The seats of a Norfolk Circuit Courtroom were filled with Ali Muhammad’s family and friends on Friday morning as Jalen Garces, convicted of second-degree murder for killing Muhammad, was sentenced to 28 years in prison.

“I feel thankful. A lot of families don’t get justice,” said Kelly Shaw, the mother of Ali’s three daughters and one of five family members who provided statements to the court on how Ali’s death impacted them.

“Not a day he wasn’t there for them,” Shaw said. “My heart is broken. I will never be the same.” she continued, her voice catching.

She and her daughters have been in counseling ever since, she said, struggling to make sense of the loss of a father who was so present in their lives.

“He was the best,” said Ali’s 11-year-old daughter, Aaliyah Muhammad. Her first time ever in a courtroom, she took the day off of school to deliver a statement on her father’s behalf.

“Be strong” and “you got this baby” rang out from the courtroom in support before Aaliyah shared how she misses moments with her dad at the beach or park.

During her testimony, Ali’s father, Bilal Muhammad, had to step out of the courtroom to collect himself.

He said later that he had been reliving the moment around 10:30 p.m. on June 29, 2023, when a routine phone call with his 33-year-old son, on his way to start a shift at Norfolk’s Sentara General Hospital, turned deadly.

The last thing he heard was “get that gun out of my face. And then pow,” said Bilal.

The shot sounded so close through the phone, he said, torn that there was nothing he could do while miles away.

Bilal Muhammad, left, with his son Ali Muhammad in an undated photo. Ali was killed in June 2023.
(Courtesy/Bilal Muhammad)

Bilal Muhammad, a longtime advocate for gun violence prevention in Norfolk, testified that his son’s murder has reshaped his approach to advocacy, from staying alert whenever he’s in public, to avoiding some areas altogether.

Now, he said, his family is thankful and relieved, knowing that 31-year-old Garces “has 28 years of trials and tribulations” to face in prison. Bilal hopes the sentence sends a message to others in the community, to choose education over gun violence.

“A sentence for the man convicted for her son’s murder won’t change the fact that he’s gone,” said Cynthia Muhammad, Ali’s mother. “But maybe, just maybe, after today my family can breathe again.”

Garces was found guilty by a jury in August. Prosecutors used the 2019 Black Mustang that blocked Ali’s car from leaving its parking space, along with witness testimony and data from the car’s infotainment system, to tie Garces to the shooting.

Ramin Fatehi, Norfolk’s Commonwealth’s Attorney, said he was glad to have been able to deliver justice and closure for Ali’s family.

“Gun violence touches every family in America, even the family of Bilal Muhammad, who has dedicated his life to stopping gun violence,” Fatehi said. “Once someone pulls the trigger, they cannot get the bullet back, and they will likely alter not just someone else’s life forever but their own.”

Garces, the defendant, chose not to make a statement in front of the court. His parents and brothers were escorted in and out of the courtroom by sheriffs officers in an effort to ease tensions between the two families.

Daymen Robinson, Garces’ attorney, said that Garces maintains his innocence and plans to appeal Friday’s decision.

It was the senselessness of the crime, as well as prior convictions for robbing a pizza delivery man and possessing a firearm as a felon, that led Judge Devon Paige to deliver a sentence above the recommendation of state sentencing guidelines.

Judge Paige noted how Garces grew up similarly to Ali Muhammad – in a tight-knit family, his mother a pre-school teacher and his brother in the Air Force.

But “somewhere you chose a different path,” Paige said to Garces. “The only time the community could be assured it was safe was when you were incarcerated.”

https://www.pilotonline.com/2026/01/09/jalen-garces-sentenced-activists-son-murder/