Judge Raul Hernandez ruled last week that the three Mexican defendants, identified only by their first names – Jesus Gerardo, Irineo Francisco and Angel Jesus – acted with premeditation.
On Friday local time they were sentenced to 158 years and nine months each.
Prosecutors had requested damages of more than $100,000, but the judge ruled against it and said any compensation would have to be pursued through civil proceedings.
“There can never be justice for the loss of a son, but we are grateful that these men will never hurt anyone else,” Rhoad’s mother Page said after learning the verdict.
‘Such cruelty’
The Robinsons’ parents had travelled to Mexico from Australia for the month-long trial and left after the verdict.
They had spoken movingly in court about their loss.
“It’s hard for a parent to lose a son, and we lost two sons,” Martin Robinson said.
Debra Robinson said what hurt the most was that her sons “were treated with such cruelty” in their final hours.
The families of the victims followed the sentencing hearing via video link.
The former girlfriend of Jesus Gerardo, who is accused of leading the attack, was sentenced to 20 years in prison in November.
She admitted to goading her boyfriend into stealing the pick-up’s tyres.
She said her ex-boyfriend had sneered at the surfers’ pleas for their lives and bragged about items he robbed from them.
A 9mm and a .45 calibre pistol were used in the attack.
Rhoad’s fiancee Natalie Weirtz and mother Page addressed the court by video link.
Weirtz called for the accused to “be punished so that no other family suffers the same pain”.
Baja California is one of Mexico’s most violent states, plagued by organised crime and drug trafficking, although cartel activity does not usually affect tourists.
Other foreign visitors have been targeted in attacks on Mexico’s Pacific coast.
Two Australian surfers, Dean Lucas and Adam Coleman, were murdered in 2015 while travelling through the northwestern state of Sinaloa. Their bodies were later burned.
– AFP
