The Delphi Murders: The Appeal: Oral Arguments

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[00:03:17] [SPEAKER_01] I'm Anya, and today on the Murder Sheet, we're going to be talking about the oral arguments in the Delphi murders case.

[00:03:23] [SPEAKER_03] Content warning, this episode includes discussion of murder and appellate attorneys.

[00:03:29] [SPEAKER_01] As well as the murder of two children. Yes. So be warned. So yeah. So right now it is the 21st of September in 2026, and we have arrived at the day of the oral arguments in the Delphi murders case. Long awaited.

[00:03:46] [SPEAKER_03] We attended it, so I think what we'll do is in a moment we'll come back. Why don't we start by giving some of our big picture impressions, and then maybe we can go into some of the details. Okay, let's do it.

[00:04:00] [SPEAKER_01] My name is Anya Kane. I'm a journalist.

[00:04:03] [SPEAKER_03] And I'm Kevin Greenlee. I'm an attorney.

[00:04:05] [SPEAKER_01] And this is The Murder Sheet.

[00:04:07] [SPEAKER_03] We're a true crime podcast focused on original reporting, interviews, and deep dives into murder cases. We're The Murder Sheet.

[00:04:15] [SPEAKER_01] And this is the Delphi murders. The appeal. Oral arguments.

[00:04:20] [SPEAKER_03] So let's talk about some big picture things before we get into whatever details you or I decide we would like to highlight.

[00:05:13] [SPEAKER_03] I think the most important thing to say right at the top is it is a fool's game. It is a fool's game, Anya, to try to predict how judges are going to rule in a case based on questions they ask in oral arguments. It is a fool's game, and I don't say that lightly.

[00:05:35] [SPEAKER_03] I really do mean that because the questions they ask are not always indicative of what their final positions are going to be. With that said, I think just inevitably because we're here talking about it, we're going to do that.

[00:05:50] [SPEAKER_01] So we're fools.

[00:05:51] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah, we're fools. We're going to tell you how we think things are looking, but keep in mind you don't necessarily have to put too much stock into that at this early date. With that said, it looks very clearly like Judge Brown is very firmly in the camp for Richard Allen based on her questions.

[00:06:14] [SPEAKER_03] Judge Altice seems to be holding a position for the state, and Judge Vedek seems to be more in the middle. And so when you have a situation where you think, okay, this judge is pretty much going to go one way, all the way, and this other judge over here is going to go pretty much the other way, all the way,

[00:06:41] [SPEAKER_03] then you look at the judge in the middle and look at the issues that seem most important to that judge because those issues will influence how that judge may end up going. And to me, it seems that what Judge Vedek seemed most concerned about were the conditions of Mr. Allen's confinement

[00:07:04] [SPEAKER_03] and the possible effects said conditions might have had on his mental health, more specifically his confessions. Was that your impression?

[00:07:15] [SPEAKER_01] You pretty much summed out my general impressions of these judges. And again, as you said, we're telling you we think one's for one, one's for the other. We could be wrong. I mean, or their ultimate decision may not really reflect this. But if we're going purely off of oral arguments, which, as we said, is a bad idea, but it's all we have. So we're going to talk about it.

[00:07:38] [SPEAKER_01] So, yeah, I very much felt that Judge Brown was very much – and, like, I can talk about some details later on why I think that, too. Why she, you know, with being more on the Richard Allen camp and Altice being for the state. And Vedek, is that how you say it, is more in the middle. Yeah, that's how I felt.

[00:08:02] [SPEAKER_01] I felt, in general, the performances – Ellen Mylander, I believe, was for the state from the attorney general's office. Is that correct?

[00:08:10] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:08:10] [SPEAKER_01] Am I saying – or am I butchering her name? Mylander. I thought did a good job. There were a couple moments where, like, there were awkward silences with her. But, I mean, I kind of feel like that's the nature of a game with an appellate attorney, so I'm not really judging on that. I thought she was pretty quick. She made a lot of good points. I thought she cleared up a lot of misinformation that was actually from the previous section, effectively. And, yeah, I thought she was solid and thought on her feet. Mark Lehman was doing this for the Richard Allen team. Richard Allen's –

[00:08:39] [SPEAKER_03] I was surprised by his performance. We saw him earlier. He represented Mr. Allen in an earlier appeal that reached the higher courts. And I thought he did a fine job in that case. I was not so impressed with him today. I felt he got highly emotional.

[00:09:02] [SPEAKER_03] I thought he made a lot of questionable strategic choices, including ending his big grand finale is about alleged issues concerning Brad Webber's fan. At one point – Yeah, right. At one point – and that's not – no matter how you view this case, that's not your slam dunk appellate issue. You want to end with something bigger than that.

[00:09:27] [SPEAKER_03] At one point near the end, one of the judges told him, you know, Mr. Lehman, this isn't a trial court. We're not a jury. You're acting like you're arguing in front of a jury. And when judges tell you something like that, that's a sign you're not doing well.

[00:09:48] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. If he – if you told me this was the first time we ever did this, I'd be like, oh, okay. Because he went totally off the tracks, you know. I did not care for his previous performance that we saw. But I admit, that may be a stylistic thing for my personality. That doesn't necessarily mean he did a bad job. It may just be that it didn't resonate with me. I find his sort of like aggrieved earnestness shtick extremely grating and phony.

[00:10:18] [SPEAKER_01] So that's me. Maybe it's because I just don't like people with that personality. I don't know. Nothing against him personally, just I – he's already underwater with me because of that because I just don't like the way he delivers things. And I think he's – you know, he comes off as extremely self-righteous. But whatever. That aside, I try to set that aside when I'm listening to what he's saying.

[00:10:43] [SPEAKER_01] I felt like generally he did a better job in his main portion sticking on topic and answering the judge's questions than he did when he came back. He reserved 10 minutes of time at the end for a rebuttal. That was a mistake because when he came back, he was behaving unhinged. He was screaming about how everyone was liars. He had to be remonstrated at some point. I think that was in the second portion of like this isn't a jury trial. Like what are you doing?

[00:11:12] [SPEAKER_01] Why are we arguing facts? You need to be sticking to the law. And I thought this – like had he just ended in his first portion, I probably would have said, oh, I still don't care for so much dick. And some things I felt he was just totally inaccurate about, like deceptive about. But I'd have to give him kudos for like staying on topic or whatever. But like I just felt like that was embarrassing. Like that was – to have to be told that, I don't know. Maybe that's normal.

[00:11:41] [SPEAKER_01] But I would think that someone who's like focusing and specializing on appellate issues would usually be in more control, not of just how they're saying it, but of what they're saying and what they're emphasizing. The judges were – two of the judges, Brown and Vladek, they were both like interested in aspects. I mean I think Brown was eating up everything he was saying. Vladek was like definitely wanted to talk about the confinement. I don't know why you wouldn't be tailoring your answers to like, hey, you were interested in this.

[00:12:10] [SPEAKER_01] Let me talk some more about that just strategically. It seemed baffling to me.

[00:12:16] [SPEAKER_03] I've heard other people say that he was so much worse in his rebuttal time. And I understand that because he certainly did a very poor job in his rebuttal time. I don't think he was all that great in the opening.

[00:12:29] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah, yeah, that's fair. That's fair. That's fair. I just – I try to give him benefits.

[00:12:32] [SPEAKER_03] He was waving the sketch around and saying this sketch is evidence that someone else was there. We'll get into all that. That's some of our general impression.

[00:12:41] [SPEAKER_01] I think he spent too much time with Andy Baldwin. That's what I think.

[00:12:44] [SPEAKER_03] You think that affected how he presented the case?

[00:12:46] [SPEAKER_01] I think when you're – I think when your delivery turns into a histrionic muddled mess, then you know, you are – it's Baldwin syndrome. You know, you are supposed to be this professional that everyone looks to to deliver a certain level of expertise and performance. And you end up just, you know, worshipping at your own altar and thinking that your own, you know, ability – and, oh, my gosh, I have to be an advocate for this beautiful man.

[00:13:15] [SPEAKER_01] Like, it's like everyone this case touches, especially on that side, ends up doing a worse job for it. And I don't know why that is. I don't know if it's he's spending too much time with trial counsel and that's influencing the decisions he's making or if he's just susceptible to that getting high on your own supply issue.

[00:13:34] [SPEAKER_03] And I should say, first of all, when we talk about how he did, we're not at this point evaluating any of the arguments.

[00:13:43] [SPEAKER_01] No, no, no.

[00:13:43] [SPEAKER_03] We're evaluating how he delivered his arguments.

[00:13:47] [SPEAKER_01] Not even just that. It's what he – I mean, like, we are talking about the arguments in terms of, like, hey, let's go to the van. That's not what these judges are signaling that they're very interested in.

[00:13:58] [SPEAKER_03] You mentioned Baldwin. Baldwin was there today, as was his other counsel, Brad Rosey and Jennifer Auger. Former Indiana State Superintendent Doug Carter was there. Jerry Holman, one of the primary investigators on the case.

[00:14:13] [SPEAKER_01] A lieutenant with the state police.

[00:14:15] [SPEAKER_03] He was there. Stacey Diener, Nick McClelland, James Luttrell, they were all there. These were the prosecutors who worked on the case. Kathy Shank was there. The family was there.

[00:14:28] [SPEAKER_01] We saw – there was only one of the families that I saw. I did not see – I saw people from Libby's family.

[00:14:34] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:14:34] [SPEAKER_01] So, I mean, but, you know, this is something where definitely a lot of people associated with the, you know, original case did show up, which was kind of wild because it's like a weird little mini reunion. It was fun for us seeing some of the reporters that we'd connected with at trial. We saw some of them. We saw some folks that we'd seen at trial who were very nice. So, we were happy to see some of those old faces, even though it's like, frankly, you know, it's all for a very sad occasion.

[00:14:58] [SPEAKER_03] And before we get into whatever we want to highlight from the proceedings, I'd like to give an example of why we say Judge Brown seemed to be really slanted towards the defense side. But at one point, well, Mr. Lehman has made it clear that he thinks, well, I think the guy that did this was Brad Holder.

[00:15:27] [SPEAKER_03] Brad Holder has this alibi. Here's why we don't think the alibi is true. And he's like, if the alibi is true, okay. He didn't do it. That seems to be where he's going. But Judge Brown is like trying to get him to say, well, you know, even if his alibi is true, he could have come by later, right?

[00:15:47] [SPEAKER_03] So, she's really working to rehabilitate and strengthen the case against Brad Holder to an extent that even the defense didn't seem willing to do.

[00:15:59] [SPEAKER_01] God help Lehman. I agree with him. Like, if that's him checking in there, then he's not involved.

[00:16:03] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah, the alibi is he clocks out of work at a certain time. Yeah. And that puts him elsewhere other than the scene of the crime.

[00:16:12] [SPEAKER_01] Judge Brown seems to think if, again, if this question is indicative of how she's going to rule and her decision making, she seems to think there was some sort of all-night Odinism party in the woods that just went on until, I don't know, you know, maybe the next day. To me, that is just so wild. And if that is true, betrays an ignorance of the facts of the case, betrays an ignorance of the basic timeline and the information provided by Libby's phone.

[00:16:39] [SPEAKER_01] And all I could hope for, if that's not just her misspeaking or kind of rattling something off, all I can hope for is that she sincerely looks over the case, again, if she's not done so already. Because that is wild to me.

[00:16:55] [SPEAKER_01] That is not something I would expect at this level of being a judge to be trying to rehabilitate what's already a garbage theory. Let's just be clear. It's already a garbage theory. But at the very least, Mr. Lehman, in all fairness to him, I just criticized him harshly, is being truthful and being honest, at least, when he's saying, yeah, like, it's either this or that. And she's trying to be like, no, you know, bring it up.

[00:17:24] [SPEAKER_01] Maybe Brad Holder has a teleportation device that we're all unaware of and doesn't exist in reality. You know, like, who knows? Maybe that's how he got—I mean, and again, I hope that that is not what she's going to be basing decisions on. We've been on a real kick lately to improve our health, and that means getting good sleep. And rest. For us, that starts with amazing, comfortable bedding.

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[00:20:51] [SPEAKER_03] I have to say to me it's a sorry state of affairs for the state of Indiana to have a situation where a man is being accused of murder in an appellate court. Even though it's very clear he didn't do it. Brad Holder had an alibi. If you want to try to say Richard Allen is innocent I think you're wrong.

[00:21:19] [SPEAKER_03] But you can make that claim without saying Brad Holder is guilty. Brad Holder had an alibi. Brad Holder didn't do this crime.

[00:21:28] [SPEAKER_01] Well as with so many innocence movements it's oh my gosh there's no evidence against my guy. But like here's even less evidence against this guy so it must have been him. I mean it's the ultimate hypocrisy that is at the central you know is central to all of this. But I would add to that that with this I'll give my lander a lot of credit. I feel like in her section she got into some of this.

[00:21:53] [SPEAKER_01] And I think even Judge Altice kind of assisted her a bit in saying well you know this was this. And they were able to get into like Brad Holder operated specific machinery. So had he not been there had he just gotten some random onus to replace him things would have not worked that day. And people would have been asking around and trying to figure out okay what's going on with Brad. Oh he's not here. He put this guy in a Viking helmet in charge. What the hell's going on?

[00:22:19] [SPEAKER_01] Like to act as if you know there's testimony about this from the woman who is organizing everything at the plant. For Lehman to be attacking it that hard I think is just disingenuous. I mean it's just ridiculous. But for Brown to be sort of wholeheartedly seemingly accepting that from the stand is concerning. But again I want to give her the benefit of the doubt and hope that that's something that I hope that all we can hope for is that the judges are making a decision based on the facts.

[00:22:46] [SPEAKER_01] And not trying to insert their own investigative you know like put on their little deerstalker caps and trying to go with it from there. Because that's just not appropriate. This should be about the law. Not you know oh could Brad Holder have done it with his little Star Trek you know beam me up device. I don't know. That disturbed me.

[00:23:09] [SPEAKER_03] So I'd like to why don't we start going through and highlighting moments that we feel were worth of highlighting.

[00:23:17] [SPEAKER_01] Can I say another Brown moment or did you want to go?

[00:23:19] [SPEAKER_03] You go ahead.

[00:23:20] [SPEAKER_01] Another Brown moment that made me feel like she was totally in the bag for Alan was at one point I just I found this bizarre inappropriate probably too strong a word because maybe it's totally appropriate. I wouldn't know. I don't cover enough appellate cases to have a sense. I just found it personally bizarre. She she kind of stops everything.

[00:23:42] [SPEAKER_01] She's asking Lehman a question and she says something to the effect of oh well we're all sorry the girls got murdered. Do you remember this?

[00:23:52] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah near the end. Near the end she says something like to the families out there we're all a thousand percent upset and sorry about what happened. And that just seemed to be something you say to the families when you know you're going to be making a ruling that's going to hurt them.

[00:24:11] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah that that's what it struck me as I see that a billion times online. Oh I feel so awful for I'm an advocate for Abby and Libby and no one else. And it's like yeah no you're not. I did that but but what was more bizarre than that was it seemed to me with that statement she was almost setting up Lehman to also respond like what do you think about that Mr. Lehman. And it was like why are you like what does that have to do with the law. What does that have to do with the issues up for appeal.

[00:24:38] [SPEAKER_01] I mean like what you're giving him a platform to say something that's like nice and PR Eve like for why should that matter. You know it's a given it's a given that I would hope it would be a given that people feel sorry for these families who lost their girls. I mean for some people who have no hearts they don't they don't like the families they want to attack them they want to torture them. But I would hope that professionals working in this space they certainly don't want to cause pain but it's their duty to uphold the law.

[00:25:07] [SPEAKER_01] What whether that means striking down a case if the if they feel his rights were not protected or if that means upholding a verdict and giving an appellate attorney for it for the convict for Richard Allen time to expand upon. Well what do you think about why are we doing this for the families. It just it just felt very out of place.

[00:25:31] [SPEAKER_03] So do you want to start highlighting moments like going let's opening up our notebooks and start picking out moments.

[00:25:38] [SPEAKER_01] Let's let's let's some magical moments. Let's do it.

[00:25:42] [SPEAKER_03] Do you want me to do the first one.

[00:25:43] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah go ahead.

[00:25:45] [SPEAKER_03] One moment early on that struck me is in talking about Mr. Allen's confessions in this case Mr. Lehman said quote we don't care if the confessions are true or not. And I just wanted to highlight that because that is the sort of thing an appellate attorney should be saying.

[00:26:10] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah that's true.

[00:26:11] [SPEAKER_03] Because he is not talking to a jury because a jury wants to care most about whether or not these confessions are true. That's not what an appellate attorney worries about is not frankly what an appellate attorney should worry about. What the appellate attorney wants to worry about is not whether or not the confessions are true but whether or not it was appropriate to admit them into the trial.

[00:26:37] [SPEAKER_01] Yes.

[00:26:38] [SPEAKER_03] So.

[00:26:38] [SPEAKER_01] I think if. Go ahead.

[00:26:40] [SPEAKER_03] Go ahead.

[00:26:40] [SPEAKER_01] I think if Lehman had brought more of that energy to this I think would have had a more favorable opinion of his performance and his general impact here. If he brought more instead of this moralizing hand wringing oh my guy's the littlest innocentest guy in the world and oh I'm crying. It just. Like you shouldn't care if he's guilty or innocent.

[00:27:01] [SPEAKER_01] If he's guilty you should still be going hard and like just cut the nonsense and focus on what you feel are the issues at that put you in the best position to get him a new trial. I mean I'll tell you this early on you know they asked him what do you feel your best issues are. And I mean he kind of like I feel like he should have had an answer there and he kind of like flubbed it like well I mean all of them.

[00:27:27] I'm okay.

[00:27:29] [SPEAKER_01] They're all great you know and it was like oh there's a whole smorgasbord for you to pick from it. Now I mean I guess I get that because he wants like he wants to probably know what they think. Although I don't feel like he did a very good job sticking to what they were interested in in general. Maybe he was just trying to get a sense of that with his answer but I just felt like.

[00:27:46] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah I think he literally said when they asked him what's your strongest issue he said something to the effect of or it depends on the judge.

[00:27:52] [SPEAKER_01] He did say that.

[00:27:53] [SPEAKER_03] So basically anything you think is my strongest issue you're right.

[00:27:56] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah what's your strongest issue judge. I think the suppression issue in the unfair trial are both strong issues but I would say it depends on the judge. Yeah it's like okay. And listen that that can sound disingenuous to a lay person because you're so well like whatever you want to hear you know. But I actually think there's that's not that's not a bad thing in my opinion because it's like that's his job.

[00:28:18] [SPEAKER_01] So I mean I'm not criticizing him for it but I wish I had seen more of like the appellate attorney versus kind of like trial to you know electric boogaloo. Like that's what I would have preferred.

[00:28:29] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah there was a lot of talk about the confessions whether or not they were reliable whether or not the jury had the information to determine whether or not they were reliable. In my judgment they did because the jury heard quite a bit of information about Mr. Allen's mental state. There was quite a bit of talk.

[00:28:51] [SPEAKER_03] The defense contention is that the confessions were the result of coercive control put forth by the state. Just the fact that the state is imprisoning him and putting him in confinement where he doesn't really have a lot of exposure to other people.

[00:29:13] [SPEAKER_03] They that in and of itself creates an environment where it is no different from them like beating him in an interrogation situation. I think most people tend to understand that Mr. Allen was kept isolated from other people in the prison for his own protection.

[00:29:33] [SPEAKER_01] I guess I just don't understand like I mean okay so I understand there's two sides to this. On the one hand I feel like where was he supposed to go? What was supposed to happen? How was he supposed to be protected from not you know getting shivved? No matter what he would have been in a one-man cell. Whether he's in jail or prison.

[00:30:00] [SPEAKER_01] Now like that's just kind of the end of it. He got resources within Westville. Westville's a pretty harsh place generally so I mean I guess I just I don't know. There's that side of it where it's like I don't really know what was supposed to have happened. I'm sure if they'd put him in gen pop and he got knifed on the first day then they would have been acting like that was coercive because they were basically threatening him. And like you know like oh if you don't if you don't confess you know we're gonna just put you somewhere that's dangerous and could kill you.

[00:30:28] [SPEAKER_01] I guess I just don't really know what was supposed to happen. Maybe there needs to be better procedures. I think something that I found to be a problem from the state but maybe they were kind of forced into this somewhat is the acceptance that he was just psychotic the whole time or even psychotic at all. Like I'm not convinced by that frankly. I think it's possible to fake it and I think it's possible for somebody you know to be smearing poop on themselves and not be psychotic.

[00:30:57] [SPEAKER_01] I think for a lot of people that's surprising because like that's not something I would ever do to myself. But you're not somebody who you know wanted to rape and kill two girls and you're also kind of you can't really put yourself in that mindset the powerlessness that you would feel in prison. People we hear this from prison guards. They do this sometimes in order to gain control. They're not all psychotic. It can be a strategy. So that's on one side. But I have to look at it from the judge's perspective from their perspective.

[00:31:25] [SPEAKER_01] I feel like the idea of we don't really know what to do with pretrial detainees who might be mentally ill and might be in a high profile case and like this is scary and it could happen to somebody else. And you know I understand why they are freaked out by that issue. When I look at it in this case I'm like you know I feel like it's kind of weak. But from their perspective it seems to be like this could have implications for other cases and for how we treat people and like what should happen.

[00:31:54] [SPEAKER_01] So I don't know. I was kind of maybe hearing a little bit of that from Vladek. This seemed to be something she was very interested in.

[00:32:03] [SPEAKER_03] So what what some other things that jumped out at you from this early part of the proceeding.

[00:32:08] [SPEAKER_01] Well I just talked about one where it was you know like they were they went they went a lot. One thing that I felt was kind of bizarre and I was surprised by it. Lehman in particular it seemed very loose about the facts or he would be saying things in a very extreme way. Assertions or characterizations of things that are not set in stone or even to me like read as flat out not true.

[00:32:35] [SPEAKER_01] And you know people on the bench would be like oh yeah yeah you know and it's like I don't know like I would hope that some of those things would be corrected prior to any sort of decision being made. And I felt a couple of times like Altice who frankly to me seemed to be the most knowledgeable one about the actual case and the facts would be saying well that didn't happen. This is what actually happened.

[00:32:55] [SPEAKER_01] And like it just it just struck me that like I would hope that that would be like cleared up some of those items because I just I kind of felt like Lehman got up there and made a bunch of like insinuations and accusations that I didn't find to be that accurate. Especially like you know taking it for granted that he was psychotic. Maybe the state is forced into that somewhat by the fact that prison officials were saying oh yeah maybe he is psychotic at some point although for a while they've been saying it we think he might be malingering.

[00:33:26] [SPEAKER_01] So it just seemed and like just this idea like he's the worst treated person in the world and I don't know like I get how like someone from the outside might look at that and be like oh my gosh he is that's crazy. But like I just felt like having like lived through this case in the way we did over time a lot of it became a lot less shocking and a lot explained and it just seems like Lehman kind of threw a lot about adjudication of the issue out the window and really got away with a lot in terms of talking about it. That was just my interpretation.

[00:33:56] [SPEAKER_01] Do you agree with me or am I being too harsh?

[00:33:58] [SPEAKER_03] No I think you're making some good points. And one thing he talked about in this early portion as Richard Allen supposedly was in this terrible situation terrible conditions. God bless his defense attorneys.

[00:34:14] [SPEAKER_03] They filed this motion I believe on April 5th saying we need to move him because he's in terrible shape and the state took a while to respond and when they did they just said it was dramatic language and colorful language.

[00:34:29] [SPEAKER_03] And I think the simple fact of the matter is when you look back on that motion it was overly dramatic and it was overstated. And correct me if I'm wrong but didn't Judge Goll herself indicate that she felt that the defense attorneys played a little bit fast and loose with the facts in that motion?

[00:34:54] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah she did and they did. I mean like but you know with Lehman it's again it's just like you know turn on the waterworks. I can't believe he called it colorful how awful. It's like it was.

[00:35:08] [SPEAKER_03] Lehman I have here that he said quote the trial lawyer said my God he needs help. So that's an indication of the kind of dramatic and emotional language that Lehman used.

[00:35:23] [SPEAKER_01] I mean I think emotion can be very effectively wielded but probably better off in a trial and this is not a trial. I just found it very grating. I'm sorry like I just and again it just yeah it forgets the fact that it was over the top. I don't you know they were I don't know to me to me this is stuff where I think they were between a rock and a hard place with where he was supposed to be.

[00:35:54] [SPEAKER_01] And I don't think I'm convinced that he was fully psychotic or if he went into a psychotic state eventually I think it was through his own sort of self debasement and self punishment and freaking out about the guilt of what he did. And the realization that he wasn't going to have his cake and eat it too with his family and God and all these other things. I don't nobody wanted him to confess. Everyone was like actively running from those confessions.

[00:36:23] [SPEAKER_01] I just feel like it seems like a real twisting the law around to try to act like that is somehow the same thing as a bullying cop interviewing someone for seven hours and threatening them until they break. I just I find it. I would find it mind boggling if they went for that but they might I don't know.

[00:36:49] [SPEAKER_03] You kept on saying there's evidence that another man was on the trail that day and that he would hold up then the sketch made by an artist based on a description given by Betsy Blair.

[00:37:05] [SPEAKER_03] And of course while Ms. Blair's verbal description of the person she saw was included at the trial and she testified at the trial and the defense had an opportunity to cross examine her. It is true that the sketch itself was not admitted at the trial even though the defense wanted it to be.

[00:37:28] [SPEAKER_03] And so he was saying that that's very very unfair and the sketch itself is evidence that there was another person on the trail.

[00:37:39] [SPEAKER_01] I mean it's I think what eyewitnesses are just that way what matters to me factually in the case is that all the witnesses said they saw the person in Libby's video. Now like that being said I felt like the judges ended up agreeing with him on that issue of the sketch.

[00:37:58] [SPEAKER_01] And they even said modern like more recent case law indicates a sketch is like a picture which if that's true that seems totally nuts to me because I mean that seems concerning to me in terms of like getting wrongful convictions because the sketch is not like a picture.

[00:38:14] [SPEAKER_03] No it's not.

[00:38:15] [SPEAKER_01] So if the case law says that then yikes Indiana but I mean but if that's the law that's the law at the same time.

[00:38:24] [SPEAKER_01] Um what what did you think about uh I thought the moment I uh what was it I one thing I thought was um interesting is at one point Judge Brown said and this is I think pretty early on and probably my first indication of where sort of she seemed to stand was when she kind of came out with I wonder if the state improperly placed a burden of proof on your client.

[00:38:51] [SPEAKER_01] That was getting into whether or not the voluntariness of the confessions should have had a credibility assessment or a reliability assessment or voluntary assessment or all these different things. And yeah that was kind of interesting and it seemed like Judge Vladek later kind of was in agreement with her on that. Did you catch that?

[00:39:12] [SPEAKER_02] Uh no I'm not sure I did.

[00:39:14] [SPEAKER_01] Okay well that's what I kind of interpreted it as but I could be wrong.

[00:39:20] [SPEAKER_03] Uh lots of talk about uh alleged uh claims from Mr. Lehman or not alleged claims that he did make these claims but he claimed that law enforcement failed to investigate Brad Holder. Where do you think they got all the information from? And Patrick Westfall.

[00:39:37] Like what? Who?

[00:39:41] [SPEAKER_01] Okay sir then how do you know those names? Like this is what I just I can't stand this. I can't stand this like just say whatever you want. Like it's like yeah they failed to arrest them and charge them and you're mad about that because this is your client and you know that would have been better for him. Um but I guess I just feel like I just hate the overstatement. I think it just muddies the water. I don't think it really gets us closer to the truth.

[00:40:11] [SPEAKER_01] If people want to say like oh it violates Richard Allen's rights or the law to do this this and this. I think those are interesting conversations to have. A lot of this just seemed to be like the trial playbook but just squeezed into the appellate courtroom in a way that I felt was like vaguely inappropriate.

[00:40:30] [SPEAKER_03] They also talked about the fact that the defense wanted uh an expert witness named Tobin to testify and Mr. Tobin his testimony basically would have been I'm sure I'm over simplifying here.

[00:40:46] [SPEAKER_01] You're not.

[00:40:46] [SPEAKER_03] But his testimony would have been the entire field of ballistic science is bunk. Don't listen to any of it folks. And uh Judge Gull said no we're not going to turn this trial into a trial as to whether or not we should believe uh something that for better or for worse is accepted as a science. If you want to critique how the science was used in this case.

[00:41:14] [SPEAKER_03] If you want to critique how their expert arrived at the conclusion that the bullet found at the crime scene matched a bullet that came from a gun owned by Mr. Allen. Then by all means do so. And in fact they did have a witness. The defense did proffer a witness who critiqued those tests and that conclusion. She said that's fine. We're not going to bring in somebody who is going to call into doubt the entire field.

[00:41:44] [SPEAKER_01] That's right.

[00:41:45] [SPEAKER_03] And uh Mr. Lehman uh for the for the defense side of the ledger says no that was uh unfair. And he even mentioned a case in Virginia where this man was excluded from testifying and Virginia courts found it to be reversible error.

[00:42:03] [SPEAKER_01] Can you talk about that?

[00:42:04] [SPEAKER_03] I believe that's a reference to the case of Welsh versus the Commonwealth of Virginia. And in my reading of that case it sounds like the only expert witness the defense had was Mr. Tobin. And so in that case again this is just from my quick reading of it.

[00:42:25] [SPEAKER_03] It appears as if the defense did not have another expert to specifically counter the conclusions made by the prosecution. And so that's an obvious difference in this case because there was another expert who did challenge the state's conclusions. And they they they just they just challenged it in a very narrow way. They said the test result that was done was improper because of this.

[00:42:53] [SPEAKER_03] They did not say oh the whole field is wrong. So that to me is the difference there.

[00:42:59] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah no I mean and and you can see like I mean if that's the case and it's like this is the only guy we got you can kind of understand that like. Like that's their one defense. In this case they had an option to just have Dr. Warren. It's not like they just had to concede to the state on the ballistics issue. I don't know. I feel like I mean I could get it's it's Lehman's job to kind of go with what they have and be.

[00:43:26] [SPEAKER_01] You know maybe a bit exaggerating but if that's the case and that seems kind of like a different scenario entirely. It's not that Tobin was removed. It's the context in which that he was not allowed to testify. That's a different case entirely.

[00:43:44] [SPEAKER_03] Yes. So that's pretty much what I wanted to say about Lehman's initial presentation. Was there something you wanted to say about his initial presentation that we haven't gotten to before we head into the state's presentation.

[00:43:57] [SPEAKER_01] Let me look. They asked him about the intent mattering as far as if the state didn't wasn't trying to get a confession out of him. He's just confessing anyway. Does that matter and unsurprisingly he said no.

[00:44:08] [SPEAKER_03] Because yeah the record is pretty clear that the state wasn't trying to exploit Mr. Allen's alleged mental illness in order to procure confessions. I say it's pretty clear because there's documented in writing and in other ways where Mr. Allen would try to confess to people like Dr. Waller or he even went to write a note to the warden of the prison saying come talk to me. I want to confess. And their reply would be don't do that. Talk to your lawyers. Don't talk to us.

[00:44:38] [SPEAKER_03] They didn't want to do anything that would violate his rights.

[00:44:41] [SPEAKER_01] You know they were they were saying you know I mean this is something that I found while at one point Altice is getting into it with him. I'll just read the transcript. They're talking about you know the failure to investigate the Odinus and you know the girls were treated so differently. Both of their throats were slit. At some point they were both naked. He at one point said oh you know somebody would have had to get them into wet clothes.

[00:45:09] [SPEAKER_01] It was very very clear from Major Pat Cicero's testimony in trial who was the only crime scene expert who testified. The defense did not counter this at all. That both girls said that Abby was the one who was found clothed dressed pre-mortem. She dressed herself pre-mortem before she died.

[00:45:29] [SPEAKER_01] She was not dressed after death and the reason for that as you can tell is because of the blood pattern on her neck and the way the way she was arranged and the blood stains. So for him to be saying that is just bunk you know I mean it's been debunked. They had the opportunity to put their own thing out there. They didn't. But at one point Altice says you know we talked about so that indicates the killer had a connection to one but not the other.

[00:45:57] [SPEAKER_01] Within a few days of the murders they identified the connections interviewed two guys that know Abby. Judge they said no that's not true. They first said they're investigating that and then they said before Richard Allen even came along it couldn't be it probably was not a ritual killing. Yes that was a terrible conclusion that law enforcement made. Judge you're asking us to reweigh the evidence aren't you? It's really clear that when you bring in third parties could have done this you have to be very specific because it sends the jury off on a tangent. I thought that was interesting.

[00:46:24] [SPEAKER_01] You know like and it's true I mean it's like I don't know there was a lot of that from from Lehman. I wrote down at one point he's getting so much wrong because of stuff like that and it may not seem like a big detail but it obviously makes a big difference. It's a big difference if someone is having to redress a dead body post-mortem and all the difficulties that would entail with wet clothes and whatnot versus forcing a victim to do so before killing her.

[00:46:53] [SPEAKER_01] And to me the details matter. The details tell us different things and if this guy is just dropping a bunch of details that like the defense didn't even really effectively argue for at trial I just find that really kind of disturbing that errors are kind of leaking into this discussion and could be influencing some of these judges. And I would just again I hope that they really look at the record and what is true and what is not.

[00:47:24] [SPEAKER_01] You know I just yeah I think that's all I mean at one point at one point I mean I this was where I thought this is where I really started noticing like I felt Lehman was different from the previous time. I agree with you like he didn't do that great on the first round but do you remember he almost started kind of like laughing at the end of his time.

[00:47:47] [SPEAKER_01] No what happened he almost started like kind of like low-key just laughing in kind of a disturbing way about how oh you know well a lot of people have the Winchester brand of ammo in Carroll County.

[00:48:00] [SPEAKER_01] Do you know who has it to ha ha ha Brad Holder the guy we the guy with a perfect alibi you know it just it just why you're even doing the Holder stuff here I don't even know because to me to me it's like you could say I don't even know.

[00:48:18] [SPEAKER_01] I mean I guess they have to say it's a decent theory so they can make the third party thing work but I don't know like I wouldn't if I were him I wouldn't be getting that detailed on Holder because there's so many problems with Holder I just feel like you're going down a rabbit hole maybe the vaguer you can make it the better. I don't know that's just me let's go on to the state.

[00:48:38] [SPEAKER_03] What do you want to start this section because I started the last one.

[00:48:41] [SPEAKER_01] She starts out just kind of with a little summary of like at 213 they were followed on the bridge and that you know person was unequivocally by his own words Alan puts himself there and basically kind of she centered the timeline as the most weighty and important evidence. Basically Alan consistently putting himself in the places that bridge guy was and there being no one else around and of course Lehman's countered that it's like what about this vague sketch from a person who is far away.

[00:49:08] [SPEAKER_03] And I mean let's be honest the reason why she is putting the focus on the timeline is because the timeline evidence is not something that's really affected by any of the issues the defense has raised.

[00:49:25] [SPEAKER_03] She wants to make the argument that even if you believe these issues raised by the other side are legitimate and evidence should be thrown out because of it the other evidence left behind is so strong he still would have been convicted. Therefore any mistake in including that other evidence is harmless and should lead to him being awarded a new trial.

[00:49:50] [SPEAKER_01] So that happens and then they go on about the sketches and why weren't the sketches allowed in to be impeaching and she's noting like the descriptions were allowed in but the sketches are hearsay.

[00:50:05] [SPEAKER_03] She says the sketches include the bias of the artist who creates the sketches because the artist is not a robot. It includes his human bias and whatever is included from the artist based on the descriptions that's hearsay from the artist in her mind.

[00:50:24] [SPEAKER_01] I thought it was bizarre when I believe at one point Brown started questioning oh was it a Carhartt jacket was that tested for blood. And it's yeah I mean I think she didn't seem to know if it was or not. Mylander like oh I don't know or I don't think it was. I'm didn't I mean they seized it during the search of his house. I imagine they were testing a lot of that stuff so I would be surprised if that was not tested.

[00:50:51] [SPEAKER_01] I feel like that was another error and this in this case in fairness it was on the state's part. I could be wrong but you know I guess it's normal for the judges to catch the attorneys off unawares and they get some stuff wrong or they just don't know some things and admit like yeah I don't know that. But it that just seemed odd to me again it's not a question.

[00:51:14] [SPEAKER_03] She discussed how Alan was kept isolated from the other prisoners because Jen Pop was not safe for him. When you have someone who is known this person is accused of committing a violent crime against children that's not going to be someone who's going to be very popular in a prison setting.

[00:51:37] [SPEAKER_01] No or a jail setting.

[00:51:39] [SPEAKER_03] And so in order to protect that person whether they're in prison or jail they will probably be kept isolated from others.

[00:51:45] [SPEAKER_01] I mean when he went to Cass County he's again in a one man cell. Jail is the same thing. We talk to people who have been in jail and prison who you know made choices or decisions in their lives where they ended up in that situation. And fortunately they've they've gotten out and they've been in a different place now and we wish them the best. But they were able to talk to us about prison and jail culture. And a big thing you have people who are unstable and you have people who are violent and you have them all together and a hierarchy forms.

[00:52:15] [SPEAKER_01] And the people who are at the bottom are cases of child victims whether it's sexual abuse or murder in the most extreme cases. And there's that hierarchy there at the bottom their targets for violence. But it's even more than that some of those guys inside were victims of violence as children themselves. They feel very angry about it. And the other thing you have to consider is why do you often hear about like people like Jeffrey Dahmer. He was ultimately murdered in prison. Right. People like notoriety.

[00:52:44] [SPEAKER_01] They want to be the person to harm or in some cases kill the guy everyone knows about because then they get notoriety. And I'm not saying that's why the guy I don't know the facts of the Dahmer case enough. But like there's a there's an element of that. And when a case blows up like Delphi did I think it is a serious serious concern. But yeah they were you know they focused a lot.

[00:53:07] [SPEAKER_01] I think in her section I felt they focused a lot on his carceral conditions, mental health of that. Although again like I guess I found it kind of bizarre that the judges focus so much on that here because the argument is that it's carceral for him to be there. But like I don't know if he killed two kids. I don't think he was which I believe he did. I don't think he was that like stable in the first place.

[00:53:37] [SPEAKER_01] So like this kind of thing of like I don't know. I guess I was I felt like there was a lot of discussion of facts that were largely adjudicated at trial. And the facts I guess inform how we apply the law. But at the same time it just I don't know it seemed to kind of go heavy on that side of times.

[00:53:57] [SPEAKER_03] Talked about how Brad Holder cannot have committed this crime. I guess we referred to that earlier because of the discussion about his alibi. The issue of the supposed phone jack evidence was brought up. Remind us Anya what is this phone jack evidence?

[00:54:13] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. So Libby's phone stops moving entirely at 2 32 p.m. The girls were abducted around 2 13 p.m. So because the phone was found underneath Abby's body underneath a shoe under her body. It's believed that at the very least the phone is on the ground. And at some point Abby's on top of it.

[00:54:38] [SPEAKER_01] And so it's it seems that they probably were killed very shortly after 2 32. And that's kind of often used as kind of like the you know the timeline for when when they're being killed. Because the phone stops moving permanently. It's on the ground. At some point I think I'm not I don't remember the exact time. I think it was toward 5 p.m. Maybe shortly after 5.

[00:55:02] [SPEAKER_01] At some point there's some kind of indication in the phone's data that a headphone jack is being utilized. And that continues for a while and then it's removed. And what the defense wants you to believe is that somebody sneaks to the scene without moving Abby's body at all. Because we know from the way the wound pattern and the blood pattern is on her that she's not moved extensively. Although it looks like someone at one point sort of checked if she was alive by kind of moving her face a bit.

[00:55:32] [SPEAKER_01] But somehow without doing anything gets under her gets under the shoe put something in the jack for no reason. And then either comes back later to get it out or stays there for hours while people are actively searching for the girls through the woods. For no discernible reason. You could believe that. Or you could be not a conspiracy theorist and you could simply think that dirt got in the headphone jack. Or water got in the headphone jack.

[00:56:01] [SPEAKER_01] I can tell you, you know, if you've spent any time with a phone ever, if you're out in the rain or, you know, it gets wet somehow, it can mess with your headphone jack and it can make it seem like stuff's there that it's not. And it's just a problem and you've got to deal with it. It's really annoying. It's happened to me. I talked to a ton of people when this first came an issue at trial. They're like, yeah, that happened to me. So what's more likely? Phantom killers who are somehow not leaving anything at the scene and not even disturbing the body at all

[00:56:31] [SPEAKER_01] and somehow still have access to the phone to do something that doesn't make any sense and why would you do that? Or this thing that we know happens all the time happened to a phone that is wet and is covered in debris. I know what I believe. Yes. But again, I'm not stretching and straining in order to make this guy innocent in my mind.

[00:56:53] [SPEAKER_01] So I guess, you know, they brought that up and that should be the death knell for the friggin', you know, timeline issue. Because, you know, the defense again wants you to believe that it's an all-night Odinist party where they're running around doing headphone jack things and no one sees them. And it's this whole group thing and Brad Holder's, I guess, running in and out. But it sort of sounded like Judge Brown bought into some of that stuff. It wouldn't surprise me if she had based on her questions, I should say.

[00:57:19] [SPEAKER_03] There was a discussion about the confessions again. And she mentioned that only five of these statements were made while Mr. Allen was allegedly under psychosis. And so if you want to take the position that those five confessions should not have been admitted,

[00:57:38] [SPEAKER_03] that that is harmless error because there were many other confessions admitted from a period where he was not allegedly under psychosis. And so adding a couple more confessions to the mix is just cumulative. It doesn't really add something new. Whatever you got.

[00:58:00] [SPEAKER_01] At one point they talked about, you know, like, I mean, again, this is Brown, of course, of course. Brown says, can we move on to the crime scene if Mr. Allen had connections to Odinism? Would evidence of Odinism and related factors been admissible in your view? And the attorney said, I don't think so. And the judge says, in light of the crime scene? The attorney says, I don't think so. The crime scene didn't support that. There wasn't a bloody F on the tree. The chemical substance was put on.

[00:58:28] [SPEAKER_01] No one contended an upside down L was a rune. The evidence from the FBI, Dr. Turco, the sticks on the bodies were not symbols of runes or Odinism. The defense is the defendant's expert, Dr. Perlmutter, with respect to the sticks on Libby's body, all she said that it had it had meaning for the offender. Her belief that the sticks on Abbey's were a bind rune that was based on the fact of Holder's social media had a picture of a bind rune. And evidence already showed Holder, you know, couldn't have been there.

[00:58:58] [SPEAKER_01] He had a confirmed alibi. You know, again, the fact that, you know, the fact that Brown seems to be taking it as fact that, yeah, it's an Odinist crime scene is simply not accurate. They were not able to get their own expert to really provide compelling testimony for that. And she was not a compelling expert, Perlmutter, of course. But it just, you know, I just, it just seemed really shocking for someone to be that much seemingly buying into it.

[00:59:24] [SPEAKER_01] Although it's possible she's just looking at it from a devil's advocate perspective, I suppose.

[00:59:31] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah, we won't know for sure what she believes until a decision is issued.

[00:59:36] [SPEAKER_01] Devil's advocate would be a pretty appropriate term in this case, given what he did to those kids. But, you know, I mean, I get, like, I guess I'm just, you know, I'm shocked by even kind of, just because the defense says something really loudly and repeatedly doesn't make it true. Saying that these are runes doesn't make it true. And when you ask rune experts, they say, no, it's not. You know, like, all these hallmarks.

[01:00:02] [SPEAKER_01] We had testimony from Major Cicero that the so-called F rune on the tree was actually the imprint of Libby's hand as she steadied herself, as she bled to death after this guy cut her throat. So, like, and they had an opportunity to say, actually, we have a crime scene expert who said it is, you know, like something else. And, like, they could have done that. They didn't do anything. But we're supposed to just forget that and just buy it because Lehman's yelling about it.

[01:00:32] [SPEAKER_01] And I just, I'm, you know, but seemingly it's convinced of the judge.

[01:00:38] [SPEAKER_03] Another interesting moment came when they're again discussing the circumstances of Mr. Allen's confinement, how he is kept isolated from others for his protection. The state's attorney said he had to have those. He had to be isolated for his own protection.

[01:01:04] [SPEAKER_03] And Judge Vedek said, you protected him into psychosis. That was certainly an interesting moment. Pointed. A pointed moment. This is one of the reasons why we say that she seems to be particularly concerned with that issue. It was also one of several moments. I did not watch the stream, of course, because that would have been silly because I was there.

[01:01:29] [SPEAKER_03] And it would have been ridiculous for me to, like, be sneaking peeks at the stream while it was happening in the same room. So I don't know if this came out on the stream. But there were moments when people outside the courtroom who are listening to the audio or watching the video would suddenly break into applause. And that was one of those moments where she said he protected him into psychosis.

[01:01:56] [SPEAKER_03] Because certainly the people outside the courtroom were heavily slanted, in my opinion, towards Mr. Allen.

[01:02:03] [SPEAKER_01] Man, I feel dumb. Because I, for some reason, I thought those, I thought, like, because we would hear that periodically. I, for some reason, thought that was with some kind of other, you know, event at the statehouse. But you're right. It must have been. I think that is so inappropriate that that was being picked up and broadcast to people. If they want to treat this like a football game and be disgusting idiots. I mean, I, that's shocking to me. But that's what they are. They can act like they care about his rights.

[01:02:33] [SPEAKER_01] This is just a football game to them. It's fun for them. They're not normal enough to just enjoy football. They, they want to fixate on the murder of two girls, the gruesome murder of two girls. They want to trade their crime scene pictures around, like, trading cards. They want to hang out with their friends and tailgate and pregame and do all this stuff. They really disgust me. And, yeah, people cheering in this instance is just unbelievably inappropriate.

[01:03:02] [SPEAKER_01] You know, this is, I felt people in the courtroom weren't necessarily super disruptive. I mean, some of the people, like, were definitely annoying. Like, mmm, like murmurs of agreement whenever Lehman opens his mouth. They're kind of whispering to each other. And so, like, that irritates me. But I don't think it was, like, being picked up by the judges or anything like that.

[01:03:23] [SPEAKER_01] I know some of the reporters were complaining that, like, there were people who got in on the media side who were definitely not supposed to and were, like, had their phones blasting and just being, like, you know, kind of the urchins they are. But to me, like, no one was, like, crazy disruptive inside. But, yeah, no, that makes sense. I mean, there was, like, a low turnout rally that happened right before this.

[01:03:50] [SPEAKER_01] I don't know why you'd have a rally on a Monday when people have jobs. And it also would coincide with when people were trying to line up to get into the courtroom. It just seemed, I mean, when we walked over, I think we saw about 12 people. I think later on somebody said maybe it was more like 20. That sounds about right. What do you think?

[01:04:12] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah, I don't know.

[01:04:14] [SPEAKER_01] I guess some of them who didn't get in.

[01:04:15] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah, I'm not going to give advice to people on how to do rallies like this, but I would imagine if it was me. I know they probably thought with this way they would piggyback on whatever coverage the oral arguments got. But I imagine they could have potentially gotten more people if they'd done it on a Saturday or a Sunday at a park or something.

[01:04:35] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah, these are not super bright people.

[01:04:37] [SPEAKER_03] So I have nothing more to say about the state's presentation. Is there anything you wanted to say before we move on to the final 10 minutes of Mr. Lehman?

[01:04:49] [SPEAKER_01] Mylander emphasized that one reason why they did not move him out when they were first asked is because his medical team felt that they could treat him and should treat him and that a change in scenery would be very detrimental to his mental health. And that they ultimately did treat him and that basically made him better. So that was something that they pushed back on. It wasn't like, oh, we want to keep him so he keeps confessing.

[01:05:17] [SPEAKER_01] It was like his medical team testified to this.

[01:05:22] [SPEAKER_03] And let me say...

[01:05:23] [SPEAKER_01] They got into also the malingering.

[01:05:25] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah, the fact that he may have been faking the mental illness. Let me say that I was there. I went to these hearings. When the defense team said, oh, he's having trouble. He should be moved. And they filed this motion with colorful language.

[01:05:47] [SPEAKER_03] When McClellan, when Mr. McClellan, Nick McClellan replied, both in writing and at a hearing, he made clear that his position wasn't, oh, my God, we have to keep him here in this one particular location. Correct me if I'm wrong. He basically said, I don't care where you keep him as long as you keep him safe. I feel obliged to point out that some of the things they're saying aren't true. Is that basically your recollection as well?

[01:06:13] [SPEAKER_01] That's correct. Correct. So I don't know how they can act like this is some pressure campaign when you have the prosecutor saying, I don't care, go whatever, but stop lying. I mean, if you want to say that the defense attorneys tripped over themselves by instead of just focusing on the law and focusing on their client trying to make it a whole big media issue, then I actually think that's a pretty fair point. I think, you know, by emphasizing that.

[01:06:36] [SPEAKER_01] And certainly when they took a more, like, not conspiratorial approach later, Judge Gull ordered him moved. So I kind of, when I look back on that, I mean, we'll never know because it's, we can't go see a different version of this, but it just felt like a lot of it was like on them for kind of making this, this histrionic, ridiculous thing that then ended up making the judge feel like you guys are BSing me. And then, you know, I don't know.

[01:07:05] [SPEAKER_01] I got, I, I, I, I find all that. The last thing I'll say about the Mylander part is unlike Lehman, they did ask her about the probable cause attorney, probable cause affidavit for the search warrant in this case. This is a case where we've had, you know, we had these things that they were going to focus on. We had the being in prison is coercive on its own, throw it out because of that. We had the throw it out because the PCA was wrong and we didn't get a Frank's hearing.

[01:07:32] [SPEAKER_01] And we had the throw it out because he didn't get to mount the Odinism defense and put on some of these witnesses like Tobin. So like they talked a little bit about the PCA, but they kind of like skimmed that. Honestly, they didn't really, I didn't feel like they went that much in depth and yeah. So I think now it's time that Lehman has his grand finale.

[01:07:57] [SPEAKER_03] Tell us about it.

[01:08:02] [SPEAKER_01] You know, how could he be the murderer? He's, he volunteered to help versus the man who never helped this sketch. And it's like Betsy Blair testified that the person she saw was the person in Libby's video, which is the same thing as all the other witnesses who saw Bridge Guy. I don't care if she thought he had a baby face. Richard Allen had a puffy face at the time. I could see that registering as younger from a distance. It's really not that hard to figure out.

[01:08:33] [SPEAKER_01] I mean, this is a one step up from the whole, he's short. He couldn't have murdered them because he's short. He's a little guy. You know, he volunteered. Do you know how many cases the killer comes forward and volunteers information early on because they A, want to know what the police know? And B, in this case, his wife was nagging him to do so? I don't see that as like a benevolent thing on his part. I think it's trying to control things.

[01:08:59] [SPEAKER_01] When you're lying, when you did something bad, some people try to control it by lying further and admitting to a certain point the truth and then hoping that nobody follows up. And, again, this is just the kind of histrionic trial attorney nonsense that we would see again and again. I don't know why it's infected the appellate team to this extent, but I don't know.

[01:09:30] [SPEAKER_03] So that's basically it. What's next is...

[01:09:35] [SPEAKER_01] Who knows? Are we going to talk more about this mess? I have more to say about this.

[01:09:39] [SPEAKER_03] Okay, go ahead.

[01:09:40] [SPEAKER_01] Okay, at one point I wrote down, don't pay attention to the timeline. Like at one point he's basically like, oh, you know, we don't even need to look at that. I'll see what he said. He talks about the rest of the timeline. It's not about a timeline. Yes, it is. It's very much about a timeline and how Richard Allen, by his own statements, put himself into that.

[01:10:04] [SPEAKER_01] And at one point, near then is, well, so judge says, then this composite, it might be Richard Allen. The attorney says, or it might be that more than one person was involved. And the judge said, I don't want you to be arguing your cases if we're a jury. This is not what we're here for. We're here to decide legally whether there were errors made. So, yeah. That was a pointed moment.

[01:10:31] [SPEAKER_01] I think the most pointed they got with the state was saying, you guys protected him into a psychosis. I agree with that. I don't think the record shows that definitively. But it's understandable. And it's understandable for appellate judges to be concerned with that. But in this case, it wasn't about the case. It was about his performance and not, I don't know, not doing what he's supposed to do. Do you remember when he started basically screaming about how everyone's liars?

[01:10:58] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[01:10:59] [SPEAKER_01] Oh, the state witnesses basically had the judge allowed them to play audio from the video from Richard Allen's cell. They would have said, the state's liars. The state's liars. Harshman's a liar. You know, a wall is a liar. They're all paid liars. I'm going to tell you, like, I don't think those videos would have made a difference. I don't think audio would have made a difference at that point. I think the jury largely deliberated based on the timeline. I think the state's right here.

[01:11:29] [SPEAKER_01] Based on what we talked to with the juror, with the juror we talked to. I mean, again, I think they had other things. I mean, they're talking about everything. But I think one big thing for them was the timeline and how that lined up. But, you know, I don't know, just hearing this guy just, like, lose it like this. I didn't care for it. I think it's unbecoming. I, you know, I get that it's a pressure cooker, I'm sure, up there dealing with all these questions and whatever. And I'm trying to be sympathetic in terms of, like, you know, you might just kind of lose your cool a bit.

[01:11:57] [SPEAKER_01] But, I mean, this guy is supposed to be pretty experienced. And I just, watching someone, like, lose control like that, I feel is a really uncomfortable thing.

[01:12:08] [SPEAKER_03] At one point I have in my notes that he said, you know, if the audio was played, it would make a big difference for the jury. And the reason is that the jury, quote, could hear with their own eyes.

[01:12:22] [SPEAKER_01] I remember that. Yeah, that's, in fairness to him, that's totally the kind of thing I would say. I'm always like, oh, did you see our podcast? It's like, no, I wasn't tripping. I wrote down, Lehman is so full of it. It just seemed like this was just grandstanding. I felt I didn't find it compelling in the least.

[01:12:43] [SPEAKER_03] And you saw it with your own ears.

[01:12:45] [SPEAKER_01] I did see it with my own ears. And I heard it with my own eyes. And I was like, the thing with Lehman, too, is like he's got some judges where he wants them as far as, I mean, again, I think Brown's, if this is anything, if she's not just doing some sort of devil's advocate routine, then I think it's possible that she's like kind of a lock for that side for ruling in Richard Allen's favor. I could be wrong, but some of her questions seem pretty out there.

[01:13:16] [SPEAKER_01] But with Ladek, she's, you know, she's saying I think they protected him into psychosis. She explicitly said, you know, that she had like basically deep concerns about his pretrial detention, about what happened with that.

[01:13:34] [SPEAKER_01] And instead of ending on that, instead of ending on something that's going to keep her thinking about that thing that she found so compelling, it's like let's just get in the van with Brad Weber and act like, oh, no, he didn't drive it. Even though, like, yes, he did. Like, they have proof and they presented it. Why are you talking about this? I don't know. I found his ending really, really bizarre.

[01:14:05] [SPEAKER_03] Well, are we ready to wrap?

[01:14:08] [SPEAKER_01] I think so. I mean, what are your thoughts?

[01:14:10] [SPEAKER_03] So what's next? What's next is we will find out what the court thinks of all this. They will make a decision and issue an opinion. This could happen probably in two or three months. After that, whichever side loses will take it to the Indiana Supreme Court.

[01:14:28] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. So if they order a retrial, the state will appeal it. And if they don't order a retrial, the L Pella team will appeal it.

[01:14:38] [SPEAKER_03] Yes. So this is just a step in the process.

[01:14:43] [SPEAKER_01] Right. I mean, people, I don't want to cop out. People are going to ask us, what do we think? Has our opinion changed? Having seen this, having, we went in person, obviously. So, you know, we got in the room. So is our opinion changing based on this? Do we think that there will be a retrial? Do we think that maybe not, but it's more likely now than we previously thought? Like, where do we stand on outcome with the acknowledgement?

[01:15:11] [SPEAKER_01] As we said at the top, we are playing a fool's game right now. Okay. This is a game for fools. Kevin and I are the fools. We're at the game board. Granted that. What do you think?

[01:15:23] [SPEAKER_03] I've always said judges will surprise you. You can never predict what judges do. I think the law here is pretty clear. So I tend to think that at the end of the day, Mr. Allen is not going to prevail and there's not going to be a new trial.

[01:15:41] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah. I think my viewpoint, knowing or feeling, because I could be wrong, that at least one judge seems very swayed by something like Odinism. I think that a retrial is more likely than I previously did because I feel like that's one automatic vote for Allen.

[01:16:05] [SPEAKER_01] Allen and it's going to be, I think I saw on Twitter, the prosecutors were live tweeting this and they say it's going to be two to three, two to one out of the three either way. I mean, and we kind of have a sense of what those might be. All types for the state, Brown for Richard Allen and Vladek's going to be in the middle and her kind of wherever she's swayed. Does she think that the pretrial detention is enough to warrant a retrial?

[01:16:34] [SPEAKER_01] Is it, first of all, did it, were his rights violated? Was the law violated? And was it enough if we lose some of those confessions? Was it enough to prompt, oh yeah, we got to throw it out as reversible error versus harmless error? So those are the things that I'm looking at.

[01:16:52] [SPEAKER_01] I still think it's more likely that the verdict will be upheld, but, you know, I think I'm at least like more open to the possibility that it'll be a retrial. But I still lean towards no. I guess one thing that I would hope is that you hope in any process that it's, you know, it's good. I just hope that these judges are ultimately able to come to a decision, either whatever that decision is.

[01:17:20] [SPEAKER_01] Based on the facts in the record and not based on, you know, anything else or like just random assertions made without the facts. And so I hope in their deliberations they're really looking at what was adjudicated pretty extensively throughout this process. Because I think that's where the truth lies. Right. Not in sort of half remembered things thrown out in a 30 minute, you know, session.

[01:17:50] [SPEAKER_03] Well, thanks for listening, everybody.

[01:17:52] [SPEAKER_01] Thank you, guys.

[01:17:54] [SPEAKER_03] Thanks so much for listening to the Murder Sheet. If you have a tip concerning one of the cases we cover, please email us at murdersheet at gmail dot com. If you have actionable information about an unsolved crime, please report it to the appropriate authorities.

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