Laken Riley’s killer got a free ride for a while – but now has gotten a sentence of life imprisonment
Jose Iberra has been convicted of murdering Laken Riley and sentenced to life imprisonment (which I suppose, in a way, is another sort of free ride, but a less pleasant one):
Athens-Clarke County Superior Court Judge Patrick Haggard found Ibarra guilty of 10 total counts, including one count of malice murder, three counts of felony murder, one count of kidnapping, one count of aggravated assault with intent to rape, one count of aggravated battery, one count of hindering a 911 call, one count of tampering with evidence and one count of being a “peeping Tom.” Ibarra pleaded not guilty to all counts.
Haggard then sentenced Ibarra to life without the possibility of parole after Riley’s family read victim impact statements aloud before the court on Wednesday afternoon. Ibarra showed no emotion as a translator repeated Haggard’s sentencing to him in Spanish.
“Your honor, on February 22nd of 2024, our family and friends were given a life sentence without a chance of parole. Jose Ibarra took no pity on my scared, panicked and struggling child,” Riley’s mom, Allyson Philips said in a victim impact statement on Wednesday. “There is no end to the pain, suffering and loss that we have experienced or will continue to endure on that horrific day. My precious daughter was attacked, beaten and shown no mercy. She fought for her life and dignity and to save herself from being brutally raped. This sick, twisted and evil coward showed no regard for Laken or human life.”
This is what John Hinderaker of Powerline had to say two days ago on the subject of how Ibarra got to be in a position to murder Laken Riley:
Nor is it just prospective jurors: every sane American must be appalled by the Biden Administration policies that welcomed an illegal alien, a Venezuelan gang member, into the U.S.; disabled ICE from kicking him out, after he was apprehended; allowed him to roam freely within our country; and bought him a plane ticket to the destination of his choice, Athens, Georgia. In a sense, it is hard to blame Jose Ibarra for thinking he could get away with anything, and the crazy American authorities would only reward him.
Kamala Harris, Biden’s laughable “border czar,” would have continued these disastrous illegal immigration policies. Many factors contributed to Harris’s decisive defeat, but her identification with Biden’s anti-American immigration policies may have been the most important.
It comes across as madness by the Biden administration. Fools or knaves? I say: both.
Justice would have been a hanging next month. Sadly, this option is not available. Also, the administration which facilitated the entry of so many criminal illegal aliens will never face justice for the injustice it has done to people living here legally.
Maybe Biden and Harris should be imprisoned with the scum
As the Esteemed Philosopher Homey da Clown might put it, “Let I see about dis. A dude from Venezuela comes into America, gets busted for bustin’ in but turned loose, then he gets a plane ride to the locale of his choice and soon’s he gets settled, he up and rapes and kills some lady jus’ mindin’ her own bizness? Den he gets to live out the rest o’ his life in a guvmint hotel wit’ three squares a day, a crib and no worries ’bout nuttin’ instead of havin’ a cap busted on his _ss. Dat’s some crazy sh_t, man.”
The smart money says the McMichaels and Wm. Bryan are more likely to die in prison than this loathsome character from Venezuela. Our courts are a scandal.
I vote for “knaves”. They are evil, not foolish.
Don’t know, Art. Unless he seeks protection from a gang, he just my see justice.
He should be executed. Life imprisonment is a gift. Plus it sends a message. We need to go back to frontier justice.
Maybe Biden and Harris should be imprisoned with the scum
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Nope. Mayorkas and Garland and the ‘immmigrants rights’ shysters.
Texas is going to give ICE some land near the border for their use. It would be nice to build that El Salvador super prison that that government has sent the worst of the gangs. There is a video on CNN about the prison.
Then all these creatures can go there to serve their term.
Fools or Knaves: You forgot to mention Obama’s HATRED of all things American.
Speaking of a Venezuelan illegal alien: From Caracas Chronicles, the only remaining oppo English language blog on Venezuela that still publishes stuff. Why Would Venezuelan-Americans Vote for Trump?
The article goes on to list some reasons. Surprisingly for the Caracas Chronicles, which has a long history of Trump Derangement Syndrome, the article gives reasonable explanations why Trump supporters born in Venezuela would vote for him.
1. “Es La Economía, Estúpido” (even non-Spanish speakers can figure this out.)
2. Lived Immigrants (legal versus illegal immigrants)
3. The S word (socialism. Say no more…)
(catire= blond[e])
Speaking of “left-leaning Venezuelans,” I recently met a “left-leaning Venezuelan,” an author pitching his books, at a local bookstore. I purchased 2 copies for childhood friends w ties to Venezuela. In the discussion, I stated that when working in Venezuela, I met people with names like “Vladimir…Ilych” (Lenin), which indicated to me that Venezuela was decidedly more left-wing- more Commie supporting- than the US. The author denied any political reason for such names– their European immigrant parents just happened to name them so. I didn’t want to hijack the discussion, so I kept silent.
While he autographed my books, I brought up Carlos the Jackal (Ilich Ramirez Sanchez), the terrorist from the ’70s. I didn’t continue, but other examples are the Venezuelan oppo (against Chavismo) activist and legislator, Stalin Gonzalez. Also the author Vladimiro Dorfman, who changed his name to Ariel Dorfman. Ecuadorean President Lenin Moreno. I would add that my elementary school’s classmates had about 40% Hungarian or Slavic surnames. Not a Vladimir/Ilich/Lenin in the crowd.
The author proved my point. He grew up in such a lefty environment in Venezuela that he saw nothing unusual about such names. I did. (His father help fund Teodoro Petcoff’s newspaper Tal Cual. Petcoff was a former guerilla who came in from the cold, embraced democracy, and decades later became a focal point of opposition to Chavez.)The author may be a lefty, but in the US is an entrepreneur.
Fools or knaves? I say: both.
–neo
I usually say both, but in this case I come down solidly on knaves — at least with the Biden administration, thought not the morons with the “No person is illegal” signs in their front yards.
This was a naked effort to shift the demographics of the United States in order to facilitate Democrat one-party rule — whatever the costs, including poor Laken Riley
Somehow there was almost no open discussion of this obvious fact.
______________________________________
The Solution
After the uprising of the 17th June
The Secretary of the Writers Union
Had leaflets distributed in the Stalinallee
Stating that the people
Had forfeited the confidence of the government
And could win it back only
By redoubled efforts. Would it not be easier
In that case for the government
To dissolve the people
And elect another?
–Bertolt Brecht (1953)
Those voting for Harris can’t deny they were voting for more of this.
We’ve taken a step against this kind of thing in the recent election, but don’t think for a minute there aren’t still prosecutors and border officials who will keep making it happen, particularly if we let up in 2026, 2028, or any future election.
@ Neo > “Fools or knaves? I say: both.”
I say: accomplices to murder.
Deliberately, maliciously, and with premeditation because they KNOW this is happening, over and over.
Did you see the prosecutor’s reason for why she didn’t ask for the death penalty?
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14107565/georgia-debroah-gonzalez-laken-riley-killer-death-penalty.html
Because it would cause ‘collateral consequences to undocumented defendants.’
I didn’t see any explanation of her explanation; maybe someone else can decode it.
Did she meant that executing Ibarra would frighten (IOW deter) other murderers and rapists, making them feel less inclined to follow their normal mode of operations in America? Or (perish the thought!) making them feel unwelcome and unincluded in America.
If so, I would say that is one of the major goals of capital punishment, the primary ones being dispensing requisite recompense for heinous crimes, and removing the perpetrator from society permanently.
Or, did she mean that some other illegals might be stigmatized as murderers and rapists when they were not guilty of murdering and raping, because they were part of the same identity group as Ibarra and the TdA gang?
(IOW, those mean conservatives would treat them the way leftists and Democrats treat conservatives and Republicans).
Given the well-documented activities of the cartels, gangs, and terrorists KNOWN to be present because of Biden’s Border Banditry, stigmatizing (aka being wary of and cautious around) a randomly-encountered illegal may not be nice, or correct, but it’s probably the way to bet.
A lot of people are upset that he didn’t get the death penalty. A death sentence would mean years of appeals, hearings and attempts at retrials and I think that would be too hard on her family. I’m good with multiple life sentences.
What’s disgusting is how many Leftie clowns I’ve seen on TV recently wanting to wring their hands over that walking piece of human fecal matter that killed her.
The prosecutor’s opinions on public policy should play no role. A comment like that should be grounds for the judge to replace the prosecutor.
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Whether or not a capital sentence should be applied should be a consequence of sentencing formulae specified in the statute.
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The task should not be assigned to the jury or to a judge acting as fact finder. The function of juries or judges as fact finders should be to issue a binary decision on each count – guilty or not. Since there will be lesser included offenses incorporated within some counts, some should be decided by a series of binary decisions.
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The function of a prosecutor should be to seek an information or indictment in preliminary hearings. Since grand juries provide almost no true screenings, the hearings should take place in front of a judge, magistrate, or panel of same. For something as serious as 1st degree murder, some sort of adversary process in the preliminary hearing should be the order of the day. Plea bargaining can commence when the indictment or information is obtained.
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It should be the judge’s decision on whether or not to accept a plea agreement (assuming the defendant did not enter a guilty plea to the charges as stated or insist on a trial).
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Once a conviction is secured, there should be sentencing hearings to make formal determinations on scalar quantities which are arguments in a sentencing formula (e.g. how much money you stole, the weight in mary jane you vended, &c). These decisions should be made by a panel consisting of a judge and two assessors. The assessors should be drawn at random off a roll of those in certain occupational guilds other than law (e.g. occupational therapy, pharmacy, accounting). The hearings could incorporate an adversary process.
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Once the sentence for the offense is determined, enhancements or dispensations which are a function of the properties of the offender should be stated in a pro-forma hearing. The most consequential would be the defendant’s point-accumulation from previous convictions, which would be specified in a manual compiled by a state sentencing board; any points requiring clarification (such as in re convictions in foreign jurisdictions) could be submitted to the state board. Another would be his precise age at the time each offense on the bill was conferred (if he were at the time under the age of 25). Another would be a fudge factor between 0.5 and 1.0 for each count specified in the plea agreement or taking on a default value if the defendant pled guilty without negotiation or the defendant was convicted at trial. The date on which a defendant is first subject to a parole review will be a function of the sentence, as will the frequency of subsequent reviews.
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If the defendant is not eligible for parole for 50 years and the defendant has a history of 1st degree murder, a capital sentence should be automatic.
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Appeals through state and federal appellate courts should not take longer than seven years, if that, after which it’s the decision of the state governor on whether or not to exercise executive clemency. These 25 year long trails of motions by lawfare artists who object to punishing offenders are a scandal and should be ended by statute.
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And quit with the veterinary methods. A firing squad in a public place at dawn should be the preferred method. You don’t have to announce the time and place beforehand.