Norma Patricia Esparza was arrested in October 2012 and accused of helping to carry out the 1995 kidnapping, torture and murder of Gonzalo Ramirez. The psychology professor, who is married with a son, has denied the charges and a campaign urging authorities to treat her as a sexual assault victim rather than a murder suspect has gained supporters across Europe.

As part of a plea deal, Esparza, who was 20 at the time of Ramirez’s death, admitted to participating in the attack but not directly killing him. She was sentenced Friday to six years in prison for voluntary manslaughter. Shannon Gries, a former colleague of hers at Pomona College in California, was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison and Diane Tran was released as she already served four years in prison for their role in the attack.

Prosecutors said that in April of 1995, Esparza told her ex-boyfriend Gianni Van that she had been raped in her dorm room by a man named Ramirez. She then went to a Santa Ana bar where she said she saw Ramirez and pointed him out to Van, who then arranged for him to be followed by himself and three of his friends — including Esparza, Tran and Gries.

The group allegedly tailed Ramirez, who worked at a Costa Mesa transmission shop, and then staged a car accident to get their quarry. They then abducted him and drove him to a garage in Irvine, where he was chained up, tied to a pillar and hacked to death with a meat cleaver.