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Clarke County Superior Court Judge H. Patrick Haggard, who
presided over the trial, wrote in an order Monday that the
evidence of Ibarra's guilt presented by the state was
“overwhelming and powerful.” After Ibarra waived his right to a
jury trial, Haggard found him guilty of murder and other charges
during the November 2024 trial and sentenced him to life in
prison.
A spokesperson for Ibarra's attorneys said they plan to file an
appeal.
Ibarra, 28, had entered the U.S. illegally in 2022 and was
allowed to stay while he pursued his immigration case.
Prosecutors said Ibarra encountered Riley while she was running
on the University of Georgia campus in Athens on Feb. 22, 2024,
and killed her during a struggle. Riley was a student at Augusta
University College of Nursing, which also has a campus in
Athens, about 70 miles (115 kilometers) east of Atlanta.
Ibarra's trial attorneys had asked the judge to delay the trial
after a DNA expert said she would need six weeks to review
evidence analyzed using TrueAllele Casework, software used to
interpret DNA and assist the defense. The judge wrote in his
order Monday that Ibarra's lawyers “effectively challenged the
TrueAllele DNA evidence at trial" and concluded that Ibarra was
not harmed by the denial of a delay.
The DNA expert testified during a January hearing on the motion
for a new trial, and the judge wrote that he did not find her
opinion to be persuasive or credible and that it would not have
changed the trial outcome.
Ibarra's attorneys also had challenged the seizure of two
cellphones from his apartment, saying they were not listed on
the search warrant, and sought to exclude evidence pulled from
them. Haggard wrote that there were “exigent circumstances
authorizing the seizure of the cellphones” and that the phones
were not searched until after warrants were issued authorizing
the search of the contents of the phones.
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