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DELPHI, Ind. — Richard Allen’s defense team rested its case after calling 20 witnesses on Wednesday.
It’s the 17th day of the double murder trial of Allen, who is accused of killing Libby German and Abby Williams.
The girls were killed in February 2017 while walking along the Monon High Bridge.
The defense rested not long after the court was called to order.
They spent most of their time casting doubt on the state’s case against Allen, questioning the quality of the murder investigation, the science used in the case and the forensics presented to the jury.
The video in the player above is from an earlier report.
On Tuesday, attorneys aggressively tried to cast doubt on the state’s argument that Allen killed the girls.
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Former FBI forensic investigator Stacy Eldridge was the 21st defense witness to testify. She told the court she spent 65 hours going through digital information in the case.
Eldridge’s testimony was consistent with several aspects of what state police experts said they found. She criticized researchers for not doing a better job of extracting data from the German phone, which could have led to better findings.
The biggest moment of her testimony came when Eldridge said at 5:45 p.m. on Feb. 13, 2017, a call came into Libby’s phone and a headphone jack was connected within “milliseconds.”
Eldridge went on to say that the headphone jack was removed nearly five hours later at 10:32 p.m. She said, “I can’t think of any explanation that doesn’t involve human interaction.”
Prosecutor Nick McLeland asked whether plugging in headphones would have caused the phone to register movement.
Elridge replied, “That might be; that wasn’t possible.’
He then asked if the phone would register movement if he was picked up and carried through the woods. She replied, “Yes.”
Eldridge also admitted that there was no record showing the phone was ever turned off.
Jurors had several questions, including whether Eldridge ever created her own timeline using the data from the German phone. She replied, “No.”
Another juror asked if Eldridge could tell if the phone was on silent or vibrating. She said she didn’t know.
Eldridge was then asked if water or moisture on the phone could be registered as movement.
She also said she didn’t know.
State Police experts Brian Bunner and Chris Cecil were called back to the witness stand. The defense has pressed them over their lack of reporting on the headphone jack data.
Cecil responded by saying he Googled the jurors’ question about water or moisture on the phone. He said he had read that a headphone jack could be used if there is water or dirt in the port.
The defense quickly responded by asking Cecil, “Do you normally Google when you’re doing research in a criminal investigation?”
Cecil responded with “not normally, no.” He said he normally uses peer-reviewed research.
Attorney Jennifer Auger then pressed further, saying, “Have you and the state had seven and a half years to investigate?”
Cecil replied, “That’s right.”
Auger then said, “and you came in here doing a Google search?”
Cecil said, “That’s right.”
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