Laken Riley was a 22 year-old nursing student at Augusta University in the state of Georgia. On the chilly Thursday morning of February 22nd, 2024, Riley went on her regular morning jog. Once a few hours had passed she did not return back to her dorm her roommates grew concerned and contacted authorities to report Riley as missing.
In collaboration with authorities and the roommates sharing their location within the “Find My” feature on Apple devices, they were able to trace Riley discovering her partially nude remains on a wooded area near the trail she would jog every morning. According to authorities her death was caused by blunt force trauma and asphyxiation.
After discovering DNA under Riley’s fingernails they were able to match it to 26 year-old Jose Ibarra. On Wednesday, November 20th, 2024 Ibarra was found guilty and convicted of murder, aggravated assault with attempt to rape, kidnapping, tampering with evidence and other charges, by the Athens-Clarke County Superior Court Judge H. Patrick Haggard and was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
However, within this trial it was discovered that Ibarra had been arrested prior to the murder. The previous arrests had taken place in New York and Georgia but he was released. On January 6th, 2025 the Laken Riley act was introduced to the Senate. The US Congress has passed this bill. This bill requires undocumented immigrants who are arrested for theft or violent crimes to be held in jail pending their trial. This bill was passed through the House of Representatives a day after it was approved by the Senate and it will now head to the White House for President Donald Trump to sign into law.
If this bill is signed, it will require the Department of Homeland Security to detain migrants if they are charged with certain criminal offences, including theft, shoplifting, burglary, assault against law enforcement or any crimes that result in death “or serious bodily injury of another person.” Within the enforcement of this bill it also provides support to the attorneys general of states to sue the federal government if their residents feel they have been harmed by national immigration policies. However the bill does not come with new funding for immigration control measures, leading to a variety of criticism from Democrats including that this act will be too expensive to fully implement.
