The volunteer who helped crack the Delphi murders case reportedly turned down the $325,000 reward for leading police to convicted killer, Richard Allen.
Kathy Shank, a retired CPS worker and volunteer clerk who went through around 14,000 tips in the case, told the families of Liberty German, 14, and Abigail Williams, 13, that she wants the reward money to go toward the memorial softball field and foundation honoring the girls.
DailyMail reports that Shank’s daughter, Jami, announced the decision in a post on X last week.
Jami, 47, who writes under the pen name Dahlia West, said her mother told the families to direct the reward money toward the softball field and scholarships created in the girls’ memory, and refused to accept any of it.
As CrineOnline previously reported, the bodies of the teen girls were found near the Monon High Bridge in February 2017, in Delphi
Five years later, police arrested Allen, a Delphi resident who worked at a local pharmacy.
After 17 days of testimony, a jury found him guilty of murder. He received a 130-year prison sentence.
Two of the original charges were dismissed due to double jeopardy, which bars multiple convictions for the same crime. He was credited with 786 days for time already served.
“The reason justice was served today was due to one person,” Sheriff Tony Liggett said in a press conference after Allen’s conviction.
“The person that only knows how to give. She has given herself literally, for free, to this investigation in different ways. Since about March of 2017, Kathy Swank, while filing, scanning, organizing, found a tip that led us to be here today.”
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[Feature Photo: Abby and Minby/Handout]
