A true crime story never really ends. Even when a case is closed, the journey for those left behind is just beginning. Since our Dateland story aird, Tracy has harnessed her outrage into a mission. I had no other option. I had to do something. Catch up with families, friends, and investigators on our bonus series, After the Verdict. Ordinary people facing extraordinary circumstances with strength and courage. It does just change your life, but speaking up for these issues helps me keep going. To listen to After the Verdict, subscribe to Dateline Premium on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or at datelinepremium. Com. Tonight on Dateline, It took my breath away. Here is this young girl with her friend out on this bridge on a beautiful sunny day. They have no idea what's coming. Got a call and said that they had found the girls. What did they tell you? That they're gone. Their lives were stolen from them. Those girls mattered. Were they out there to meet someone? Somebody was in contact with Libby, the fake persona. People wondered if there was some catfishing element. There was the theory that the girls were killed in a pagan ritual in the woods.

We found Libby's phone. She secretly was able to videotape this person approaching them. You also hear him say something. Down the hill. Down the hill. Down the hill. The voice of the killer. Voice of the killer. They knew something was not right. They had to be scared out of their minds. We've got a picture. We've got his voice. Where is this guy? Two girls who had so much to offer. We weren't going to let up until we found this guy. A grainy picture on a phone, a gravely voice recorded in secret. Could these girls help solve their own mystery? I'm Lester Holt, and this is Dateland. Here's Andrea Canning with A Walk Through the Woods. Winter was masquerading as spring, teasing those tired of the cold to step outside. Two girls set out for a walk through the woods. This is very peaceful here. It is. I could see why they would want to come here on a day off. We just saw the bald eagle. Yeah, it's a beautiful place. And then this is the trail. A trail that ends here at an old railroad Bridge. This is scary. Yes. There's added out ties were so high up.

Yeah. Water underneath us for part of it. I walked across that bridge, and I swore I'll never do it again. You wouldn't catch me crossing that bridge for anything. I walked as as I could that I was on my hands and knees. One of the girls took a photo of the other, inching her way across the bridge. A final moment of innocence. Because the real danger wasn't beneath them. It was behind mind. A silhouette taking shape, growing as it picked up speed on the bridge, coming toward them. It makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up. Absolutely. When you think about these two girls, they knew something wasn't right. Yeah, and they were scared. All they had left in that moment, a cell phone, each other, and a split second to act. Delphi, Indiana, population 3,000, more or less. A rural community about an hour and a half strive north of Indianapolis. Carroll County Delphi is a great place to raise your family. Tony Liggett the sheriff. I grew up here, choose to be here. I want to be here myself. It's beautiful. People felt safe. Still do, he says, though maybe a little less since that Monday, February 13th, 2017.

The morning had started off promising blue skies, warm weather. Better yet, classes were canceled to make up for an unused snow day. What's the plan for the girls that day with this day off? Well, there wasn't a plan. Becky Patty is talking about her granddaughter, 14-year-old Liberty German, and her best friend, 13-year-old Abigail Williams, Libby and Abby. They'd had a sleepover at Becky's the night before. Libby came out, and she was sitting on the floor in my office. Just then, Libby's older sister announced she'd be taking the car out. Kelsey popped her head in and said, Hey, I'm going to go to my boyfriend's house. And Libby jumped right up and said, Hey, can you take us to the trails? The public trail's on the outskirts of town. Kelsey dropped them off just before 2: 00. They planned to stay for an hour, then call for a ride home. The hour came and went. Becky called Libby. Was it ringing or was it going straight to voicemail? It would ring and then go to voicemail. You're not really thinking anything bad. She alerted Abby's family that they couldn't find the girls. Then she reached out to her husband, Mike, week, Libby's grandfather, and said, Hey, Libby went to the trails.

It's been about an hour. She's not answering her phone. Of course, it's getting cold. It is February. It was warm out during the day. So We're all thinking, All right, eventually we're going to find him here, right? But daylight was waning. It was going to start getting dark because it's February. And I said, We're going to have to call the police. And Libby's afraid of the dark. I think we initially got the call somewhere between 5: 00 and 5: 30. Liggett was a detective back in 2017. He figured the teens would show up soon enough. Were we actively looking for them? Absolutely. But there was not a real sense of urgency. I'm sure no evil thoughts were entering your mind at that point. Correct. Though when he heard they'd been at the trail, he did wonder about the bridge. What we're standing on now, this wasn't the way it was back then. This was what it all looked like, these rotted railroad ties, no railings. The Monan High Bridge is a relic from a past century. Trains once used it to cross Deer Creek more than 60 feet below. It's the thrill. What teenagers don't like thrill.

Libby's cousin, Sadie Maudi, says the abandoned bridge was where young daredevils chose to hang out. I wouldn't even go out to the first platform. Noop. But the kids do it. Yeah. My best friend in high school got her senior pictures taken on that bridge. Did you know if they were planning to venture out onto the bridge? No, we didn't. At some point, Libby's sister checked social media. We saw a Snapchat photo of Abby that Libby had taken, so we knew that they had been on the bridge. Is that reinforcing the thought that maybe this is connected to the bridge? That maybe something happened, they got hurt? Well, that's what was going through my mind was, okay, Now, either they fell off the bridge or they got down one of the ravines out there. Is panic setting in? I just knew that something wasn't right. When the sun went down, Liget started to worry. Soon, word was out, and Delphi sprang into action. Its residents joined the search. Even though not a lot of time has passed, you have a lot of people looking for these two girls. Oh, absolutely. That's just the way things work around here.

Yeah. Neighborhood members and police, armed with flashlights, searched for hours in the dark around trees and brush along unsteady paths. But yet no one saw anything around the Bridge area. Correct. So they just vanished. Correct. Now that the sun is up, the search here has resumed outside Delphi in Carroll County. Liget was at the station the next day when the call came in. It was a little past noon. It was the worst possible news. Got a call and said that they had found the girls' bodies. Abby and Libby lay in a hidden depression of the forest floor about a quarter mile beyond the bridge. It was clear the girls had been murdered. We are investigating this as a crime scene. A shaken town would want answers and an arrest. Neither would happen quickly. This was a long journey with a lot of suspects along the way. That's correct. I think a lot of people looking at this case always wondered if there was some catfishing element, why did the girls go out there that day? She had to wear with all to pull that phone out and take a video. This man has placed himself by the bridge at the time the girls were there.

Absolutely. A police report that talked about odinism, and all of a sudden, a whole new world opened up about what might have happened. A twisted world. It's a very twisted world. Sheriff Ligget, back at the station, could hardly believe what he was hearing. Two local girls found murdered near the Monan High Bridge in Delphi, Indiana. He raced to the area a short drive away. What information have you been given before you arrived at the scene about how these girls died? No. Nothing. No information. He was directed down a hill near the bridge and onto a patch of privately owned land. Where were they ultimately found? So further around, you see how the creek bends upstream up that way. It was grim. Abby and Libby lay dead a few feet apart. Libby at the foot of a tree. Their throats had been cut. Abby was wearing close. Libby was not. Libby's wounds were just devastating. It was obvious that Libby had been moved a very, very short distance, appeared there trying to conceal her behind a tree. There was a large tree next to her, and they both had some sticks on top of them. I don't know how a human being can do what they did to anybody, let alone two little girls.

Becky and Mike were searching in a different area when they heard the girls had been found. They raced back to the trail, assuming they were okay. Becky didn't realize her sister was one of the searchers who'd come upon the girls' bodies. She just kept saying, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, and she was crying. She just kept saying I couldn't go back to him. I said, Well, tell me where they are so I can go. Even then, it didn't sink in until... And I'm waiting, and the coroner's van come driving by. That's when I realized this isn't good. From that point on, a lot of things are really glazed over or a daze because they're like, This isn't really happening type thing. But they made announcement that they'd found two girls, but they couldn't confirm the identity. But you knew? Well, yeah. Small community. Two girls missing, two girls found. Investigators brought the families back to the station where they had set up a command center for the search. And I thought at that time that they were there to help us, that they were asking questions, and I was answering and trying to Let's figure out what's going on.

I didn't even realize until years later, Oh, my God, they were interrogating us. It fell to Mike to formally identify both girls. He remembered how surreal it felt. Just hours earlier, his granddaughter and Abby had been brimming with life, giggling during their sleepover. They were upstairs watching movies. They were painting and silly little videos and stuff, just having a good time. It was a normal night. They were being kids. Now the Patty's and Abby's family had been thrust into a new, terrible normal, one in which their girls existed only in photos and memories. I mean, there's so many beautiful photos of Libby and Abby. Just two happy-go-lucky girls. Abby had been the only child of a single mom. Libby and her sister, Kelsey, came to live with their grandparents after their mother and father split up. I want to say through a course of life events, it presented an opportunity, and we had spare bedrooms, and they came to us and gladly welcomed it and took it on and made the best of it. Was there any hesitation to take her into your home. That's a lot, right? To bring a child in. No, not at all.

We do it again. Both Abby and Libby were good students. Abby loved crafts and music. Libby, music and sports. It was softball, then volleyball, swimming, soccer. She had soccer in the fall. There was about three weeks out of the year, she was not in a sport. So And you must have been doing a lot of driving. Lots. Abby was the shyer of the two. She was quiet and reserved. I think her and Libby complimented each other because Libby was a little more loud and boisterous, and she was quiet. In fact, Libby was an all-around jokester at home. When you decide to be fancy after shaving. Here she is giving a tutorial on shaving for the first time. It burns. It burns. It's red. It burns. It burns. She loved challenging anyone, especially her uncle, into ridiculous stunts. We were gone, and she was daring him to jump and do a handstand on the handrail and end up in the pool. And she kept, and you could hear her saying, You won't do it. You're scared. And he'd said, Why are you pushing me? She said, Because grandma's going to be home, so you got to do it.

Did he do it? Yeah, he did do it. Was he okay? Two girls, funny and sweet, their families and the community were in mourning and on edge. Then, just hours into the case, investigators caught a break. We found Libby's phone. I mean, this phone could be thing, depending on what you find on it. Correct. So you want to go up this road here and get to the roundabout. You take a left and then you go past Murphy's house. Do you know the Murphy's? Their young lads John, I think he's over in London now. Oh, yeah. Fbd doesn't stand for frustratingly bad directions. Fbd stands for support. We support van drivers in Ireland with up to 75% off new van policies. Fbd Insurance. Support. It's what we do. Can't miss it. Once you pass there, a little terrier will start to chase you. And once he gives up, you should be there. 75% off based on five years no claims discount. Terms and conditions apply. Underwritten by FBD Insurance, PLC. Fbd Insurance Group Limited trading as FBD Insurance is regulated by the Central Bank of Ireland. Hey, everybody. I'm Al Roker from the Today Show. Let's kickstart your wellness journey with the all new Start Today app.

Everything you need for a healthier you, all in one place. Fitness challenges for all meals, meal plans that are easy and delicious, and so much more. It's built to fit your lifestyle, and our experts will guide you every step of the way. Come on, let's do this. To subscribe, download Start Today from the App Store on your Apple device now. Terms apply, cancel anytime through Apple under profile settings. It was late past midnight when they broke into the farmhouse. Never in a million years would you think that you'd see your parents house taped off by that yellow tape? No. And they said, You're going to be out of being killed. They left behind a wall of blood and the key to a secret. She looked at me and she said, I'm screwed. Murder in the Moonlight, a new podcast from Dateland. To listen to the latest episodes each week, completely free, you can find and follow, murder in the Moonlight on Pandora. Mike and Becky Patty knew nothing would ever be the same. Their granddaughter Libby and her friend Abby had been taken from them, and so violently. Their lives were stolen from them. I'm a mother of five girls.

I have a 14-year-old and one that's about to turn 13, exactly the ages of Libby and Abby. It truly is a parent's worst nightmare. The rest of the family gathered at the house to help any way they could. Some of us were standing around the kitchen island. Some of us were at the kitchen table. Sadie Maudy remembers her aunt Becky looking for Libby's older sister, Kelsey. I remember her yelling up the stairs, Libby, Libby, But she meant to say Kelsey, but she was saying Libby. And we all just stood there with eyes wide open. None of us said a word. At that point, police were still not releasing the girls' names, but everyone in Delphine knew. This is a small town, so a word travels fast. This is a community that is hurting. Reporter Emily Longnecker covered the story for NBC's Indianapolis affiliate, WTHR. You could see it on people's faces. Delphine, nothing happens here. It's like, how could this be happening here? You didn't need a positive identification from the police. You knew, and you knew it in your gut, and you saw it on the faces of the one you encountered in that town.

People expect things instantaneously, and I started to feel that. The investigation team included Indiana State Police. Doug Carter was the agency's superintendent. He was already fielding questions from the public. Like, is this the work of a drifter, a serial killer, or someone already known to police? I started to think to myself, Oh, my gosh, we are never going to be able to meet the expectation that people have. And we weren't. Investigators were at that moment collecting evidence. You found some clues at the crime scene. Correct. The unspent round from a gun. A crime scene investigator noticed a bullet peaking through leaves between the girls. So very odd that, number one, it's unspent, hasn't been fired through a gun, and also that the girls were not shot. Correct. In my head at that point in time was that there may have been a gun used to control. How does a person control two girls? Well, you can do it with a gun. Liggett believed the killer racked his gun to scare the girls into submission, not realizing the evidence he was leaving. So when you rack a gun, it ejects the bullet out the side and lands on the ground.

There was more. As crime scene investigators moved Abby's body, they discovered a shoe. And beneath that, We found Libby's phone. They immediately sent the phone to a forensics analyst for testing. Meanwhile, officers continued collecting evidence hoping for DNA, searched for surveillance cameras on nearby businesses, and spoke to property owners. It's so mind boggling. I haven't really caught up. It hasn't caught up with me yet. Like Ron Logan, he spoke to WTHR shortly after the girls were discovered on his property. My son grew up here. He's been down here when he was 13 years old. Never in your wildest dreams do you think that he comes down here to play, he won't come back home. I mean, that's just something that doesn't end in your mind, ever. Investigators also talk to anyone who'd been in the area that day. Indiana State Police Lieutenant, Jerry Holman. We were able to identify everybody, interview them. Three girls described a man on the trail around 1: 30, about 20 minutes before Abby and Libby arrived. We knew they saw a white male, but the descriptions were slightly different. Though they agreed he was overdressed for the warm day and avoided eye contact, a woman walking close to the bridge thought she saw the same man.

Looking like he was waiting for somebody as she's walking back towards the trailhead where she parked. She sees two girls later identified as Abby and Libby walking towards the bridge. Others came forward but had nothing really to offer. One woman saw the story on the news and urgent her husband to report he'd been out there that day. Did he see anything unusual? No, he did not see anybody or notify us of anything unusual. So you had to work with what you had to work with? Yeah. But one woman did report something disturbing. She saw a man near the trails while she was driving. He was walking along the road, covered in mud and blood. Are you thinking, wow, she witnessed the killer? Right. I mean, who else would have blood and mud on them like that? Exactly. The girl's autopsies revealed they had been killed with a sharp object. There were no signs of sexual assault. Police kept those and many other details of the investigation from the public. Then a major announcement. Police had obtained a photo of a man on the bridge that day. We've been able to identify almost everybody else that's been on that trail, and this gentleman has not been identified, and we want to know what he saw what he might have seen on the trail.

The officer didn't say who took the photo. We were definitely able to tell a pretty good description of the person, white male, blue coat, shirt, head covering, blue jeans. Police described him as a possible witness. Viewers responded, flooding the tip line. Several identified the same man, Ron Logan, that property owner, and some women had a lot to say about him. They had experiences where they woke up in the middle of the night, and he was standing at the foot of their bed watching them sleep. Oh, my gosh. Well, we know the family really well, so it's been overwhelming the whole thing. In the days after the murders, people in Delphi came out to support the families. They released lanterns in remembrance. When we remember. They gathered for prayer vigils and hung ribbons with the girls' favorite colors. Libby's family says a CVS worker even made free copies of the girls' photos for their visitation. The line for it stretched the length of the building. It was overwhelming how many people showed up to show their support. I'm sure, yeah. It was supposed to end, and there still wasn't an end to the line. And I remember somebody asking us, What do you want to do?

And we said, These people came. We can't stop now. So we We stood there long time. But the small Delphi community was changing. People were fearful. The town used to not lock their doors when they went to bed. It was like everyone was scared. Nobody went on the trails. There's a bogeyman out there. I mean, unknown. Could be one of your neighbors. Yeah. Didn't know if they were walking amongst us or not. The whole community He was scared. And what about that man in the photo? Investigators described him as a possible witness. Was he something more? Were you trying not to scare the killer? Maybe try to draw him in? Yeah, a little bit of both. That's one of the strategies. You make them start thinking, Oh, my. Are they closing in on me? When he doesn't come forward, he becomes your prime suspect that you have named Bridge guy. Correct. Bridge guy. They now believed he had to be the killer. Officers and agents from almost every corner of law enforcement were scrambling to figure out who he was. A week after the murders, they had an important update about that photo. This young lady is a hero.

There's no doubt. For the first time, they revealed where the image had come from. It wasn't taken by some random eyewitness or even a security camera. Incredibly, Libby herself captured the killer on her phone. Libby recorded from just off the end of the bridge, way down there. You believe then that, based on the video, that he followed them across? Yeah, that's what the video shows, that he was behind Abby in the video. So yeah, I believe he followed him across. Yes. Libby had the presence of mine to know something wasn't right about this person, and she secretly, I assume, was able to videotape this person approaching them. It makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up. Absolutely. When you think about these two girls. The phone's data revealed Libby hit record at 2: 13 PM, roughly six minutes after she posted that photo of Abby to Snapchat. I hate to even ask this, but the final moments of the girls and the fear that they would have experienced at the hands of that person. They had to be scared out of their minds. Play the clip, please. Police did not release the video, only a snippet of sound from it.

A man's garbled voice playing on a loop. We have Down the hill. Down the hill. Down the hill. Down the hill. The voice of the killer. Voice of the killer. To investigators, it sounded as though the man was ordering the girls down the hill to their deaths. And they thought they heard something else in that video, though they didn't reveal it at the time. We believe that we hear a gun racking in that video, and that made sense with the bullet being down between the two girls when we found it. A young victim recording her killer was more than enough to turn a small town's grief into a national news story. Police in Indiana are pleading for help to solve a double murder mystery. Tips were pouring in, thousands to sort through. When Connie Dilman learned where the girls were found, she believed she knew the killer. I just told him that I felt that it was Ron Logan. They had done this because he's abusive. Ron Logan was Connie's ex-boyfriend. The man who owned the property where the girls were found. And I said, Oh, my God. Ron Logan killed him. I really thought he killed him.

He just finally killed somebody. Connie said Ron once barricaded her inside his house. Another time, she said, he attacked her in his yard. I was helping him outside do some things, and he just hit me over the head with a crustert wrench. Then, when she saw the picture of Bridge guy, she was even more convinced. Just to build this dance. It It looked like Ron. Ron dressed that way. This is Ron Logan's house. This is a guy with a sketchy past and some big accusations from women against him. Absolutely, and a lot of reasons for police to look at him. Barbara McDonald covered the Delphi murders for Court TV. She spoke to some of those women. Two of the women that he had dated told me that after they had broken up, they had experiences where they woke up in the middle of the night, and he was standing at at the foot of their bed watching them sleep. Oh, my gosh. He had broken into their house? Had broken into their homes. They had no idea how he got in. That's terrifying. But Logan was never charged with any crimes related to the women's allegations.

And we interviewed Ron, he would deny all that. He would deny any of those accusations. Logan was a 77-year-old retiree living alone at the time of the murders. He told police he wasn't home the afternoon the girls were killed. He was out with his cousin running an errand. So we followed up. He said he had the cousin drive him to the fish store. So we located the cousin. The cousin backed up Logan's alibi. But then, two days later, he changed his story. Initially, the cousin was covering for him, but then during a separate interview, he said no. As in he had not driven Logan to the store. Why would he lie about that? Because he-Why lie? Yeah, exactly. That's what we thought. Not only that, the cousin said Logan asked him to lie before the girl's bodies had even been found. It was time for investigators to take a closer look at Ron Logan. All that has led us back to this location. Police were moving in. An arrest was imminent. A lot of people, when that happened, thought, Okay, well, this is the beginning, right? You're thinking back to interviewing him and thinking, My God, did I interview the killer?

The hunt for a killer was still on, but some in town thought they already knew who it was. Ron Logan. His ex-girlfriend, Connie, wasn't the only person to report him. As many as 15 tips came in suggesting he was involved in the girls' murders. The investigation was nearly a month old when police arrested him, but not for the murders. He's picked up on a probation violation. He's not supposed to be driving. He's not supposed to be driving. He's on a suspended license. I think a lot of people, when that happened, thought, Okay, Well, this is the beginning, right? This is what they're getting him on now. And then there's going to be these other charges. Investigators pressed Logan about the murders to see if he'd confess, but he denied any involvement. They also searched his house. With the information we received, with the interviews that we've done, tips that have come in, all that has led us back to this location. Everyone is descending on Ron Logan's house. You see them hauling away his truck. You see them carrying out stuff. They're there five and six hours. Then we don't hear anything. Emily Longenecker had talked to Logan right after the girls were found.

You're thinking back to interviewing him and thinking, My God, did I interview the killer? Logan pleaded guilty to an unrelated charge and violating his probation. He was sentenced to four years in prison. Police continued to investigate him, but Detective Holman had doubts Logan was involved in the murders. Did he look like Bridge guy at all? His build, his age, his weight? No, not to my opinion. He's very tall, older than the photo. They didn't find any direct evidence tying Logan to the case and investigators eventually cleared him. But if not Logan, then who? What's going on? We've got a picture of the man. We've got his voice. Where is this guy? Residents worried he would strike again. This was potentially a ticking time bomb with this killer. Big time. Five months after the murders, investigators released a sketch. It was based on information from that woman who'd reported seeing a muddy and bloody man. It's basically just a clear picture of his face compared to what you saw down below. If the photo of Bridge guy had been fuzzy, the sketch of him was detailed. Today was the first day that I've really been excited through this whole process.

It was the most optimistic we've been. We got a face to the person. We're going to get him. Instead, it kicked up a hornet's nest. People were accusing each other on social media with little or no proof. That was really the time that people were convinced it was their ex-husband. They were convinced it was their neighbor. They were convinced it was their son. Some people on social media actually thought you could be the killer? Oh, yeah. Somebody called in a tip that one of my male colleagues looked like Bridge guy. As I understand it, my boss had to sign an affidavit that said this male colleague was at work the day that Abby and Libby disappeared. Nobody was off the table. Nobody. More months ticked by. Libby's grandparents and Abby's mother, Anna Williams, tried to keep the case in the public eye. I'm hoping that there's going to be people that haven't heard about the girls see this. We just asked that you do the right thing. Do the right thing for our girls and to keep this from happening to the next family. Along the way, the two families supported one another. Both families were equally committed to doing whatever they could to catch this killer.

We always had hope that we were going to get to the end of this. The first anniversary of the girls' murders came and went. As the second anniversary approached, the families were frustrated there was still no arrest. It is sad. Nobody even here thought that we would still be looking for somebody in two years in a town this size, but we are. It's a clear picture of his face. We got a voice recording. We got a picture, albeit it's grainy, we got a sketch from eyewitness that saw the guy. How do we not have him in today's world? Still, Libby's family remained hopeful. Through strength of the Lord, prayer, and this faith that the good Lord is going to see this thing through. A few months after the second anniversary, Superintendent Carter held a press conference. His hope, smoke out the killer. Directly to the killer who may be in room. We believe you are hiding in plain sight. I was convinced that he was watching. It's an unsettling feeling. It was. I've never experienced anything like that. It's like you're talking to a ghost out there. Yeah. Investigators believe their killer was someone living among them, someone from Delphi.

My gut the entire time was people don't know about these trails. People didn't know about Highbridge. The random person from the next town over, you would find very few people that even there knew what it was. So I always figured that it was someone here or from here that was familiar with the area. We're also releasing video, recovered from Libby's phone. One more thing to come out of that press conference. For the first time, investigator showed a short clip of Bridge guy played on a loop. Watch the person's mannerisms as they walk. I can imagine someone studying that walk over and over and over again and saying, Yeah, that looks like somebody I know. The video generated more tips. None panned out. Then suddenly, there was a new name in the news. State police are now looking for information about a social media profile with the name Anthony Shatz. Anthony Shatz. This male model type with his shirt off and smiling and nice pecs and good abs. Who was this mystery man? And what did he have to do with the murders? You learned that Liberty had been in communication with Shatz. Yes. A true crime story never really ends.

Even when a case is closed, the journey for those left behind is just beginning. Since our Dateland story aird, Tracy has harnessed her outrage into a mission. I had no other option. I had to do something. Catch up with families, friends, and investigators on our bonus series, After the Verdict. Ordinary people facing extraordinary circumstances with length and courage. It does just change your life, but speaking up for these issues helps me keep going. To listen to After the Verdict, subscribe to Dateline Premium on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or at datelinepremium. Com. Every morning, we choose how to begin our day. This is today. I think about the people at home. They tune in because they are curious. They care about their world, and they care about each other. There's always something new to learn, whether a news event or a new recipe. And when we step through the morning together, it makes the rest of the day better. We come here to make the most of today. We are family. We are today. Watch the Today Show with Savannah Guthrie and Craig Melvin, weekdays at 07: 00 AM on In early 2020, Delphi investigators were trying to figure out if the murders of Abbey and Libby were linked to other crimes in the area.

They reached out to Libby's sister, Kelsey. Kelsey gets called in by law enforcement, and they give her a list of names, and among those names is this Anthony Shatz. She says, Oh, that sounds familiar to me. Kelsey told police in the days before the murders, Libby had been chatting with Shatz. Evidence would seem to be that she was saying, Oh, I'm talking to this really cute guy. The profile showed a floppy-haired heartthrob with abs and tats who was rich and drove fancy sports cars. Police learned after the girls went missing, Kelsey looked for clues in Libby's social media. Kelsey had the passwords, and she was going through and looking to see if there were messages, and she saw this Anthony Shatz account. On Libby's? On Libby's social media. And that it had at least liked or commented on one of Libby's images. Kelsey even asked Shatz for help. So she reaches out and says, My sister's missing. Do you know anything about this? And the response is, No. I talked to her earlier. I'm sure she'll turn up. I'm sure it's fine. And then it didn't go anywhere. At the time, Kelsey didn't tell investigators about Shatz.

But three years later, they knew a lot about him, including a disturbing connection he had with Libby. He had asked for explicit photos. This Anthony Shatz was soliciting young girls for nude photos and videos, and some of the girls were friends of Liberty, and one was Liberty as well. Which is a very bad sign. It's bad, yeah. And Any idea what Libby was sending to him? Was she sending him nude photos? No. The problem with social media, we could tell that they're communicating together, but we don't always get the content of it. But we do know that he was asking for those because she had told people that he was asking and she wasn't sending them. To investigators, Shatz checked a lot of boxes. He was one of the last people to communicate with her before she died. People We are starting to think, Okay, he's communicating with Libby in the days before her death. Could be something here. I was in shock, first off, that she was even doing that because I kept thinking she would never do that. So it was hard to accept that she had. Did you think this person might have had something to do with their deaths?

Certainly. You start to ride up that roller coaster because of the connections made, right? We talked to Libby the day of or day before. Hours before their deaths. Yes. And they were really investigating the San Anthony shots. They were investigating him hard. Becky wondered if he was part of a pedophile operation. At that point in time, I'm thinking, Oh, my gosh, this guy was talking to him. Oh, my gosh, they were going to kidnap and traffic them. And there was something else alarming. Police discovered the guy Libby had been talking to didn't exist. It turned out Anthony Shatz was Anthony Shatz. Correct. Anthony Shatz was just a screen name? Yes. While investigating the murders of Abigail Williams and Liberty German-more than a year later in 2021, investigators asked the public for help. Investigating investigators would like any individual who communicated, met, or attempted to meet the Anthony Shatz profile to contact law enforcement. I think a lot of people looking at this case always wondered if there was some catfishing element, why did the girls go out there that day? Were they out there to meet someone? I think that fit in with that theory of the case is that, Oh, yes, they're catfished.

That's how they got out there. As we're covering this, we're thinking, Okay, maybe this is the guy. An update now. That fake social media profile shared by detectives investigating the murder of two young girls in Delphi. As journalists and true crime bloggers raced to identify the person who created the fake profile. Local NBC station, WTHR, tracked down the man in those photos. Well, now for the very first time, we're hearing from the man whose pictures were stolen and used by that Anthony Shatz profile. His real name is Vincent Kowalski. Once a model, he'd changed careers and joined law enforcement. Arjenne Ronovich talked with the former model and now current police officer in Alaska, who frankly was pretty shocked to see his face connected to this investigation in Indiana. Kowalski had nothing to do with sorded images of young girls or the murders of Abby and Libby. Just seeing your face blasted all over the news was crazy. Even though he looked casual interviewing as he worked out, this father of two girls was outraged when he learned someone had used his photos as bait. So listening videos from young girls, that's disgusting, and it makes me sick.

But to know that two young girls possibly lost their life because of my picture It's the worst of the worst. Police had a catfisher on their hands. But who was it? Are you thinking that this guy could be the killer given the fact that he was talking to Libby? Over Snapchat, not too long before the murders? Yeah, absolutely. To uncover the truth, the investigation would go into dark places. He's definitely a bad person who was doing bad things. And there would be allegations of something even more sinister. I believe that would have been the first ritualistic killing of two young girls. It was a complete shocker and was absolutely not the direction I thought they were going to go. When investigators went public with the Anthony Shatz profile. They actually knew much more about the person behind it than they were letting on. He's definitely a bad person, was doing bad things. So you just knew that he had been misrepresenting himself to young girls? Yes. Turned out he'd been the target of an entirely different investigation two counties away from Delphi. Back in 2017, a few days after Abby and Libby were murdered, the man posing as Anthony Shatz got an underage girl to send him her address.

A day later, she saw a figure in a ski mask peeping through her bedroom window and reported the scary encounter. Police investigated and traced the account to a 22-year-old man named Kegen Klein. Who is KegenKagan Klein. Kagan Klein is the person that was using the Anthony Shatz profile to solicit girls to send them pornographic photos. And Kagan Klein was a big, overweight, not somebody that these girls would talk to person. And so he changed who he was. Not long after that Peeping Tom incident, law enforcement raided Klein's home. They turned up more than 100 sexually explicit photos and videos of underage girls on his electronic devices. It took three years, but he was arrested on child pornography charges. And that's when Delphi investigators spoke with him. He's a bad guy. He's a pathological liar. He would tell us something we would look into, and it'd be a lie. He lied a lot. Klein seemed to have a strong alibi that he was in Vegas at the time of the murders. But after a deep dive into the data on his phones, the Delphi investigators found out that wasn't true. It's determined, though, that he was not in Las Vegas.

He's in Peru, Indiana, which is not far from here. That is true. They checked it and they thought he was in Vegas, but we knew shortly after that he wasn't in Vegas. Are you thinking that this guy could be the killer given the fact that he was talking to Libby over Snapchat not too long before the murders? Yeah, absolutely. He was definitely someone who he believed that could have been capable of doing that. Kagan Klein was on the radar of police early on, but he came back on the radar because someone looked at him again and said, Wait a second. He was not in Las Vegas. He was in Peru, Indiana. Yeah. Yeah. Seems like a suspect. It seemed like it had the most potential up to that point. So you're just waiting for that call? Maybe they'll arrest him for the murders? That's how we said we were going to operate, and we stuck to that. When Court TV's Barbara McDonald learned Klein was in jail on child pornography charges, she contacted him. What happened? He talked to me. He gave me an interview from jail. Hi, Keegan. How are you? Did Keegan have any history of violence that you could see.

No history of violence. He seemed to be the type of guy who sat behind a computer and did his crimes that way. So are you aware that there's a bunch of news stories out there linking you to the Delphi murders? Yeah, I saw that on the news. Okay. And you have admitted that you created this fake profile, Anthony Shatz. Is that correct? Yeah. Why did you create that profile? I was just lonely. You know what I mean? Just talking to people. I don't know why I did it, really. He did admit, though, to being involved in child pornography? Absolutely. You were committing crimes against children. Right. You were asking children to send you inappropriate images, correct? Right. Yeah. He said, Yes, the things that I'm accused of so far, the charges I have, I did that. But when it came In a contact with Libby, Klein seemed evasive. Anthony Shatz was communicating with Libby. Was that you? That's what they said. Was that you? No, not that I remember, but that's what they're saying. Are you aware Are you aware whether you may have talked to Libby on the 13th? That's what the police tell me.

Do you have any recollection of that? No, not at all. He said he had no plans to meet Libby or Abby or anyone else that day. Where were you on February 13th, 2017? I was at my house. In Peru, Indiana? Yeah. He says he had never been to Delphi except for a high school football game, and that he didn't know about the bridge or where it was. But with Kegin, it was always really hard to determine what was true and what wasn't. Did you have anything to do with the murders of Abby or Libby? Not at all. I gave up my DNA, a hair follicle test. Done everything they wanted me to. Immediately, I was like, well, give me a polygraph test, a DNA, whatever you want. I'll do anything. I'm innocent of this, and I would love to find out who did it. Klein's phone activity showed he was at his grandmother's house 40 minutes from Delphi. We could never put his phone or any technology of him being in Delphi. During the time of the murders, he was actually at his grandmother's house. And in the end, investigators couldn't prove he killed Abby and Libby.

We conducted a thorough investigation and rolled him out. Another dead end. Another dead end. Klein would eventually bleed guilty to 25 charges, including child porn and child exploitation. He was sentenced to 40 years in prison. Then, after years of dead ends, investigators would finally get a break. A conscientious volunteer happened to find a box and stumbled upon a new name on a tip sheet. Could you believe it? A new name This is potentially huge. And not just a new name, a name and a timeline in this tip that fits what we've been looking for for, at that time, five and a half years. Hey, everybody. I'm Al Roker from The Today Show. Let's kickstart your wellness journey with the all new Start Today app. Everything you need for a healthier you, all in one place. Fitness challenges for all levels, meal plans that are easy and delicious, and so much more. It's built to fit your lifestyle, and our experts will guide you every step of the way. Come on, let's do this. To subscribe, download Start Today from the App Store on your Apple device now. Terms apply, cancel anytime through Apple under profile settings.

It was late past midnight when they broke into the farmhouse. Never in a million years would you think that you'd see your parents house taken off by that yellow tape? No. And they said, I'm scared of being killed. They left behind a wall of blood and the key to a secret. She looked at me and she said, I'm screwed. Murder in the Moonlight, a new podcast from Dateland. To listen to the latest episodes each week completely free, you can find and follow murder in the Moonlight on Pandora. Now they had the final answer. Or did they? Nothing has more suspense than a dateland mystery, and no one wants to wait to find out what happens next. That's why everyone needs Dateland Premium, where listening is always ad-free. You get the whole story and nothing but the story. Or do you? Yes, actually. You do. Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or at glinepremium. Com. The double murder case that law enforcement once thought would be solved quickly had haunted them for over five long years. I knew it wasn't for lack of effort. We had a great team. We were working extremely hard, 10, 12, 15 hours a day.

A lot of sleepless nights. We were really focused on finding the killer, and we weren't going to give up. By then, they'd received tens of thousands of tips. Some from the earliest stages of the investigation hadn't been filed away properly. There was so much coming in that we just handle it. We just couldn't. I'm here to help in any way I can. Over the years, a local volunteer named Kathy Shank dedicated countless hours organizing and digitizing those files. Felt like that I need to be here and I need to help. Excuse me, that's what I do. She was a former investigator with Child Protective Services and had an eye for detail. When she would come across things throughout the years that she wasn't aware of, she would bring it to an investigator. Most of the time, that was me. In September 2022, as the team prepared to move to a new location, Kathy was packing up files and stumbled on a box in the bottom of a drawer. Inside was a tip from early in the investigation before Kathy joined. It involved that man whose wife had seen the story on the news and urgent him to report he'd been at the trail that day.

And so now this is a new name. Correct. Yeah. To Kathy Shank, this could be their man. This could be Bridge guy. This is This is potentially huge. A name and a timeline in this tip that fits what we've been looking for for, at that time, five and a half years. Back then, a conservation officer met and spoke to the man who explained he'd been out of the trails around 1: 30 to 3: 30. The officer's report somehow got overlooked until now. So it was missfiled as cleared, so no one followed up on it. So something fell through the cracks where this tip did not-Whoever wrote cleared on it, everybody ignored it. This man has placed himself by the bridge at the time the girls were there. Absolutely. What did you think when you saw that? I thought that that's Bridge guy. So I'm like, We need to talk to that guy. That's the guy that we were missing. Oh, my gosh. Are you just dying when you hear this? Is this what we've been waiting for? Yes. The man who'd come forward all those years ago was Richard Allen, a A two-year-old Delphi man who worked at the local CVS.

He was married with a grown daughter. So this is an average Joe, it seems like. It's what it appeared. Squeaky clean as far as law enforcement goes. Correct. Investigators went back over the evidence, including surveillance video from a business near the trail. In it was a black car. They couldn't confirm the license plate or who was driving, but they knew Alan owned something similar. Was his vehicle on that video? It was. It lined up with the time that Richard Allen said he was there. A few weeks later, they paid Allen a visit. Went to his house and knocked on the door and asked him to come talk to us. He willingly went with you? He did. Back to the Investigation Center, where Sheriff Liggett and another detective began their interview. Allen chose not to have an attorney present. In the beginning, his demeanor was fine. I believe he drank a lot of water, but in In the beginning, he was fine. When Detective showed Alan the picture of Bridge guy, he bristled. He said it wasn't him, that he never saw Abby or Libby at the trail, and he changed his timeline. Now he said he was there earlier in the day.

But what about that video of the black car? Did you confront him with that? Yes. He was abrasive about it and said, You don't know that that's my car, and things like that. Did he look nervous? And he got to that point, yes. The interview ended. He was free to go. But the investigation into Alan was just beginning. They got a search warrant and went back to his Delphi home. What do you find from the search warrants? He had a lot of knives, a lot of clothing that matched the description that matchedBridge guy? Yes. And they found something else, a Sig Sauer pistol, like this one. They sent the pistol to the crime lab, where a state firearms expert tested it using 40 caliber bullets. She then compared markings on the bullets made by the gun with markings on the bullet found at the crime scene. Soon after, Sheriff Liggett got a call. Was it a match? It the match. This news is everything. That's huge. Investigators thought they heard someone racking their gun on that video from Libby's phone. Now, with the bullet match, they were convinced it was Alan. Once we got the result back that the round matched his gun, we decided to call him back in for another interview.

Alan agreed to come in, again without an attorney. Lieutenant Holman did the interview this time and told Alan how the crime scene bullet match to his gun. Why is your round from your gun at the crime scene? And he just denied it and could never give us an explanation. The tone in the interrogation room quickly became heated, and the lieutenant says Alan eventually threatened him. He just made a comment that I was going to pay for this, and I told him, No, you're going to pay for this. The detective had heard enough. And soon after that interview, police arrested Richard Allen for the murders of Abby and Libby. After so many false leads, Libby's grandparents were cautious when they heard the news. And we asked him, Do you have enough evidence to convict? Are you sure? Are you positive? They were sure And on Halloween, 2022. Today is not a day to celebrate. Police unmasked the alleged killer. But the arrest of Richard M. Allen of Delphi on two counts of murder is sure a major step in leading to the conclusion of this long term and complex investigation. You waited five days to announce the arrest?

Why not rush out and tell the public that we got the man we believe is-We didn't rush out and do anything throughout the course of this. What was the reason, though? Global attention crime. The case had become an international story, even more so after a stunning allegation surfaced. Could others have been behind the murders? These men who practice Odenism were perhaps performing some ritualistic sacrifice in the woods. What did you make of that modanism theory? It needed to be investigated. For the people of Delphi, the news was still settling in that there had been an arrest. We're going to keep pushing all the way. Libby's grandparents were, of course, relieved. And as for the identity of the suspect, do you know Richard Allen? No. If law enforcement is correct, the suspect has been hiding in plain sight this whole time, just like they thought. Many in Delphi did know Richard Allen, or at least had seen him working at that neighborhood CVS, a disturbing detail is that this man is the man who prepared the photos for the girls' funerals. Yes. That was the first thing my daughter thought of when they showed his picture and said he worked at CVS.

She said, Oh, Mom, Mom, he's the one that developed those pictures. For the victim's families, the arrest marked the first of many more startling revelations. The defense was about to drop an alternate theory of who did this and why, and it was a shocker. It was a complete shocker and was absolutely not the direction I thought they were going to go. Eleven months after his arrest, Allen's attorneys surprised many with a pre-trial filing claiming the girls might have been killed in those woods by members of a pagan religion called Odenism. This theory that these men who practice Odenism, which is this Norse pagan religion were perhaps performing some ritualistic sacrifice in the woods and decided to target these two girls. Are there any known groups like that in the area? There are these different groups in the area. There are these people who practice this Norse pagan religion. To explain that theory, Allen's attorneys met us in an area similar to the crime scene. We should say these are not the woods where Abby and Libby were found. Jennifer O'Jay, Brad Rosie, and Andy Baldwin represented Alan. They say those sticks that were partially covering the girls' bodies were meant to send a message and demonstrated for us how some of them were placed.

We had sticks that were arranged in a certain pattern. To me, it's just plain silly to say that these were thrown on there to hide the body. And they certainly didn't hide the bodies. Did not. They believe the sticks formed letters from an ancient alphabet known as runes, a way Odenism followers can communicate. It sends a message to the person that made them and created them. So what could it have meant in this case? It's only known to the person that created the Rune. Their bodies were forming a V as well, and we think that that is likely symbolic to the person or people that did this. And they point out that Libby His blood was found on a nearby tree, and say it appears someone used it to create another Odenistic symbol that looked like this, an F. There's just no natural way that that shape gets on the tree accidentally. While some thought the ritualistic killing theory was far fetched, Allen's attorney said they weren't the first to bring it up. If we're going to come up with a defense, we're not going to pull Odenism out of the air. That's fantastical, right?

I mean, this was driven by the evidence that was given to us. Soon after the murders, it was the police who had looked into the possibility of a ritualistic killing. It was definitely investigated very thoroughly by multiple people. No stone unturned. We did not have tunnel vision. Multiple officers spent multiple hours, multiple months, looking into that connection. What did you make of that theory, Odenism theory? It needed to be investigated. They investigated that Odenism. Sheriff Liggett says law enforcement concluded there was no connection between Odenism and the murders. I believe that that would have been the first ritualistic killing of two young girls. That's not what Odenism, it's a religion. I wasn't aware of it, but it's evidently not uncommon. Then, Alan's attorneys found themselves in hot water after some crime scene photos were leaked to several media outlets. Turned out, they came from their camp. You've been accused of trying to put your narrative out there of this odinism by leaking these photos. True or false? 100% false and offensive. Alan's attorney say a former associate who had access to their office copied the photos, and unbeknownst to them, sent the images around. It is very upsetting to me that anybody would say that we intentionally made any of that happen.

So this was unintentional? Absolutely. There was nothing to gain by leaking those documents. I mean, there's no plausible game for me. The judge was so angry, she took you off the case. Yeah. Fired us. What was your reaction to that? Deep despair, getting in the futile position in my bed for days, thinking my life is over, my career The attorneys appealed the judge's decision, and the state's Supreme Court reinstated them. But the fallout from those leaked photos continued. Somebody said, I've got some pictures I want you to see. You need to see A podcaster texted them to Becky. It was the first time she and Mike had seen the gruesome images of the girls. The photos, the things that we learned, only confirmed our most horrible imaginations. Those photos should have been protected. Should have never got to that point. I'm sorry, I'll call it out. The defense team has culpability in that. Would you be open to saying sorry to them for what happened? I would love to do it in person. I would love to sit down and talk with them if they would want to do that. Absolutely. The defense now had to focus on the trial, which was just weeks away.

Did you feel it was an uphill battle going to trial? Well, It felt, from a defense perspective, it felt like a stack deck. The prosecution, on the other hand, had a possible ace up its sleeve. Prison calls that would reveal some stunning conversations. When you heard that, did you think, game over? I'm just confirm that we had the right guy. In the summer of 2024, Richard Allen's lawyers were revving up for trial. At a pre-trial hearing, they presented that key part of their defense, that followers of a pagan cult killed Abby and Libby. Richard Allen has the right to present these alternative theories if they have some basis. And then the judge says you can't bring them up in trial as alternate suspects. That's a blow to your defense. Huge. Carroll County prosecutor, Nicholas McLeeland, acknowledged that as strong as some of the evidence appeared to be, his case had holes, too. Male DNA had been recovered at the crime scene, but the sample was too small to match to anyone. There was no DNA, no fingerprints, no text messages tying Richard Allen to the girls. The image from the phone was grainy. The voice isn't perfect.

So many things that would be cons to a prosecution. Correct. I think you have bad facts in almost every case. Those are just hurdles that we had to overcome by other circumstantial evidence that we had. Was there anything you learned about Richard Allen's past that would explain why he could be capable of something like this? How do you explain this behavior that it suddenly just happens? I am not the person asked to explain the criminal psychology of one's mind that convinces them that they need to kill two little girls. I don't think anything in his past would justify or explain why he did this. Nearly eight years after the murders, Richard Allen's trial got underway. People lined up news crews from all over, tons of security solidarity. This little, quiet, sleepy town suddenly is ground zero for this trial. People from Australia, Finland, I mean, just everywhere. It's been a fascination for so many I think, because of how unusual it is. Libby's and Abby's families did their best to drown out the noise. They sat on the same side of the courtroom in a show of solidarity. There would have never been another option.

We walk through this thing from the beginning together. We have to finish it together. This is everything. And all eyes are on you when you walk in the courthouse. I didn't care about any of that. I cared about the 12 jurors there and what they thought and how the information and facts are going to be presented to them. No cameras were allowed in court. Prosecutor McLean set out to convince the jury there was only one man responsible for these murders. Richard Allen, a. K. A. Bridge guy. He opened with this. This is about Bridge guy. This is about a bullet, and this is about two young girls who were murdered. You made it very straightforward. My openings are always very, very short and very, very to the point. I would rather just keep the jury on the hook. He began his case by calling officers who described the crime scene and evidence gathered in vivid detail. The prosecutor went with a little more of the emotion in the beginning to get the jury to really sense how horrific this thing was that happened to these two girls. He drove home the full horror of the murders by showing photographs of what had been done to Abby and Libby.

To watch the jury during that was... They were visibly shaken and emotional. I wish that I had never seen those. It was awful. There were some members of Abby's family who chose not to be in the room. There were a few members of Libby's family that left as well. I remember that one juror, he could not... He would lean forward and put his head in his hands. He couldn't look. Becky testified for the prosecution My goal was to tell the jury about Libby. I wanted them to know that those girls mattered, and they need to think of that throughout this whole trial. Mccleeland laid out for the jurors his theory of how Alan carried out the murders. He went out to the trails that day. He laid in wait. He then saw the two girls, forced them down the hill with a firearms. We believe there's a sexual assault that was going to occur, and then we believe he got spooked, and he decided to kill them. He left the crime scene and continued on with his life. The prosecutor put the state's firearms expert on the stand. Her opinion was the bullet found between Abbey's and Libby's bodies had to have come from Richard Allen's gun based on marks matching the gun's mechanism.

The bullet, to me, was huge because it tied Richard Allen to the crime scene where the girls were found. Racking the gun in that situation It would be such a powerful statement that if you don't do what I say, I am going to shoot you or I am going to hurt you. And so we just believe that was how he was able to control the girls with this firearms. Mccleeland argued the moment Allen racked the gun could be heard on the 43 seconds of video captured by Libby. You're hearing Abby and Libby talk. You're hearing one of them say, Is he behind me? The fact that Libby had the wherewithal to hit record on her phone and capture these images and keep rolling. She was in death, almost your star witness. I agree. In her dying moment, she had to wearwithal to pull that phone out and take a video and help solve her own crime. The prosecution said the phone provided a key timeline for the murders and a link to the killer. A number of witnesses testified the man in the video was the one they saw that day, including the woman who reported a man covered in mud and blood.

Said. All agreed he was Bridge guy. You didn't have them in court actually look at Richard Allen and say, Is that the man you saw? Which is what we're all used to on TV, right? That's the big, powerful moment. Is that the man, and you didn't do that. Why not? Just a strategic move. Was there fear that if you did say, Is that the man? That they would say, Honestly, I can't be sure. There's always that fear they're going to say that. But we had in our minds, what we want to identify as Bridge guy, and then tie in that Richard Allen is Bridge guy. That was our strategy from day one. As the trial progressed, the prosecutor used Richard Allen's own words against him. He argued Allen told law enforcement before later changing his story that he was on the trails during the window of the murders. We believe he was on the trails from 1: 30 to 3: 30, like he had originally said in 2017. In 2022, he changed that from 12: 30 to 1: 30. Mcleeland also played Richard Allen's voice in court. It It turned out that while he had been in jail, officers recorded some 700 phone calls between Allen and his wife and mother.

In some of those calls, he confessed. He told his wife, I wanted to apologize to you. I did it. No, I did it. I killed Abby and Libby. When you heard that, did you think, game over? It just confirmed that we had the right guy. Libby's family listened intently to the recordings. Did they seem believable? Yeah, 100%. And it's like, Oh, yeah, by the way, I did kill those Delphi girls. And she said, No, you didn't. They're messing with your mind. And he said, Why would I tell you I did it if I didn't? And Alan didn't just make confessions to his family. Over the course of 21 months in jail, he made more than 60 apparent confessions to Corrections officers, inmates, and also to the jail psychologist, Dr. Monica Walla. She said he told her he marched the girls across the creek and killed them with a box cutter. That he had planned to rape them but got spuked by a passing van on a nearby drive. What can we confirm in that confession? He said he saw a van. Let's start looking around. Were there any vans in the area? A local man named Brad Webber took to stand.

And sure enough, Brad Webber was coming home from work that day, and sure enough, he was driving a van. As the prosecution rested, it appeared it could be game over for Richard Allen. But Allen's attorneys argued nothing was what it seemed. They would counter that those weren't real confessions, that it wasn't Allen's bullet, and there was no proof he was Bridge guy. None of the people on the trail gave a description that matched Richard Allen. As Richard Allen's defense defense team saw it, even though they had some setbacks before trial, the case against their client was thin. There's just not much there. One of the things that really jumps out at you is that this is a man who had never been in trouble with the law. He works at CVS, and then suddenly he's responsible for this very gruesome crime with these young girls. And no forensic evidence. No forensic evidence. But the defense had some major obstacles to overcome. What does look really bad for Richard Allen is that he places himself in that area that day. He didn't have to do that. I don't know how somebody's supposed to react when the law enforcement gets on the TV saying, We need help.

The easiest thing for him to do would have been to say nothing and leave Delphi. He did the exact opposite, which was he cooperated. One of the things the prosecution pounced on was they say that Richard Allen changed his story as far as the time that he was out there. Five and a half years past, who, anyone here, anyone listening, who can tell you what they were doing to a specificity five and a half years ago? He wasn't the one that changed his story. It was the police who lost recordings of the initial conversation with Richard Allen. Richard says, I was on those trails between noon and 1: 30. What's more, they argued, none of the witnesses could say for sure that Richard Allen was Bridge guy. None of the people on the trail gave a description that matched Richard Allen. Even the witnesses on the trail couldn't agree on what Bridge guy was wearing. It was jeans in a Carhartt-type coat. You're in a rural county in Indiana, probably half the men in that county have those clothes. And while Allen stands about 5'6, some witnesses described Bridge guy as medium height or even tall.

So many different opinions about how old this person was, how tall they were, how heavy. One of the key witnesses for the state, she described to police a guy that was in his early 20s that had brown poofy hair. That's the guy that she said was Bridge guy, and that doesn't match the guy that's on the Bridge. The defense attorneys also poured cold water on the 43 seconds of audio and video captured by Libby. They argued the audio was muddy, the video, grainy. With everything in this case, on the surface, you hear, okay, there's a video of the suspect, and then you find out, okay, well, it's grainy, and it's from far away, and it's not real clear. But what about the unfired bullet found at the scene? The defense pushed back hard on the state's expert who said it was a match to Alan's gun. I was fairly well-versed in the ballistics arena. It's not what we would call or what a layperson would call science. You didn't trust the science behind this so-called match. It's not a science. No. He argued there's a difference between fired bullets and unfired bullets ejected from a gun after it's been racked.

There's no dispute that the round, the magic bullet that was found allegedly at the scene, was cycled and not fired. But when they conducted the examination, the test-fired rounds that they actually compared to our client's firearms were fired rounds. They were not test-cycled rounds. The simple way of describing that is, is they were comparing apples on oranges. I will say about this jury, they listened and took notes and leaned into every detail. But perhaps the most insurmountable evidence would be those 60 plus jail confessions. Richard Allen at one point says to his wife, I wanted to apologize to you. I did it. No, I did it. I killed Abby and Libby. Those conversations, he would later go on to say, I think I killed them. Maybe I killed them. Init was the same conversation. Yeah, in the same conversation. The defense argued they were false confessions made under duress. Following his arrest, Richard Allen was jailed for months in a maximum security segregation unit. The state said it was for his own safety. His lawyers disagreed. The three of us here have been in this business a long time. We've all represented some of the worst humans on this planet, and none of us have ever seen somebody detained on a pre-trial basis in the most secure unit in the state of Indiana.

That made him lose touch with reality, they said. When you're stuck in those circumstances, when you have no outside stimuli, you're stuck in a gray steel box day in day out, lights on day in, day out. You're trying to figure out why you might be held in this condition. It's not unrealistic that that's where you go. That's where your brain goes. It's medieval the way he was detained. He started losing his mind been there? Is that through your eyes? Is that how you would-It's psychological warfare on a man who's a pretrial detainee. They argued those conditions also played into Alan's confessions to the psychologist. It this textbook for an environment where somebody would spew some false confession, where basically a man says, I give, I've had enough. At the time that these statements are being made, it's hard to believe that you could give a lot have credibility to anything he was saying. To bolster their argument, defense attorneys pointed to Alan's police interviews. Time after time, he insisted he was innocent. In the police interviews, he's saying, I didn't do it. I didn't do it. This isn't me. And then when his wife comes in, he's saying, I didn't do it.

You know I couldn't do this. He's not admitting to anything at this point. No, he's insisting that he was out there on the trails to go for a walk that he was looking at fish from the bridge, that he was looking at the stock ticker on his phone, said he never saw Abby or Libby. And with that, the defense rested. I think a lot of people who were watching the trial thought, There's a possibility this is going to be a hung jury, that this could go either way. For nearly three weeks, jurors and the Delphi community were consumed by a trial that was as grueling as it was heartbreaking. Enduring it all and sitting together were Abby's and Libby's families. We were brought together by an event. Even though we are totally two different types of families, we are basically family, and we are We are bonded forever. In closing arguments, the defense told jurors not to trust much of the state's case, especially the testimony about the crime scene bullet matching Alan's gun. The ballistics and the magic bullet That it's just this stuff is totally unreliable. The prosecution hammered home that confession Alan gave to his prison psychologist about seeing the van on the day of the murders.

That's a big aha moment, if you will, something that only the killer would know. Yeah, it was. We felt that way. We felt that the only person that would know a van went down that private drive on that day would be the two girls and the killer. The case was now in the hands of the jury. The defense felt confident. I felt like we tried a great case on reasonable doubt. That's what the case was about. There's reasonable doubt here. A verdict wouldn't come quickly. Hours soon turned into days. The jury goes out, and they're out for four days. That's a long time for a jury. It's a long time. There's a possibility this is going to be a hung jury. We've got breaking news coming out of Carroll County this afternoon. We have learned there is a verdict in the Delphi murders case. This is probably the biggest moment of our lives. Something we've been working so hard to get to this day. Now, this this hour, this moment, this minute. The judge read the decision. There was a couple of gasp we could hear. Guilty on all charges. Outside the courthouse where the press and spectators had gathered, cheers erupted.

We got our verdict, but that didn't bring the girls back. It doesn't give us closure. It gives us a little bit of peace to know that he can never hurt another person again, and that he's where he should be. Libby's cousin, Sadie, was overwhelmed. I instantly started crying, and I called my mom, and my mom started crying. So it was like, I don't know if it was tears of happiness, tears of this are nightmares coming to a close. Good morning. A few weeks later, at a press conference, the prosecutor recognized an unsung hero of the case, Kathy Shank. She was the woman who, five years after the murders, found that file that led to Richard Allen. Without her, we would not be here. Without her, we would not have an arrest, a conviction, and a sentence. That sentence was 130 years, 65 years for Libby, and 65 for Abby. Helen is appealing. Yet out of all the pain and sorrow came a ray of light. People in the beginning didn't know what to do, so they started sending us money, and we didn't want that money, so we decided we would do something in honor of Libby.

They checked with Abby's family, and together came up with a plan. We decided we were going to buy bleachers for the girls' softball field because their bleachers are horrible. But the money kept coming in and coming in. So they went bigger, much bigger. It started out as bleachers and ended up a 22 acre complex. We have three ball fields on it, and we host tournaments. We have an amphitheater where you can hold concerts, musicals, and car shows. Amazing. All in their honor. Yeah. It's called Abby and Libby Memorial Park, a place where Delphi's heartbreak is slowly rewritten in every cheer, every moment of joy. A tribute to two best friends. Forever, together. What would you say to people watching? Keep your faith in your deepest, darkest time. Sometimes a good prayer or somebody say they're saying a prayer for you. It does help. Don't ever take for granted what you have today. Hug those kids. Tell them all you love them. That's all for this edition of Dateland. Check out our talking Dateland podcast, Andrea Canning and Blaine Alexander will go behind the scenes of tonight's episode, available Wednesday in the Dateland feed wherever you get your podcasts.

We'll see you again next Friday at 9: 00, 8: 00 Central. I'm Lester Holt for all of us at NBC News. Good night. How can I help? It's a question I ask my patients every day. It's a question I ask myself. One thing I've learned is that I can help even more when I can easily connect with... Physios. Pediatricians, specialists. Nurses. Who are all working with me in a healthcare network that takes a wider view of your health. That's VHI, where healthcare connects. So let me rephrase the question. How can we help? Vhi, because your health means everything.