
description of the person in Libby's video between one twenty
six pm at two thirteen pm, the time that Abby
and Libby were encountering that man on the bridge.
Speaker 12 (25:54):
And one of those witnesses is seen on surveillance video
arriving a brown one for six peter and she says
she parked her car and then walked out to the
bridge where she saw a man standing on the bridge
about fifty feet away. She didn't walk onto the bridge,
she turned around and walked back in the direction she
came and when she did that, she passed two young
(26:16):
girls who were walking towards the bridge, and she believes
that was Abby and Libby.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Another witness says that she was driving north of the
trails that day and about two hours after the abduction,
she saw a man in a blue jacket walking in
the opposite direction quote muddy and bloody.
Speaker 5 (26:35):
Just before Richard Allen was arrested in October of twenty
twenty two, he met with investigators again after they had
resurfaced his name and he said, yes, I was there.
I was wearing a blue jacket, I was wearing a
blue pants, may have been wearing a hat.
Speaker 20 (26:48):
One of the other most damaging pieces of evidence came
from Richard Allen in him admitting to being on the
trail that day.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
Think about it.
Speaker 20 (26:57):
He's admitting to being there from one thirty three and
he claims he went there to watch the fish. So
how unlucky is this guy that he admits to being
present and his window encompasses the window of time that
investigators believe those beautiful girls were murdered.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
About eight months after his arrest, a slew of documents
are released, and that's when we find out that Richard
Allen has confessed.
Speaker 20 (27:25):
His confessions are going to be a major problem for
this defense team.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
We need to have more than that.
Speaker 20 (27:33):
Whenever we have a criminal case, a confession alone is
not enough.
Speaker 12 (27:36):
So the state is mounting this case.
Speaker 20 (27:38):
With other pieces of evidence that corroborate what he's admitting to.
We haven't heard the confessions yet, We're just aware that
prosecutors have alerted the court to the fact that he
has made admissions made them to his wife by way
of a jail phone call. And that they plan to
introduce that evidence.
Speaker 5 (27:57):
So everything we've been hearing up to this point is
the theory of the case from the prosecution, from law enforcement,
and then via filings we start to hear from the defense,
and the details that they lay out are like nothing
we could possibly have imagined today.
Speaker 10 (28:15):
Like I said, unexpected, out of left field. One hundred
and thirty pages worth of information in just one of
the filings that was released. They are pointing the finger
in a very specific direction as to who's responsible for this.
Speaker 5 (28:30):
And it's not Richard Allen.
Speaker 10 (28:32):
It's some sort of a religious sect slash cult that
follow Odinism and it was a sacrifice.
Speaker 14 (28:44):
Wow, when that thing dropped he was a defense attorney.
Speaker 9 (28:49):
It blew my mind. I had never seen a filing
like that. My name is Mark pitt Cavage. I'm a
senior research fellow with the Anti Defamation League Center on Extremism.
The defense argument that Odinism was involved in the murder
is largely based on the idea that there were Norse
(29:16):
pagan symbols left at the scene of the crime in
the form of sticks or branches or blood patterns, and
it's not clear to me that any such symbols were
actually left at the scene in the first place. Odinism
is one of the branches of white supremacy. There are
(29:38):
a number of different types of white supremacy, and it's
derived from a religion that is the easiest way to
put is modern Norse paganism. Modern Norse paganism is the
revival of some of the old Scandinavian myths and religious
beliefs centered around the ancient Norse gods like Odin and
(30:02):
Thor and Freya. Most modern Norse pagans are not racists,
they're not white supremacists. The religion as a whole is innocuous,
but this one part of it is not so innocuous.
It's much more problematic. So at the Center on Extremism
we try and track extremism in a lot of different ways.
One of the things that we started doing in two
(30:23):
thousand and eight was to track extremist related murders, where
we created a database to track extremists domestic extremist related murders.
Because those allegations were raised, we have been tracking the
progress of the case to see if any of them
are ever at some point substantiated with evidence. If and
(30:43):
that's a big. If any of the allegations were actually substantiated,
then we would certainly add it to our database.
Speaker 12 (30:51):
At that point, the defense says this theory of the
crime was never fully explored by law enforcement and that
men they've identified as potential suspects were cleared too easily, and.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
After making those bombshell claims, the defense is off the case.
Speaker 10 (31:12):
Coming up, graphic crime scene photos make their way to YouTube.
Speaker 14 (31:17):
Pictures like that are just going to incite and enrage people,
and they are going to blame the person that's under arrest.
Speaker 5 (31:40):
In October of twenty twenty three, work gets out that
crime scene photos have leaked, apparently from the office of Baldwin,
and what it turns out had happened was that someone
who was in his office had taken pictures of the
evidence and shared them.
Speaker 14 (31:55):
Thankfully, these things didn't make it out to the public
and mass for number one. For the families, like the
nightmare of them getting online one day and opening up
a picture of their daughter is like beyond words. The
other thing is you worry about is if they get out,
it destroys Rick Allen's opportunity to have a fair trial.
Just does because pictures like that are just going to
(32:16):
incite and enrage people, and they are going to blame
the person that's under arrest.
Speaker 12 (32:21):
Defense attorney Andrew Baldwin says he's essentially the victim of
a theft. But the judge is furious and she accuses
the defense team of being incompetent and negligent.
Speaker 18 (32:33):
We've had an unexpected turn of events, Ladies and gentlemen.
Mister Baldwin made an oral motion to withdraw. I granted
that oral motion to withdraw, and mister Rosie will be
submitting a written motion to withdraw. I'm assuming within the
next couple of days.
Speaker 5 (32:52):
With Baldwin and Rosie off the case, Richard Allen still
needs a defense, so Judge Gull appoints two attorneys from
her home county of Allen County.
Speaker 12 (33:00):
She picks Allen County's chief public defender, William Lobrado and
Robert Screman. But that's not the last that we hear
of Rosie and Baldwin. They say they were coursed into
leaving the case and they fight to get back on.
Speaker 1 (33:14):
So that issue goes to the Indiana Supreme Court, who
quickly rule that the original defense team should have never
been removed.
Speaker 12 (33:21):
Seventy nine days after they were appointed. Librado and Scremmen
are off the case, and Rosie and Baldwin are back.
Speaker 11 (33:31):
I was asked to do a job. I did my job.
I was then told two gentlemen are going to take over.
It is what it is. My name's William Labrado. I
am now Richard Allen's former lead counselor. I don't think
mister Allen had anything to do with this.
Speaker 12 (33:49):
You're a defense attorney, so that's your job to sort
of say your client is innocent, and.
Speaker 11 (33:56):
Rarely do I believe it. But in this particular case,
I believe it. And what convinced you conversations with him,
the fact that he lived in this very small community
that's not much bigger than a high school. He worked
(34:18):
at the CVS in Delphi. The police sketches are hung
up in the CVS. The bridge guy picture is in
the CVS, and in five and a half years, no
one comes into that store and says that kind of
looks like you. I don't know if this has any relevance,
(34:39):
and you know I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but arrest
was made twenty four, twenty seven days before a sheriff election.
Speaker 12 (34:51):
How would you characterize the case as you know it
against Richard.
Speaker 11 (34:55):
Allen Well, it's obviously circumstantial. I haven't seen a direct
evidence that other than he admitted that he was on
the bridge that day and we think during the same
timeframe as the girls were.
Speaker 20 (35:12):
There's technically both direct evidence and circumstantial evidence. For example,
his confession, that's direct evidence. Witnesses eyewitnesses seeing it Goby direct.
Speaker 11 (35:22):
Evidence eyewitness haestimony inherently unreliable in my opinion. They all
say saw the same person, and you have that many
different descriptions. That's a problem.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
Rosie and Baldwin, in a filing, claimed the descriptions attributed
to witnesses and the probable cause affidavit are wrong.
Speaker 12 (35:44):
So remember the witness who said that she walked out
to the bridge and saw a man standing on it,
and then she passed what she believes Rabby and Libby
as she was walking back to her car. Well, the
defense says that the state left out that woman's description
the man she saw. She described a young man, possibly
in his twenties, clean shaven, with a boyish look.
Speaker 5 (36:08):
That description is actually what led to the second sketch
which was made in February of twenty seventeen but not
released until April of twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
And the witness who saw a man walking on the
road both muddy and bloody, actually just saw a man
who was muddy. According to the defense.
Speaker 14 (36:25):
Richard Allen's five to four. So when you're talking about
the witness statements, okay, in none of them that would
have been the first descriptive thing that I would have
said is that he's really short. Not one of them
said that he was a really short guy, And that
would have been, like to me, the first descriptor, you know,
and it just didn't happen.
Speaker 12 (36:47):
Bradley Rosie and Andrew Baldwin also said there's no electronic
evidence linking him to the crime scene or the girls,
and that there's no DNA of his at the scene.
Speaker 11 (37:00):
Yes, as far as I can tell, yes, nothing forensically
other than this bullet that they claimed that they found
that they shot through a barrel. That there's no way
to compare the markings a bullet projectile shell casing would
have fired through a barrel compared to ejection marks. And
(37:26):
it was to my knowledge about two inches underground.
Speaker 12 (37:31):
What do you think is the biggest piece of evidence
in this case.
Speaker 11 (37:36):
There's an alleged confession. That's it to me.
Speaker 12 (37:41):
You had not heard of Odonism when it first was
floated with regard to this case.
Speaker 11 (37:47):
I honestly thought I thought it was hocus pocus. I
honestly didn't.
Speaker 5 (37:51):
I'd never heard of it.
Speaker 11 (37:53):
And the more I got into it, that's a real thing.
It is a real thing, and it's scary. I believe
they sacrificed a girl and killed another one.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
In addition to pointing the finger at several men who
allegedly practice Odinism, the defense says that several of the
prison guards in charge of Richard Allen were wearing Odinism
patches on their uniform.
Speaker 12 (38:20):
You described one of those officers. It's mentioned in one
of Rosie and Baldwin's filings, Sergeant Jones, who was wearing
patches that said in Odin we trust on his Department
of Corrections uniform. The judge ordered the warden to make
them stop.
Speaker 2 (38:41):
And then what did.
Speaker 11 (38:42):
You notice that mister Jones had a tattooed under his
right eye. From the bus, we can tell it looks
a lot like Odin's spear.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Both sets of Richard Allen's defense attorneys have raised issues
about what they call harsh conditions behind bars. Rosie and
Baldwin also alleged that Richard Allen's family was threatened if
he didn't confess.
Speaker 11 (39:08):
There's no ties to this oldness to call whatsoever. He
didn't even know that there was oldness in Delfa. He
had never heard of it.
Speaker 6 (39:18):
Up.
Speaker 9 (39:18):
Next, did Abby and Libby's killer have help?
Speaker 5 (39:22):
One of the major things hanging out there right now
about this story is the fact that there are likely
other people involved in this crime.
Speaker 13 (39:47):
Hopefully justice for Abby and Libby Bill means some closure
for their family members. I always see you never get
complete closure in a homicide case because there is a
void left in your heart that can never if would
be still but some bit of closure, some bit of
justice and peace knowing that the right person has been
help responsible and can't hurt anyone ever again.
Speaker 2 (40:10):
All that being said, the State.
Speaker 20 (40:11):
Of Indiana has mounted quite a case to prove that
Richard Allen is that person.
Speaker 7 (40:19):
As sees in Bloom at the side of you, oh
so priceless. So this was a song that actually played
at her funeral, and just the way that it describes
I see you dressed in why Every wrong Made right?
Or it really makes me think of Abby as angelic.
(40:44):
I feel connected to her. It just really makes me
think that she's an angel by my side. Rather than
the things that she went through and how she died,
there are a lot of things that make me think
of her. I got this tattoo of butterflies on my arm,
(41:06):
and that was just a huge part of her.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
She loved butterflies.
Speaker 7 (41:28):
I think what is important is talking about who they
were while they were living, and that's what's most important
to me. I really want to make sure that people
know that they were good people and that their lives
are constantly part.
Speaker 2 (41:49):
Of everyone who knew them's lives.
Speaker 7 (41:55):
True justice would be that there would be no need
for justice at all, that it never would have happened,
that they never would have been taken from us, that
they never would have been treated.
Speaker 2 (42:08):
In that way.
Speaker 7 (42:10):
For me, there's a piece that really never will reach justice.
Speaker 5 (42:21):
One of the major things hanging out there right now
about this story is the fact that there are likely
other people involved in this crime. Prosecutor Nick McCleland said
that himself there could be other actors involved. Former Sheriff
tob Blesenbie saying under oath that he believes it would
have taken at least two people to commit this crime.
Speaker 14 (42:39):
And you just have to hope that law enforcement is
up to the task because they're putting all the cards
on the table with Rick Allen at this point. You know,
but we still have that thing, don't we sitting there
saying we think that they were more involved. So we
have to hope that they're continuing to investigate it.
Speaker 5 (43:18):
It's easing all this back and forth and debate about
this case. Who did it, who didn't do it, who
might have done it. It's easy to lose the victims,
Abby and Libby. I learned early on and throughout that
these girls were the absolute lights in the lives of
those who loved them. Abby and Libby were loved. Justice
(43:43):
in this case is going to mean different things to
different people. I'm not going to presume to define that
for those who love them. My definition is a little
more traditional. It's arresting and punishing the person or people
responsible for this, whoever that may be, and however long
that takes.
That's okay.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Having Joyce Williams getting scared. Now it's getting a cold.
Speaker 3 (00:08):
Liberty rose Lynn.
Speaker 4 (00:10):
German missing abducted.
Speaker 5 (00:12):
We don't know for sure.
Speaker 6 (00:15):
At the high Bridge in Delphi, Indiana.
Speaker 7 (00:18):
Delphi is just not one of those places where any
of us ever thought that something like.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
This would happen.
Speaker 5 (00:29):
Despite that video, despite that audio, nothing happens seemingly for
six years.
Speaker 8 (00:35):
That just did find probable cause for arrest of Richard Allen.
He's been charged with two counts of murder for the
murder of Abba Williams and Liberty German.
Speaker 9 (00:44):
Richard down murder.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Why would you do it? They got the wrong guy
in no way.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
There are other people who were looked at for this.
Speaker 10 (00:55):
Yeah, it's some sort of a religious sect slash holder
that follow od.
Speaker 11 (01:06):
I believe they sacrificed a girl and killed another one, and.
Speaker 12 (01:11):
Law enforcement insists no one's ever been cleared.
Speaker 13 (01:14):
When can you provide any kind of journalism?
Speaker 5 (01:16):
It's time for you guys to start being journalists. Delphi
(01:46):
is a small town. The downtown is two blocks. It
has a main street literally a main street, old courthouse,
wonderful restaurants called the Stonehouse Girl, which has amazing breakfasts,
and it just has a regular America small town cliche,
(02:08):
almost flavor and field.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Downtown is surrounded by lots of fields, corn and soybean,
and lots of farmland.
Speaker 5 (02:24):
The Historic Trails of Delphi is a popular spot in
town for people to go to. It's a little bit
outside of town. It's just a beautiful place filled with trees.
You could hear nature, you could hear the birds chirping.
It's a very serene place.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
I live pretty close to the trails.
Speaker 7 (02:42):
Dropping your kids off at the trails was just something
that you did.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
It was just what kents did.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
And just off the trail, there's an abandoned railroad bridge,
the Monon high Bridge, sixty three feet above Deer Creek.
Speaker 5 (02:55):
The Monon high Bridge is not that serene. It's this
old rickety bridge, or it was at the time, right
the rail ties are falling apart. It's you know, you
could look down, take a step, a couple steps and
look down and see one hundred foot drop below you.
Speaker 7 (03:12):
I mean, it was a very high bridge. The name
definitely applies. I grew up watching people post on their
Snapchat stories like going to the bridge to like read
a book or things like that, and they'd have their
feet like swinging over the edge. My name is synth
Rossi and I was best friends with Abby and Libby.
(03:35):
I first met Abby when we were in preschool together.
I spent my entire childhood basically at her grandparents' home.
We just loved being little girls and just sitting on
my bed reading magazines, playing with makeup.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
She loved playing dress up. That was one of our
favorite things to do together.
Speaker 7 (04:00):
I first met Libby when we were in classes together
in elementary school. She just had such a spunky personality.
She was constantly saying the funniest things I've ever heard
in my entire life. I've seen this picture a lot.
It was during one of her swim meets. She loved
(04:22):
swimming and how much she was such an active kid.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
She seemed to never run out of energy. She was
constantly going.
Speaker 7 (04:30):
Oh, the picture that I'm often cropped out of. So
this was our solo and ensemble competition with the song
Home on the Range that we could not agree how
to play. And Abby's actually wearing a dress that my
mom had gotten her for Christmas. I'll never forget that day,
February thirteenth.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
It was around two pm.
Speaker 7 (04:54):
I saw the picture of Abby on the bridge on
their Snapchat stories, and I immediately just knew that.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
Something was wrong. Taken by Liberty.
Speaker 7 (05:04):
It should have just been them being kids on a
day off from school, but unfortunately turned.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Into a lot Why.
Speaker 6 (05:13):
Until okay two minute in juveniles Liberty Rose Lynn German,
but being at a high bridge in Delphi, Indiana, A
personally thirteen hundred hours second juno, I would you know
Joyce Williams last name? Where I've braved it up to
twit shirt and a rich shirt with the rich or
(05:36):
under his engine.
Speaker 5 (05:38):
On the afternoon of February thirteenth, twenty seventeen, Abby and
Libby were dropped off at the trails that lead to
the Monon Highbridge. They're supposed to be picked up by
Libby's father at three pm. They never turned up. The
search started around five point thirty.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Well upset, confused, obviously, very de strong, just worried.
Speaker 7 (05:59):
All I want to do is have the girls get.
Speaker 14 (06:00):
Home safe, missing, abducted.
Speaker 5 (06:03):
We don't know for sure.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
There's a cell phone tower, but the pain was last
noted about five or six hours ago.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
I say the phone's now dead.
Speaker 5 (06:10):
Words spread quickly that help was needed, that these girls
needed to be found. Hundreds of people turned out and
searched through the night. Becky Patty, Leeby's grandmother would say
that you could see flashlights everywhere, like stars in the sky,
like fireflies. It was a full town effort.
Speaker 15 (06:27):
Ravin's ditches, trash cans for phones, any sign of the girls.
Speaker 7 (06:34):
I was like, I think one of them just like
fell off the bridge and maybe broke their leg, and
then the other one went down to help them, and
maybe they got hurt.
Speaker 5 (06:42):
All options around the table. Did they run away, did
they go to a party, did they fall off the bridge,
did they get injured? No one had any idea what
had happened to them, but the official search was halted
that night and picked up the next morning.
Speaker 7 (06:56):
The next day, I went to school and it was
just gloomy.
Speaker 5 (07:01):
Hundreds of people showed up searching all over the place.
Hope was high, and then the word came.
Speaker 7 (07:09):
I learned that Abby and Libby had been found. When
I saw everybody in the hallway just crying. No one
said the exact words to me, and we just sat
on our phones and watched the news headlines start to
come in.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
We have found two bodies about a mile east of town.
We are investigating this as a crime scene. We suspect
bout play.
Speaker 5 (07:44):
They didn't identify them as Abby and Libby, but everyone.
Speaker 7 (07:48):
Do I knew it was them.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
I wasn't in a position to hear it.
Speaker 7 (07:54):
I just was truly traumatized, like my body was just
in fight or flight. Didn't know exactly what all foul
play entailed.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
But when my.
Speaker 7 (08:05):
Mom started to tell me someone hurt them and someone
wanted them to die for me, it was so difficult
to process. New stations started showing up to my house.
I couldn't enter my home without someone asking what happened?
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Do you have any information?
Speaker 7 (08:23):
And I'm just trying to process the fact that my
two best friends were just murdered, let alone trying to
balance a media presence at thirteen like it was so terrifying.
Speaker 3 (08:38):
Basically, we have identified the bodies of the two females
that were found out yesterday, Epicgail J. Williams, thirteen of
the Delphi area and Liberty rose Land German, fourteen at
the Delphi Area. Family has been notified. This is considered
a double homicide investigation.
Speaker 7 (09:00):
Yeah, I had known that Abby and Libby were active
on some kind of sites where you could meet new people,
and part of me thought that that might have something
to do with it, that maybe they had met someone online.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
We have nobody in custody at this time.
Speaker 5 (09:25):
The next day, police released a picture of a man
on the bridge. He appears to be wearing a blue coat,
blue pants, and boots. They don't say where this picture
comes from, but they do say that they are looking
for this person and they want to.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Talk to him.
Speaker 7 (09:42):
When I first saw that image, I just wanted to
solve it.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
Immediately.
Speaker 7 (09:48):
I was flipping through every single person I'd ever seen
in my entire life, who might walk like that, who
might appear like that? And the first thing that I
noticed when I saw it was the pockets, that they
were filled, that there was something along like the waste
(10:11):
area into me. I just immediately was like, that's either
a knife set or a gun.
Speaker 5 (10:19):
At this point, no one knows where this picture had
come from, so speculation was rampant. Was he caught on
a trail cap and if they had that image, what
else did they have? This picture had actually come from
Libby's phone. She had captured that image. Not only that,
she had also captured his voice, and.
Speaker 12 (10:42):
For the first time we hear that this man is
the prime suspect in the murders of Abby and Libby.
Speaker 7 (10:49):
Finding out that Libby had recorded him, I felt proud
of her.
Speaker 5 (10:54):
And then in July twenty seventeen, police release a composite sketch.
They say that the man they're looking for. The sketches
between five six and five ten, weighs between one hundred
eighty and two hundred and twenty pounds, and has reddish
brown hair.
Speaker 7 (11:07):
I couldn't think of anyone that I thought looked like that,
But then again, I thought of everyone who looked like that,
Like he just looked like every other guy I'd ever
seen in this town. I couldn't place anyone specific to
(11:27):
the sketch, and that was frustrating.
Speaker 5 (11:32):
Who was this person? Was he a trucker passing through?
Could he have been a drifter? Was he a serial killer?
This is really when the people in town started to
pay attention and start to look around.
Speaker 7 (11:46):
I've done numerous interviews with police officers, FBI investigators, and
they all, I mean, when you get asked, do you
have any answers?
Speaker 2 (11:56):
You just want to have an answer.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
But I didn't and then two years into the investigation,
a whole new direction.
Speaker 15 (12:07):
To the killer, who may be in this room. We
believe you were hiding in plain sight. We likely have
interviewed you or someone close to you, and you want
to know what we know. One day you will.
Speaker 12 (12:28):
A couple of new things come out of that pressor
they add one word to the audio from Libby's phone.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
They also released this much younger sketch, saying that he
could be as young as sixteen at the time of
the murders.
Speaker 7 (12:45):
I thought to myself, Oh my gosh, they have no
clue who did it. And I was like, if they
don't know if the age range is from sixteen to
forty like, I was like, do they know anything about him?
Speaker 2 (13:01):
Do they have anything at all?
Speaker 7 (13:05):
I was hopeless, and that, to me was my worst fear,
that they wouldn't end up arresting anyone and they would
just become another case.
Speaker 5 (13:18):
Despite both of those faces, despite that video, despite that audio,
despite the fact that Indiana State Police Superintendent Doug Carter said,
this person probably lives here, he's probably a neighbor of yours.
No arrests are made for six years coming up.
Speaker 15 (13:33):
I am proud to report to you an arrest has
been made.
Speaker 5 (13:37):
I think everyone's first reaction was, who.
Speaker 16 (13:56):
Here we are guys on Ron Loggan's property Steer Creek.
I'm on on high bridges over that way, and over
here is where the bodies were.
Speaker 5 (14:15):
This case has been going on for a long time
and a lot of names have come up over those
years as potential people who could have been involved in
this crime, and none of them have been cleared. Ron
Logan was one of the first people that police took
an interest in for many reasons. One guest, the girl's
bodies were found on his property, that's going to raise questions.
But also he was out there on TV early doing interviews,
(14:37):
giving tours of the crime scene, telling people where he
was and when.
Speaker 14 (14:42):
Who would have thought they let their children out to
do something spatial that day, take a trip down and
turn out a disaster like this.
Speaker 12 (14:51):
Within weeks of the murders, there were two search warrants
executed ron Logan's property. The first one was just looking
for guns and they found a hundred and fifty six.
The second search was directly related to the murders. Ron
Logan gave me a copy of the probable cause that
was used to get that second search warrant for the
(15:12):
search of his property, and in it the FBI writes
that they believe he is responsible for the murders.
Speaker 5 (15:20):
There are a couple key pieces of the ron logan
probable cause EFFI David. Perhaps the most compelling part of
it is that he constructed an alibi for a crime
that had not yet been discovered.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
He lied about when he left his house to go
by Tropical Fish. He had a suspended license. He shouldn't
have been driving at all.
Speaker 17 (15:43):
Detectives with the Carroll County Sheriff's Office and then Danta
State Police have uncovered an online profile named Anthony Shotts.
The fictitious Anthony shots profile used images of a known
male model and portrayed himself as being extremely wealthy and
owning numerous sports cards.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
The creator and the.
Speaker 17 (16:02):
Fictitious profile used this information while communicating with juvenile females
to solicit nude images.
Speaker 12 (16:09):
We know that Libby was at least friends on social
media with the Anthony Schottz profile, and that he at
least liked or commented on some of her posts. Kegn
Klein from Peru, Indiana, about forty minutes away, admitted he
created that fake profile, and I spoke to him from jail.
Are you aware whether you may have talked to Libby
(16:32):
on the thirteenth.
Speaker 7 (16:34):
That's what they said, and that's what the police tell
me that you did.
Speaker 12 (16:39):
Yeah, And do you have any recollection of that?
Speaker 8 (16:43):
Not atlone.
Speaker 12 (16:45):
Did you have anything to do with the murders of
Abby or Libby?
Speaker 7 (16:49):
Not at all.
Speaker 18 (16:49):
And I've gave up my DNA a hair follical test.
Speaker 8 (16:52):
I've done everything they wanted me to.
Speaker 5 (17:04):
In October of twenty twenty two, surprisingly we got word
that there was an arrest.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
What you know, disbelieve Like, Okay, I'm hearing this.
Speaker 15 (17:17):
But.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
It's a process.
Speaker 5 (17:22):
Like the rest of national media, I showed up to
watch that press conference to announce the arrest, not knowing
what to expect.
Speaker 15 (17:28):
Today is not a day to celebrate, but the arrest
of Richard m Allen of Delphi on two counts of
murder is sure a major steppard leading the conclusion of
this long term and complex investigation.
Speaker 19 (17:43):
We expected to be excited and happy and like overjoyed
that he's arrested, but now we're we're dealing with understanding
that there's a lot of reopening wounds that's.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Coming with that.
Speaker 5 (17:58):
My name's Dan Simtobe which I'm the producer and co
host of Down the Hill, the Delphi Murders podcast. My
first reaction, I think everyone's first reaction was who. We
had no idea who this was.
Speaker 6 (18:10):
Richard?
Speaker 4 (18:10):
Now you job murder? Why did you do it? Same
on you.
Speaker 8 (18:16):
My name is Nicholas Mclearlin. I'm the Carroll County prosecutor.
Mister Allen has had his initial hearing. He's in an
a preliminary plea of not guilty, and he is in custody.
He's being held currently without bond.
Speaker 14 (18:28):
Here comes a guy that has never ever been announced there.
Speaker 9 (18:33):
He was nobody's radar.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
It was like, where did this guy come from?
Speaker 1 (18:37):
Richard Matthew Allen was fifty years old, had no criminal history,
and worked as a farm tech over at the local
CBS in Delphi.
Speaker 12 (18:46):
I was surprised because he seemed like a real nice
guy and everything waiting on us in the drive through
and everything.
Speaker 7 (18:52):
I had not interacted with him, but I everyone knew
who he was.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
I mean, he worked there for so long and I
when I.
Speaker 7 (19:00):
Found out who it was, I never in a million
years thought that it would have been him, not someone
so integral to the community and to the Delphi experience.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
Richard Allen has been married to Kathy for thirty years.
Speaker 5 (19:18):
They have one daughter. Ellen was raised in Mexico, Indiana,
about forty miles from Delphi.
Speaker 12 (19:24):
Mexico is a very small town, smaller than Delphi, with
the population of about twelve hundred people.
Speaker 4 (19:36):
That's where Ricky Ellen lived there in that yellow house
early on, and I think when he first.
Speaker 5 (19:44):
Got married they moved in there, if I remember right.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
Very very nice, very respectable young man. He always has been.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Yeah, my name is David Yoda, and when I knew
Ricky his.
Speaker 4 (19:58):
Entire life, very loyal to dog. He's a quiet kind
of He's very polite, always has been respectful to me
and all. He'll go out of his way and say hi,
you know, just to say hello to me. Very friendly, sociable.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Hey.
Speaker 4 (20:15):
I really can't speak highly enough about the man. I
just can't believe it this that he did this, and
I don't believe it for a minute.
Speaker 12 (20:24):
People who have talked to who shopped at the CVS
and dealt with Richard Allen described him as friendly. In fact,
after the murders, Libby's aunt went in there to have
some pictures printed for Libby's memorial. She said Richard Allen
helped her and at the time she thought he was
helpful and kind.
Speaker 7 (20:42):
I just wanted to ask him, why would you do
something like that? Why would you take such too innocent
people from this world?
Speaker 2 (20:52):
Why?
Speaker 7 (20:53):
What was your motive? What did you want to do?
What were your intentions? Did you know all along if
that's what you were going to do?
Speaker 5 (20:58):
But we still didn't know why he had been arrested,
and they said in that press conference that everything about
that was still under seal. This is really important.
Speaker 15 (21:09):
While I know you are all expecting final details today,
it's sending this arrest today is not that day.
Speaker 20 (21:18):
It's very unusual for what happened in this case to happen,
and especially a case of this magnitude, which is why
that's the reason why when a case is so high profile,
a case that's gone cold for so many years, and
there are obviously things that for some good reason we
as members of the public just shouldn't be privy to prosecutor.
Speaker 12 (21:41):
Nicholas mcleland also said there could be other actors involved
in this crime.
Speaker 5 (21:46):
Where are those people? Where's that second person? Why haven't
we heard anything about it.
Speaker 12 (21:52):
Then Sheriff Tobe Lesanbie of Carroll County asked the court
to move Richard Allen out of the Carroll County Jail,
saying they couldn't ensure his safety. So the judge agrees,
signs off on that and sends him to the Department
of Corrections. And then the judge immediately steps down from
the case.
Speaker 14 (22:11):
And what happens is he's moved without a judge who
had accused himself, claiming that the blood lost of the
case was just too much for him to handle and
he didn't think that he'd be able to sit on it.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
Allan has moved to the Westville Maximum Security Prison. That's
pretty unusual because usually suspects are held at the county jail.
Speaker 12 (22:33):
With Allan in prison without defense attorneys and now no
judge on the case, the Indiana Supreme Court steps in
and they appoint Special Judge Francis Gull, who's from Allen County,
about two hours away.
Speaker 10 (22:48):
Coming up.
Speaker 9 (22:49):
Richard Allen has a message for the judge.
Speaker 5 (22:52):
He writes a letter to Judge Gull, throwing himself on
the mercy of the court.
Speaker 12 (23:12):
Richard Allen is in custody without bond after being charged
with the murders of best friends Abigail Williams and Liberty German.
Speaker 5 (23:27):
So in November of twenty twenty two, we finally hear
from Richard Allen. He writes a handwritten letter gives it
to Judge Gall throwing himself on the mercy of the court,
asking for help paying for his defense.
Speaker 14 (23:39):
Allen had originally when he made his first appearance and
told the judge that he was going to try to
get private counsel. I don't think, realizing how much a
case like this would cost in terms of hiring private counsel.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
Carroll County is too small to have its own public defenders,
So Judge fran Gall she appoints two private attorneys, Brad
Rosie and A Andrew Baldwin.
Speaker 14 (24:01):
Both of these guys have vast experience, I mean collectively
they've been trying cases for fifty years, both very experienced
trial lawyers.
Speaker 5 (24:08):
His new defense attorneys, Baldwin and Rosie, immediately release a
statement saying he is not guilty, he has nothing to hide,
is one hunch percent innocent.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
We also learn more about why Richard Allen was arrested
in the first place when the probable cause affidavit is
released to the public.
Speaker 14 (24:25):
That is what the public is going to be basing
their initial opinion as to innocence are killed on.
Speaker 12 (24:31):
We learn that the evidence shows that Abby and Libby
are dropped off at the trails at one forty nine PM,
and we already knew that Libby's video recording that man
on the bridge happened at two thirteen. Just twenty four
minutes later.
Speaker 5 (24:47):
We learned that the video has one of the girls
saying the word gun. We also find out about some
physical evidence. An unspent, unfired forty caliber round is found
in between the bodies.
Speaker 14 (24:59):
They then brought or had examined by Indiana State trooper
who had some training with tool markings. He gave a
subjective opinion that he thought that the gun that they
recovered in Richard Allen's home pursuant of the search was
a match.
Speaker 20 (25:15):
To me, the most damaging piece of evidence that the
State of Indiana has against Richard Allen is the unspent
round that cycled through his gun found just two feet
away from Libby Jerman. He is either the unluckiest guy
in the world or he was there at the scene
(25:35):
when those two girls were murdered.
Speaker 5 (25:37):
The probable Cause reveals at least four witnesses, three teenage
girls and one adult woman saw someone generally matching the
description of the person in Libby's video between one twenty
six pm at two thirteen pm, the time that Abby
and Libby were encountering that man on the bridge.
Speaker 12 (25:54):
And one of those witnesses is seen on surveillance video
arriving a brown one for six peter and she says
she parked her car and then walked out to the
bridge where she saw a man standing on the bridge
about fifty feet away. She didn't walk onto the bridge,
she turned around and walked back in the direction she
came and when she did that, she passed two young
(26:16):
girls who were walking towards the bridge, and she believes
that was Abby and Libby.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Another witness says that she was driving north of the
trails that day and about two hours after the abduction,
she saw a man in a blue jacket walking in
the opposite direction quote muddy and bloody.
Speaker 5 (26:35):
Just before Richard Allen was arrested in October of twenty
twenty two, he met with investigators again after they had
resurfaced his name and he said, yes, I was there.
I was wearing a blue jacket, I was wearing a
blue pants, may have been wearing a hat.
Speaker 20 (26:48):
One of the other most damaging pieces of evidence came
from Richard Allen in him admitting to being on the
trail that day.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
Think about it.
Speaker 20 (26:57):
He's admitting to being there from one thirty three and
he claims he went there to watch the fish. So
how unlucky is this guy that he admits to being
present and his window encompasses the window of time that
investigators believe those beautiful girls were murdered.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
About eight months after his arrest, a slew of documents
are released, and that's when we find out that Richard
Allen has confessed.
Speaker 20 (27:25):
His confessions are going to be a major problem for
this defense team.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
We need to have more than that.
Speaker 20 (27:33):
Whenever we have a criminal case, a confession alone is
not enough.
Speaker 12 (27:36):
So the state is mounting this case.
Speaker 20 (27:38):
With other pieces of evidence that corroborate what he's admitting to.
We haven't heard the confessions yet, We're just aware that
prosecutors have alerted the court to the fact that he
has made admissions made them to his wife by way
of a jail phone call. And that they plan to
introduce that evidence.
Speaker 5 (27:57):
So everything we've been hearing up to this point is
the theory of the case from the prosecution, from law enforcement,
and then via filings we start to hear from the defense,
and the details that they lay out are like nothing
we could possibly have imagined today.
Speaker 10 (28:15):
Like I said, unexpected, out of left field. One hundred
and thirty pages worth of information in just one of
the filings that was released. They are pointing the finger
in a very specific direction as to who's responsible for this.
Speaker 5 (28:30):
And it's not Richard Allen.
Speaker 10 (28:32):
It's some sort of a religious sect slash cult that
follow Odinism and it was a sacrifice.
Speaker 14 (28:44):
Wow, when that thing dropped he was a defense attorney.
Speaker 9 (28:49):
It blew my mind. I had never seen a filing
like that. My name is Mark pitt Cavage. I'm a
senior research fellow with the Anti Defamation League Center on Extremism.
The defense argument that Odinism was involved in the murder
is largely based on the idea that there were Norse
(29:16):
pagan symbols left at the scene of the crime in
the form of sticks or branches or blood patterns, and
it's not clear to me that any such symbols were
actually left at the scene in the first place. Odinism
is one of the branches of white supremacy. There are
(29:38):
a number of different types of white supremacy, and it's
derived from a religion that is the easiest way to
put is modern Norse paganism. Modern Norse paganism is the
revival of some of the old Scandinavian myths and religious
beliefs centered around the ancient Norse gods like Odin and
(30:02):
Thor and Freya. Most modern Norse pagans are not racists,
they're not white supremacists. The religion as a whole is innocuous,
but this one part of it is not so innocuous.
It's much more problematic. So at the Center on Extremism
we try and track extremism in a lot of different ways.
One of the things that we started doing in two
(30:23):
thousand and eight was to track extremist related murders, where
we created a database to track extremists domestic extremist related murders.
Because those allegations were raised, we have been tracking the
progress of the case to see if any of them
are ever at some point substantiated with evidence. If and
(30:43):
that's a big. If any of the allegations were actually substantiated,
then we would certainly add it to our database.
Speaker 12 (30:51):
At that point, the defense says this theory of the
crime was never fully explored by law enforcement and that
men they've identified as potential suspects were cleared too easily, and.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
After making those bombshell claims, the defense is off the case.
Speaker 10 (31:12):
Coming up, graphic crime scene photos make their way to YouTube.
Speaker 14 (31:17):
Pictures like that are just going to incite and enrage people,
and they are going to blame the person that's under arrest.
Speaker 5 (31:40):
In October of twenty twenty three, work gets out that
crime scene photos have leaked, apparently from the office of Baldwin,
and what it turns out had happened was that someone
who was in his office had taken pictures of the
evidence and shared them.
Speaker 14 (31:55):
Thankfully, these things didn't make it out to the public
and mass for number one. For the families, like the
nightmare of them getting online one day and opening up
a picture of their daughter is like beyond words. The
other thing is you worry about is if they get out,
it destroys Rick Allen's opportunity to have a fair trial.
Just does because pictures like that are just going to
(32:16):
incite and enrage people, and they are going to blame
the person that's under arrest.
Speaker 12 (32:21):
Defense attorney Andrew Baldwin says he's essentially the victim of
a theft. But the judge is furious and she accuses
the defense team of being incompetent and negligent.
Speaker 18 (32:33):
We've had an unexpected turn of events, Ladies and gentlemen.
Mister Baldwin made an oral motion to withdraw. I granted
that oral motion to withdraw, and mister Rosie will be
submitting a written motion to withdraw. I'm assuming within the
next couple of days.
Speaker 5 (32:52):
With Baldwin and Rosie off the case, Richard Allen still
needs a defense, so Judge Gull appoints two attorneys from
her home county of Allen County.
Speaker 12 (33:00):
She picks Allen County's chief public defender, William Lobrado and
Robert Screman. But that's not the last that we hear
of Rosie and Baldwin. They say they were coursed into
leaving the case and they fight to get back on.
Speaker 1 (33:14):
So that issue goes to the Indiana Supreme Court, who
quickly rule that the original defense team should have never
been removed.
Speaker 12 (33:21):
Seventy nine days after they were appointed. Librado and Scremmen
are off the case, and Rosie and Baldwin are back.
Speaker 11 (33:31):
I was asked to do a job. I did my job.
I was then told two gentlemen are going to take over.
It is what it is. My name's William Labrado. I
am now Richard Allen's former lead counselor. I don't think
mister Allen had anything to do with this.
Speaker 12 (33:49):
You're a defense attorney, so that's your job to sort
of say your client is innocent, and.
Speaker 11 (33:56):
Rarely do I believe it. But in this particular case,
I believe it. And what convinced you conversations with him,
the fact that he lived in this very small community
that's not much bigger than a high school. He worked
(34:18):
at the CVS in Delphi. The police sketches are hung
up in the CVS. The bridge guy picture is in
the CVS, and in five and a half years, no
one comes into that store and says that kind of
looks like you. I don't know if this has any relevance,
(34:39):
and you know I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but arrest
was made twenty four, twenty seven days before a sheriff election.
Speaker 12 (34:51):
How would you characterize the case as you know it
against Richard.
Speaker 11 (34:55):
Allen Well, it's obviously circumstantial. I haven't seen a direct
evidence that other than he admitted that he was on
the bridge that day and we think during the same
timeframe as the girls were.
Speaker 20 (35:12):
There's technically both direct evidence and circumstantial evidence. For example,
his confession, that's direct evidence. Witnesses eyewitnesses seeing it Goby direct.
Speaker 11 (35:22):
Evidence eyewitness haestimony inherently unreliable in my opinion. They all
say saw the same person, and you have that many
different descriptions. That's a problem.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
Rosie and Baldwin, in a filing, claimed the descriptions attributed
to witnesses and the probable cause affidavit are wrong.
Speaker 12 (35:44):
So remember the witness who said that she walked out
to the bridge and saw a man standing on it,
and then she passed what she believes Rabby and Libby
as she was walking back to her car. Well, the
defense says that the state left out that woman's description
the man she saw. She described a young man, possibly
in his twenties, clean shaven, with a boyish look.
Speaker 5 (36:08):
That description is actually what led to the second sketch
which was made in February of twenty seventeen but not
released until April of twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
And the witness who saw a man walking on the
road both muddy and bloody, actually just saw a man
who was muddy. According to the defense.
Speaker 14 (36:25):
Richard Allen's five to four. So when you're talking about
the witness statements, okay, in none of them that would
have been the first descriptive thing that I would have
said is that he's really short. Not one of them
said that he was a really short guy, And that
would have been, like to me, the first descriptor, you know,
and it just didn't happen.
Speaker 12 (36:47):
Bradley Rosie and Andrew Baldwin also said there's no electronic
evidence linking him to the crime scene or the girls,
and that there's no DNA of his at the scene.
Speaker 11 (37:00):
Yes, as far as I can tell, yes, nothing forensically
other than this bullet that they claimed that they found
that they shot through a barrel. That there's no way
to compare the markings a bullet projectile shell casing would
have fired through a barrel compared to ejection marks. And
(37:26):
it was to my knowledge about two inches underground.
Speaker 12 (37:31):
What do you think is the biggest piece of evidence
in this case.
Speaker 11 (37:36):
There's an alleged confession. That's it to me.
Speaker 12 (37:41):
You had not heard of Odonism when it first was
floated with regard to this case.
Speaker 11 (37:47):
I honestly thought I thought it was hocus pocus. I
honestly didn't.
Speaker 5 (37:51):
I'd never heard of it.
Speaker 11 (37:53):
And the more I got into it, that's a real thing.
It is a real thing, and it's scary. I believe
they sacrificed a girl and killed another one.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
In addition to pointing the finger at several men who
allegedly practice Odinism, the defense says that several of the
prison guards in charge of Richard Allen were wearing Odinism
patches on their uniform.
Speaker 12 (38:20):
You described one of those officers. It's mentioned in one
of Rosie and Baldwin's filings, Sergeant Jones, who was wearing
patches that said in Odin we trust on his Department
of Corrections uniform. The judge ordered the warden to make
them stop.
Speaker 2 (38:41):
And then what did.
Speaker 11 (38:42):
You notice that mister Jones had a tattooed under his
right eye. From the bus, we can tell it looks
a lot like Odin's spear.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Both sets of Richard Allen's defense attorneys have raised issues
about what they call harsh conditions behind bars. Rosie and
Baldwin also alleged that Richard Allen's family was threatened if
he didn't confess.
Speaker 11 (39:08):
There's no ties to this oldness to call whatsoever. He
didn't even know that there was oldness in Delfa. He
had never heard of it.
Speaker 6 (39:18):
Up.
Speaker 9 (39:18):
Next, did Abby and Libby's killer have help?
Speaker 5 (39:22):
One of the major things hanging out there right now
about this story is the fact that there are likely
other people involved in this crime.
Speaker 13 (39:47):
Hopefully justice for Abby and Libby Bill means some closure
for their family members. I always see you never get
complete closure in a homicide case because there is a
void left in your heart that can never if would
be still but some bit of closure, some bit of
justice and peace knowing that the right person has been
help responsible and can't hurt anyone ever again.
Speaker 2 (40:10):
All that being said, the State.
Speaker 20 (40:11):
Of Indiana has mounted quite a case to prove that
Richard Allen is that person.
Speaker 7 (40:19):
As sees in Bloom at the side of you, oh
so priceless. So this was a song that actually played
at her funeral, and just the way that it describes
I see you dressed in why Every wrong Made right?
Or it really makes me think of Abby as angelic.
(40:44):
I feel connected to her. It just really makes me
think that she's an angel by my side. Rather than
the things that she went through and how she died,
there are a lot of things that make me think
of her. I got this tattoo of butterflies on my arm,
(41:06):
and that was just a huge part of her.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
She loved butterflies.
Speaker 7 (41:28):
I think what is important is talking about who they
were while they were living, and that's what's most important
to me. I really want to make sure that people
know that they were good people and that their lives
are constantly part.
Speaker 2 (41:49):
Of everyone who knew them's lives.
Speaker 7 (41:55):
True justice would be that there would be no need
for justice at all, that it never would have happened,
that they never would have been taken from us, that
they never would have been treated.
Speaker 2 (42:08):
In that way.
Speaker 7 (42:10):
For me, there's a piece that really never will reach justice.
Speaker 5 (42:21):
One of the major things hanging out there right now
about this story is the fact that there are likely
other people involved in this crime. Prosecutor Nick McCleland said
that himself there could be other actors involved. Former Sheriff
tob Blesenbie saying under oath that he believes it would
have taken at least two people to commit this crime.
Speaker 14 (42:39):
And you just have to hope that law enforcement is
up to the task because they're putting all the cards
on the table with Rick Allen at this point. You know,
but we still have that thing, don't we sitting there
saying we think that they were more involved. So we
have to hope that they're continuing to investigate it.
Speaker 5 (43:18):
It's easing all this back and forth and debate about
this case. Who did it, who didn't do it, who
might have done it. It's easy to lose the victims,
Abby and Libby. I learned early on and throughout that
these girls were the absolute lights in the lives of
those who loved them. Abby and Libby were loved. Justice
(43:43):
in this case is going to mean different things to
different people. I'm not going to presume to define that
for those who love them. My definition is a little
more traditional. It's arresting and punishing the person or people
responsible for this, whoever that may be, and however long
that takes.
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