A jury and alternates have been chosen for the double murder trial of the Indiana man who is accused of killing two teenage girls on a hiking trail in 2017. The case has puzzled police for years and has sparked interest across the country.
The deaths of Abby Williams, 13, and Libby German, 14, are being blamed on Richard Allen. He is being charged with murder.
It was found that the teenage girls were dead near the Monon High Bridge in Carroll County, Indiana. They had been missing since February 2017 while hiking and not coming back. Allen has said he is not guilty.
Because of all the news attention, the jurors were chosen in Allen County, which is near Fort Wayne and about 100 miles east of Delphi, Indiana.
On Thursday morning in Allen County, the jurors will be sworn in. After that, they will be locked up and taken to Carroll County, where the hearing will take place.
Andrew Baldwin, one of Allen’s defense lawyers, showed new evidence that could be used in the trial for the first time on Tuesday. He said, “But it wasn’t Richard Allen’s hair that was found in one of the girls’ hands.”
A bullet that was found at the scene of the crime was also described by Baldwin as “open to interpretation.”
Police say that the.40-caliber round that was found near the bodies of the two girls had been fired through Allen’s Sig Sauer Model P226.
How the teens were killed has never been made public by the authorities. In addition to the gun and bullet evidence, court papers also say that a knife was used in the killings.
Two different things happened on Tuesday. Prosecutors asked the judge to stop the defense from using early composite sketches of a person of interest in the killings during the trial.
Nick McLeland, the prosecutor for Carroll County, said the pictures had nothing to do with finding Allen to be the main suspect. In the motion, the plaintiffs ask the court to tell the defense not to talk about or draw the sketches during the hearing.
As they looked into the killings, police shared two different sketches of a person they thought might have done them. The first one showed an older man who, according to police, was not a person of interest.
On Thursday, Special Judge Frances Gull will hear the prosecutor’s request and make a decision.
Tuesday was a court day, and Williams’ grandparents and two members of German’s family were there.
The first comments will begin on Friday.
The killings of the girls shocked the small, close-knit town of about 3,000 people. For five years, the case remained a public murder mystery as police begged people with knowledge to come forward.
Early on, some of the most important proof came from the girls themselves. Police say that the older of the two girls was able to record a short video clip of a guy walking on the bridge near where the girls were last seen.
Later, the police shared a blurry picture of the suspect, who was wearing jeans and a dark jacket.
The girls also caught a man’s voice saying, “Guys, down the hill.”
Allen was arrested in October 2022. He was married, had a child, lived in Delphi, and worked at the nearby CVS.
According to court records, Allen told police that he was on the trail that day, but he denied having anything to do with the killings.
Authorities said Allen confessed to the killings several times in a jail phone call with his wife in April 2023, according to court documents.