Hi everyone, I'm a first time poster so I apologize in advance for any errors in my posts, I'll try not to break any rules! The following is all MOO, I do not want anyone to assume anything I theorize is fact unless reported by law enforcement.
The first thing I thought when I saw this case was it's Lyric Cook and Elizabeth Collins all over again. I'm an Iowan daughter of a cop and I think a lot of people from Iowa and probably the midwest couldn't help but think of the cousins from Evansdale. Lots of eerie similarities in the way they were abducted and found and I initially thought they could be connected, perhaps a SK drifter in the midwest (Evansdale and Delphi are only about a 5-6 hour drive apart) but LE has since said they don't believe the cases to be related so I trust them on that as the have all the information. The COD in each case could be so different that LE can't officially rule out, but make an assumption that the same perpetrator likely didn't commit both crimes.
Unfortunately, as long as each case remains unsolved and an open investigation, LE won't release a COD as a way to tie a killer to the crime (only the killer and the cops know how the girls died and killers have been caught many times for accidentally letting LE know they know things only the killer would know).
I've seen a lot of posts with people who are sure BG must be a local due to having to navigate the land between the bridge and where the bodies were found. While I agree that it would be easier to commit this crime with experience on the land, I wouldn't discount the drifter/non-local possibility. I watched a video someone else posted (I apologize, I can't find it anymore) but they walked the whole abandoned railway system through Delphi ending at the bridge. This whole area looks very similar to all the wooded areas in Iowa. Even in Ames, a college town where I am from, there's parks and trails through wooded areas nearly identical to Delphi and I wouldn't doubt that anyone with experience in the woods in the midwest could probably navigate the area where the girls were abducted/found.
This is all JMO based on reading about SKs and profiling, but having the instincts of a cop's kid plus a whole lot of forensic files over the years, I tend to get weird gut feelings in these kinds of cases and my gut says this is a drifter who doesn't stay in one place long and has probably done this before. If this is the case, it would be a lot harder to find the perp and they'd more than likely have to wait for him to get arrested for something else and tied with the DNA they supposedly found (I saw several posts about DNA but haven't seen a confirmation from LE). IMO without LG's quick thinking recording BG, they would have close to nothing to go on in this investigation and I hope last efforts to tell the world who did this to her and her friend lead police to the right tip.
Nothing I have seen leads me to believe RL is BG. To explain my reasoning, lets pretend RL is BG for a moment. It would take a of smarts lot for a man in his seventies to capture and murder two teenage girls who could probably run much faster, though if a gun were involved they would probably comply with his demands and not risk him shooting them while running. The still of BG was released fairly quickly after they were discovered with LE just saying they want to talk to BG. Why, if RL killed them, they were found on his property, and after a photo of a possible POI is released, would RL do a TV interview dressed in similar clothes that make him appear to be BG?? That would be a really stupid thing for someone who just murdered two people to do. I'm guessing BG would have wanted to make sure he didn't look like the photo as he doesn't want to get caught. Just doesn't make sense to me that someone who had to be smart to commit this crime, would be so stupid after his crime scene is discovered.
I don't think this is the perpetrator's first time committing murder given how little physical evidence they seem to have to go on, but again all just me speculating and I know that LE likely knows a lot more than they are able to say but are withholding information to help link the killer to the crime. I have theory involving an Indiana sex offender with a past of similar crimes, but I won't risk breaking rules to talk about him when he has likely already been ruled out by LE.
Thank you all for listening to my thoughts, I think a lot of people have posted a lot of very possible theories, but unfortunately only LE have all the evidence to draw conclusions on what really happened. Just hope BG slips up and gets himself on their radar soon! Hoping for a resolution to bring closure to these families who have been through so much.
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