Delphi man met two teens on Snapchat then took them to woods – just a mile from scene of infamous murders
Delphi police caught a man meeting two 15-year-old girls in the local woods after meeting them on Snapchat – in an incident that chillingly harks back to the small Indiana community’s notorious 2017 murders.
The Delphi Police Department said in a social media post on Friday that they received a call saying that there was a man taking two young girls into a wooded area behind a cabin at Riley Park in Delphi.
When officers arrived on the scene, they found a 24-year-old male with two 15-year-old girls smoking cannabis.
The man, according to police, came to Delphi from another town after connecting with one of the girls on Snapchat.
He allegedly claimed he was “under the impression” that the girls were 19 years old.
“Have you checked your kid’s phone today?” Delphi police said in the post.
“Please check your kid’s phone and be actively involved in what they are doing, where they are at, and who they are with,” the statement added, before thanking the citizen who reported the incident.
Delphi Police Chief Nathan LaMar told WIBC News the man is now under investigation, and any details will be sent to the Carroll County Prosecutor’s Office for potential charges.
The man was caught just over one mile away from an entrance to Monon High Bridge Trail, where two teenage best friends Libby German and Abby Williams were killed seven years ago in what became known as the Delphi murders.
Abby, 13, and Libby, 14, had set off on a walk together along the local trail one February day.
They never returned, their bodies found the following day in a wooded area off the trail.
During the walk, Libby posted a photo of her best friend on Snapchat as they walked along the Monon High Bridge.
She also captured a video of a man – who became known as “Bridge Guy” – dressed in blue jeans, a blue jacket and a cap walking along the abandoned railroad bridge.
In the footage found on Libby’s phone, the man is heard telling the two girls: “Guys, down the hill.”
The case into the killings went cold for years, though it later emerged that a now-convicted paedophile had been in contact with Libby online in the days before the murders.
In October 2022, a local man named Richard Allen was arrested and charged with their murders.
Mr Allen’s trial was slated to begin on 24 January 2024. It has now been pushed back until 15 October 2024, after Mr Allen’s attorneys dramatically quit the case in October 2023 amid a scandal over the leak of graphic crime scene photos.
In September, his team made a bombshell claim that the girls were not killed by the suspect, but as part of a “ritualistic sacrifice” at the hands of a white nationalist cult called Odinists.
