DELPHI, Ind. (AP) — Murder trial in Two teenage girls were murdered in 2017 The case began Friday in a small Indiana town where the teens and the man accused of killing them all lived.
Richard Allen, 52, is accused of killing 13-year-old Abigail Williams and 14-year-old Liberty German. Their deaths remained unsolved for more than five years when Allen, a pharmacy employee at the time, was arrested in the case, and the case received significant attention from true crime enthusiasts.
Allen had been in Delphi all his life, living and working in a community of about 3,000 people in northwest Indiana. He is charged with two counts of murder and two counts of murder during kidnapping or attempted kidnapping. If convicted, Allen could face up to 130 years in prison.
almost two years later Arrested in October 2022Opening statements are scheduled to begin in front of a special judge in the Carroll County Courthouse, a few blocks from the pharmacy where Allen worked. The jury was assembled from nearly 100 miles (160 kilometers) away. They will be kept in isolation throughout the trial, which is expected to last a month, and will be prohibited from watching the news and allowed limited use of mobile phones to call relatives under the supervision of bailiffs. It turns out.
The judge also prohibited media coverage from the courtroom during the trial.
Prosecutors said this during jury selection in Fort Wayne this week. They say they plan to call about 50 witnesses. Mr. Allen’s legal team plans to call about 120 people. The 12 jurors and four alternates will receive advance instructions Friday morning before hearing opening statements.
The case has been subject to repeated delays over leaked evidence. Allen’s public defender withdraws and after them Recovery by the Indiana Supreme Court. It is also Subject to gag order.
The teens, known as Abby and Libby, were found dead on February 14, 2017, in a rugged wooded area about 400 meters from the Monon High Bridge Trail. The girls went missing the previous day while hiking on a trail just outside their hometown. Within a few days, the police released him. A file was found on Libby’s phone. They believe they have captured images and audio of the killer – two grainy photos and audio of a man saying: “Go down the hill.”
Investigators also released one sketch of the suspect in July 2017 and another in April 2019. They also released a short video of the suspect walking over an abandoned railroad bridge known as the Monon High Bridge. After years without a suspect identified, investigators said they retrospectively reviewed “previous information.”
Investigators discovered Allen had been questioned in 2017. Allen told police he was walking down the street on the day Abby and Libby went missing and saw three “women” on a bridge called Freedom Bridge but did not speak to them. It is said that he did. in the affidavit.
Allen told officers that he did not see anyone as he walked from the bridge to the Monon High Bridge, but that he was distracted by simply “watching the stock market on his cell phone while walking.” .
Police interviewed Allen again on October 13, 2022, when he said he saw three “girls” during a walk in 2017. Investigators searched Allen’s home and seized a .40 caliber handgun. Prosecutors said tests showed that Allen’s gun was “fired” by an unspent bullet found between Abby and Libby’s bodies.
Allen said he had never been to the scene and had “no explanation why the bullet that passed through his firearm was in that location,” according to the affidavit.
Allen County Superior Court Judge Fran Gall, who is currently overseeing the Carroll County case, cited dozens of incriminating statements Allen allegedly made during conversations with correctional officers, inmates, law enforcement and relatives. The court ruled that prosecutors can present evidence of That evidence includes recordings of phone calls between Allen and his wife, which prosecutors say: he confesses to the murder.
Allen’s attorney is trying to argue the girls were murdered. in a ritual sacrifice By members of the Nordic pagan and white supremacist group known as the Odinists.
Prosecutors have not said how the teens were killed. However, documents filed in court by Allen’s lawyers in support of their ritual sacrifice theory state that their throats had been slit.
