Pharmacy lab technician Richard Allen didn’t really stand out in Delphi, Ind., a town of 3,000 people about a one-hour drive north of Indianapolis, where a meatpacking plant is the biggest employer.
“Our community is very friendly and people say ‘hello’ with smiles,” resident Kathy Clendening tells A&E Crime + Investigation. “Richard Allen wasn’t that way, but he was a familiar face if you went into CVS.”
Allen led an unassuming life and worked at Delphi’s only CVS store until 2022, when he was charged with the February 2017 kidnapping and double murder of teens Liberty “Libby” German and Abigail “Abby” Williams.
After Allen’s arrest, Libby’s grandmother Becky Patty told reporters that Allen had printed photos at no charge of the two girls after they died that were displayed at the girls’ funerals.
Clendening, a warehouse manager who has lived in Delphi since 2002, befriended the victims’ families after the murders.
“My family always thought that the person who did it was from the community or really knew the area well,” Clendening says. “When [Allen] was taken in, it was kind of like, ‘Oh wow! That’s the guy who works at CVS!’”
Victim Takes Cellphone Video of Man On Trail
Allen would not be arrested in the case until 2022, five years after the girls disappeared while walking together on a trail and were found dead one day later.
Early on in the investigation into the murders, a cryptic key piece of evidence that Libby produced just before she disappeared brought national attention to the case. Using her cellphone while on the trail, Libby recorded a brief video of a man walking toward her and Abby on Delphi’s Monon High Bridge trail on the day they died. Investigators found the phone under Abby’s body.
In an effort to get leads into his identity, police released a still image of the man and an audio snippet of him saying the words “down the hill.” Months after the trial, authorities publicly released the full video.
Prosecutors later said that Allen forced 14-year-old Libby and 13-year-old Abby at gunpoint down a hill next to the trail and killed the middle school students by slitting their throats with a knife. Their bodies were discovered along a creek and an unspent bullet found at the crime scene was eventually matched to a semiautomatic pistol police from Allen’s house.
Allen’s defense team accused law enforcement authorities of conducting a shoddy investigation, including ignoring another possible suspect, as well as destroying and hiding evidence. As a result, Allen appealed the verdict in March 2025. Allen’s lawyers, who maintain Allen’s innocence, the Indiana State Police and Carroll County Sheriff's Office all declined comment to A&E Crime + Investigation.
What Happened to Delphi, Indiana Teens Libby German and Abby Williams?
One of the young victims may have captured audio and photo clues that point toward the killer.
One of the young victims may have captured audio and photo clues that point toward the killer.
Media Horde Converges on Delphi for the Trial
During the high-profile murder trial, Allen and the victims’ relatives, locals, reporters and true crime podcasters packed the courtroom.
“Podcasters and YouTubers were paying people to sit in lawn chairs to save their spots in line the night before the trial started,” Clendening says.
She attended the first day of the trial, when Patty testified about the last conversation she had with her granddaughter, saying she told the girl to get a jacket and that Libby responded, “Grandma, I’ll be OK.”
“After listening to Becky’s testimony, I really didn’t want to go anymore,” Clendening says.
Testimony Reveals an Unnoticed Early Clue
Journalist Susan Hendricks, author of Down the Hill: My Descent into the Double Murder in Delphi, attended Allen’s trial and tells A&E Crime + Investigation that prosecutors revealed Allen talked with an Indiana conservation officer assisting on the case just three days after the murders. At a grocery store parking lot, Allen told the officer that he had been on the trail the day of the murders and passed three girls along the way. The officer typed up his notes and submitted the paperwork for the investigative file, but prosecutors said it went unnoticed for five years.
Kathy Shank, a volunteer clerk in Delphi, testified at trial that she discovered the officer’s notes in 2022 when she was helping authorities organize thousands of tips as they sought new leads. Carroll County Sheriff Tony Liggett, who also took the stand, testified that the Allen tip “fell in the cracks” and that Allen “was hiding in plain sight.”
Investigators never found the murder weapon or any DNA linking Allen to the crime scene, but witnesses told jurors that they saw a man whose clothes matched those worn by the man in Libby’s video on the day of her and Abby’s murders. During the trial, investigators also revealed that Allen was off from work the day the girls disappeared and did not have an alibi, Hendricks says.
Prosecutors Say Allen Confesses 61 Times
Prosecutors said Allen incriminated himself 61 times while being held in Indiana’s Westville Correctional Facility before he went to trial.
Jurors heard some of those confessions via recorded jailhouse phone calls Allen made to his wife and mother. A prison psychologist also testified that Allen confessed multiple times during therapy.
Allen’s defense team countered that he made the statements while suffering a mental health crisis and when he was in solitary confinement under suicide watch.
The confessions included an April 3, 2023, call from Allen to his wife, Kathy, in which he stated: “I killed Abby and Libby.” When she refuted this, he replied, “I think I did. I don’t know. I wish they would kill me and let me apologize to the families.”
During a phone call Allen had with his mother, Janis Allen, the next month, he said, “Did Kathy tell you I did it?” and “I’m just worried you guys aren’t going to love me because I said I did it.”
When the phone calls were played during the trial, Allen did not sound “psychotic or manic,” according to Hendricks.
“It sounded like he was having a casual conversation,” she continues. “He sounded believable. And it’s the same voice you heard in the video clip from Libby’s phone.”
After a trial lasting two months, Allen was convicted on two counts of murder in December 2024 and sentenced to 130 years in prison. Under Indiana law, a person convicted of more than one murder and who receives more than a life sentence is not eligible for parole.
