The convicted killer at the center of the 2017 Delphi murders is now claiming his own confessions should never have been used against him, arguing that he was suffering a severe psychological crisis when he repeatedly admitted killing two teenage girls.
Richard Allen, 54, was convicted in 2024 of murdering best friends 13-year-old Abigail Williams and 14-year-old Liberty German, whose deaths sent shockwaves through the close knit Indiana community.
He is currently serving a 130-year prison sentence, 65 years for each girl.
Now his lawyers are fighting to have those convictions overturned, arguing that Allen’s increasingly bizarre behavior and statements behind bars were the result of a serious mental health crisis.
The appeal was heard by the Indiana Court of Appeals on Monday, with Allen’s attorneys arguing that his alleged confessions were unreliable because of his deteriorating psychological state in prison.
It is the latest twist in a case that began with one of the most chilling pieces of evidence ever captured on a victim’s cellphone.
On February 13, 2017, Abby and Libby had gone for a walk near the Monon High Bridge in Delphi during a day off from school when a man approached them.
Libby, just 14, managed to record a short video on her phone. The grainy footage showed a man walking along the railroad bridge, while a male voice could be heard ordering the girls: ‘Down the hill.’
Richard Allen’s defense attorneys alleged in an appeal on Monday that the 2017 killings of 14-year-old Liberty ‘Libby’ German and 13-year-old Abigail ‘Abby’ Williams were carried out by members of a pagan cult dedicated to Odin, a war god in Norse mythology, and that Allen was framed by law enforcement as the main suspect in the murders
The girls had the day off school on February 13, 2017 and had decided to go for a walk near the Monon High Bridge in Delphi
The eighth graders would soon vanish along the rural abandoned railroad trail and were found with their throats slashed the next day, however the most compelling piece of evidence presented at the time of Allen’s conviction was a video Libby had taken with a male voice that could be heard saying ‘Down the hill girls’.
The eerie recording would become one of the defining pieces of evidence in the investigation.
Prosecutors later argued that Allen was the man captured in the footage and that he used a handgun to force the girls away from the trail before they were killed.
Their bodies were found the next day, and their throats had been slashed. One was found nude while the other was wearing the first victim’s clothes.
Yet Allen would remain free for more than five years before he was arrested in October 2022.
At his trial, prosecutors presented an unspent cartridge discovered between the victims which they said had been cycled through Allen’s handgun.
But perhaps the most extraordinary evidence came from Allen himself.
While behind bars awaiting trial, he allegedly made a series of increasingly disturbing statements about the murders.
According to testimony heard during the trial, Allen repeatedly confessed to killing Abby and Libby.
Richard Allen was convicted in 2024 and sentenced to 130 years with 65 years for each girl
At the time of the conviction Libby German’s grandfather, Mike Patty, said on behalf of both families, ‘Justice has been served for the girls. I want to thank the jurors, who took time out of their lives. For that, I will always be grateful.’
However now Allen is appealing his sentencing, with his lawyers stating he was suffering from a psychological crisis resulting from prison conditions and confessed wrongly at the time. His lawyers also pointed to a sketch of the suspect that was withheld from the first trial
One prison employee testified that Allen said: ‘I, Richard Matthew Allen, killed Abby and Libby by myself.’
Another witness said Allen described planning to sexually assault the girls before panicking and killing them.
Over 60 confessions in-person, over the phone and in writing, were presented at trial. But his lawyers now insist those statements and evidence cannot be relied upon.
The defense argues that Allen’s prolonged isolation and the conditions of his imprisonment – in solitary confinement- contributed to a severe psychological breakdown.
They proposed that the deterioration of his mental state led him to convince himself that he had killed the girls, arguing he was experiencing psychosis when some of the alleged confessions were made and adding that jurors should have been given more information about his mental state.
‘We live in a world where one or two things happen here,’ his attorney Mark Leeman said. ‘A pharmacy tech with no criminal history goes out for a walk to watch a stock ticker and look at fish and decides to gruesomely murder two girls. Or, we live in a world where the police through confirmation bias failed to find the right guy.’
Videos of Allen’s behavior in prison were displayed to jurors in an effort to convince them that Allen was unable to comprehend what he was confessing to at the time. The court has yet to decide if Allen will be given a new trial
Prosecutors strongly dispute that interpretation, maintaining that Allen’s confessions were genuine and have pointed to the timing of his statements, arguing that he began making admissions before some of the more extreme behavior later observed in prison.
Videos of Allen’s odd behavior in prison were shown to jurors, the appeals judges questioned why the trial judge did not allow the audio to be played as well, audio in which Allen claimed to be a king and that he had started World War III.
The panel also questioned why a defense expert wasn’t allowed to question whether marks on an unfired bullet can be traced to a specific gun, as prosecutors had asserted.
They also asked why a police sketch of someone seen near the trail was omitted from trial, noting that the sketch looked nothing like Allen.
His lawyers have also challenged other evidence used at trial and argued that jurors should have been allowed to consider an alternative theory involving unknown perpetrators and an alleged Norse pagan ritual.
The appeals court has yet to rule on whether he should receive a new trial.
The Daily Mail has reached out to Allen’s attorney Mark Leeman for comment.
