The man convicted of killing 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton six years ago was sentenced Monday to 84 years in prison.
At Monday's hearing, Micheail Ward, 24, denied he was the gunman who fired into the group of high school students, killing Hadiya and injuring two others.
Ward initially confessed during the lengthy investigation before recanting.
Pendleton was shot in the back and killed while standing with friends inside Harsh Park in Kenwood, Chicago after taking her final exams she was killed only one week after performing at events for President Barack Obama’s second inauguration.
ward's getaway driver Kenneth Williams was found guilty of first-degree murder of Pendleton. his sentencing date has not yet been set.
Cleopatra Cowley, Hadiya's mother, had urged the judge to give Ward the maximum sentence.
"Hadiya is serving a death sentence handed down by Micheail Ward, and all the family is doing life as a result," she told the court in her impact statement.
President Obama mentioned Pendleton's death in his 2013 State of the Union Address in Congress in which he pleaded the community to put an end to gun violence.
