Content warning, today's episode contains discussion of the brutal murder of two girls, as well as issues around mental health and suicide.
I think we have some good news for you all.You're going to hear a lot less from us today.
It's going to be a much shorter episode than usual as we recap the day's events in the trial of Richard Allen for the murders of Ludwig German and Abigail Williams in Delphi.
And there's a reason for why it's going to be shorter, and we will tell you that reason and tell you everything else that happened today in just a moment.
My name is Anya Kane.I'm a journalist.
And I'm Kevin Greenlee.I'm an attorney.
And this is The Murder Sheet.
We're a true crime podcast focused on original reporting, interviews, and deep dives into murder cases.We're The Murder Sheet.
And this is The Delphi Murders.Richard Allen on trial.Day 14.The superintendent and the camcorder tapes.
Shall we start with some housekeeping?
Sure.Let's start out by thanking the wonderful Allie Dillon for being a murder sheet lifesaver, linesaver.Um, thank you so much.It was so nice to meet you and just like seriously, like save it, saving our lives here.
A shout out to Allie for braving the cold.It was very cold.It was very cold out and she was awesome.And I'm sorry for info dumping about the Lincoln assassination.
Never ask Anya about the Lincoln assassination.
I don't even think she did.I think I just brought it up.So it's like it's not her fault.It's just been a time.But it was really nice talking to you.And again, thank you so much.
And I want to stress what Anya said, the people who wait for us in the line, actually they're more than just lifesavers, they become show savers because the fact of the matter is people actually start lining up for the next day's session before the previous day's session ends.
So in other words, while we're sitting in the courthouse listening to Judge Gold and the attorneys wrap up for the day, people are already getting in line.
And there's such a limited number of seats that it would be difficult if not impossible for us to – we'd have to like leave court, rush to get in line and then stay in line and there wouldn't be any show and there probably wouldn't be any Kevin and Anya because we wouldn't be eating or sleeping.
Yeah, it's so appreciated, and all of you, and everyone who's volunteered, just thank you.
You all mean the world to us.
It means the world to us, absolutely.We just really appreciate you guys.
We're just a couple of idiots just sitting here talking into microphones, and so it means so much.
Yeah, exactly.So today it's going to be a shorter episode, as Kevin alluded to.Let me give you a sense.I'm typically filling up a notebook.I have these kind of small reporter notebooks that you kind of flip around, and that's my preferred notebook.
And normally, maybe I have a couple of extra pages left over today.I only wrote down 12 pages, so six pages double-sided, 12 pages of notes.That's all I got.
I have a much larger notebook than Anya.I guess it's a clash, the cliche of the guy wants the big car, I want the big notebook.
You're a lawyer, it's a legal pad.
It's a legal pad.I usually fill up anywhere between 30 to 40 pages.Today I filled up three and a lot of that is doodling.
Yeah, a lot of mine is doodling and not even good doodles like I did the other day of that Frankenstein guy.These are just, this is just like weird shapes.I mean, not a lot happened today and we're not gonna waste your time.We value your time.
So let's just get into why nothing happened today.
So you may remember that yesterday there was some discussion that the defense wanted to introduce certain videos taken of Richard Allen while he was in prison.
And it was determined that the videos that would be allowed to be admitted, at least at this stage, would be camcorder videos with the audio stripped out of, I believe, Richard Allen being escorted to and from his cell on different occasions.Right.
And so that was what was going to be shown today.Court was delayed a bit, and the reason for that is the attorneys, at least lead attorney Brad Rosey, Judge Gohl, and prosecutor Nick McClellan were having some sort of discussion.
And the end result of that discussion was that it was decided that because these videos contained explicit scenes, that out of respect for the dignity of Richard Allen, the people sitting in the gallery would not be permitted to see the videos, that they would be, these silent videos would be displayed on a screen in such a way that the jury could see them, but the people in the gallery
could not.And let's talk about that for a minute.I can tell you we talked to some people over the break in the middle of the session, and a lot of people in the gallery were outraged by this decision.
And one reason was just a week or so ago in this trial were displayed, frankly, horrific images of the bodies of Abby Williams and Liberty German, including graphic and highly disturbing photos of their wounds.
And those were displayed on the screen for the gallery to see and all members of the public to see.And so people were expressing anger, feeling that perhaps there was a double standard.
and not understanding why exactly it was decided that the man who, to say the very least, has been plausibly accused and charged with the murder of these two girls is being afforded more dignity and more protection of that dignity than these two girls.
And I'd also like to say something else. This is also a public access issue because these are exhibits in a public murder trial.
And if the defense maintains that what's seen in these videos is so bad that it somehow explains that Richard Allen made false confessions.I guess that's the upshot, right Anya?
The upshot is that and juror sympathy.
Right.So it is plausible that if this jury ends up choosing to acquit
Richard Allen of these crimes he's been charged with, it is plausible that that decision would at least partially be based upon the videos that they saw today, videos which are not being shared with the public.
And the public has the right to that information because the public should have the ability to determine and evaluate and weigh this evidence themselves.
And if the jurors' decisions might be based on something that's being withheld from the public, I find that to be an outrageous situation.What do you think about all this, Anya?
Yeah, I concur with all of that.
And I also want to note something that I found rather bizarre about Gull's, Judge Francis Gull's ruling here that I don't really understand is that so these videos ranged in length from I think maybe like under a minute to up to maybe like over 50 minutes.
I think one was 52 minutes.
Right.And so we didn't watch all of them straight through.Some of them we did, some of the shorter ones.
And to be clear, when Anya says watch, we did not watch them.
We didn't watch them.We watched the jury watch them.But one thing that Brad Rosey, who was doing the direct here and sort of directing this whole thing, was doing was saying, judge, can I advance a minute?Judge, can I advance two minutes?
There were many times where he'd skip ahead. The jury is not even seeing all of the video.They're seeing portions of the video.And I understand if there's sort of, quote unquote, dead time, maybe it's like, OK, nothing's happening here.
Let's go to this relevant portion.
But without the public being able to see what's going on, it's sort of troubling because I don't think that what the jury saw will be replicated to the public ever because we won't have Brad Rosie there saying, OK, I remember I skipped ahead here.
Boom.And I skipped ahead two minutes here.Boom.
So we don't know what parts the jury saw and what parts were skipped over.And we don't know if it was just innocent skipping or if there was a reason why Mr. Rosey may have chosen those particular moments to skip over.
This could have been a lot of cherry picking here, frankly.
Yes, and let me bring up, let's all play a mental game.
The other day in court a number of recordings of telephone calls were played, and these were telephone calls between Richard Allen and his wife and his mother, and in these calls he made incriminating statements.
Imagine how we would all feel if the prosecution was fast-forwarding through parts of those calls and only playing parts of the calls instead of giving the entire context of those calls.I think a lot of people would be very concerned.
Imagine how we would feel if it was said, well, these calls are too sensitive.Let's not let the public hear them.Let's just let the jury hear them.That again would be it's entirely possible the jury may decide to convict based on those calls.
So it is appropriate that the public get a chance to hear those calls.
And if those calls have been shielded from the public, or if parts of it have been fast-forwarded and skipped over, I think a lot of people would be outraged, and in my mind, justifiably so.So I do not understand this decision.
I think Judge Gold does not have the best track record on public access issues.
Well, I just don't even understand it because it completely conflicts with what she said the other day about the phone calls.
It was like if McClellan did wanted to, if Nick McClellan, the Carroll County prosecutor had wanted to play like a portion of the phone call, but cut out the part where Richard Allen said, I feel like I'm losing my mind.
That would have been deeply unfair because perhaps for some people, the I'm losing my mind portion might, well, maybe he's having an episode or something.So. I don't understand this.
It was bizarre and I actually kind of am shocked that the defense wanted it to go this way to be perfectly blunt given the amount of showboating that has gone on in the pretrial phase and. Not really during trial, actually.
It's kind of been a lot more muted and we'll talk about that.But I would have thought that they would want to essentially, you know, continue to pile up upon the martyrdom of Richard Allen.
And this would be an easy way of doing that by showing the public videos of how bad a time he's experiencing, because I'm sure whatever they show is horrific.
You know, today, the videos would have been filmed on a camcorder held by prison guards following him as he left his cell.
I'm not, let's not even say they're horrific because we didn't see them.
We didn't see them, but like, I mean, I guess for most people not, I think for most people, like if you were suddenly thrust into a prison situation, it would be a totally different world that you wouldn't be able to imagine.
And that's normal for people who work in a prison, but it's like scary for a normal person who's never been in a prison.
Right and so that's what I'm saying it'd be like whoa he's all chained up when he's walking in the shower that's I that doesn't happen to me at home and you know like it's one of those things and I'm just like I don't know like it it just seemed baffling I don't know why she made that call and I also don't know why the defense made that call because again they seem to be more
playing to the media, playing to social media.So it kind of confused me that why they wouldn't want that out there, especially since they're the ones putting in front of the jury.I know there's been my understanding has been a lot of like now.
So let's get like there were 15 videos in total.
Before, let me say something else.I said that I feel that this is a public access issue, and I said that I believe Judge Gold made the wrong call here, and that I believe Judge Gold's record on public access is horrible.
And I'll probably say a lot more about that in later episodes after the trial is over.But it is a horrible track record, and she deserves a lot of criticism for that.With that said,
Despite my strong feelings towards Judge Gold on that point, I want to say that some of the criticism she has gotten throughout her tenure on this case has been unfair.
And one of the things that she gets criticized for a lot is that she is supposedly supposed to be a prosecution judge, a judge who will do whatever the prosecutor asks her to do.
And that's not the case, and it certainly wasn't the case today, because Prosecutor Nick McClelland strenuously objected to the playing of these videos.And he made it clear over and over again he had a continuing objection to each of the videos.
And Judge Gold allowed them to be played, at least to the jury, regardless. So she is certainly not someone who always does what the prosecution wants.
And I mean, we go back through the entire case and find many, many other times when she has sided with the defense over the prosecution.I just thought it was worth noting that now, since I feel some of the criticism she gets is warranted.
I feel that particular criticism of her is unfair.Let's talk about one sponsor we are really excited about, the Silver Linings Handbook with Jason Blair.
If you've listened to our show, you've heard from Jason.He's always got excellent insights on true crime.Well, he's also got a wonderful weekly podcast that's all about fascinating conversations with inspiring people.
The thing about Jason is that he is one of the most compassionate and interesting people we know, which definitely helps him out on the interviewing front.
Listening to the Silver Linings Handbook feels like sitting around a campfire with interesting storytellers.You get into topics like the criminal justice system, spirituality, and mental health.
And the big through line is it's all thoughtful and human-centric.
We've so enjoyed getting to go on the Silver Linings Handbook to talk about true crime.Jason always makes us believe in the bright side of true crime, and I always end up endlessly quoting him afterwards.
These talks are just so engaging, as well as being completely unscripted and authentic.
Jason is a person whose experiences with loss and failure have helped him rebuild and shape into the empathetic, kind person we know and love.
And that is ultimately what The Silver Linings Handbook is all about, growing together, understanding one another, and moving forward with greater compassion.
Subscribe to The Silver Linings Handbook wherever you listen to podcasts. Our wonderful sponsor, Viahemp, is offering our listeners a terrific, affordable deal on premium hemp products, just in time for the holidays.
If you're 21 and up, treat yourself to 15% off with our exclusive code, msheet, at viahemp.com.That's V-I-I-A-H-E-M-P.com.
Viahemp has served over half a million customers. delivering on USA Farmed lab-tested and certified hemp products that can fit easily into your budget.
They craft gummies, vapes, topicals, and drops that fit each mood and goal, from relaxing to getting productive to catching better sleep.
If you're looking for premium hemp THC gummies, they've got products ranging from 0mg to 100mg.You can microdose or really dive in.
And if THC is not your thing, they've got a lot of terrific zero-THC products that can help with energy, focus, and sleep.
For instance, Viya's Grapefruit Flowstate Gummies have CBG and CBD in them.They're THC-free.I really dig them because they help me get creative and productive.
I was able to work hard without getting super stressed about it, and I feel so accomplished at the end of the day.
This holiday season, gift yourself some peace of mind.If you're over 21, head to viahemp.com and use the code MSHEET to receive 15% off.That's V-I-I-A hemp.com and use code MSHEET at checkout.Please support our show and tell them we sent you.
Enhance your every day with Viya.This holiday season, enhance your every day with Viya.
I completely agree.I think she's on the legal side of things has been pretty even handed.One thing that people maybe, you know, I mean, like I hear people, oh, well, she mostly rules against the defense.
The defense often asks for some pretty out there stuff.So that's not exactly surprising.
You know, I mean, if you're in a if you're in a football game and one side is trying to like, you know, do like handstands or like change the rules, then you imagine the refs are going to call against them a little bit more.Right.
I mean, as opposed to the team that's mostly following the rules and whatever.So I'm like. That's not really that surprising.
But even with that said, she absolutely and she's often, you know, over overruled prosecution objections, sustained defense objections.
I mean, when you're actually there in court, it's not you're not sitting there being like, wow, she's always against them.You're like, she's kind of just calling it.
Like she sees it, which is what a judge is supposed to do, just because she comes from a prosecution background doesn't mean she's incapable of being a judge.It's ridiculous.
Just as if it's ridiculous to say if someone comes from a defense attorney background, they shouldn't be a judge because they'd be pro defense.It's like, yeah, everyone's influenced by their perspectives and their experiences, but.
that's kind of life.And if you're a judge, you know, you're supposed to, I don't know, set that aside.Some of the criticism about her has been just frankly bizarre because it's like, there is stuff to criticize.We could talk about that.
There is a lot of stuff to criticize this judge for.And I have very strong feelings.
But, but, but like, but when, but when you're just throwing in like the kitchen sink, it's just kind of makes it all meaningless.Cause you're like, that's not it.Like people are saying, oh, she's giving, uh, McLeanland signals to object.
And it's like, that's not even close to what's going on.
Another thing we would talk about after this is over, maybe in a wrap-up show, is it is shocking.
It's shocking to the conscience, frankly, that we sit in this courtroom every day, we see exactly what's going on, and then we get glimpses of how other people with agendas are covering it, and they're lying.I mean, they're lying.
But tell us about these videos.
Okay, well, there's not much to tell.Kevin and I were sitting in the corner, and I don't know if anyone in front of us could see them, but we were at the end of a row, right?
If they were visible to anyone, they should have been visible to us.
I would think, and we didn't see anything.
And so we saw the back of this TV that Max Baker, Rosie's intern, and Rosie set up in front of the jury. And so we, we were essentially just trying to watch the jury because that's all there is.Uh, there were 15 videos in total.
I mentioned, uh, some of them were under a minute.Some of them were 52 minutes.The longer ones, Rosie sort of skipped through randomly.Um, no audio, maybe randomly.Well, skip through maybe randomly or maybe not randomly or maybe who knows.
It just, it was weird.And, um, I actually was not even in a really great place to see a lot of the jurors, to be honest.Now I can tell you the ones I saw, it's hard to read their expressions. It was hard to read their expressions here.
And we can go back to the one I'm thinking of with the notebook.
We'll do that in a minute.
Yeah.But in the meantime, during break, I did approach a couple of folks that I trust who kind of were in a better position to get a better view of the jury.And I just tried to poll people.What do you think?
I asked them, did the jurors to you look bored, upset, and disturbed, or just engaged, like they're taking it all in? A number of people said it was impossible for them to read.
Quite a few said they thought they looked bored, or at least some of them did.And then a few also said they thought some of them looked upset and they would give reasons, like, this guy kept touching his face.
I saw this woman wipe her eye at one point.And so basically the answer is no one knows what's going on.We can't read these people's minds.But I tried.
Yeah, and I saw, I tried to look at the jury as best I could from my vantage point.Sometimes some people would seem bored, and then later they'd seem more engaged.Some people would seem upset, and then seem bored.
It's hard to know, and of course, it's entirely possible to feel, oh, what's happening to Richard Allen in this video is unfortunate, but still conclude that he's guilty and deserves to be incarcerated. That's another point I want to make.
I think it's important when we look at the witnesses these defense lawyers are putting up.
Really, the question is, the question we should be focused on is the prosecution has produced evidence which they say proves that Richard Allen committed these murders on February 13th.
So when I'm looking at these defense witnesses, I'm asking myself, does anything from these defense witnesses affect or pertain to our understanding of February 13th, 2017 and whether or not Richard Allen was involved in this?
And if so, maybe it could raise a reasonable doubt.And if not, why are we wasting our time?For instance, the first witness for the defense was this woman, Cheyenne, who was at the Monon High Bridge which is where the kidnapping occurred.
She was there like an hour later and she saw nothing really relevant.
And so you could believe that everything that Cheyenne said, as presented by the defense, is complete gospel truth and it doesn't have any impact whatsoever on the question of Richard Allen's guilt or innocence.So I would hope that at some point
they would actually start presenting witnesses that actually are relevant to the central question of this trial.And these videos, he could be treated horribly in prison.He could be treated like a king in prison.
But ultimately, that does not tell us anything about whether or not he was on that bridge with Abbey and Libby on February 13th, 2017.
I will note one thing that's kind of struck me.When the defense has been talking about his horrible conditions, a lot of what the talk is about situations that on some level he was inflicting upon himself with his behavior.
And what I mean by that is like there's not there's been two incidents, I believe.I think it's two.
It might be one, but I think it's two where he got tased for not removing his hands from the cuff port, which is a big no in prison because they want you to put your hands away so you can't try anything.Right.
And so getting tased is scary and I'm sure very painful.
So that those are two instances where it's like, OK, yeah, there's there's there's that kind of moment where he's getting tased that that could be something to single out for, like, look how badly he was treated.
But we're not hearing a lot about him getting beaten or being subjected to threats from guards.We've heard that the other inmates were at times chanting for him to kill himself and that he was a baby killer.
But when it comes to actually people doing something to him, we've not heard a lot about that.So I'd be curious.I'd love to see the videos because I'd love to know, is that true?
Are we seeing kind of harsh treatment from guards or are we seeing guards who are essentially trying to take care of a man who is?
for whatever reason, smearing himself in feces, banging his head against the wall lightly, but enough to cause swelling later on, and various things that we've all heard about.
So I'm just curious, because it's very hard to assess any of this information without seeing that.If you see people being really mean to him all the time, then you might say, well, I don't know.But as you said, ultimately, it's sort of irrelevant.
If Cheyenne had seen, if Cheyenne Mill had seen
A man, identical to Richard Allen's description, strolling down the lane at 2.30, then that would be a pretty big deal because you could say, well, listen, maybe he didn't kill them because how could he be out there at 2.30 when Libby's phone stopped moving at 2.32 p.m.?
That's a big deal.That totally throws the Saints timeline off.We've not heard that.We've not heard that.We've heard a bunch of irrelevant stuff.
I think basically we've covered what we can cover about these videos, but let's do.
Well, did you want to talk about the guy with the notebook?
That's what I was about to say.
Let's do this.You're the one who noticed this more.
There's a little bit of color.So. The way it was structured was the screen was set up so only the jury could see it.And obviously the attorneys want to also be able to see it.
And so some of them moved over so they would be either standing or sitting pretty close to the jury so they could see what the jury is being shown.
And one of the attorneys who did this was Jennifer Ogier, and she goes and she stands by the jury box pretty close to the juror who is sitting at the edge of the jury box, the first juror in the box.
And he, a couple of times, looked a little uncomfortable.And then whenever he was taking notes or using his notebook, he was careful to hold his notebook and notes in such a way as to shield it from the view of Ms.Ogier.
And I'm not suggesting that Ms.Ogier was doing anything inappropriate.I'm just saying the juror was plainly uncomfortable.
He did not want her seeing what you saw.I saw that when you pointed it out to me and I saw and I saw him just like leaning away to kind of, you know, he made like I don't like it when people are looking over my shoulder either.
I don't think that's what she was doing.I think she was just trying to stand there.Essentially, one of the prosecutors was always sitting in the little seat sort of near the front of the jury.At first, it was McClellan.Then it was Stacey Diener.
So she would go behind them and sort of stand. I will note that Miss OJ at one point looked very upset to me watching the video has sort of her hand pressed against her mouth like, you know, it's horrifying.
Baldwin, Andrew Baldwin, when the other attorneys went over there and he looked very emotional.This is a this is an attorney who's often. If you've ever read his website, you know, there's a lot of emotion, a lot of upset, a lot of crying.
And so I think that that was that was something I noticed.But yeah, the jurors themselves hard to read.I feel like some of them at times to me looked upset when I was kind of I would crane my neck a little bit and be like, is that person upset?
And then I remember one guy who I could see very well.I was like, this guy looks like he's very disturbed by this.And at the end, he kind of sort of straightens up, casually looks up at the clock.So I don't know.It's hard to read.
You can't read any of this. And hard to know because we don't know even what they saw.I'd like to just say one more thing.I guess, I mean, like we knew that there was going to be what we thought would be a huge witness today.
Can we say one more thing about this? So we wanted to—we imagined that the videos would be shown today, and so we—there are two sides of the courtroom.
One side is more of the jury side, and then on the other side is where the prosecution sits and where the family sits.
And we sat more on the jury side because we were hoping to be able to see these videos so we could describe them to you this afternoon.Of course, that didn't happen.
But from where we were sitting, we didn't have the greatest view of Richard Allen, for instance.Certainly not as good a view as we would have had on other occasions.
But we talked to a number of people we know and trust on the other side of the gallery, and they saw something that we did not see, But I think they're reputable people, incredible.
So with the understanding of the disclaimer, we did not personally see this ourselves, but we talked to people who did.
On the other side of the gallery.
Shall we share what this anecdote is?
Yeah.Richard Allen may have eaten a sticky note.
Yeah, he appeared to write something to himself.He wrote a note on a sticky note and then put it in his mouth, after which it was not seen again.
So given his predication for eating discovery, that was odd to hear.
And again, we did run it down on the other side where people had a better view, again, in the gallery side and just asked a few people and yeah, there was some talk and people had seen that.
So we didn't see it, but I guess it's possible that it was maybe an optical illusion and he had the sticky note and he kind of
I don't know, like swallowed, and maybe people saw the wrong thing, so I'm not saying it definitely happened, but a lot of people saw this.
A lot of people saw it, and so we wanted to pass it on.
Also, didn't you lock eyes with Alan again after yesterday's bizarre pointing incident?
I locked eyes with him again, and this time, at the end of it, he nodded at me and then turned away.
Very big nod.Yeah, I've seen him do that to other people before.So yeah, it's it's interesting.So I know he was doing heart gestures at somebody who was sitting in the defense row.
So, you know, he, you know, kind of like, you know, when you put your hand together where you form a heart.So he's he's like. He didn't seem like in a bad place necessarily today.
Like he seemed like he wasn't like, I wouldn't use any terms like out of control or being particularly creepy or like, like it wasn't necessarily like malevolent.
It was just like he seemed more like communicative today just through gestures with the gallery side of things.So make of that what you will, I suppose.
Now, do you want to go on to the what what maybe in 2019 Reddit would have been like the marquee witness, please?
So Superintendent Doug Carter is in some ways for many people the face of this investigation into the Delphi murders and has been for years because he is a person who is very much a public communicator and gets out there and talks about what this case means to him and is emotional.
I think one reason, frankly, that this case has gotten as much attention as it did is because Superintendent Carter is such an effective communicator.
And if you watch some of these clips of him at press conferences and you hear the emotion in his voice, it is impossible not to care.
I have felt like at times that people following this case were treating his words in press conferences like they were some sort of like coded language that they could decipher and figure it out.
And I've always thought that that was a little bit too much.But I can understand why, because again, he's definitely speaks from the heart and he made it clear how much this case was important to him at some of these different press conferences.
And so that gets people engaged.They want to know more.They want to see if this can be solved.And so Again, Carter is the superintendent of the state police.He's not boots on the ground in terms of being the one investigating this case.
But he because of some of those public appearances has very much sort of assumed that role of people associating him with the case.So we it was reported and we had heard that Doug Carter might be called today as a witness by the defense.
And then we saw Doug Carter.He was there folks in in the you know in the well of the court.And we were like oh hey it's Doug Carter.So here we go.And I remember thinking OK well
We this has been a very quiet day to do these endless videos that none of us can see.
So at the very least we're getting what should be an interesting witness and what we had talked about beforehand what we believe that Doug Carter was going to be there for was.
you know, potentially information about like where this investigation went.
But one thing that we thought that might be a big deal for Carter from the defense perspective is Andrew Baldwin in his opening made a huge deal alluding to some nasty breakup between the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Indiana State Police and the Indiana State Police.
I guess Carroll County Sheriff's Office consortium where it's like, ISP booted the FBI out, kicked him out of the case.And that's something that, as superintendent, Carter could speak to.
Yes, so we imagined that that would be why he was being called.
Because let me just say, when you set something up in your opening statement, one would think that you would want to Sow the seed and let the tree grow.
Yes.Now, before we get into what Doug Carter said, let me go back to what I was saying a minute ago.The story of what may or may not have happened between the Indiana State Police and the FBI may be a very interesting story.
It may be a story that maybe we'd consider putting in the book or covering in the podcast at some point if we get more details about it.But the question I have is,
Are administrative and investigative decisions made between the FBI and the Indiana State Police, are they going to shine any light on what happened on February 13th on that bridge, and are they going to produce any reasonable doubt about
what the state contends happened that day.In other words, if the Indiana State Police Superintendent said, the FBI, we don't need you, does that mean Richard Allen is innocent?
Or is it just totally irrelevant to any question of his guilt or innocence?And I believe that whatever happened between these two agencies is ultimately irrelevant.
unless you can establish that the FBI would have done something that the Indiana State Police did not do, and what they would have done would have somehow proved Richard Allen's innocence, which sounds really far-fetched to me.
So to me, whatever happened between them might be interesting, might be good for a book or a podcast, pretty irrelevant to the question of Richard Allen's guilt or innocence.
I completely agree.It has no, I mean, let's go over everybody.Teresa Liebert seeing a man at a mailbox who she thinks she never saw before but cannot describe it all at 8.30, the day of the murders, doesn't matter for Richard Allen.
Brad Heath seeing a car that looked like it was from The Fugitive, the 1990s film, you know, on the day of the murder, parked for a while, And doesn't remember if there was cars parked in the CBS parking lot irrelevant for Richard Allen.David McCain.
Being there David McCain and Cheyenne mill being there well past the time where the girls were likely already dead or abducted if you believe the defense theory irrelevant.Everybody so far.
they've called has been, you know, the fire chief searching around in the darkness, not going seemingly anywhere near the crime scene.And even if somehow they had, it's very dark out.
They have lanterns and they're all spread out because they're looking for two living children or possibly girls who've succumbed to the elements or possibly girls who fell into the water, like irrelevant.It's all irrelevant.
And frankly, it makes me wonder, Like if somebody had seen richard allen that day news acting totally normal at like three p.m.
Maybe that's not an alibi but it's relevant cuz you like it would you get all the blood off you that quickly maybe that raises some doubt where are those people.
Yeah. So with all that said, Doug Carter was actually on and off the stand in probably 10 minutes.
Oh, yeah, this was nothing.OK, so he establishes that he was superintendent for 12 years.He's retiring soon, I believe.Yes.And he talked about they asked him what kind of how many agencies were involved.
He said Indiana State Police, dozens of agencies, obviously Carroll County Sheriff's Office, as well as sheriff's offices of all the contiguous counties. And from the federal perspective, you had ATF, FBI, U.S.Marshals.
And Baldwin was like, oh, FBI, tell us more about that.They were involved for a while and then they weren't involved.When did they leave?And Carter, Superintendent Carter said, I think they left sometime in 2021.
Baldwin was like, well, would this refresh your recollection?And he shows him some document. Carter looks at it and says, well, it looks like the FBI left in August of 2021.There was a brief sidebar, after which Baldwin gets Carter.
He asks Carter a couple of questions, and Carter says, well, it was my decision for the FBI to leave the case, and when they left, I asked them to return all investigative documents they might have.
And Baldwin had no further questions, and McClelland had no questions, and the jurors had no questions.
And I had many questions like, what the heck was that?
And I want to make a, yes.
I want to make a point, first of all, that when you ask if someone is, if an agency is leaving an investigation, it's not unusual to ask them to return all investigative documents because you want to keep them all secure.
Yeah, you don't just give the FBI all the documents for like a keepsake for fond memories.Also, what's the federal nexus here?Yeah, so.
I mean, listen, the FBI has resources and can be a great tool, I'm sure, for local law enforcement because perhaps in some cases they have investigative tools that are not readily accessible to the local outfits.
Although I'm sure ISP provides many of the same ones. And so if it's a situation where there's no federal nexus, the FBI has other concerns.I mean, they're taught.Let's just think about this for a minute.
They're talking about people like special agent, now supervisory special agent Adam Pohl, who is now working
Texas election security for this election and prior to that was working on some sort of gang task force so these people have other things to do and if the leads are drying up and Things aren't necessarily going anywhere I don't think it's reasonable to expect the FBI to continue to pour all of those agents into this situation Like at some point they're gonna have to move on and
I don't know why the FBI left the case or why Descartes made that decision.That's a plausible scenario.If we can find out why, maybe it's an interesting story.Maybe if we find out something, we'd put it in our book or on the podcast.
But the point I just want to stress is it has no relevance whatsoever to the guilt or innocence of Richard Allen.
And I don't know if there's I don't believe there is anything that the FBI could do that the Indiana State Police could not have done because they have lots of resources.
But also it's just like it's like it's just I think it's just basically to like attack the investigation from like a really banal standpoint of like FBI good ISP bad. because I watched a movie and the FBI agents were good at their jobs.
And it's like, if Baldwin had established something, like the FBI was doing this, this, and this, and then the ISP came in and messed it up, and the FBI were doing it really professionally, and then the ISP and the Carroll County Sheriff's Office messed it up, we could maybe go somewhere, because then you could say, well, maybe then they got the wrong guy.
But they're not even like, but also, can I just ask you, What happened with Baldwin here?It seemed like we were all ready to go of like, well, why did you kick them out?How could you?You're right.
From an informational, let's look at the case standpoint, this is all meaningless either way.But from like an Andrew Baldwin is calling Doug Carter and wants to make a point for the jury, why on earth did this end after like three questions?
It's entirely possible that we would know the answer to that if we were privy to what was said at that sidebar.
So McClellan basically shuts him down.Presumably, that's what happened.
I can't believe that Baldwin would call Doug Carter and be like, did you ask them to leave?Yes.And did you ask them to return the documents?Yes.All right.Thanks for coming in.
I mean, people were talking to me afterwards and they're like, what did that add?
Yeah, a lot of people in the courtroom who don't have an active reason to be biased have been expressing bafflement and bewilderment to us about the performance of this defense team.
This was a waste of the court's time.I mean, not the videos.There's no way of us knowing that.
But calling Carter and doing this was a waste of the court's time.It was a waste of everybody's time, in my view.
And we don't want to waste your time, dear listener.So are we wrapping?Is there anything more we wanted to say?
I'm looking.So there was a brief Carter respite, and then we went back to videos, which we already talked about, so we don't need to talk about again.And I think we're done.I think that's it.We'll be back, I guess, Monday and seeing what's going on.
One thing to note, McClelland, there seem to be more videos on the way.
We saw the camcorder videos.We may potentially be seeing cell videos.It's not clear.Rosie was very vague on that the other day.He was also vague.
He talked about, well, we're not sure we need to have these witnesses like Kagan Klein brought it after all.
So they seem very clearly to me like they're doing their strategizing on the fly, which in some cases could be good because you're responding to things in the moment.
But it feels like this defense team, frankly, has been woefully underprepared for this.
I've been my expectations were not necessarily super high, but they've not been.
I mean, they've not been met.
A lot of people, including Anya famously, she kept on predicting that the trial would be delayed by request of the defense because they'd been preparing so hard, they'd been working so hard on their odinism defense, and after that went nowhere, people imagined they would want time to come up with a different theory, and they didn't choose to take that time, and so
We thought, well, they must have something else.Apparently, the something else they had was, you know, please reconsider Odinism.
I'm going to just say, yeah, this isn't going well so far for them.They can probably bring out some expert witnesses.Maybe that can do something.
But I really do feel like this prosecuting, this prosecution team is very, very prepared to do some cross-examination. So I'm like, I don't know.
I saw what this team, I saw what Nick McClellan did when he cross-examined Don Perlmutter over the summer.
Yeah, I've seen, yeah.We'll never forget that.And so if there's more like that, then I don't, even the expert witnesses, they're not even bothering to really cross test civilians.
I want the defense to present something about Richard Allen and or February 13th.And by Richard Allen, I mean Richard Allen and his life on and before February 13th, 2017.Yeah. because they've not rebutted anything about his activities on that day.
And they, at least in my mind, have not given this jury any reason to doubt that he was on the bridge that day.
I concur.I'm surprised by the performance so far, not in a good way.And I will say this.McCleland is going to cross Max Baker once all these videos are done, or if we're already done, I guess next time.And then who knows?
the videos but that's coming too so i'll be curious some people said it was kind of odd that rosie didn't bother asking him to like put any context or like talk about like he didn't really it was just more like tell me about this video this video this video so it'll be interesting to see the cross and what ends up happening with them
So is that it?Can we wrap, let these people go and enjoy their weekend?
Enjoy your weekend, everybody.Thanks for sticking with us and certainly tune in next week and we'll hopefully have more information for you and not just us watching other people watch stuff.
So, cause that's, you know, we don't want to, we don't want to waste your time.
That's not fun for anybody.
No, it's really not.And it just, yeah.Well, anyways, thanks very much.And we appreciate y'all listening anyway.
Thanks so much for listening to The Murder Sheet.If you have a tip concerning one of the cases we cover, please email us at murdersheet at gmail dot com.
If you have actionable information about an unsolved crime, please report it to the appropriate authorities.
If you're interested in joining our Patreon, that's available at www.patreon.com slash murder sheet. If you want to tip us a bit of money for records requests, you can do so at www.buymeacoffee.com slash murdersheet.
We very much appreciate any support.
Special thanks to Kevin Tyler Greenlee, who composed the music for the Murder Sheet, and who you can find on the web at kevintg.com.
If you're looking to talk with other listeners about a case we've covered, you can join the Murder Sheet Discussion Group on Facebook.We mostly focus our time on research and reporting, so we're not on social media much.
We do try to check our email account, but we ask for patience as we often receive a lot of messages.Thanks again for listening. Thanks so much for sticking around to the end of this Murder Sheet episode.
Just as a quick post-roll ad, we wanted to tell you again about our friend Jason Blair's wonderful Silver Linings Handbook.This show is phenomenal.
Whether you are interested in true crime, the criminal justice system, law, mental health, stories of marginalized people, overcoming tragedy, well-being, like he does it all. This is a show for you.
He has so many different conversations with interesting people, people whose loved ones have gone missing, other podcasters in the true crime space, just interesting people with interesting life experiences.
And Jason's gift, I think, is just being an incredibly empathetic and compassionate interviewer, where he's really letting his guests tell their stories and asking really interesting questions along the way, guiding those conversations forward.
I would liken it to like you're kind of almost sitting down with friends and sort of just hearing these fascinating tales that you wouldn't get otherwise, because he just has that ability as an interviewer to tease it out and really make it interesting for his audience.
On a personal level, Jason is frankly a great guy.He's been a really good friend to us.And so it's fun to be able to hit a button on my phone and get a little dose of Jason talking to people whenever I want.It's a really terrific show.
We really recommend it highly.
Yeah, I think our audience will like it.And you've already met Jason if you listen consistently to our show.He's been on our show a couple times.We've been on his show.He's a terrific guest.
I say this in one of our ads about him, but I literally always am like, oh yeah, I remember when Jason said this.That really resonated.I do quote him in conversations sometimes because he really has a good grasp of different
She quotes him to me all the time.
I do.I'm like, remember when Jason said this?That was so right.So, I mean, I think if we're doing that, I think, and you like us, I think you should give it a shot.Give it a try.I think you'll really enjoy it.
And again, he does a range of different topics, but they all kind of have the similar theme of compassion, of overcoming suffering, of dealing with suffering, of mental health, wellness, things like that.
There's kind of a common through line of compassion and empathy there that I think we find very nice. We work on a lot of stories that can be very tough and we try to bring compassion and empathy to it.
But this is something that almost can be like if you're kind of feeling a little burned out by true crime, I think this is kind of the life affirming stuff that can be nice to listen to in a podcast.
It's compassionate, it's affirming, but I also want to emphasize it's smart.Jason is a very intelligent, articulate person.This is a smart show, but it's an accessible show.I think you'll all really enjoy it.
Yeah, and he's got a great community that he's building.So we're really excited to be a part of that.We're fans of the show.We love it.And we would strongly encourage you all to check it out.Download some episodes, listen.
I think you'll understand what we're talking about once you do.But anyways, you can listen to The Silver Linings Handbook wherever you listen to podcasts.
Wherever you listen to podcasts.Very easy to find.Absolutely.
Sign in
