At the upcoming Delphi Trial, one person will be responsible for solving a double murder, or freeing a wrongfully accused man… and she passed away 8 years ago. Liberty German, one of the two teenage victims at the center of this tragic case, concealed her cellphone to record a short video of a man approaching her and her best friend, Abigail Williams, as they walked across a 70-foot-high abandoned Monon Railway bridge on February 13, 2017. Moments later, this man would force the girls off the bridge (reportedly while brandishing a gun), down a steep hill, and across a creek into a wooded ravine, where he brutally murdered them with an unknown edged weapon.
When searchers and law enforcement arrived at the scene the following day, something unexpected had survived the treacherous journey down the precipitous bluff and through the icy waters: Liberty’s iPhone.
The 46-second clip captures only a brief “full body shot” of the killer from approximately 70 feet away. Likely due to Liberty’s efforts to conceal that she was filming, the video is shaky and highly pixelated, offering few discernible features aside from a blue jacket and jeans.
Because the ‘Bridge Guy’ is nearly faceless, many have speculated that the video will offer little value in court for visually confirming whether Richard Allen is the man in the footage. However, I believe Liberty’s video will be the single most crucial piece of evidence in the entire Delphi trial, possessing the potential to establish with nearly 99% certainty whether Richard Allen is a double child killer or a wrongfully accused man.
‘Photogrammetry.’ This is the term to watch for at trial, and it’s a subject both the prosecution and defense should have nearly mastered after two years of trial preparation.
Photogrammetry is the science of measuring a person’s height or other dimensions from photos or videos by analyzing camera angles and reference points within the image. Over the years, many internet sleuths have attempted to assess the Bridge Guy’s height, yielding wildly differing results. Calculating his true height requires knowing Liberty’s exact position while filming, factoring in camera angles, known reference points, lens type, and more. Fortunately, modern software can accomplish this with just a single photo and terrain scan, leaving little room for error.
Last week, I learned the basics of photogrammetry and witnessed the results firsthand, which will be documented in an upcoming video. Could photogrammetry accurately calculate my height from a photo of me standing on a bridge with my dog? By revisiting the location, scanning the landscape, and using known reference points, the software pinpointed where I stood and took measurements. It determined I was 5’10”. I’m actually 5’9″, but I was wearing 1-inch boots.
Richard Allen stands between 5’4″ and 5’5″, placing him shoulder-to-shoulder with very few —just 6% of men in the United States share this height. If either side invests in a photogrammetry expert to analyze Liberty’s video and conduct additional scans, the truth about the Bridge Guy’s height will emerge. Should the defense succeed in proving this elusive figure is 5’6″ or taller, Richard Allen could be positively and factually exonerated as the Bridge Guy. However, if the prosecution establishes that the man on the Monon is under 5’6″, it plunges Team Allen into a nightmare from which they may struggle to escape. They will face the formidable task of convincing the jury that not only was another man traversing those trails at the same time as Richard Allen—dressed in nearly identical clothing—but that he also is shorter than 93% of men in the country. With such compelling statistics and the weight of common sense stacked against them, the defense’s case could teeter on the brink of collapse.
