DELPHI, Ind. — Investigators in Indiana are asking the public to contact police if they think they recognize the man in the sketch who is suspected to be involved in the killings of 14-year-old Libby German and 13-year-old Abby Williams, instead of posting it on Facebook.

Posts explicitly linking a person to the composite drawing have surged via social media sites since the sketch was released by police on Monday, according to Carrol County Sheriff Tobe Leazenby. Many posts show a photo or mugshot of a man beside the drawing. One post of a Kokomo man’s picture shown beside the sketch has been shared more than 17,000 times on Facebook as of Thursday morning.

But those posts won’t do any good, Leazenby said.

“A lot of people just don’t understand,” he said. “Social media isn’t going to get our conviction. It’s going to be a court of law. We can speculate and assume all we want, but until a jury or judge makes a final determination, it’s not going to be social media.”

Leazenby said law enforcement officials were aware releasing the sketch of the man believed to be connected to the Delphi murders might lead to a plague of social media posts pointing fingers, but officials determined the sketch needed to be released to the public.

“There were a number of things we were concerned about,” he said. “You have a list a pros and cons, and when it was all said and done, our pros list was longer than our cons.”

One of those pros has already proven itself. In just three days since the drawing was released, police have received nearly 1,000 tips about the case. Leazenby said over the past 5 months of the investigation, they had averaged only around 15 tips a day.

Some of those tips have been duplicates from past months, he said, but officers are still holding out hope that the sketch will draw out new information that will lead to an arrest in the case that has devastated the town of around 2,900.

“Let’s face it,” Leazenby said. “To a certain degree, when you look at that face, it’s the face of a common, ordinary Joe or John, so to speak. It has potentially a broad range it could cover…This is a huge process of elimination and putting a huge puzzle together, but we’re hoping someone will come forward who can help do this.”

One thing that won’t help, though, is sharing related opinions on social media sites, he said. Not only do officials not have time to comb through Facebook, but those posts could make the investigation harder for officers.

“To a certain degree, it does cloud the investigation,” Leazenby said. 

Not only that, but posting untrue statements on sites such as Facebook could open users up to libel lawsuits.

“You’ve got to tread lightly. You start pointing a finger, and that finger can easily get pointed right back at you,” Leazenby said.

Gerber writes for the Kokomo, Indiana Tribune.

Leazenby asked anyone who thinks they know the person depicted in the drawing to do what police have been asking from the beginning – call or email the official tip line so officials can follow up on it.

Anyone with information about the murders or the person depicted in the composite sketch should call 844-459-5786 and can remain anonymous. Tips may also be emailed to abbyandlibbytip@cacoshrf.com.