DELPHI, Ind. (WAND) - The man accused of killing two young girls in the small town of Delphi, Indiana has been found guilty on all counts.
WTHR reported Richard Allen has been found guilty on all four counts he was facing in the murders of Liberty German, 14, and Abigail Williams, 13.
Allen, 52, was charged with two counts of murder and two additional counts of murder while committing or attempting to commit kidnapping in the killings.
He will be sentenced Dec. 20.
This image provided by Indiana State Police shows Richard Matthew Allen. Indiana authorities have arrested the man in the unsolved slayings of two teenage girls who were killed while hiking five years ago near their small community in northern Indiana hometown, police said Monday, Oct. 31, 2022. State Police Superintendent Doug Carter announced that Allen, 50, was arrested Friday on two murder counts in the killings of Liberty German, 14, and Abigail Williams, 13, in a case that has haunted the Indiana city of about 3,000 people. (Indiana State Police via AP)
Carroll County Prosecutor Nicholas McLeland told jurors Allen is the man who appears in a grainy cellphone video recorded by one of the girls as they crossed an abandoned railroad bridge just before they vanished on Feb. 13, 2017.
Monday marked Day 4 of deliberations for the jury.
Allen made multiple confessions, admitting to the killings, including telling his wife he killed the girls.
Allen's defense had claimed Allen's confessions were not valid, saying he was delirious and psychotic after months of being held in solitary confinement.
No DNA, fingerprints, or forensic evidence linked Allen to the murder scene, further complicating the case.
However, the prosecution pointed in closing arguments to an unspent bullet found between the teens’ bodies that they said “had been cycled through” Allen’s .40-caliber Sig Sauer handgun. A firearms expert called by the defense questioned the state police analysis.
The prosecutor also said a state trooper who had listened to more than 700 phone calls placed by Allen had identified Allen's voice on German’s cellphone video telling the teens, “Down the hill″ after they crossed an abandoned railroad trestle called the Monon High Bridge, according to the Associated Press.
The prosecution said Allen, armed with a gun, forced the girls off the trail and that he had planned to rape them before a passing van made him change his plans.
Crime scene photos showed the girls were found with their throats cut the next day, about a quarter mile from the bridge, the AP said.
Prosecutors said Allen's confessions contained information only the killer could have known.
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