The illegal immigrant convicted in the killing of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Jose Ibarra was charged with murder and other crimes in Riley’s February death, and the guilty verdict was reached on Wednesday by Athens-Clarke County Superior Court Judge H. Patrick Haggard. Ibarra, 26, had waived his right to a jury trial, meaning Haggard alone heard and decided the case. Haggard found Ibarra guilty of all 10 counts against him: one count of malice murder; three counts of felony murder; and one count each of kidnapping with bodily injury, aggravated assault with intent to rape, aggravated battery, obstructing an emergency call, evidence tampering and being a peeping Tom. Riley’s family and friends tearfully remembered her and asked the judge to sentence Ibarra to the maximum penalty. Her mother called him a “monster” and her father called him a “truly evil person.” Ibarra did not react as an interpreter relayed their words to him. Before announcing the verdict, Haggard had said that as he listened to the closing arguments, he wrote down on a legal pad two things the lawyers had said. He noted that prosecutor Sheila Ross called the evidence “overwhelming and powerful” and that defense attorney Kaitlyn Beck reminded him he was “required to set aside my emotions” in making his ruling. Riley’s killing added fuel to the national debate over immigration when federal authorities said Ibarra illegally entered the U.S. in 2022 and was allowed to stay in the country while he pursued his immigration case. But there was no mention of Ibarra’s immigration status during the trial. “Laken Riley herself has given you all the evidence you need” to find Ibarra guilty on all counts, Ross told the judge during her closing. She added that the physical evidence is sufficient and is corroborated by forensic, digital and video evidence to “twist this very powerful knot that this defendant cannot get out of. There is no way out for him.” The evidence shows that Ibarra killed Riley “because she would not let him rape her.” Ross said Ibarra’s DNA was found under Riley’s fingernails and her DNA and Ibarra’s were found on a jacket that police found in a trash bin in his apartment complex. A man seen in security footage throwing that jacket away was identified as Ibarra by his brother and another roommate, she said. Riley was wearing “tight running clothes that are designed not to move,” Ross said. When her body was found, the waistband of her running tights was pulled down and her jacket, shirt and sports bra were pulled up, evidence that her clothes were displaced by an attempted assault not by dragging, Ross said. Surveillance video shows a man wearing clothes that appear to match those seen in a selfie Ibarra snapped on his phone earlier that morning, lingering outside the apartment of a female graduate student. That student told police someone tried to get in the front door while she was in the shower and peered through her window. Ibarra was “out prowling and hunting females” and when he couldn’t get in the apartment, he turned to the running trails looking for a victim, Ross said. Defense attorney Kaitlyn Beck told the judge that the evidence is circumstantial […]