Anthony Riley rocked slowly in his chair, waiting to be sentenced.

In blue jail clothes, with his hair shaved and a beard growing, he looked different than the day a couple of months ago when a jury found him guilty of manslaughter in Doyle Bryant's death and three counts of attempted murder for the part he played in a drive-by shooting in Lincoln nearly three years ago.

Shots fired from Riley's tan Marquis ripped into a red Dodge Charger in the early-morning hours of Aug. 6, 2006.

On Wednesday, just after 9 a.m., Riley's family crowded in together in the rows behind him for the hearing that lasted just a few minutes and ended with a few of them crying and hugging in the hallway outside.

As the hearing started, everyone stood when the judge entered, then sat again.

"Is there anything you would like to say?" Lancaster County District Judge Jodi Nelson asked Riley.

"No," he said.

It was the only word he would utter at his sentencing in a case where an appeal seems almost certain.

His attorney, Pete Blakeslee, declined to speak as well. Last month, he asked for a new trial, but the judge turned him down Tuesday.

Prosecutor Amy Jacobsen asked the judge to consider the letter Doyle Bryant's wife, LaDionna, wrote about how his death affected her and their children, Doyle IV, who is 8, and Desreonna, who is 5.

"This was just a senseless crime that never should have happened," Jacobsen said.

Then, without comment, Nelson sentenced the 26-year-old Riley to 20 years on the manslaughter and eight to 15 years on each of the attempted murder charges, all back to back, for a total of 44 to 65 years.

She gave him credit for 602 days he's served.

Riley stood and, with shackles around his wrists, he shook Blakeslee's hand, then turned and walked with deputies to a door to the jail.

As his family headed to the elevator, Bryant's family got off another elevator, a few minutes too late to hear the news firsthand.

They went into the courtroom, where attorneys told them what they'd missed.

Doyle Bryant Jr., his son's namesake, didn't like what he heard.

"That's all the time he gets? I'm not a vindictive person, but I'm not happy about what he was given. Not at all."

Maybe it worked out for the best not being in the courtroom to hear it himself, he said. If he had, he would have had an emotional reaction.

"It's still agonizing," he said. "When an innocent person gets killed just minding their own business … it's tragic."

His son, Doyle Bryant III, came to Lincoln the night of his death to celebrate finishing barber school and a new job he was to start the next week.

But as he, his brother and friends headed for home, a gold car pulled up alongside them on 27th Street near Superior Street and five shots tore into the Charger.

One hit Doyle Bryant III in the chest, another burned through his brother, Daryl Bryant's, leg and a third burrowed into Lynell Green's thigh. LaRon Tolbert was not hit.

At trial, three of the men in the gold car said Riley was the shooter.

The state said he, Terrell Jones, O'Dari Wiley and Tramel Patterson chased the wrong car, believing it belonged to some guys they had a fight with outside a downtown Lincoln club.

Doyle Bryant Jr. said his grandson still cries out for his father, and he worries his granddaughter's memories of her dad are starting to fade.

"He was just a great young man. He was caring, he was loving. He adored his children. He loved his wife," he said.

Bryant, an associate minister, said he has had to lean heavily on his faith to get through the past three years.

"I think all things work together for a reason, for a purpose. I don't understand what that purpose is at this particular time, but I do know this much because of my faith. It was supposed to be. We'll find out eventually why."

Daryl Bryant, who was with his brother when he died, said it's still hard. Hard to sleep, hard to see the faces of his brother's kids.

He has some pain in his leg still from being shot, especially on cold days. But most of all, he misses the big brother, with whom he did everything.

"I can't do that any more," he said.

The men in the gold car, all four of them, deserve the same because they were in it together, he said. They got beat up, so they did what cowards do, he said.

"It wasn't right," Daryl Bryant said.

Two of the three men in the car with Riley reached plea agreements following the shooting. Terrell Jones was sentenced May 6 to the maximum of one year in prison for attempted accessory to a felony. O'Dari Wiley pleaded guilty to unlawful discharge of a firearm and was sentenced Tuesday to 20 years in prison. The fourth was not arrested.

Reach Lori Pilger at 473-7237 or lpilger@journalstar.com.