Abigail Williams & Liberty German

Case background and investigation

On February 13, 2017, best friends Abigail "Abby" Williams, 13, and Liberty "Libby" German, 14, were dropped off to hike the Monon High Bridge Trail near Delphi, Indiana, a small town in Carroll County. The girls failed to appear for a planned pickup that afternoon, and their bodies were found the following day, February 14, roughly half a mile from the abandoned railroad bridge. The killings of the two middle-school students shocked the community and drew national attention, beginning one of the most closely followed unsolved cases in Indiana history.

The investigation was shaped from the outset by evidence Libby German captured on her cellphone. Before the attack, she recorded video of a man walking on the bridge and audio in which a male voice instructs the girls to go "down the hill." Investigators released a still image of the man, dubbed "Bridge Guy," days after the murders, followed by the "down the hill" audio and, later, composite sketches of a suspect in 2017 and a revised sketch in 2019. Despite tens of thousands of tips and years of work by the Indiana State Police and the FBI, no arrest was made for more than five years.

On October 26, 2022, authorities took Richard Matthew Allen, a Delphi pharmacy technician then in his early 50s, into custody; he was formally charged with murder on October 31, 2022. The case reportedly advanced after investigators re-examined a 2017 tip that had been misfiled, placing Allen on the trail the day of the killings. Prosecutors said an unspent .40-caliber round found between the girls' bodies had been cycled through a pistol owned by Allen. Before trial, Allen maintained his innocence, and his defense advanced a theory—disputed by prosecutors and largely excluded by the court—that the girls were killed in a ritualistic attack tied to a pagan group; those pre-trial defense claims were never proven.

Allen's trial began on October 18, 2024, in Delphi before Special Judge Fran Gull. Jurors, brought in from Allen County, heard evidence over several weeks, including the cellphone recordings, the ammunition, and statements the state described as confessions Allen made while jailed. On November 11, 2024, the jury convicted Allen on all four counts—two counts of murder and two counts of felony murder—for the deaths of both girls. On December 20, 2024, Judge Gull sentenced him to the maximum, 65 years for each victim served consecutively, for a total of 130 years in prison.

Allen's attorneys said he would appeal and that he continued to maintain his innocence. In March 2025, the defense filed a notice of appeal with the Indiana Court of Appeals, later submitting a 113-page brief challenging both the conviction and the 130-year sentence. The appeal raises issues including the validity of the search warrant, the effect of Allen's lengthy pretrial solitary confinement on the reliability of his statements, and the trial court's exclusion of alternative-suspect evidence. As of 2026, Richard Allen's conviction stands and he remains incarcerated—transferred out of state under an interstate corrections agreement—while his appeal remains pending before the Indiana Court of Appeals.