INDIANAPOLIS — New civil attorneys for Delphi murders suspect Richard Allen are asking for the Indiana Supreme Court to weigh in on public access to court filings in the case. Allen is accused of killing Abigail Williams, 13, and Liberty German, 14, in February 2017.
Among the civil attorneys claims:
- Hundreds of documents are improperly excluded from public access.
- Allen has asked his "chosen counsel" to make filings on his behalf, and the judge ordered the Clerk of Court to remove those filings after ruling Allen's chosen counsel are no longer on the case.
- The trial court has failed to perform the “clear, absolute, and imperative duty imposed by” the Access to Court Records Rules and the Trial Rules.
The chief justice issued a Nov. 9 deadline for any party to file an objection or any supplemental material. The court will then take the matter under advisement.
Civil attorneys' claims
The civil attorneys' claim, when the court made 118 documents accessible to the public on June 28, 2023, the documents were not labeled in a way for the public to understand what they were, and the link to find the documents was in a court order that required a member of the public to find, read and understand the content of the order.
The attorneys also claim a filing by Allen's defense team raising concerns about the search warrant for Allen's home was filed as a public document but was removed from the record. In that filing, the defense team claimed the probable cause affidavit used to obtain the search warrant for Allen's home misled the court.
The “verified petition for writ of mandamus and prohibition” filed Monday morning seeks intervention by the Supreme Court to reinstate court records the judge ordered to be removed and to not order the removal of any additional court files. It also asks the high court to order Judge Frances Gull not to remove any additional court records from public access without first meeting requirements established by state rules.
“It’s really a fancy legal way of saying: follow the rules and don’t break them again,” explained longtime defense attorney and former deputy prosecutor Katie Jackson-Lindsay. She said the new Supreme Court filing is intended to hold the judge accountable for ensuring that important court records are public as the Supreme Court intended in its published rules.
“Those attorneys are not only raising a violation of Richard Allen’s rights. They’re raising a violation of the rights of the public because we, as the general public, have a right to full transparency of our court system and to know what’s going on with legal cases,” Jackson-Lindsay told 13News. “To that end, she has not complied with the rules.”
Leak of evidence
The civil attorneys also addressed the issue that led to Allen's criminal defense attorneys being taken off the case. In the filing to the Indiana Supreme Court, Allen's attorneys claim he was made aware that a friend and former employee of attorney Andrew Baldwin had photographed crime scene evidence in Baldwin's office and then released it without consent.
A letter from Allen's attorney, Bradley Rozzi, informed the judge to the theft on Oct. 6. Judge Gull responded saying in part, "Thank you for passing on this troubling information."
Prosecutor Nicholoas McLeland then emails the judge and Allen's attorneys that the incident was investigated by Indiana State Police and that several people were identified. The first being the friend and former employee who had photographed the evidence and the others who had disseminated it. One of those allegedly involved would take their own life.
The judge then responded to that news saying, "I'm deeply concerned that Mr. Allen's defense is being compromised by all these recent events and set an Oct. 19 hearing.” She then ordered the original defense team to stop working on the case.
Documents filed Monday with the Supreme Court include an Oct. 11 letter from Allen to the judge in which Allen said he had been made aware of the evidence leak and still wanted to keep Baldwin and Rozzi as his defense attorneys.
Before that hearing, the filing includes an Oct. 11 letter purportedly from Allen to the judge in which he claims he was made aware of the theft and still wanted to keep Baldwin and Bradley Rozzi as his attorneys.
However, at a hearing on Oct. 19, the judge said she accepted Baldwin's verbal withdrawal from the case that day and that she expected Rozzi to submit a written withdrawal in the next few days. His attorneys later claimed Judge Frances Gull forced their withdrawal.
According to a later court filing from Rozzi, the defense and prosecutor met with Judge Gull prior to the Oct. 19 hearing when the judge read a prepared statement to Rozzi and Baldwin, identifying various issues throughout the case of the defense exercising "gross negligence" in carrying out their responsibilities for Allen.
In his filing, Rozzi then says says the judge then gave Rozzi and Baldwin two options:
- Voluntarily withdraw their appearances and exit the courthouse in advance of the hearing
- Participate in the 2 p.m. hearing, and the judge would read a prepared statement into the record and then disqualify both Rozzi and Baldwin in the presence of Allen, his family and the public.
According to the filing, the defense then spoke with Allen, who allegedly reaffirmed he wanted to continue being represented by Rozzi and Baldwin — and Allen allegedly still objects to the judge taking Baldwin and Rozzi off the case.
In court filing, Rozzi said the judge "had engaged in an ambush of defense counsel, entirely void of due process." Rozzi said he agreed to withdraw his appearance but says he was coerced and did not do it voluntarily.
An order by Gull was entered into record Oct. 19 — after the hearing — in which she ordered Rozzi and Baldwin withdrawn from the case. She then ordered the clerk to remove them as attorneys of record in the case. Subsequent filings by Rozzi were then ordered removed from court record by the judge.
Rozzi is also requesting Gull remove herself from the case. The attorney is asking for her recusal, claiming she has shown her "impartiality might reasonably be questioned."
Rozzi goes on to claim Gull violated the Indiana Supreme Court’s Administrative Rules by removing or concealing some of the defense’s pleadings from the case summary.
At the moment, it appears Allen may have as many as seven separate attorneys working on his defense, but it is unclear which of those attorneys will be formally recognized by Gull and whether she will reconsider requests from the defendant’s original lawyers to continue representing him.
Jackson-Lindsay said the recent developments present a very challenging situation for everyone involved in the murder case.
“It is a complete mess and total chaos, and I think because of the attention that this case has received, we’re sometimes losing sight of the life and death at the foundation of it,” she told 13News. “You have two young girls who lost their lives, and their families are hanging in the balance really wanting justice. You have a man who’s been accused of this crime, the most serious crime on our books, who’s wanting his day in court. And at every turn, something unusual is happening, something extraordinary is happening. What we know above all else is that what is happening right now is more than likely going to cause a delay in the proceedings.”
Allen is expected back in court Tuesday morning for another pre-trial hearing. It is unclear how many attorneys will be in court to represent him.
His original attorneys asked the judge for a continuance that would have delayed the hearing on Halloween day. Because Gull no longer recognizes the first defense team as official parties in the case, she took no action on the petition. Jackson-Lindsay believes it would be wise to address the concerns of the original attorneys – including their petitions to continue representing Allen and for the judge to recuse herself – before the judge conducts another hearing in the case.
“At every stage of these proceedings, the defense attorneys have an obligation to protect Richard Allen’s record because if he is convicted, he has a right to an appeal and a higher court is going to come and review all of these actions," Jackson-Lindsay said. "And so I think that it will be prudent upon everyone involved to request to hit the brakes, which is what these defense attorneys have requested, and it would be prudent for this court to say, ‘OK, I need to take a moment and just sort of pause everything before we go further.’”
13News reporters will be inside the Carroll County courtroom during Tuesday’s hearing and will have reports throughout the day.