A man convicted of killing two teenage girls who were posting on Snapchat before vanishing has been hit with a maximum sentence of 130 years in prison.
Richard Allen, 52, learned his sentence nearly eight years after the bodies of Abigail Williams, 13, and Liberty German, 14, were found on a hiking trail just outside of the small town of Delphi, Indiana.
‘These families will deal with your carnage forever,’ Allen County Superior Court Judge Fran Gull told Allen on Friday.
The judge called it ‘right up there with the most hideous crimes’.
Abigail and Liberty were discovered with their throats cut on the trail a day after they went missing in February 2017.
A video they posted on Snapchat during the hike showed them being followed on the Monon High Bridge Trail by a man wearing a jeans and a dark jacket. An audio recording revealed a man ordering the girls to go ‘down the hill’.
Liberty’s grandfather, Mike Patty, said ‘justice has been served for the girls’.
‘It’s been almost eight years coming,’ he said.
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‘If I live to make it 80, it would almost be 10% of my life has been spent working on this.’
Allen, of Delphi, has insisted he is innocent and one of his defense lawyers, Jennifer Auger, said they will appeal and request a new trial.
‘Thoughts and prayers to the families of the victims. What they went through was unimaginable,’ said Auger, declining to comment further.
A jury last month found Allen guilty of two counts of murder and two counts of murder while committing to trying to commit kidnapping. He faced 45 to 130 years behind bars.
The video that Liberty recorded turned out to be a crucial piece of evidence.
‘I’d be remiss if I didn’t thank Abby and Libby themselves,’ said Carroll County Prosecutor Nicholas McLeland.
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‘Libby, for recording the defendant as he walked across the bridge. Having the wherewithal to pull out her phone and record that individual, having the wherewithal to know that something wasn’t right.’
During the trial, prosecutors played a jail call recording in which Allen allegedly confessed to his wife: ‘I did it, I killed Abby. I killed Abby and Libby.’
But his wife did not believe him and blamed his medication.
The double murder shocked the tight-knit community that is located about 60 miles northwest of Indianapolis.
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