Richard Allen, a convicted killer from Delphi, Indiana, was sentenced to 130 years in prison on Friday for the murders of two teenage girls in 2017, as the victims’ families spoke in court.
Allen was sentenced to 65 years for each murder, which will be served consecutively.
Allen, dressed in an orange jumpsuit, a gray sweatshirt, and ankle chains, looked over to the courtroom seats reserved for his family, which were empty. None of his relatives attended the sentencing.
He had no reaction to his sentence.
Last month, a jury found Allen guilty on all charges in the double homicide: felony murder for the killing of 13-year-old Abigail “Abby” Williams while attempting to commit kidnapping; felony murder for the killing of 14-year-old Liberty “Libby” German while attempting to commit kidnapping; murder for knowingly killing Abby; and murder for knowingly killing Libby.
A gag order prevented Abby and Libby’s families from speaking out during or after Allen’s trial.
Becky Patty, Libby’s grandmother, broke her silence on Friday, saying at sentencing, “I can never change my decision to let Libby and Abby go to the trails that day.”
“I hope he lives with the same fear he caused Abby and Libby in the last hour of their lives,” she told me.
Libby’s mom, Carrie Timmons, said Allen’s decisions created a “path of destruction.”
“I was blind that such evil existed,” she said.
Timmons said she suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, guilt and anxiety.
She said Libby would be 22 years old now, but the family has stopped celebrating her birthday because it’s too difficult.
“You could’ve taken accountability,” Libby’s grandfather, Mike Patty, said to Allen. “You need to stand up and not appeal.”
Diane Erskin, Abby’s grandmother, stated, “This is a day of great sadness for our family.” We will not be going home to celebrate with champagne.”
Nearly eight years after her granddaughter’s murder, Erskin said, “I’ve watched her friends graduate college and wondered how many great-grandchildren were murdered that day, too.”
Erskin said Abby’s last words on Libby’s phone were “don’t leave me up here,” so the bereaved grandmother refused to leave the trial, even during difficult testimony.
Indiana State Police Lt. Jerry Holeman described the crime as “brutal,” telling the judge Abby and Libby were stalked, kidnapped, humiliated, and “treated like animals.”
“I can’t imagine their fear,” he said.
He described Allen as “manipulative and persuasive” and accused him of a “lack of remorse.”
Judge Fran Gull told Allen, “I’ve spent 27 years as a judge, and you rank right up there with the most heinous crimes in the state of Indiana.”
“You rank right up there in the extraordinary impact on family, including the generational impact,” she told me. “These families will deal with your carnage forever.”
“You sit here and roll your eyes at me like you rolled your eyes at me through this trial,” she told me.
At a press conference following the sentencing, Carroll County Prosecuting Attorney Nicholas McLeland thanked Abby and Libby for assisting in the arrest of their own killer.
Libby had the “wherewithal to pull out her phone… to know that something wasn’t right” and record the suspect as he walked across the bridge, McLeland said, calling it “arguably the biggest piece of evidence that we had — that recording.”
He praised Abby for concealing the phone from the killer so that law enforcement could locate it.
Indiana State Police Superintendent Doug Carter stressed that anyone who shares the leaked crime scene photos of Abby and Libby should be held accountable.
“The crime scene photos are still out there,” McLeland said, urging anyone who receives the photos to delete them to avoid revictimizing the families.
McLeland has filed a motion to keep the crime scene photos, autopsy photos and Allen’s mental health records confidential.
Carroll County Sheriff Tony Liggett apologized to the families for the case taking eight years to reach a conclusion.
“There will never be any closure in this case,” the sheriff told reporters. “Although justice was served, it did not bring Abby or Libby back. These families will have to go through each day without two of their most important loved ones. They are missing milestones because a low-life coward chose to take their innocent lives.”
Abby and Libby were attacked while walking along a Delphi hiking trail on February 13, 2017. Their throats were slashed, and their bodies were dumped in the surrounding woods.
Libby shared a Snapchat photo of Abby on the Monon High Bridge just moments before the murders occurred. According to prosecutors, after crossing the bridge, the girls noticed a man behind them — known as “bridge guy” — and Libby began recording on her phone.
As police searched for the suspect, they released footage from Libby’s phone to the public: a grainy image of “bridge guy” and an audio clip of him telling the girls to go “down the hill.”
Allen, a husband and father who worked at a nearby CVS, was arrested in 2022.
“He developed photos with no remorse and didn’t blink,” Becky Patty told the court on Friday.
Allen admitted to police that he was on the trail that day, but he denied any involvement in the crime.
The prosecution’s key physical evidence was a.40-caliber unspent round discovered near the girls’ bodies. According to prosecutors, an unspent round was cycled through Allen’s Sig Sauer Model P226.
Allen’s multiple confessions in jail, as well as his mental health at the time, were also major topics of discussion during the trial. The defense claimed Allen was in a psychotic state when he confessed repeatedly to his psychologist, corrections officers, and his wife.