The case was swept up in the debate over immigration after investigators said the perpetrator was a migrant from Venezuela who entered the U.S. illegally.

In the nine months since Laken Riley was killed while jogging at the University of Georgia, her death turned into a lightning rod over crime and illegal immigration and cast an ominous shadow over the college town of Athens.

Republicans seized on the fact that an immigrant who entered the US illegally is the suspect in the murder of the Georgia nursing student