DELPHI, Ind. — The jury left the Carrol County Courthouse in Delphi, Indiana, on Saturday after a third day of deliberations. Richard Allen’s double murder case.

Allen is accused of killing Libby German and Abby Williams, who were hiking on the Monon High Trail in February 2017.

The jury has been in the courthouse for 14 hours since the case was taken Thursday afternoon. The media has been kept out of the courtroom since deliberations began, so it is unclear whether they had questions, were asked to look at evidence, or were given any notes to the judge.

There are no negotiations on Sunday. The jury will return at 9 a.m. Monday morning.

Allen has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder and two counts of felony murder in connection with the 2017 deaths of 14-year-old German and 13-year-old Williams. If convicted of all charges, Allen could face up to 130 years in prison. Associated Press reported.

The 12-member jury began deliberating on Thursday and returned to the Carroll County Courthouse on Saturday morning, CNN affiliate WTHR reported. reported.

READ MORE | Delphi murders trial: Jury sees videos of Richard Allen held in Westville jail

Jurors will deliberate from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Saturday until they reach a verdict, according to the CNN affiliate WTHR. Last month, 16 Allen County residents were selected to serve on juries; among them were four people serving as reserves. WTHR in question.

Allen County Superior Court Judge Frances Gull gave her final instructions to jurors Thursday morning, urging the jury to “consider the facts” by going over the evidence and testimony presented during the trial before Carroll County Prosecutor Nick McLeland delivered his closing statement, WTHR reported .

“I believe the evidence is absolutely convincing that Richard Allen was the Bridge Guy and that he killed Abby and Libby,” McLeland told the jury.

McLeland showed jurors graphic photos of the girls’ bodies, a video taken from Libby’s smartphone in which the suspect said he captured the final moments of the girls’ lives, and a recording of Allen allegedly confessing to his wife during a phone call.

“I did it,” Allen was heard telling his wife. “I killed Abby and Libby.”

Defense attorney Brad Rozzi said in his closing argument that the broken timeline, false confessions and lack of DNA or gun evidence should have resulted in an acquittal.

“The defense believes that what you’ve heard over the last few weeks is more important than what you’ve heard today,” Rozzi told the jury Thursday.

The defense also argued there was no physical evidence linking Allen to the murders and said his past confessions were “involuntary” and resulted from months of solitary confinement.

The Delphi murder case dates back to February 13, 2017, when “Abby” and “Libby” went for a walk on the Monon High Bridge in Delphi. The two girls were reported missing after they were unable to contact Libby’s father that afternoon. The next day, their bodies were found, both slit up to their throats and partially covered with sticks.

The case came to public attention due to the suspect’s photo and audio recording taken from Libby’s smartphone. The image shows a man walking across the bridge with his hands in his pockets, and the audio includes the muffled voice of a man saying, “Guys, down the hill.” Although police distributed the photo and audio just days after the murders and identified the “Bridge Man” as the prime suspect, the case remained inconclusive for more than five years until Allen was arrested in 2022.

Allen had seemingly evaded police notice, staying in the small town of Delphi and working at a local CVS pharmacy until September 2022, when a clerk digitizing clues relevant to the investigation realized he had placed him at the scene of the crime. Just a few days after the bodies were found, Allen told police he followed the trail around the time the girls were thought to have been killed.

Carroll County Sheriff Tony Liggett said Allen “got lost in the cracks” despite the tip, according to CNN affiliate WLFI. About a month after the tip was rediscovered, Allen was arrested after police matched the unspent cartridge found among the girls’ bodies to a gun seized from his home during a police search.

After Allen was arrested on October 26, 2022, he was charged five days later with two counts of murder while committing or attempting to commit a kidnapping. Prosecutors later amended the charges to include two more murder charges.

Allen’s mental state and confessions came to the fore

Throughout the trial, which began Oct. 18, the prosecution highlighted dozens of confessions Allen made while in prison: Prosecutors say Allen confessed to the crime more than 60 times, including to his wife, his mother, the psychologist who treated him and his wife. guards and other prison employees and inmates. They played audio recordings of some of the confessions to the jury.

Monica Wala, the former chief psychologist at Westville Correctional Facility, where Allen was housed, testified that he initially told her he was innocent, but began confessing to the crimes in April 2023, when he was placed on suicide watch again.

According to the CNN affiliate, Wala testified that Allen told him, “I killed Abby and Libby. I’m sorry.” WTHR. He said he initially planned to sexually assault the victims, but fled when he saw a minibus nearby, slit the girls’ throats and covered their bodies with sticks.

SEE ALSO | Delphi murders case: Psychologist says suspect distorted truth during prison confessions

The defense sought to paint a portrait of Allen as a mentally ill man whose fragile mental state was further deteriorated by the months he spent in solitary confinement, including the period when he confessed to the crimes. While in prison, he was placed on suicide watch twice, exhibited strange behavior such as eating his own feces and hitting his head, and was once diagnosed with a “brief psychotic disorder,” according to Wala’s testimony.

Deanna Dwenger, a clinical psychologist with the Indiana Department of Corrections Department of Behavioral Health who testified on behalf of the defense, testified that Allen was diagnosed with a serious mental illness in April 2023 and that a team of mental health experts concluded that he “suffered a serious disability.” . ” According to CNN affiliate WRTV.

The defense initially hoped to introduce a so-called “Odinism” defense: the theory that the murders were committed by followers of Odinism, a Norse pagan religion recently adopted by white supremacists. But Judge Gull repeatedly denied motions asserting this theory.

Audio recording and gunshot evidence became key focuses

Despite Allen’s confessions, there is little physical evidence connecting him to the case: A DNA expert testifying for the state found none of Allen’s DNA at the scene, and none of Libby or Abby’s DNA was found on items recovered from his home.

Prosecutors pointed to an unspent .40-caliber bullet found in the girls’ bodies, which a prosecution expert testified matched Allen’s gun. According to WRTV, the defense cast doubt on the bullet evidence, questioning why more photographs of the cartridge were not taken and suggesting that the bullet may have come from a law enforcement officer’s gun.

The prosecution also attempted to match Allen to video and audio of “Bridge Guy” captured on Libby’s cell phone. Indiana State Police Specialist Brian Harshman, who said he listened to more than 700 phone calls from Allen in prison, testified for the prosecution that, in his opinion, “the voice of the ‘Bridge Man’ was the voice of Richard Allen.” with WRTV.

“Richard Allen is the Bridge Guy,” McLeland told jurors. “He kidnapped them and later killed them.”

In response, Rozzi said Allen was not clearly identified by witnesses as the man who was on the hiking trail or bridge when the teens went missing. He also noted that Allen lived in Delphi for more than five years after the girls’ murders.

“He had every chance to escape, but he couldn’t because he didn’t,” Rozzi told jurors.

ABC7 Chicago contributed to this report.

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