Prosecuter Robert Ives shares details about The Delphi Murders crime scene signatures, suspects, & search warrents in this interview transcript from 'Down The Hill' podcast.
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ROBERT IVES: Well, in once sense, any murder scene is probably odd. But again this is where I have difficulty because I’m not sure what all has been released. There were a variety of things at the scene of the crime where I guess I would ask you to talk to the State Police about that. They have to decide what’s going to be released was not going to be released. It was just not your normal ‘a person was killed here’ crime scene. That’s probably all I can say about it.”
It wasn’t your normal a person was killed here crime scene?? It really does sound like searchers who found the kids probably didn’t realize the kids had been murdered right away. The scene may have just appeared like an ordinary woods scene - leaves, trees, branches… dirt… rocks. Probably nothing that stood out to the searchers to say the kids were killed there. I still do not get how this is possible and that is why this case has fascinated me! How do you just not realize someone was murdered there? Especially when years later we learn from LE that they believed the girls lost a lot of blood at the scene and had no visible signs of a struggle (taken from Murder Sheets Podcast regarding a released transcript).
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ROBERT IVES: I follow along with your example. The very first case I handled as a prosecuting attorney back in 1987…1988, a fellow shot his wife in Deer Creek Indiana. He pinned her up against the refrigerator, shot in the back of the head, she fell on the floor, he shot or twice more in the chest. So, you had a dead person with three bullets in them. They were dead. He was seen at the scene, you know, things like that. All I can say about the situation with Abby and Libby is that there was a lot more physical evidence than at that crime scene. And it’s probably not what you would imagine, or what people think that I’m talking about, it’s probably not. And so because of unique circumstances,
which all unique circumstances of a crime are a sort-of ‘signature’, you think “Well,
this unusual fact might lead to somebody, or
that unusual fact might lead to somebody”. I wish I could tell you, but again that’s up to the State Police. There was nothing that seemed similarly identical that you think ‘well this is modus operandi’. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the term modus operandi, where sometimes criminals will use a…commit a crime in such a way where it’s so distinct that it acts as a sort of signature for them.”
MOre evidence at the scene than what they found in a scene where man pinned a woman and shot her in the back of the head then twice more??? I imagine the scene of the crime in that matter was bloody to say the least!! Probably other things around as well, perhaps beer or alcohol bottles? Drugs? What was left at the scene that wasn’t obvious to searchers but was clear to LE that this was a murder?? The searchers must not have noticed blood or anything more shocking than finding two bodies. Its possible then that the kids were killed in an unobvious way and that while the scene was bloody, the kids were not (perhaps dirt and leaves covered blood? Maybe kids were wiped down and re-dressed if they were ever undressed?).
We were never told if the kids faces were covered or uncovered when found. EG: had someone placed a jacket over them Or something? Why would this matter? It would tell you a lot about how the kids were left and the killer’s state of mind. It would tell you as well whether perhaps initially searchers thought the kids were sleeping until someone removed a face cover and the kids didn’t respond to their names or something? MOOOOOOOO MOOOOOOOOO. I’m jus baffled as to how it wasn’t a normal someone was killed here scene, and how searchers didn’t know immediately what they’d stumbled on.
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