Theories Why The Property Owner Where The Delphi Murder Victims Were Found Lied To The Police
When two young girls, Liberty "Libby" German and Abigail "Abby" Williams, were found murdered in 2017 in the small town of Delphi, Indiana, police received more than 70,000 tips regarding the case (via ABC News). According to The Sun, 15 of these tips implicated the land owner where the bodies were found — Ronald Logan.
Despite a lot of attention surrounding the murders, more questions have been raised than answers given over the last five years, and a number of loose ends have baffled amateur detectives online. Finally, as of October 2022, a local resident Richard Allen was arrested on murder charges (via The Independent) — but those who have been following the case for some time still have questions about the landowner. Logan was the subject of an FBI investigation back in 2017, and it was widely reported in the press that he had lied to police during the investigation about his whereabouts.
It is not yet known whether police found any links between the two men, although new information may yet be revealed during Allen's trial, currently scheduled for March 2023. Everything from Logan's character to his whereabouts and claims of abuse was put under the microscope by journalists prior to his death in 2020.
The murder site
When the bodies of Libby and Abby were first found on February 13th, 2017, police had little to go on, apart from a low-resolution recording of what appeared to be a man dressed in a blue coat and jeans, found on Liberty's phone (via NBC News). The voice on the recording can be heard presumably ordering the girls down to walk down a hill. Although images and clips from the video have been used in the case to try to locate the killer, the full footage has never been released to the public due to its distressing nature (via The Daily Mail).
Ronald Logan, who lived very close to the murder site, was soon a prime suspect, and the FBI acquired a search warrant to investigate his home. Police documents reveal that investigators believed Logan's voice was "not inconsistent" with the one on the video.
Initially, it appeared that Logan had a solid alibi. During questioning, he stated that a friend had driven him to a tropical fish store that day, between 2:00 and 2:30 p.m., and he had only returned home around 5:00 p.m. (via The Sun). His friend did confirm this alibi. Just two days after the initial round of questioning, however, Logan's friend cracked and revealed the truth to the police — he had been asked to lie on Logan's behalf (via The Independent).
The story unravels
When police looked into Logan's cell phone data, his story unraveled further. It turned out Logan had been near the trail on the day of the murder, close to the crime scene (via The Daily Mail). A receipt found on Logan's property also raised questions about the timeline Logan gave to the police — the bill they found was timestamped at 5:21 p.m. and came from a town 20 minutes away from Delphi.
Although Logan was never charged with any crime nor even made an official suspect, many things about Logan's behavior raised red flags for interested members of the public. The police report from the warrant investigation showed that Logan had multiple weapons in his home, including guns and knives (via The Independent), and that he had a history of trouble with the police for driving offenses.
The police also reported that Logan had also been accused of being violent toward women in the past. According to a report by ABC News, Logan's own ex-girlfriend came forward to say she believed he might be guilty.
Reasons to lie?
Although Ronald Logan is still the subject of a great deal of suspicion even after his death, he may have had an alternative reason for lying (in addition to the possibility of being guilty of the murders, of course). Logan was guilty of multiple traffic offenses and had other run-ins with the law that put him on the radar of the authorities (via Fox 59). Logan wound up flouting a court order that prohibited him from getting behind the wheel, and he appears to have gone for a drive on the day of the girls' murders. He was ultimately sentenced to four years in prison in April 2017 after pleading guilty to multiple driving violations.
Logan, who was 77 at the time of the murders, died in 2020 before the case could be resolved. He was just one of a number of people who were rumored to be involved in the murders — among them Kegan Kline, a possible child sex offender, and pedophile and kidnapper James Chadwell (via The Daily Mail). The charging documents for the case have so far been sealed in the wake of Mr. Richard Allen's recent arrest. Local police superintendent Doug Carter has stated, via NBC News, that the investigation "is far from complete."