Tipsheet

Oh, So That's Why the DA Didn't Pursue the Death Penalty Against Laken Riley's Killer

Mia Cathell
Mia Cathell  |  November 20, 2024 3:50 PM

The district attorney who declined to seek the death penalty against illegal alien Jose Ibarra, the Venezuelan national convicted of murdering 22-year-old Georgia student Laken Riley, is a criminal justice activist and outspoken Kamala Harris supporter.

She "takes into account collateral consequences to undocumented defendants" when charging criminals.

Democrat DA Deborah Gonzalez only sought a sentence of life behind bars without the chance of parole, which the judge overseeing Ibarra's bench trial granted Wednesday.

Although Georgia is a death penalty state, Gonzalez said pursuing the death penalty was not in the interest of "justice."

Gonzalez, a self-described "unapologetically Democrat" "progressive prosecutor," has a different definition of "justice" than how it's traditionally used in the courtroom.

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"There are many prosecutors who don't like that word — progressive — but to me, what it means is that we need to look at this differently [...] We need to always ask ourselves, 'Is this in the interest of justice?'" she said.

What does she mean by "justice" then?

On her 55th birthday, about half a year into her tenure, she raised funds for "criminal justice reform."

"Winning the DA seat was just the beginning," the "Justice Warriors" campaign said. "Now the true work of transforming the criminal legal system begins."

In January 2021, Gonzalez, then the newly elected DA for the Western Judicial Circuit, which covers Athens-Clarke County, released a "Day One memo" rolling out soft-on-crime changes to the way cases will now be processed and prosecuted by her office.

Gonzalez announced that her office will outright no longer seek the death penalty in all criminal cases, saying that life in prison without the possibility of parole is essentially "a sentence of death in prison." Both the death penalty and life imprisonment "constitute very substantial punishment," she said.

As for sentencing recommendations, Gonzalez said victims' pleas for justice will be balanced against "the defendants' needs for rehabilitation and reintegration back [in]to society."

When it comes to charging criminals, particularly illegal alien offenders, Gonzales said her office will "take into account collateral consequences to undocumented defendants."

She also pledged to provide "alternatives" to incarceration, sentencing, and conviction, such as pre-trial "diversion" programs and "community-based" housing rather than prison, as part of "inclusive" efforts to be "mindful of the mandate of equality."

"We will decline to prosecute where we find it is not in the interest of justice to do so, and we will seek non-incarceration sentences before we determine that, in a given case, incarceration is the only appropriate sentence, always aware that incarceration is, by definition, destructive of personal integrity and human potential, destructive of families and communities, inefficient and vastly more expensive than other paths," Gonzalez wrote.

She is the circuit's first female and first minority DA, the only Latina DA in Georgia, and the first female Puerto Rican DA in the country, Gonzalez's government bio touts.

On the campaign trail, Gonzalez closely aligned herself with open-border Democrats like Kamala Harris, the nation's failed "border czar." She also said she's the "only candidate who has vowed to take on systemic racism."

Gonzalez ran for reelection this year. However, the incumbent Democrat lost to an independent opponent, Kalki Yalamanchili, who reportedly won Oconee County with 76.51 percent of the vote and Clarke County with 51.9 percent.

Election observers are attributing Gonzalez's loss by a landslide to her handling of the Ibarra prosecution.