Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / THE DELPHI MURDERS: TRIAL BEGINS WITH LIBBY, 14, ABBY, 13, BODIES FOUND & SLIT THROATS

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THE DELPHI MURDERS: TRIAL BEGINS WITH LIBBY, 14, ABBY, 13, BODIES FOUND & SLIT THROATS · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:01
Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace.
0:07
Speaker 2: The Delphi murders trial finally commences, with Libby just fourteen
0:14
Speaker 2: and Abby thirteen. Photos of their bodies found their throats
0:21
Speaker 2: slit tears in the courtroom working over the weekend, witnesses
0:28
Speaker 2: breaking down on the stand, one witness stating, when I
0:33
Speaker 2: first saw them, I thought they were mannequins. I'm Nancy Grace.
0:38
Speaker 2: This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us.
0:41
Speaker 3: As soon as you get into town, I mean, it's picturesque,
0:44
Speaker 3: it's beautiful, everybody's super friendly. You're talking about Delphi, Indiana.
0:50
Speaker 4: It was supposed to be a walk in the wood
0:52
Speaker 4: shared by two friends, Abby Williams and Lebby Jerman went
0:55
Speaker 4: to this hiking trail in near Delphi's monin high Bridge.
0:58
Speaker 3: But there's no way you find that if you're not
1:01
Speaker 3: from there.
1:02
Speaker 4: When the girls didn't return to the spot where they
1:04
Speaker 4: were supposed to be picked up, their families knew something
1:07
Speaker 4: was wrong.
1:07
Speaker 5: They thought maybe the girls were hurt. That bridge is treacherous,
1:11
Speaker 5: and they never thought they would hear that the girls
1:15
Speaker 5: were murdered.
1:17
Speaker 6: Directly to the killer, who may be in this room.
1:26
Speaker 6: We believe you are hiding in plain sight. For more
1:32
Speaker 6: than two years. You never thought we would shift gears
1:36
Speaker 6: to a different investigative strategy.
1:38
Speaker 2: But we have.
1:42
Speaker 6: We likely have interviewed you or someone close to you.
1:49
Speaker 6: We know that this is about power to you, and
1:54
Speaker 6: you want to know what we know, and one day
2:00
Speaker 6: you will.
2:00
Speaker 1: That day is now.
2:04
Speaker 2: You were just hearing a direct warning from Indiana State
2:08
Speaker 2: Police Superintendent Doug Carter, And oh how right he was
2:13
Speaker 2: when he gave that chilling warning. For two years, you
2:18
Speaker 2: never thought we would shift gears to an investigative strategy,
2:21
Speaker 2: a new strategy. We have likely interviewed you, And as
2:27
Speaker 2: it turns out, the you to whom he refers was
2:31
Speaker 2: a local pharmacy tech that had waited on Libby and
2:37
Speaker 2: Abby's family for years, even process their photos for free.
2:44
Speaker 2: How many times do you think he poured over photos,
2:48
Speaker 2: candid photos of those girls, watching them come in and
2:53
Speaker 2: out of the pharmacy. Again, this is crime stories. I'm
2:58
Speaker 2: Nancy Grayson. I want to thank you for being with us.
3:00
Speaker 2: The trial has commenced.
3:03
Speaker 1: Listen. Even though the.
3:04
Speaker 7: Case of Libby German and Abby Williams murders has been
3:07
Speaker 7: in the news for years, police have never said how
3:10
Speaker 7: the girls were killed during his opening statement, prosecutor Nick
3:13
Speaker 7: mcglealand told the jury, you're going to see the crime scene.
3:17
Speaker 7: It was a gruesome scene. Libby was completely naked, her
3:21
Speaker 7: throat was cut, blood all over. Abby's throat was also cut.
3:25
Speaker 2: Joining us at the courthouse is investigative reporter Susan Henrys.
3:28
Speaker 1: But before I go to her, I.
3:31
Speaker 2: Want to go out to Matt Murphy, high profile lawyer,
3:35
Speaker 2: former Orange County homicide prosecutor, ABC legal analyst and author
3:40
Speaker 2: of the book of Murder.
3:42
Speaker 1: Matt, thank you for being with us.
3:45
Speaker 2: I would try to warn victims' families about photos that
3:49
Speaker 2: would be introduced into court, and very often those photos
3:53
Speaker 2: would be put up on a slide show or hand
3:57
Speaker 2: it out to the jury so the victims families could
4:01
Speaker 2: be prepared. But I don't think there is ever any
4:04
Speaker 2: way to prepare the families of Libby, Liberty and Abby
4:10
Speaker 2: for what they are about to see.
4:12
Speaker 1: The girl's throats slashed.
4:14
Speaker 8: Yeah, I agree, I mean, it's this is a it's
4:16
Speaker 8: brutal for families. What you have to do as a prosecutor, though,
4:20
Speaker 8: is it's all about maintaining the integrity of the process.
4:23
Speaker 8: You don't want that to become a sideshow and the
4:25
Speaker 8: jury doesn't miss that, you know, So the family members
4:28
Speaker 8: that can't handle it, you've got to have them sit outside,
4:33
Speaker 8: you know, because you don't want you don't want that
4:35
Speaker 8: to be distracting. You want this jury to make the
4:37
Speaker 8: call based on the evidence and the law, and above
4:40
Speaker 8: all else, you want to make sure that you're you're
4:42
Speaker 8: avoiding appellate issues at every step because the case is
4:46
Speaker 8: so horrific and the only thing worse than going through
4:48
Speaker 8: something like this as a family is having to go
4:51
Speaker 8: through this whole process only to do it again because
4:53
Speaker 8: the case gets reversed because it's some sort of error.
4:56
Speaker 2: To just got Morgan, Professor Forensics, Jacksonville State Universe and
5:00
Speaker 2: author of Blood Beneath My Feet on Amazon. Star of
5:04
Speaker 2: a hit new series, Body Bags with Joe Scott. Morgan,
5:07
Speaker 2: Joe Scott, thank you for being with us. One of
5:10
Speaker 2: the last times that you and I dealt with a
5:14
Speaker 2: decapitation or near decapitation that actually.
5:17
Speaker 1: Went to the jury was.
5:20
Speaker 2: The case of course Nicole Brown Simpson murdered by former
5:26
Speaker 2: husband football star Orenthal James Simpson. The degree of blood
5:33
Speaker 2: from a near decapitation or decapitation is overwhelming what does
5:39
Speaker 2: that mean.
5:39
Speaker 1: That means it.
5:40
Speaker 2: Will be very difficult to determine if the defendants of
5:45
Speaker 2: blood is somewhere in there.
5:47
Speaker 1: And of course, Joe Scott.
5:49
Speaker 2: And one of his many, many, many confessions, Richard Allen
5:54
Speaker 2: blurted out something to an inmate that nobody else knew
5:59
Speaker 2: that he had perform the maurtters with a box cutter.
6:04
Speaker 1: What does that mean to you forensically.
6:06
Speaker 9: Well, in order to well, let's just think about the
6:08
Speaker 9: dynamics of a box cutter, the dimensions of it. It's
6:11
Speaker 9: a very shallow blade, it doesn't go very deep. So
6:14
Speaker 9: what does that mean. Well, we've got people throwing around
6:17
Speaker 9: terms like decapitation, Nancy, let me just say this plainly.
6:23
Speaker 9: If we're talking about decapitation with a box cutter, this
6:26
Speaker 9: would have taken a protracted period of time. This is
6:31
Speaker 9: not like using a knife, a hunting knife for instance,
6:34
Speaker 9: that has a long leading edge and now granted they're sharp,
6:39
Speaker 9: but it would take a protracted period of time. And
6:43
Speaker 9: you know, I'm more curious right now to hear what
6:46
Speaker 9: the forensic pathologist will say, and that's that's going to
6:50
Speaker 9: be a big tael here to give the dimensions of
6:53
Speaker 9: this injury. But I can say this, it would have
6:56
Speaker 9: been a very bloody affair. And the fact that this
7:00
Speaker 9: individual would have gotten out of there and not have
7:03
Speaker 9: been soiled by the blood that would not have transferred
7:08
Speaker 9: over to their person is.
7:12
Speaker 1: The odds.
7:12
Speaker 2: Wait a minute, Hold on, Hold on, Joe Scott Morgan,
7:15
Speaker 2: you're right about everything you said, and I want to
7:17
Speaker 2: follow up with you regarding the fact that the amount
7:20
Speaker 2: of blood from the jugular vein, from any any artery
7:25
Speaker 2: is going to be immense. And my point is before
7:30
Speaker 2: we get into the actual forensics of that, what this family,
7:33
Speaker 2: what these families are witnessing in court, and what that
7:37
Speaker 2: does to them, it would take wild horses to drag
7:41
Speaker 2: them out of the courtroom. So far they have stealed themselves.
7:45
Speaker 2: Joining me now from the courthouse, Susan Hendrix, investigative reporter,
7:49
Speaker 2: author of Down the Hill, My Descent.
7:50
Speaker 1: Into the Double Murder in Delphi.
7:54
Speaker 2: Susan, please explain who is Jake John's and what's his
7:59
Speaker 2: testimony over the wake into the jury.
8:01
Speaker 10: He is the gentleman, the volunteer who found the clothes
8:04
Speaker 10: of Abby and Libby, and his testimony was during that
8:08
Speaker 10: volunteer search. Again, the search was called off the night before,
8:12
Speaker 10: but volunteers came and the next morning when they started
8:15
Speaker 10: to search early and the bodies were discovered a little
8:18
Speaker 10: bit after me. He found clothes Libby sneaker her top.
8:23
Speaker 3: What we have learned through all.
8:25
Speaker 10: Of the testimony and a hearing at the end of
8:27
Speaker 10: July was because of death. And Nick McCleland mentioned that
8:31
Speaker 10: in the opening statement that Libby had been completely lewed
8:35
Speaker 10: blood all over her. Her next slash sadly Abby as well,
8:38
Speaker 10: and Abby was in the clothing of Libby had put
8:42
Speaker 10: that close her clothes on. Libby's clothes was ordered to
8:46
Speaker 10: before she was brutally murdered.
8:54
Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy grace.
8:59
Speaker 2: A.
9:01
Speaker 4: Four other girls also saw the man on the bridge
9:03
Speaker 4: that day and described him as kind of creepy.
9:06
Speaker 1: Witness statement.
9:07
Speaker 3: There is a lot of similarity in what the witnesses said,
9:11
Speaker 3: and they seem to have seen.
9:13
Speaker 4: A man and a woman says she later saw the
9:15
Speaker 4: man in the bridge video. He was muddy and bloody.
9:18
Speaker 2: She said, now you just heard the killer state guys
9:28
Speaker 2: down the hill.
9:30
Speaker 1: He had to have pulled a gun on the girls.
9:33
Speaker 2: The girls then go down the hill and they actually
9:36
Speaker 2: had the wherewithal to take the video of the man
9:39
Speaker 2: approaching him. Something about him made the hair on the
9:44
Speaker 2: back of their neck stand up, and they started videoing
9:46
Speaker 2: him right there. The girls themselves did this, and they
9:51
Speaker 2: caught his voice saying, down the hill. Cheryl McCollum, I'm
9:58
Speaker 2: predicting it'll be a cold h double l before Richard
10:03
Speaker 2: Allen utters one word in the courtroom, because they drinking
10:07
Speaker 2: here just like you and I can and compare it
10:10
Speaker 2: to down the hill, Down the hill, Down the hill,
10:12
Speaker 2: that loop of down the hill that prosecutors made.
10:15
Speaker 3: One hundred percent Nancy. The other thing about that video.
10:19
Speaker 3: You show the man on the bridge dressed for freezing weather.
10:24
Speaker 3: He is a layered in a like a sweatshirt and
10:28
Speaker 3: then a jacket. Remember it was unseasonably warm. Even Abby
10:34
Speaker 3: is in a tank top. So he is dressed not
10:37
Speaker 3: for hiking. He is the layered. And I think again,
10:41
Speaker 3: when you look at the way that he is dressed,
10:43
Speaker 3: you look at the way that the person sounds on
10:46
Speaker 3: that recording. That person is calm, That person is in control.
10:51
Speaker 3: He is in charge. There's no way coworkers, friends, neighbors,
10:56
Speaker 3: folks from high school, and his family don't recognowledged his
11:01
Speaker 3: gait his pace of walkin and that boy, let me go.
11:04
Speaker 2: Straight back out to Susan Hendricks joining us at the courthouse.
11:08
Speaker 1: You told me about Jake.
11:10
Speaker 2: John's the volunteer and all these volunteers were working through
11:15
Speaker 2: the night with the family. Police law enforcement had called
11:19
Speaker 2: off the search, but they the family and volunteers went
11:22
Speaker 2: back with lights, went out on canoes in the night,
11:27
Speaker 2: all the way through the night looking for the girls.
11:30
Speaker 1: But Susan Hendricks, who is Patrick Brown.
11:33
Speaker 10: Patrick Brown is the volunteer who discovered the body said
11:38
Speaker 10: he said that he walked up, but at first he
11:41
Speaker 10: wasn't quite sure of what he was seeing, and he
11:45
Speaker 10: took up his glasses, kind of tearing up and said,
11:48
Speaker 10: I thought they were manica.
11:49
Speaker 1: Oh. Doctor Bethany Marshall joining me.
11:51
Speaker 2: Renow psycho Analys joining us out of Beverly Hills, author
11:54
Speaker 2: of deal Breaker, and you can see her on Peacock
11:58
Speaker 2: or find her at Dodger Bethany Marshall dot com.
12:00
Speaker 1: Doctor Bethny, thank you for being with us.
12:02
Speaker 2: You know that has I've heard that response to from
12:07
Speaker 2: many witnesses who discover bodies. For instance, Connor Peterson Baby
12:14
Speaker 2: Connor Lacy Peterson's little baby who died when his mother
12:21
Speaker 2: was murdered. His body after her uterus disintegrated underwater.
12:27
Speaker 1: His body just kind of floated out.
12:30
Speaker 2: It was completely pristine, like a little one of those
12:34
Speaker 2: little plastic baby dolls. They're kind of shiny that you see,
12:38
Speaker 2: the little naked baby dolls. And the witness that found
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Speaker 2: the body thought it was a mannequin, a baby doll.
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Speaker 2: Could that be or are you just so conditioned not
12:54
Speaker 2: to expect to find a dead body that your mind
12:57
Speaker 2: goes to a mannequin like this witness said that you're
13:00
Speaker 2: he's hearing from Patrick Brown.
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Speaker 1: He was searching for the girls and he sees the girls.
13:08
Speaker 2: One I'm completely naked, but he instead thanks, they're mannequins.
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Speaker 11: Nancy, our brains are not wired to see a scene
13:18
Speaker 11: like this and to immediately comprehend what it is. Just
13:21
Speaker 11: like being in an accident.
13:22
Speaker 1: Let's say you're.
13:23
Speaker 11: Walking across the street a car starts hurtling towards you.
13:26
Speaker 11: Your first thought will be that car's not really hurtling
13:29
Speaker 11: towards me. There's like a disavowal of the reality of
13:33
Speaker 11: the situation. But sadly, Nancy, when I heard the term mannequins.
13:37
Speaker 11: I thought about the sexually motivated nature of this crime
13:42
Speaker 11: and how he used those girls like dolls. When he
13:47
Speaker 11: says down the hill, down the hill, Down the hill,
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Speaker 11: I hear a menacing, power hungry, horrible little man whose
13:57
Speaker 11: only way to have control and authority in life is
14:00
Speaker 11: to take a thirteen and a fourteen year old And Nancy,
14:03
Speaker 11: you know, these crimes are sexually motivated. So what I
14:07
Speaker 11: wondered was did he slit their throats to subdue them
14:12
Speaker 11: so he could antally and vagually rape them, or masturbate
14:15
Speaker 11: on them, or do whatever he wanted with them, toy
14:17
Speaker 11: with them, or did he torture and toy with them
14:21
Speaker 11: and then slit their throats so that he couldn't id them.
14:25
Speaker 11: The idea that Libby's clothing was found on Abby suggest
14:31
Speaker 11: a prolonged period of playing with them and toying with them,
14:35
Speaker 11: which breaks my heart that these two children had to
14:40
Speaker 11: experience something like that.
14:42
Speaker 2: Speaking of what they were wearing, the state did not
14:45
Speaker 2: have to rely upon recollection. One of the last photos
14:51
Speaker 2: of these two girls was, of course, remember they're thirteen
14:55
Speaker 2: and fourteen, a snaptat photo.
14:58
Speaker 7: Snapchat photos Libby took Onebruary thirteenth, twenty seventeen, show Abby
15:02
Speaker 7: sitting in the backseat of Libby's sister Kelsey Seabird's car
15:06
Speaker 7: en route to the trailhead earlier that afternoon. Abby wore
15:10
Speaker 7: a grey zip up hoodie, blue jeans, and a messy bun.
15:14
Speaker 7: Libby wore a tiight eyed shirt. The other photo Libby
15:17
Speaker 7: took that day showed Abby stepping from one wooden railroad
15:21
Speaker 7: tie to another on the high Bridge.
15:23
Speaker 1: Cheryl McCollum.
15:25
Speaker 2: One witness states that was Jake Johns, one of the
15:29
Speaker 2: first witnesses, not the first witness, but one of the
15:32
Speaker 2: first witnesses, describes how he found the clothing. The clothing
15:38
Speaker 2: we just heard about that was in the snapchat they
15:40
Speaker 2: took of each other. You're familiar with snapchat. It is
15:44
Speaker 2: the thing and it has to be done quickly. There's
15:47
Speaker 2: no message to it.
15:48
Speaker 1: It's just a photo. Instead of texting somebody.
15:52
Speaker 2: You have a Snapchat group or people that you chat
15:56
Speaker 2: back and forth with and all you do is you
15:58
Speaker 2: send a picture. It's just a picture in that moment,
16:01
Speaker 2: and that's what they did. Now, that's how we know
16:04
Speaker 2: for sure what they were wearing. Cheryl mccoom we know
16:09
Speaker 2: that Jake Johns described finding the shirt up in a tree.
16:17
Speaker 3: Nancy, this is a trail. This is a clue as
16:23
Speaker 3: to what went on after he forced them down the hill.
16:28
Speaker 3: So when they are being disrobed and the clothing is
16:33
Speaker 3: sound in a tree and a shoe was found in
16:35
Speaker 3: the creek, this is leading you to the homicide scene.
16:40
Speaker 3: So this to me pinpoints and paints a picture of
16:45
Speaker 3: exactly what happened and the order that it happened. This
16:49
Speaker 3: is what he's testifying to.
16:51
Speaker 1: But why up in a tree, Cheryl?
16:53
Speaker 3: He possibly could have been hiding it thinking he could
16:56
Speaker 3: discard it where nobody would see it. Knows what's going
17:00
Speaker 3: through his head. But Nancy, again, it's telling you this
17:04
Speaker 3: happened at this exact location. The bodies are then found
17:07
Speaker 3: at this exact location. So again it's like these breadcrumbs
17:12
Speaker 3: to this horrible event, from the shoe to the shirt
17:16
Speaker 3: to the bodies. You know what is happening and exactly
17:20
Speaker 3: where it happened. That's what's important to me.
17:23
Speaker 2: To you, Jesscott Morgan, that the shirt we've been talking
17:26
Speaker 2: about was up in a tree?
17:29
Speaker 1: Why was it in a tree? Look? Is it privative? No,
17:34
Speaker 1: I'm not proving anything with this, but I want to
17:37
Speaker 1: know why was it in a tree? Was he taking
17:41
Speaker 1: the clothes and just throwing them? What's your theory.
17:43
Speaker 9: I'd like to know how high up in the tree
17:45
Speaker 9: it is. You know, if you're talking about discarding something,
17:48
Speaker 9: you know, accessibility, that sort of thing. And as Cheryl
17:51
Speaker 9: pointed out just a second ago about the deer Creek,
17:56
Speaker 9: I think it's called the shoe that was in there,
17:59
Speaker 9: why not discard everything in that area? First off, you're
18:02
Speaker 9: going to wash away any kind of well most forensic
18:05
Speaker 9: evidence perhaps, and also if it's got to flow to
18:09
Speaker 9: it's going to take it downstream from where the initial
18:11
Speaker 9: event perhaps happened. So it's a curious finding. But again
18:17
Speaker 9: I'd have to know physical relationship to the height of it.
18:20
Speaker 9: Is it something that he was attempting to sequester. Here's
18:24
Speaker 9: one other piece to this. I've often wondered, you know,
18:28
Speaker 9: going back to you say, for instance, him working at
18:31
Speaker 9: CBS and look at these photographs. This guy's got a
18:34
Speaker 9: rich fantasy life. I'm wondering was he a trophy taker
18:37
Speaker 9: as well? And seems like clothing he has something to
18:40
Speaker 9: do with clothing, taking time to dress and undress, bodies,
18:44
Speaker 9: this sort of thing. Why would you not retain that
18:47
Speaker 9: for your own recollections, like a lot of these guys do.
18:50
Speaker 9: It is certainly, I think it is rather probate.
19:00
Speaker 1: Crime stories. With Nancy Grace, these two.
19:07
Speaker 9: Precious souls who were taken, I'll say it plainly. We're
19:11
Speaker 9: talking about perhaps to the point of a partial decapitation
19:16
Speaker 9: here Nancy.
19:17
Speaker 5: And they never thought they would hear that the girls
19:21
Speaker 5: were murdered.
19:22
Speaker 1: You're talking about Delphi, Indiana, a child murder. It's never happened.
19:27
Speaker 2: A poignant detail that the family told me is that
19:34
Speaker 2: morning before the girls left, the grandma was worried that
19:40
Speaker 2: it might get to Chili. That was her concern. She
19:44
Speaker 2: thought that I'll want to be gone an hour and
19:46
Speaker 2: a half. And she kept telling the girls wear a coat,
19:51
Speaker 2: put on a hoodie.
19:54
Speaker 1: That was the fear. The trial is happening now today
20:02
Speaker 1: in a court of law.
20:04
Speaker 2: Straight back out to Susan Hendrick's investigative reporter joining us
20:07
Speaker 2: at the courthouse. Susan, how does the defendant look?
20:13
Speaker 10: He looked so much different Nancy than he did of
20:17
Speaker 10: course in the in his jailhouse orange clothes. He was
20:21
Speaker 10: in street clothes, khaki pants, a belt, kind of a
20:25
Speaker 10: linen looking shirt, a light shirt with glasses reading glasses
20:30
Speaker 10: on his head. He looked more healthy than he had
20:33
Speaker 10: since I've seen him, and looked more just engaged, if
20:38
Speaker 10: you will. And I saw that even during jury selection
20:42
Speaker 10: where he was involved and his attorneys were leaning over
20:45
Speaker 10: Richard Allen and he was pointing to kind of witchers.
20:49
Speaker 10: It was a team kind of they worked as a
20:52
Speaker 10: team with Richard Allen to decide who they should pick.
20:55
Speaker 10: I noticed that, and absolutely he looked so much different
20:59
Speaker 10: than he had even during the cur what I saw
21:02
Speaker 10: at the end of my beginning of office. Of course,
21:04
Speaker 10: the deputies very close arms and handcuffs. Deputies are even
21:09
Speaker 10: in plain clothes behind him, so it's of course not
21:13
Speaker 10: to prejudice. The jury is seeing mister Allen in a
21:17
Speaker 10: jailhouse orange, but it is much different.
21:20
Speaker 1: I think he looks better too.
21:22
Speaker 2: Wow, Susan Hendricks, Okay, really reading glasses. I will never
21:27
Speaker 2: forget with the Menendez brothers, how the female defense attorney
21:31
Speaker 2: would like pick lint off them and hug them, smooth
21:34
Speaker 2: down their sweaters. I'm like, okay, whatever, but we're seeing
21:39
Speaker 2: the same thing happening now. Cheryl McCallum, the fawning of
21:43
Speaker 2: a Richard Allen in front of the jury.
21:45
Speaker 3: The jury's gonna know it's a stunt. They knew when
21:48
Speaker 3: they saw him in that wheelchair, when he couldn't walk
21:51
Speaker 3: and he was e MA siated was a stunt. They
21:54
Speaker 3: know that. Saying that there was a hair found that
21:57
Speaker 3: didn't match him before the trial started with a stunt
22:00
Speaker 3: is surious, not stupid. They are going to understand exactly
22:03
Speaker 3: what's going on. They are going to look at the
22:06
Speaker 3: evidence and evidence only in render an appropriate verdict. I
22:10
Speaker 3: believe that.
22:11
Speaker 2: Well, we also see the stay is preparing the jury
22:15
Speaker 2: for a lack of DNA. Susan Henwick's joining us at
22:20
Speaker 2: the courthouse, what about it?
22:21
Speaker 10: Susan Cleveland said, how many of you have seen CSI
22:24
Speaker 10: and people raised their hand, and how many of you
22:27
Speaker 10: think you need to have DNA evidence for a crime
22:31
Speaker 10: to have taken place to find someone guilty? Who believes
22:34
Speaker 10: that you need dannet vidence? So to me, it was
22:36
Speaker 10: very clear they just don't have that. The bullet is
22:39
Speaker 10: the key piece of evidence, they say, And of course
22:42
Speaker 10: the confessions. Sixty plus confessions were mentioned of Richard Allen,
22:47
Speaker 10: saying to the jurors and during opening statements that they
22:51
Speaker 10: will hear.
22:52
Speaker 11: Richard Allen in his own words tell what happened.
22:55
Speaker 10: That day, not only why he did it, but how
22:59
Speaker 10: we did it.
22:59
Speaker 2: Oh, I can't wait to hear that. Susan Hendrix, Now
23:03
Speaker 2: we already know. Let me go straight back to justicph
23:06
Speaker 2: Scott Morgan, Professor Forensics, Jacksonville State University, and then I'll
23:10
Speaker 2: follow up with you. Cheryl McCollum. A box cutter. Now
23:14
Speaker 2: this is interesting. Remember how we railed about law enforcement
23:20
Speaker 2: not releasing what we thought were enough facts to get
23:25
Speaker 2: more tips from the public.
23:27
Speaker 1: Well, in a way, the facts that they did withhold
23:31
Speaker 1: it was very very.
23:32
Speaker 2: Wise because we apparently have Richard Allen talking about murders
23:38
Speaker 2: were conducted with a box cutter, which was then disposed.
23:44
Speaker 2: He also said in a dumpster, I think a CBS dumpster,
23:48
Speaker 2: which would have been an area familiar to him because
23:50
Speaker 2: he was a pharmacy tech. Right now, can you, as
23:54
Speaker 2: a death investigator, determine if a box cutter was used
23:57
Speaker 2: any way to do that?
24:00
Speaker 4: Yeah?
24:00
Speaker 9: And I think that it's going to be relying upon
24:02
Speaker 9: our friends that work in the tool mark section, which
24:04
Speaker 9: I know you're familiar with the crime labs, we might
24:07
Speaker 9: hear evidence from them. It all depends on and forgive
24:11
Speaker 9: me for being rather gruesome, if that instrument struck bone
24:15
Speaker 9: in particular we're talking about, they keep using the term
24:18
Speaker 9: near decapitation. Is that possible to make that connection? I
24:24
Speaker 9: guess kind of peripherally it could be. You could say
24:27
Speaker 9: that this could be consistent with a mark left by
24:31
Speaker 9: a box cutter. It's got a thinner blade than say,
24:34
Speaker 9: perhaps I don't know, like a kbar knife, for instance,
24:38
Speaker 9: It's not as robust, So yeah, you could have an
24:42
Speaker 9: indication of that. And also what you're going to be
24:46
Speaker 9: looking at, And this is how these beautiful young girls
24:49
Speaker 9: are going to test fout on their behalf in this trial.
24:54
Speaker 9: We're going to hear about these injuries, and we're going
24:56
Speaker 9: to hear about a presence or absence of ridges in
25:01
Speaker 9: these wounds that they have sustained to their neck. And
25:05
Speaker 9: they're going to paint a picture, Nancy that is going
25:07
Speaker 9: to leave all this other stuff in the dust. Trust me,
25:10
Speaker 9: whether it's odinism or thor or all this other nonsense
25:14
Speaker 9: that they keep coming up with, We're going to hear
25:16
Speaker 9: the real scientific facts and that box cutter is going
25:18
Speaker 9: to be a big part.
25:19
Speaker 2: Of this guys testimony pouring from the witness stand, the
25:24
Speaker 2: jury working over the weekend.
25:27
Speaker 1: But then here is the problem, the fly.
25:32
Speaker 2: In the ointment, so to speak, for the state, A
25:36
Speaker 2: mystery hair listen.
25:38
Speaker 7: During opening statements, defense attorney Andrew Baldwin says some hair
25:42
Speaker 7: evidence is not tied to the defendant, Richard Allen. During autopsy,
25:46
Speaker 7: a hair is found in Abby Williams's hand. That hair
25:50
Speaker 7: has a root and is able to be tested, and
25:52
Speaker 7: the tests showed the hair belonged to a female, not
25:56
Speaker 7: to Abby or Libby, but probably from a relative of Libby's.
26:00
Speaker 7: Baldwin says there should be more tests to find out
26:03
Speaker 7: whose hair it was.
26:04
Speaker 2: Joining me, Cheryl McCollum, forensics expert who has been at
26:07
Speaker 2: the courthouse and in Delphi throughout this investigation, Cheryl McCollum,
26:14
Speaker 2: when you first hear a mystery hair, it's like, oh,
26:18
Speaker 2: could it be the killer's hair? And if it doesn't
26:21
Speaker 2: match up to Richard Allen, that could equal reasonable doubt.
26:26
Speaker 2: But the rest of that sentence is it belongs to
26:29
Speaker 2: a female relative of the victims, which you would absolutely
26:33
Speaker 2: expect to find on them through some sort of a transfer.
26:37
Speaker 1: I don't know how. Maybe her hand touched her body.
26:40
Speaker 2: Maybe on the ride over, she was sitting in the
26:43
Speaker 2: car with her hands on the seat, and there was
26:44
Speaker 2: a hair there and it stuck to her body or
26:46
Speaker 2: her clothing. So now we know it's a female relative.
26:51
Speaker 2: You know what this reminds me of. This reminds me
26:54
Speaker 2: of the hair found in top Mom Casey Anthony's trunk,
26:58
Speaker 2: the trunk from which the odor of a dead body emanated.
27:04
Speaker 2: Top Mom's own mother, Cindy Anthony, stated that in the.
27:07
Speaker 1: Nine to one one call then the hair was.
27:10
Speaker 2: Found in the trunk and it could have been one
27:12
Speaker 2: of three people, Cindy Anthony, tot Mom, Casey Anthony, or
27:17
Speaker 2: baby Killy Anthony. But Cindy and Top Mom had chemically
27:24
Speaker 2: treated hair, dyed and or frosted. This hair was pristine,
27:30
Speaker 2: which proves that the baby Kelly Anthony had been in
27:35
Speaker 2: that trunk from which the odor of a dead body emanated.
27:41
Speaker 1: So in my mind, in this case, that mystery hair
27:44
Speaker 1: is much ado about nothing.
27:46
Speaker 3: It's completely nothing.
27:48
Speaker 1: Here's one of mine.
27:50
Speaker 3: Thanks to Libby, we got a video. There's no woman
27:54
Speaker 3: on that bridge. There's no female voice on that tape,
27:58
Speaker 3: and I'm going to tell you the biggest thing to
28:01
Speaker 3: me that is going to come very soon are the
28:04
Speaker 3: other forty three seconds on that video tape.
28:07
Speaker 12: Prosecutor mclealand says there is more than just bullet evidence
28:11
Speaker 12: that ties Richard Allen to the murders of Abby and Libby.
28:15
Speaker 12: Richard Allen himself, in statements to correctional officers, inmates, law enforcement,
28:20
Speaker 12: even his wife, Allan tells them things with details that
28:24
Speaker 12: only the killer would know. Mcleland says, Richard Allen followed
28:28
Speaker 12: Abby and Libby to the Monan high Bridge, and that
28:32
Speaker 12: Allan is quote the man on the bridge joining us at.
28:35
Speaker 2: The courthouse, investigative reporter and author of Down the Hill,
28:39
Speaker 2: My Descent into the Double Murder in Delphi, Susan Hendrix.
28:43
Speaker 1: We have a surprise. What is it?
28:46
Speaker 10: Nick McCleland, the prosecutor, said that Richard Allen was interrupted,
28:51
Speaker 10: that he brought the girls and led them down that hill,
28:55
Speaker 10: planned on having his way with them, as he said,
28:58
Speaker 10: and was interrupted. And to me that stood out. We
29:02
Speaker 10: had never heard that before, and I wonder what will
29:05
Speaker 10: come in to play during the trial. Was Richard Allen
29:09
Speaker 10: interrupted by some sort of vehicle driving by. We don't
29:12
Speaker 10: know that as we will hear that during the trial.
29:14
Speaker 2: Now, why with the prosecutor I'm wondering about it. Susan
29:18
Speaker 2: Hendrix believe that Richard Allen was interrupted.
29:23
Speaker 1: In the murders of these two girls. Cheryl McCollum, what
29:26
Speaker 1: do you think?
29:26
Speaker 3: I think there was possibly items at the scene that
29:29
Speaker 3: were not used. I think that the lack of DNA,
29:33
Speaker 3: possibly seminal fluid things of that nature would cause them
29:37
Speaker 3: to believe this is clearly a suol crime that looks
29:41
Speaker 3: as though it was not completed.
29:42
Speaker 2: Now very curious because so far we haven't heard about
29:48
Speaker 2: DNA linking linking him to the scene, and sperm would absolutely.
29:56
Speaker 1: Be that link.
29:58
Speaker 2: Matthew Matt Murphy ound a veteran trial attorney. Matt As
30:05
Speaker 2: part of discovery, all scientific evidence must be handed over
30:10
Speaker 2: to the defense X number, usually ten days, but in
30:13
Speaker 2: this case it's been months prior to trial, and in
30:17
Speaker 2: those scientific reports that is where we would learn if
30:21
Speaker 2: DNA links back to Richard Allen in any way.
30:24
Speaker 1: Isn't that true?
30:25
Speaker 8: That's right, And it sounds based on the Fort Daire,
30:30
Speaker 8: which is the jury selection, it sounds like they don't
30:33
Speaker 8: have that, but it's important to remember Nancy. In this case,
30:35
Speaker 8: he had a lot of time here. One of them,
30:39
Speaker 8: of course, was found naked, the other one wearing the
30:42
Speaker 8: opposite young young ladies clothes, so he had time to
30:46
Speaker 8: do this, which means he also had time to clean up.
30:49
Speaker 8: And one of the fascinating things I think about a
30:51
Speaker 8: lot of the modern cases we're seeing this with gilgo Bees,
30:55
Speaker 8: with rex Huerman, is that if they're given time there,
30:59
Speaker 8: you know you can read of DNA, and he certainly
31:02
Speaker 8: had time here, so there is a reasonable explanation. And plus, remember,
31:07
Speaker 8: given what happened to them, we have a complete absence
31:10
Speaker 8: of DNA, So the logical conclusion of the argument is, well,
31:13
Speaker 8: nobody killed them then, right. So it's one of those
31:17
Speaker 8: things that jury just has to think through. And as
31:20
Speaker 8: long as it's I think, effectively argued, it's going to
31:23
Speaker 8: be fine, or at.
31:25
Speaker 1: Least it should be.
31:26
Speaker 8: I believe the evidence against this man is overwhelming if
31:29
Speaker 8: properly presented.
31:30
Speaker 3: Well.
31:30
Speaker 2: The defense is certainly making a foray, and they're arguing
31:33
Speaker 2: about the timeline.
31:35
Speaker 1: One thing that's going to be very difficult for them to.
31:37
Speaker 2: Counter are the alleged confessions this guy blabbed behind bars listen.
31:44
Speaker 7: After discovering over sixty recorded confessions by the accused killer
31:48
Speaker 7: in jail phone calls to his wife and mother, mcleland
31:52
Speaker 7: believes over a year ago, Alan began speaking about the
31:55
Speaker 7: murders in very specific detail with a fellow inmate even
31:59
Speaker 7: testifies that Alan revealed to him that he killed the
32:02
Speaker 7: girls with a box cutter, which Alan later disposed of
32:05
Speaker 7: in a CBS dumpster.
32:07
Speaker 2: I mean, you'd think by now, doctor Bethany Marshall, that
32:11
Speaker 2: lawyers would tell their clients don't reveal anything over the phone.
32:16
Speaker 2: I've even had cases where recorders were set up in
32:22
Speaker 2: the walls of a jail. Not my jurisdiction, But when
32:26
Speaker 2: you're in jail, that doesn't matter. You do not have
32:28
Speaker 2: any expectation of privacy. You don't need a search one
32:31
Speaker 2: to put in a tapping device like I'm at a
32:35
Speaker 2: grave or hanging outside someone's apartment on the fare on
32:40
Speaker 2: the fire escape. You can put a tape recording device there,
32:45
Speaker 2: just like you can in a jail. So why is
32:47
Speaker 2: it when you know Richard Allen has been told shut the.
32:51
Speaker 1: Hay up, keep your lips together.
32:54
Speaker 2: Hey still talking, and all of those calls aren't recorded.
32:58
Speaker 11: Bethany Well obviously lead the defense has lost control of
33:01
Speaker 11: their client. But what it tells me a couple of things.
33:04
Speaker 11: He's impulsive, he's profoundly immature. He wants to keep telling
33:10
Speaker 11: the story because he's changing the narrative again and again
33:14
Speaker 11: to try to justify why he did it.
33:16
Speaker 1: But also he's reliving the.
33:19
Speaker 11: Glory of the crime. I mean, if you think about
33:21
Speaker 11: the fact that likely this is sexually motivated. He's in jail,
33:25
Speaker 11: he has no access to sex partners. I mean, his
33:28
Speaker 11: fantasy life is probably prolific, and this is probably how
33:32
Speaker 11: he got attached to the girls in the first place,
33:35
Speaker 11: looking at all those photos and that they're clothing and
33:38
Speaker 11: sort of developing a fantasy relationship with them. And the
33:41
Speaker 11: only way to continue that talk about the crime.
33:44
Speaker 4: Speaking about reasonable doubt, defense attorney Andrew Baldwin says Richard
33:48
Speaker 4: Allen is an innocent man ensnared in an investigation that
33:52
Speaker 4: he says was messed up from the beginning. Challenging the
33:55
Speaker 4: state's timeline, Baldwin says Abby's phone connected to a cell
33:59
Speaker 4: phone tower after Alan had left the trail on February thirteen,
34:02
Speaker 4: twenty seventeen, claiming after four pm, human hands handled that phone.
34:07
Speaker 4: Richard Allen was at home and never came back.
34:09
Speaker 2: Two you, Cheryl McCollum, who has been at the courthouse,
34:12
Speaker 2: in the and in the area since the investigations started.
34:16
Speaker 1: Cheryl, what is the defense?
34:18
Speaker 2: Is it based on cell phone data placing Richard Allen
34:21
Speaker 2: elsewhere at by two point fifteen.
34:24
Speaker 3: That's what they're going to try to show, Nancy. But again,
34:27
Speaker 3: if you look at the totality, that's one aspect. You've
34:31
Speaker 3: got confessions. You've got himself at the bridge. You've got
34:35
Speaker 3: the bullet, you've got the video, you've got the voice,
34:38
Speaker 3: you've got the fact that, to me, you've got somebody
34:42
Speaker 3: that parts away, his car was seen, he's dressed inappropriately
34:47
Speaker 3: for the day. You've got a totality of what occurred here.
34:51
Speaker 3: They are going to be able to paint a picture
34:54
Speaker 3: that he had information only the killer would know. There
34:58
Speaker 3: is no way with that video and that boy, it
35:03
Speaker 3: is entire family, his entire friendship circle, every co worker,
35:07
Speaker 3: nobody can identify him. I don't believe that that's what's coming.
35:12
Speaker 1: Susan Hendrix joining us at the courthouse.
35:13
Speaker 2: Susan, I understand that people are lining up in the
35:17
Speaker 2: wee hours of the morning to get into the courthouse.
35:20
Speaker 1: What's happening, Nancy.
35:21
Speaker 10: The interest in this case is clear, as you see
35:24
Speaker 10: with citizens lining up. People want to know being part
35:28
Speaker 10: of course of Carroll County, and it's being held here
35:30
Speaker 10: at Carroll County. You're selected outside of this county, and
35:35
Speaker 10: really you could see the interest people want to know.
35:37
Speaker 1: I mean, the hearts are in this.
35:39
Speaker 10: There's teal and purple ribbons all around downtown Delphi aligning
35:43
Speaker 10: the streets here. If people want closure for this. The
35:47
Speaker 10: girls are never coming back, of course, but they want
35:50
Speaker 10: to be part of this because their hearts have been in.
35:52
Speaker 2: It when they start Susan Hendrix at the courthouse, I'm
35:55
Speaker 2: just thinking about the family who has been in court
35:58
Speaker 2: all day long, listening to excruciating testimony, seeing horrific crime
36:04
Speaker 2: scene photos of the girls nearly decapitated, and it reminds
36:10
Speaker 2: me of what Becky Patty told.
36:13
Speaker 1: Me when I spoke to her, how she could not even.
36:19
Speaker 2: Ask when she was told she was out searching, when
36:22
Speaker 2: she was told they found the girls, she would not
36:26
Speaker 2: let herself ask are.
36:29
Speaker 1: They dead or alive? Listen, did you ask any questions,
36:34
Speaker 1: did you, oh, I jumped in a car, and did
36:36
Speaker 1: you think they were alive? They wouldn't. Did you ask
36:41
Speaker 1: them I I would tell him. I just told asked
36:47
Speaker 1: them to take me to them. I said they found him.
36:49
Speaker 1: I wasn't even ask him if they were how they
36:52
Speaker 1: found him. I just said, let me needs me, You
36:55
Speaker 1: need to take me to her.
36:56
Speaker 2: Now, unable to even ask are the girls dead or alive?
37:03
Speaker 2: And this whole day they've been sitting through those horrific
37:08
Speaker 2: crime scene photos and testimony. We wait and pray as
37:14
Speaker 2: justice unfolds. Live at the court House, Nancy Grace signing
37:19
Speaker 2: off goodbye friend,