Lang/AP
5/29/21
A judge has set a sentencing date for the man convicted of killing former University of Iowa student Mollie Tibbetts.
Cristhian Bahena Rivera was convicted on Friday of first-degree murder in the abduction and stabbing death of the 20-year-old Tibbetts. The verdict came after a two-week trial at the Scott County Courthouse in Davenport.
Tibbetts vanished while out for a run near her hometown of Brooklyn, Iowa in 2018. Bahena Rivera later led investigators to her body, which he had left in a cornfield near where she went missing.
On Friday Judge Joel Yates set a sentencing hearing for 9:30am on July 15th. By Iowa law, Bahena Rivera will receive a mandatory life sentence.