Delphi Murders: Richard Allen Receives 130-Year Sentence for the Deaths of Indiana Teenagers

 Allen was found guilty last month for the 2017 murders of best friends Abigail Williams and Liberty German in the town of Delphi.

Officers escort Richard Allen out of the Carroll County Courthouse in Delphi, Ind., after a hearing in 2022.

By Phil Helsel and Minyvonne Burke

Richard Allen, the Indiana man convicted of murdering two middle school girls in 2017, was sentenced to 130 years in prison on Friday, nearly eight years after the bodies of Abigail Williams, 13, and Liberty German, 14, were discovered near a hiking trail.

Allen, 52, was convicted of murder in November following a four-week trial in connection with the deaths of the two girls in Delphi. Their bodies were found on February 14, 2017, near the Monon High Bridge Trail, but their killings remained unsolved for years.

At sentencing, Allen received the maximum punishment. Judge Frances C. Gull called the crime “one of the most heinous” she had encountered and emphasized that the victims’ families would be affected by his actions forever.

“These families will deal with your carnage forever,” Judge Gull said.

Allen, arrested by State Police in October 2022, was charged with murder following what officials described as a "long-term and complex investigation." Prosecutors say Allen encountered the girls on the trail, and after confronting them with a firearm, forced them down a hill and slit their throats.

On November 11, a jury found Allen guilty of four counts of murder—one count for each victim and one for each of the two felony murders.

Facing a possible sentence of 45 to 130 years, Allen’s attorneys indicated they would appeal. In a memo filed before sentencing, they reaffirmed his innocence, stating, “Richard Allen maintains his innocence.”

The murders deeply impacted the small town of Delphi, which has a population of about 2,900, located 60 miles northwest of Indianapolis.

On the day of the killings, Liberty German had recorded a video of a man prosecutors say was Allen. They also pointed to a .40-caliber bullet recovered from the scene, linking it to a gun owned by Allen, and to surveillance footage of a black 2016 Ford Focus, which was registered to Allen and seen near the crime scene.

While the defense argued there was no eyewitness identification of Allen or DNA evidence connecting him to the crime, prosecutors highlighted a jailhouse confession made by Allen in 2023, where he allegedly admitted, "I did it, I killed Abby. I killed Abby and Libby." His wife, who was on the call, dismissed the statement, suggesting it might be a result of his medication.

A former prison psychologist testified that Allen had confessed to her, and prosecutors said he made similar admissions to other prison staff. Defense attorney Brad Rozzi attributed these confessions to Allen’s mental health issues, asserting that he was enduring a crisis while in custody. They also argued that Allen was subjected to solitary confinement without due process during his pretrial detention.

In their sentencing memorandum, Allen’s attorneys noted his longstanding struggles with mental health, including major depressive disorder and anxiety disorder.

At the time of the killings, Allen worked as a CVS clerk and was not considered a suspect until September 2022. A clerk reviewing thousands of tips discovered a misfiled document, which showed that Allen had contacted authorities days after the murders, claiming to have been at the same location as the girls the day they disappeared.

Defense attorneys argued that Allen frequently walked on that trail and had only approached police because he wished to assist in the investigation.