Down the Hill: The Delphi Murders
Episode 6 -- A Walk in The Woods
Individuals interviewed for this episode:
Kelsie German (KG) - Libby's older sister
Doug Carter (DC) - Indiana State Police Superintendent
Julia Leahy (JL) - Executive Director of the Carroll County Chamber of Commerce
DTH - DTH Podcast Host
We know "the hill" is at the south end of the bridge, and the girls crossed the bridge from the north. We don’t know how -- but we know the killer and the girls crossed back to the other side of the creek not far from where they were dropped off. That’s where their bodies were found almost a day after they went missing, about a quarter mile from the bridge.
DTH:
We don’t know how or when they were killed, and we don’t know why. All we really know is that whatever investigators saw out there — it shook them badly.
The place where a murder happens matters here a lot.
Delphi, Indiana is about 1.5 hours northwest of Indianapolis, and it’s the Carroll County seat. It's only about a 2-hour drive to Chicago and a small northeastern neighbor of Lafayette -- home of Purdue University.
DTH spoke with Julia Leahy, the Executive Director of the Carroll County Chamber of Commerce in Delphi, to get a feel for the small town.
JL:
Delphi is a quaint, small community that has a lot of interesting things to do. Um, you’re so close to the bigger cities. I think people like to live here [and] visit here because it’s that small town slower pace, you know. And you can escape the hustle and bustle of the bigger cities, but you’re so close if you need those big city amenities.
DTH:
What are some of the big landmarks for places?
JL:
Some of the landmarks here, uh -- we’re home of the Wabash and Erie Canal, so there’s a one-mile section where you can actually take a canal boat ride, um, and kind of live like you did in the 1800s. And, that was entirely built by volunteers.
The center, the park, the trail system, umm. Another thing that was more recent, uh, about six years ago, was the Delphi Opera House.
DTH:
What are the people of Delphi like?
JL:
People in Delphi are friendly, you know. It’s not unusual to walk down the street and say hi to — people greet you that way. And, I’m sure you have found that too. It’s — people wave, they say hello. If you look lost, they are gonna stop and say, “what can we help you with?” Um, we’re very -- we’re a close community is how I would describe us.
DTH:
Do you think that people outside of this area connect to Delphi with this crime?
JL:
How do you mean?
DTH:
Well, I mean, is that something you come up against as you are promoting this area? When you say "I’m from Delphi"?
JL:
Yes.
DTH:
What do people say?
JL:
Exactly. So, for months on end, when I would travel and go to conferences and things like that -- and they wanna know where you came from -- I would say well, my -- "I live and work in Delphi". And, it was an immediate reaction. And even to this day -- it doesn’t happen as often but — people are like "oh, yeah I remember what happened there in Delphi".
And even from a tourism point of view, and when you Google Delphi or you Google things to do, I mean that’s what’s coming up. You know, it’s sad that we’re known for that now. Umm, and I hope that people realize that there’s so much more here. And, you can come here and enjoy a lot of things but also still know that you’re in a place where people still remember, fondly, you know, about these girls.
DTH:
It, uh, it sounds like there’s a resiliency to the town.
JL:
Umm, yeah that’s a good point. I think that people here are strong. The kids were strong, you know. My niece was the same age and it just — they have come through this, you know. It’s sad that they all had to grow up so quickly that day, and um, but you see them — people are close. You know, people are closer together.
Um, I think you’re willing to help your neighbors out even more than you ever were before, but there’s still this, this — people are still more cautious. More suspicious, they look over their shoulders, which people probably already do that in bigger cities but here we didn’t. We didn’t have to -- you didn’t to lock your door. You didn’t have to worry about that and now -- stuff like this didn’t happen here. It doesn’t happen here. It’s like we caught up to the rest of the world in the most horrific way possible.
The road 300 North is a narrow country road, and as far as the story of the Delphi murders is concerned, it’s the main backdrop and where that day in February 2017 began. There’s not much of a parking lot where the girls had entered the trail, which is why it was a drop off spot and not really a place where people parked.
The cemetery is one of the landmarks in this case because it indicates the crime scene -- it was just down from the cemetery closer to the creek. On the other side of that cemetery, RL's property begins. He owns quite a bit of land down by the creek, as well. The killer left the bodies of Abby and Libby on RL's land, which attracted a lot of attention to him.
DTH reached out to RL several times and invited him to speak on the show. He wasn’t interested in talking about the case now, but he gave several interviews to different news outlets back in 2017. He even showed a few of them around his property and the freshly cleared crime scene.
Here's a snippet from an interview with HLN —
HLN:
So where’s the high bridge?
RL:
Um, it’s — you can actually see it from my property. Ok, there’s the taped off area where the girls were found.
HLN:
I can get down here but this is steep.
RL:
I know.
HLN:
So, how — because of that — how, what are the entry points? Like how would somebody actually—
RL:
You’re, you’re seeing it.
HLN:
So, someone would’ve — this is the only way?
RL:
Pretty much.
Well, you could walk — this ground is so [unintelligible] my feet here. You okay?
HLN:
Yep.
RL:
You all right? Oh, okay, all right.
HLN:
Got it.
RL:
You’re good to go. You’re a country girl.
RL:
Now, somewhere in this roped off area, the girls were found. I’m not sure what location they were actually laying in or anything.
The family of the German girl came here the other day and put some flowers down there in a particular spot, so maybe they know more about it than I do.
HLN:
Probably. So, other than coming through your property though -- how else can somebody...
RL:
Well, my property ends over here and the other guy begins in the ravine there.
DTH spoke with Doug Carter and Kelsi German on the trails separately, but their questions and answers were all mixed up together.
KG:
The red gate wasn’t there at the time. There was just a sign there that said Monon High Bridge, and you could just park there and enter the trails from there.
In the winter, there’s no leaves so it’s very dark, but you can see so much more into the trees. It’s just as pretty as it was—now, then.
DTH:
Talk a little bit about the logistics of coming out here and searching for two girls when you don’t know where they are.
DC:
Right. It’s almost impossible, really, to get your arms around that. This is as rural as it gets anywhere in the country, really. And, it’s, it’s rolling. It’s up and down and there’s not much [unintelligible] straight into the trail. It was quite a task. It was quite a task, and--
DTH:
And the search began just as it’s starting to get dark.
DC:
It did. Right around 4 o’clock in the afternoon or so, yeah.
DTH:
Did it complicate things for you guys that -- this is such a volunteer community and when people heard they just came out and started searching on their own?
DC:
No. No, it was awesome. It was awesome.
Now that -- obviously the end result wasn’t good, but there was nothing compromised by doing what they did.
DTH:
So, some people have speculated that — we’ve heard an estimate that maybe there were a thousand people out here searching that first night, and that that did, in fact, contaminate your crime scene.
DC:
I don’t know, you know. There’s all kinds of speculation. It’s easy to have an opinion when you don’t know what you’re talking about.
You know, it’d be different if once the girls were found, they would have been completely moved. That’s not the case. I don’t agree with that statement.
DTH:
With so many people looking for them that first night, why weren’t they found?
DC:
[Long pause]
Umm, I, I think I’ll leave that question unanswered.
DTH:
We are approaching the area where the girls entered the trail, and there’s a, a trail marker there that’s become a bit of a memorial. What does it mean to you?
DC:
Ahh, this intersection’s tough for me. It will always be tough for me.
Umm, [long pause] I can close my eyes and I can see ‘em -- the innocence here. You know, I can see — they came from the left side over here. Laughing and joking, and cutting up like two young girls do, probably. Or walking quietly or having a conversation about whatever, and then they turn left and the world’s about to change.
So many people are not afraid of where they are, but for those that remain -- and thinking man, man if they’d have just turned right. You know, not left.
So, yeah this is a pretty special place. You know, and on that bench, and like you said, the beauty up there. Uh, [long pause] it’s something. And there’s a reason this all happened, I just don’t know what it is yet. I just don’t know what it is. I just don’t know what it is. [Pause] I don’t know.
DTH:
Is that to the girls?
KG:
Umm hmm.
Sometimes I always check to see if there’s something he could’ve left here. Like maybe he left a note for them or maybe he left a rock that he painted or something — because he could have. So, I just always check the notes when I come here and the notes on her grave and things like that.
DTH:
What do you think he would say in a note? How would you recognize that it was an item left by him?
KG:
I don’t know. I just feel like if it was from him I would know just by looking at it. I feel like he’d be really sneaky and try to do something like that.
DTH:
What did that note say?
KG:
Uh, it was like a poem. It says --
"Love is so strong that it will guide your way,
and everyone is still looking for the coward that stole you away.
So, keep smiling and guiding us down below,
for we love you so much that your soul's beauty and love will never grow old."
DTH:
Do you think there could be that element?
That he’s watching? He’s that close now?
DC:
Probably, yeah.
Yeah, whoever it is, and whoever it was, has stared at this nature reserve like we are right now. I know that. Even if it was his first day, he stood right here. Stood right here, yeah.
DTH:
When you would go out to the crime scene, what is that like?
KG:
It’s very peaceful.
You guys probably haven’t been out there yet, but it’s just out there in the middle of the woods, and it’s just the most peaceful place. Because you can watch the creek and just sit there and think about the nature that’s around you instead of what happened.
DTH:
Do you feel like that area is secluded? Is it an area that he would’ve known I have privacy here?
KG:
Probably, yes. You can’t really see anything. You can just barely see the bridge, and you can see all of the water and just nothing but trees. So, I don’t think anybody would’ve heard them or him or anyone else.
DTH:
We’re approaching the bridge now.
DC:
Damn.
DTH:
What do you see as you look at it?
DC:
Him. I can see him standing right out there. I can see him standing right out there.
I feel the same way I feel every stinking time I come out here, gosh dang it. You know, and then you look back this way, and you see them walking here. You can see, you can see Abby and Libby just, just doing what girls do. Yeah, [unintelligible] where this bridge is going.
DTH:
Do you think him approaching them on the bridge was intentional or is that just where he caught up with them?
DC:
Ya know, that’s a good question. I don’t know.
It would be speculative; nobody knows right now. I don’t know. Gosh, I hope we can ask him one day, and I hope he’ll tell us and then be free.
Lets walk up here closer.
DTH:
All right, that goes right down.
DC:
Oh, yep. It goes right down. Nothing good is going to happen.
DTH:
And that’s what? Like 73 feet?
DC:
This was gone — this was gone then, too. That was gone then, too.
So, you know for the — if those would’ve been my girls and I found out that they would have crossed it, I’d just -- "HEY! WHAT ARE YOU THINKING?" What are you thinking?
DTH:
We talk to a lot of people who have crossed the bridge who say the first time they crawled.
DC:
Yeah, I’ve heard that too. I’ve heard that too.
DTH:
But, I’ve also talked to people who have ridden ATVs across this.
DC:
Oh my gosh.
DTH:
Do you think that Libby took that video intentionally because she was concerned or was she already recording video when he approached?
DC:
I think she did what she thought she could do to identify who this person is.
I’m gonna thank her for that one day, yeah. Yeah, I think she realized that something was really badly wrong. And for whatever—we don’t know, we don’t know why.
We don’t know what led up to that. We don’t know what interaction there was. We know a little bit more than we have talked about, but there’s a lot of detail in that engagement that we don’t know.
DTH:
Can you put like a percentage on how much of the story you feel you understand now?
DC:
Umm, I hadn’t thought about that before.
[Pause]
You know, that’s a tough question. That’s a tough question.
We know a lot about before and after, but there’s a lot about the middle we don’t know. So, I would say two-thirds and you put a third in the middle. It makes the beginning and the end. It makes sense.
DTH:
The day that you dropped off Libby and Abby, you did see other kids out here, right?
KG:
Yeah, other kids that were like Libby’s age were here. Um, and I knew that a lot of my friends were out here that day, so I knew it would be okay. Or thought it would be okay.
DTH:
So, do you think this was the kind of place on a day off from school that a lot of people might think hmm… there might be some kids or people out at the High Bridge?
KG:
Oh yeah, I’m sure that people knew that there would be kids out here. Especially if you lived here, you knew that people would go out on the trails when they had a day off.
Most of the time we would go during the summer, and I would absolutely not want to cross it but I wouldn’t let her go by herself. So, I would cross it because she wanted to.
DTH:
She wasn’t afraid of crossing this bridge?
KG:
Libby wasn’t scared of anything except needles and anything that caused pain.
DC:
From the time their little feet hit that very railroad tie, and we know they did, what happened between here and there and then that initial engagement with the murderer. What happened?
DTH:
So, they were on the far end of this bridge when Libby took that video and Abby was still on the bridge. You said before -- you think that maybe he knew this area well enough to know that’s a very vulnerable place over there.
KG:
Umm hmm.
DTH:
Why?
KG:
Well, the bridge is really scary, and uh I wouldn’t cross it had I not known what it looked like. And so, if you don’t know what it looks like, then you wouldn’t know how vulnerable you are when you’re on it.
So, umm, I definitely think he took advantage of how vulnerable they were there at that moment.
DTH:
What do you say to the people who are frustrated it hasn’t happened yet.
DC:
I understand. I don't always say I understand to people, but I, I understand. Yeah, I understand. I’d do anything, you’d do anything to help people close this chapter.
DTH:
You know, one of the things that we kinda talk about within a story is when you don’t know what happened, usually the simplest explanation is what happened.
When we find out what happened here, do you think it’s going to be simple? Is it going to be the simplest explanation?
DC:
No, I don’t think so, and that’s just my own personal opinion. Because, it’s uh, it’s complex.
It’s—from what happened down there to what happened over there is complex. And, there’s not a simple explanation.
Ya know, if—I mean, if you and I were standing on this bridge, and you pushed me off and I died. Simple explanation, right? Or I jumped, simple explanation. Tragic — but simple explanation. It’s something that’s not, that’s not like this.
