November trial set in murder of AU nursing student Laken Riley
ATHENS, Ga. - A murder trial is expected to start in November for the undocumented immigrant accused of killing Augusta University nursing student Laken Riley.
Suspect Jose Antonio Ibarra was in court Friday morning when Athens-Clarke County Superior Court Judge H. Patrick Haggard announced his decision to start the trial Nov. 18.
Ibarra’s attorneys asked the judge to move the case to another county because they say it’s impossible to find an impartial jury in Athens-Clarke County.
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If the trial date holds, prosecutors said they want to have the proceedings concluded before Thanksgiving.
Ibarra, 26, faces charges of malice and felony murder, aggravated battery, kidnapping, concealing the death of another and several other charges in connection to the death of 22-year-old student who was killed on the University of Georgia campus.
Haggard said during the brief hearing that he was planning to start jury selection on Nov. 13 and then proceed with the trial the following week.
He gave prosecutors 10 days to respond to the request for a change of venue, which was filed Thursday.
A 2013 Georgia court decision found that a change of venue is proper in cases where media coverage is “‘unduly extensive, factually incorrect, inflammatory, or reflective of an atmosphere of hostility,’” according to the filing.
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A grand jury in early May returned an indictment charging Ibarra, 26, with murder, aggravated assault, kidnapping and other crimes in the February killing of Riley.
The 10-count indictment accuses him of hitting her in the head, asphyxiating her and pulling up her clothing with the intent to rape her.
He pleaded not guilty in May.
The killing immediately became a flashpoint in the national debate over immigration because Ibarra, who is from Venezuela, entered the U.S. illegally in 2022 and was allowed to stay to pursue his immigration case. Republicans, including former President Donald Trump, blamed Riley’s death on President Joe Biden and his border policies.
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Riley’s body was found Feb. 22 near running trails after a friend told police she had not returned from a morning run, and police have said her killing appeared to be a random attack. Ibarra was arrested the next day and has been held in jail without bond since then.
The indictment says that on the day of Riley’s killing, Ibarra had peered into the window of an apartment in a university housing building, which is the basis for the peeping Tom charge.
In a separate filing on Thursday, Ibarra’s attorneys said that charge should be tried separately from the others because the alleged victim is different.
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