Jose Ibarra, the illegal migrant with a violent past who attacked and brutally killed nursing student, Laken Riley, has been found guilty and sentenced to life without parole.
Prosecutors called the evidence against the suspect “overwhelming,” while the defense raised the theory that the defendant could be an accomplice but not the killer during closing arguments in his trial.
Before his sentencing, Laken’s mother delivered a powerful victim impact statement– calling the Tren de Aragua gang member a “sick, twisted, and evil coward.”
“Jose Ibarra took no pity on my scared, panicked, and struggling child,” Laken’s mother, Allyson Phillips, told Judge Patrick Haggard, through tears, as Ibarra listened on stone-faced, emotionless, with not an ounce of remorse.
“She fought for her life in dignity and to save herself from being brutally raped. This sick, twisted, and evil coward showed no regard for Laken and human life. We’re asking the same be done to him,” the mother said, raising her voice at times.
“There is no end to the pain, suffering and loss. On that horrific day, my precious daughter was attacked, beaten, and shown no mercy,” she said, recalling Laken as a “kind and thoughtful child of God” and her “best friend.”
In a hearing that lasted barely more than two hours, the judge answered the grieving mother’s pleas – declaring the illegal immigrant guilty on all charges and giving him two life sentences, plus 27 years, each to be served consecutively.
Laken’s father, Jason Riley, also spoke, calling the pain Ibarra causes him every day “unexplainable.”
“I will never hold her hand or feel her hug,” he said. “Our world has been torn apart. I am haunted by the fear she felt in those final moments. I hope justice is served for her.”
Riley was brutally killed on Feb. 22 as she jogged on the University of Georgia campus, not far from Augusta University, where the well-liked student was pursuing her nursing degree.
Ibarra, 26, attempted to sexually assault the coed but ended up smashing her head with a rock and asphyxiating her when she fiercely battled back.
Prosecutors said Riley valiantly “fought for her life” for a staggering 18 minutes, gouging deep scratches into Ibarra’s neck and wrists before the much larger man finally overpowered her.
Those scratches — as well as his DNA later found under her fingernails — wound up being key pieces of evidence that helped convict her killer.
Ibarra’s trial lasted just four days, with 29 witnesses being called by the prosecution.
The defense called only three witnesses before resting its case Wednesday morning. Ibarra and his brother — a fellow gang member, Diego, who they tried to pin the killing on — did not testify.
Haggard returned to the bench just 19 minutes after the sides presented their closing arguments to deliver the verdicts.
Sobs filled the gallery, and Riley’s family held hands as Haggard read off the guilty verdicts for felony murder, malice murder, kidnapping with bodily injury, aggravated assault with intent to rape, and Peeping Tom charges.
Riley’s savage death at the hands of an illegal immigrant garnered national attention, coming as the US is in the grips of a full-blown migrant invasion, in which some 12 million people have streamed across the border under the Biden-Harris administration’s watch.
Ibarra got to Georgia, where he committed his heinous act from New York City on taxpayer dollars, thanks to the Biden-Harris program that paid for one-way flights for migrants to anywhere in the world.