US: Charlottesville attacker gets life in prison

By Michael Hernandez

WASHINGTON (AA) - The man who drove his car fatally into a group of demonstrators protesting a white supremacy rally in Charlottesville, Virginia was sentenced Friday to life in prison.

James Alex Fields Jr. earlier pleaded guilty to 29 of 30 federal hate crime charges he was facing after he barreled down a street packed with demonstrators in his car, killing Heather Heyer, 32, and injuring nearly three dozens others in August 2017.

Prosecutors dropped the sole charge Fields Jr., an avowed neo-Nazi, did not plead to as part of his deal. It carried a possible death sentence.

Fields, Jr. faces sentencing next month in a separate state case in which he was convicted of first degree murder in December.

"Every day I think about how things could have gone differently, and how I regret my actions," he said in court, according to the Washington Post newspaper. "I am sorry."

Hundreds of neo-Nazis and white supremacists had gathered in Charlottesville for the "Unit the Right" rally in 2017. Images of the gathering with men's enraged faces glowing under torch light spread across the globe drawing concerns about the rise of the far-right in the West.

"I would like to apologize for the hurt and loss I have caused," Fields said. "I apologize to my mother for putting her through all this."