Delphi Murders: Potential break in 2017 mystery emerges after podcast hosts receive anonymous tip

A potential break in the 2017 murders of two teenage girls in Delphi, Indiana, has emerged.

Liberty “Libby” German, 14, and Abigail Williams, 13, were found murdered on the morning of Feb. 13, 2017, after German’s sister dropped the pair off at the entrance of a hiking trail the day prior.

Journalist Áine Cain and attorney Kevin Greenleeand, who host “The Murder Sheet” podcast and have been following the Delphi murder case, received an anonymous tip that led them to the Wabash River in Peru, Indiana, on Aug. 23, where they witnessed and photographed authorities searching the water with various tools.

“We just kind of ran up there ourselves to see what was happening, and we witnessed a search about 12 personnel in the river looking over things,” Cain told Fox News Digital. “They had buckets, shovels. They seemed to have devices that we felt could have been metal detectors, and Indiana State Police (ISP) vehicles were parked next to the river. We documented that and then … looked at sort of a confluence of events that we felt were likely related based on what our anonymous sources have told us.”

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Sgt. Jeremy Piers, public information officer for the ISP Lafayette District, said ISP did have dive teams in the area that day but could not confirm whether they were conducting training exercises or a search. He could not confirm any additional information.

Indiana court documents obtained by Cain and Greenberg in May and August also indicate possible developments in the case. 

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On Aug. 19, the ISP petitioned the Miami County Circuit Court for custody of an Indiana man name Kegan Kline, 27. Kline is currently in custody in Miami County for 30 counts of child pornography-related charges dating back to 2016 and 2017. 

Kline has been perviously linked to the Delphi murders – he was reportedly in contact with German the night before she was murdered, according to FOX 59 Indianapolis. He allegedly made plans to meet up with her at the bridge where her body was found the next day, but Kline denies that he had anything to do with the girls’ killings.

In March, Cain and Greenberg obtained a 2020 transcript of an ISP interview with Kline that was accidentally posted online.

According to the transcript, which has since been sealed in the court record, Kline told police he communicated with German on the day she was killed. The transcript also revealed that Kline searched “How long does DNA last” on his computer and failed a police polygraph.

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Kline lived near the location where the girls’ bodies were found, and the search that Cain and Greenberg witnessed last month was “a very short distance away from Kagan Kline’s house that was raided in 2017…a week or so after the murders,” Cain said.

“We came upon the court documents that outline a 2020 transcript of an interview between Kegan Kline and police quite by accident,” she explained. 

In December 2021, ISP said in a Facebook post that they had uncovered a fictitious Instagram account under the username “Anthony_Shots” in their investigation into the murders. The transcript indicates that Kline had access to the account, which had been in contact with German. Kline told investigators, however, that he gave the account password to “a lot of people,” according to the document.

“This profile was being used from 2016 to 2017 on social media applications, including but not limited to, Snapchat and Instagram,” Indiana police said in the Facebook post. “The fictitious anthony_shots profile used images of a known male model and portrayed himself as being extremely wealthy and owning numerous sports cars. The creator of the fictitious profile used this information while communicating with juvenile females to solicit nude images, obtain their addresses, and attempt to meet them. Pictured below, you’ll see images of the known male model and images the fictitious anthony_shots profile sent to underage females.”

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Greenberg said that when he came across the 149-page transcript, he “was surprised at the amount of detail in there, including names of individuals that should have been kept private,” and he was “astonished that this had been made public.” When he went back to the case website later on, the document had been deleted, but Cain and Greenberg still have it in their possession and have shared the document with local and national media.

“One of our goals of reporting on this case is to shine a light on activities associated with one of the most high-profile murder investigations in the state,” Cain said. “And I think this is a situation where we very much hope that things are progressing as they need to because these girls were beloved by their communities, beloved by their families. All of these people deserve answers.”

She added that there are “a lot of people watching and waiting for justice,” and that she does not “feel like at this point, we know what exactly will happen in the future,” but she and Greenberg “hope that there are answers forthcoming because [they] feel that strongly that something needs to be held accountable for what happened to these girls.”

Police say German used her cell phone to snap images of a man walking across the railroad bridge shortly before she and Williams were killed on February 13. German also recorded the man believed to be the killer ordering the friends “down the hill.”

Authorities are asking anyone who may know something about the Instagram profile or anything about the case to contact law enforcement at abbyandlibbytip@cacoshrf.com or 765-822-3535.

Fox News’ Cristina Corbin and Laura Ingram contributed to this report.