I understood that the bigger topic within the conversation was when and why RA told a CO he was on the bridge (and I wasn't trying to answer that, though I generally agree with the conclusions you made), but I thought the original poster
@Le Singe was also asking a different question as well - though I could be wrong. I thought the original post brought up something that is very interesting and nuanced, which is, when could it have been generally known by the public that the girls had been on the bridge? This question would inform significance into the timing of RA coming forward to a CO, though we can only speculate at this point.
I think from family interviews with GH and in podcasts like "Murder in My Family" and "Down the Hill" it seems to me (MOO) that Libby's dad did not know about snapchat pictures showing them on the bridge when he began searching around 3:15 but by the time the family was gathering at the police station later that night, the pictures were known. I wonder how fast word was spreading on social media, in town, and among volunteer searchers that they had been physically on the bridge itself. I do think that this information influenced how they searched that night (downstream towards Delphi instead of upstream, etc). And it will be interesting if we ever find out that it influenced when RA came forward about his whereabouts on that day.
