Soros-backed prosecutor is under fire over the death penalty for Laken Riley’s killer

When a judge in Georgia convicted Laken Riley’s killer Jose Ibarra on 10 counts and sentenced him to life in prison without the possibility of parole, politicians and pundits across the country expressed frustration that he had not been sentenced to death.

During a nearly four-day trial, prosecutor Sheila Ross brought 29 witnesses to the witness stand to prove that Ibarra Riley, a 22-year-old Augusta University nursing student who was jogging on the University of Georgia campus, brutally attacked and killed by hitting her head. with large stones and possibly strangling her.

But Georgia Western Judicial Circuit District Attorney Deborah Gonzalez decided not to pursue the death penalty against Ibarra in May, about three months after Riley’s murder. In a May 31 news release, he said the decision to seek life without the possibility of parole instead of the death penalty “was reached after careful consultation with the chief prosecutor and the support of the victim’s family.”

“Our greatest duty is to ensure that justice is served and that the victim’s family is an integral part of the deliberation process,” Gonzalez said in a statement at the time. “We understand that there will be those outside this office who will disagree with our decision and will seek to exploit this case for political gain. However, the integrity of our judicial process and the pursuit of justice must always transcend political considerations.”

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Soros-backed Georgian prosecutor Deborah Gonzalez lost a re-election bid in 2024. (X)

Fox News contributor and former criminal and civil attorney Ted Williams, who also worked as a homicide detective in Washington, D.C., called Gonzalez’s decision “absolutely outrageous.”

“This person should burn her bar card,” Williams said. “Every case, and this case, should have been settled, and a death penalty decision should have been made on the merits. This is bloody outrageous.”

He added that “under Georgian law, the death penalty is left to the discretion of the local prosecutor.”

Jose Ibarra will appear at his trial Tuesday, November 19, 2024, at the Athens-Clarke County Superior Court in Athens, Georgia. (Arvin Temkar/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP, Pool)

“A prosecutor would have to make a decision on whether to seek the death penalty based on how egregious and violent the murder was,” Williams explained. “Political preferences should never play a role in that decision. Unfortunately, Prosecutor Deborah Gonzalez Laken Hope Riley failed in the death penalty by not seeking the death penalty against Jose Ibarra. If ever there was a case that called for the death penalty, it was this case.”

“Ibarra violently murdered Laken Riley. He chased Laken, picked up a stone and smashed her skull in.’

–Ted Williams

Georgia Republican Rep. Houston Gaines told Fox News Digital that if the death penalty had been on the table, Ibarra might have opted for a plea deal instead of life without parole, and that a trial in which the graphic details of the murder on Riley would not have been necessary.

Deborah Gonzalez, the district attorney for the Western Judicial Circuit of Georgia, participates in the inaugural Athens Pride Parade in downtown Athens, Georgia, June 12, 2022. (Joshua L. Jones/USA Today Network)

“If there was ever a case to seek the death penalty, this is a case to consider,” Gaines said. “At least leave it on the table… let the defendant plead to life without parole.”

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When the George Soros-backed prosecutor — a former state representative — took office as prosecutor in 2020, she expressed her opposition to the death penalty.

“I do not support the death penalty. It is cruel and humane.”

– Deborah Gonzalez

“I do not support the death penalty. It is cruel and human,” Gonzalez said in a September 23, 2020 post on The eye for an Eye arguments do not make our community whole.

Laken Riley’s final moments were captured on a UGA trail camera on Feb. 22. (Miguel Martinez/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP, Pool)

On her first day on the job, Gonzalez’s office outlined some of her new initiatives, including not seeking the death penalty, in a memo her office sent to the Georgia Legislature at the time. Gaines shared parts of the memo about X in February after Riley’s murder and urged the district attorney to seek the death penalty.

In that memo, Gonzalez said she would “consider the collateral consequences for undocumented suspects,” or, in other words, the negative impact of criminal convictions on illegal immigrants.

“Prosecutor Gonzalez is wrong to consider ‘collateral consequences for undocumented suspects’ in her decision not to seek the death penalty,” Williams said. “It is outrageous to believe that any prosecutor sworn to uphold the law, looking at the facts of this case, would consider how undocumented suspects should be treated in the criminal justice system. A decision to seek the death penalty should be based solely on the individual merits of a case and not on whether a person is undocumented.”

Gonazlez, who lost re-election in 2024, decided not to prosecute the Ibarra case and turned it over to special prosecutor Ross, who handed down a hasty conviction after the nearly four-day trial.

Gonzalez was criticized by Gov. Brian Kemp and other local politicians for failing to obtain a single conviction in a jury trial for a criminal case during her term, WSBT-TV first reported in February.

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Houston Gaines has criticized Deborah Gonzalez’s decision not to pursue the death penalty in Jose Ibarra’s criminal case for the murder of Augusta University student Laken Riley. (Gaines/© Joshua L. Jones/USA Today Network)

“She made the decision before the case even happened,” Gaines said of Gonzalez’s stance against the death penalty. “When you come to power and make blanket policy statements, that’s the issue. … Again, you have individuals who come into our community like Jose Ibarra because … we are a community that welcomes individuals who are in this country illegally and who They commit serious crimes and they know that violent criminals get off easier in Athens than in others places.”

Gaines also noted that Gonzalez “only has a few attorneys left in the office because they have had 35 layoffs for 17 positions in recent years.”

“They’ve had a turnover of over 200%,” the state representative said. “So she really doesn’t have any lawyers in her office anymore, and they couldn’t handle this case.”

Gonzalez’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

Prosecutor Sheila Ross presents her closing arguments before Superior Court Judge H. Patrick Haggard during the trial of Jose Ibarra in the Superior Court of Athens-Clarke County, Wednesday, November 20, 2024, in Athens, Georgia. (Hyosub Shin/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP, Pool)

Ibarra entered the United States illegally El Paso, Texas, in September 2022 and was released on parole to the US, ICE and DHS sources previously told Fox News. He briefly lived in New York City, where he was arrested in 2023 for child endangerment. He and his 29-year-old brother, Diego Ibarra, were also previously caught shoplifting in Athens.

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Jose, Diego and their younger brother, Agenis, lived in an apartment complex less than a half mile from the campus park where Riley was running on the morning of Feb. 22. Their apartment complex is adjacent to a shortcut that leads to running trails. along UGA’s campus, where Riley was found dead that afternoon in a wooded area, partially nude and covered in leaves. She died of blunt force trauma and asphyxiation, according to a Georgia Bureau of Investigation medical examiner.

Diego, who briefly worked at a UGA cafeteria before his arrest in February, had ties to a known Venezuelan gang in the U.S., Tren de Aragua, according to federal court documents.