James Alex Fields Jr.

On March 27, 2019, Fields altered his plea. Having originally pleaded not guilty on all charges, this was changed to guilty on 29 of 30 hate crime charges. It was speculated that this plea bargain was taken to avoid the possibility of the death penalty, as the option of capital punishment was removed from his potential sentence as a result of the alteration. For the hate crime convictions, Fields was sentenced to life in prison on June 28, 2019.

I think there is blame on both sides. You look at, you look at both sides. I think there’s blame on both sides, and I have no doubt about it...you also had people that were very fine people on both sides.

Heyer's father Mark said that "My thoughts with all of this stuff are that people need to stop hating and they need to forgive each other. I include myself in that forgiving the guy that did this. He doesn’t know [any] better. I just think about what the Lord said on the cross. Lord, forgive them. They don’t know what they’re doing."

The organizer of the Unite the Right rally, Jason Kessler, held a news conference near the Charlottesville City Hall the day after the car attack. A crowd of around a hundred counter-protesters shouted him down, screaming "murderer." In February 2018, three were found guilty of assaulting Kessler at the news conference and a case against a person charged with spitting on Kessler was continued until February 2019 at the request of the prosecution.

On January 3, 2018, Fields waived his right to a speedy trial, and his trial was scheduled to begin on November 26, 2018, and last three weeks. On December 7, Fields was found guilty of first-degree murder, hit and run, and eight counts of malicious wounding. On December 11, the jury recommended life in prison for the killing of Heather Heyer along with an additional 419 years for the other crimes committed which break down to 70 years for each of five malicious wounding charges, 20 for each of three malicious wounding charges, and nine years on one charge of leaving the scene of an accident. The judge affirmed the sentence on July 15, 2019, sentencing Fields to life in prison with an additional 419 years.

On June 27, 2018, as reported by the DOJ's Office of Public Affairs, a W.D. Va. federal grand jury charged Fields under two hate crime statutes with multiple federal hate crimes:

On July 5, 2018, Fields pleaded not guilty to all 30 counts of federal hate crime charges.

Director Spike Lee dedicated his 2018 film BlacKkKlansman in Heyer's memory.

On the last day of his job, photojournalist Ryan Kelly took a photograph of the attack for The Daily Progress, the sole daily newspaper in the vicinity of Charlottesville. On April 16, 2018, Kelly won the Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Photography.

On the afternoon of May 12, 2018, Heyer's close friend Marissa Blair married her fiancé Marcus Martin, who pushed her out of the car's way and was injured in the attack himself. During the ceremony, Blair led a butterfly release in remembrance of Heyer.

The 2018 film BlacKkKlansman features video footage of the attack; the film ends with a dedication to Heyer.

On August 12, 2017, a car was deliberately driven into a crowd of people who had been peacefully protesting the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, killing one and injuring 28. The driver of the car, 20-year-old James Alex Fields Jr., had driven from Ohio to attend the rally. Fields previously espoused neo-Nazi and white supremacist beliefs. He was convicted in a state court of hit and run, the first-degree murder of 32-year-old Heather Heyer, and eight counts of malicious wounding, and sentenced to life in prison with an additional 419 years in July 2019. He also pled guilty to 29 of 30 federal hate crime charges to avoid the death penalty, which also resulted in another life sentence handed down in June 2019.

The Unite the Right rally was a white supremacist rally that occurred in Charlottesville, Virginia from August 11 to 12, 2017. Jason Kessler, the organizer of the rally, had been protesting for months the proposed removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee in Emancipation Park in Charlottesville.

On August 12, 2017, a maroon Honda Odyssey and a white Toyota Camry sedan behind it were driving down the Fourth Street Southeast crossing (after a sawhorse barricade blocking southward traffic left behind by an evacuating officer was moved) of the Downtown Mall toward Water Street and were stopped by a large group of counter-protesters who decided to walk up Fourth Street Southeast in the direction of Market Street. A school resource officer stationed at the intersection of 4th Street NE and Market Street was reassigned after she radioed for assistance when "violent skirmishes" broke out causing her to feel unsafe. However, the officer was not replaced and the intersection was left without a police presence. According to the report, "unknown persons" moved a sawhorse barricade set up to block traffic from moving down 4th Street. A gray 2010 Dodge Challenger drove down Fourth Street Southeast mall crossing and idled for a short time behind the white Toyota at the Downtown Mall. It then backed up and traveled more than a block before rapidly accelerating forward.

At around 1:45 p.m. on August 12, 2017, the 2010 Dodge Challenger impacted a crowd of counter-protesters while driving at a high speed. The speed was estimated between 23–28 mph (37–45 km/h) by a police crash reconstructionist. It audibly rammed pedestrians and struck the white sedan. The impact accelerated the sedan to 17.1 mph (27.5 km/h). The impact reportedly "[shoved] tons of metal into the crowd" and sent people "flying through the air" and over another car near the intersection with Water Street East. The struck vehicle also hit the maroon minivan ahead, "sending that vehicle into more pedestrians". A few seconds after the initial impact, some in the crowd began hitting the car with objects including a baseball bat, and Fields drove in reverse—hitting more people—with his car's front bumper "scraping the road." Pedestrians who had avoided the attack chased Fields along Fourth Street.

Heather Heyer, a 32-year-old woman, was fatally injured in the attack, and died at the University of Virginia Medical Center. Initially, nineteen injuries were reported, as twenty patients were taken at the University of Virginia Medical Center. In the evening, five people were in critical condition and fourteen others were being treated for lesser injuries. Nine people had been discharged and ten remained hospitalized in good condition the next day. Testimony at the preliminary hearing in December 2017 revealed that a total of 35 people were injured.

At the preliminary hearing in December 2017, State District Court Judge Robert H. Downer Jr. certified all ten charges to a grand jury. The certified charges were one count of first-degree murder, three counts of malicious wounding, three counts of aggravated malicious wounding, two counts of felonious assault and one count of hit and run. Video footage of the surveying helicopter and surveillance video footage from a restaurant near the mall crossing were shown. Surveillance video footage from the restaurant reportedly showed the Dodge Challenger zooming past "a string of vehicles" heading south on Fourth Street Southeast.

On August 18, 2017, Kessler wrote on Twitter: "Heather Heyer was a fat, disgusting Communist. Communists have killed 94 million. Looks like it was payback time." Kessler deleted the tweet the next day, initially saying he was hacked, but later claiming he had been on a mixture of drugs. Other white nationalists criticized Kessler for the tweet, including Richard Spencer, who wrote: "I will no longer associate w/ Jason Kessler; no one should. Heyer's death was deeply saddening. 'Payback' is a morally reprehensible idea."

On August 15, 2017, Tadrint and Micah Washington, who were in the white sedan that was hit during the attack, filed a US$3 million lawsuit in damages against Jason Kessler, James Alex Fields Jr., Richard Spencer and 30 other groups and individuals.

Susan Bro presented the 2017 MTV Video Music Award for Best Fight Against the System.

In September 2017, New York's 25th Assembly district Representative Nily Rozic, a Democrat, filed a bill and petitioned the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation to rename the Donald J. Trump State Park in honor of Heyer.

On December 20, 2017, a part of Fourth Street Southeast in Charlottesville, where the attack occurred, was designated Honorary Heather Heyer Way.

According to Weimer, Fields "left school for a while" and became quieter about politics when he came back, until his senior year, when the candidates for the 2016 presidential election were declared. Weimer said that Fields supported Donald Trump because of what he perceived were Trump's racial views. According to Weimer, Fields supported Trump's Mexico border proposal. Weimer said that Fields "admired" the Confederate States of America for their military, though they "never spoke about slavery." Weimer said that "the constant presence of the Confederate flag was an ongoing issue" and that an African-American cheerleader was "very uncomfortable having to ride in a parade being carried by a pickup truck with a large Confederate flag sticker". Fields reportedly made students feel "unnerved" and "unsafe," and one woman told The New York Times, "On many occasions there were times he would scream obscenities, whether it be about Hitler or racial slurs." Fields' roommate on a class trip to Europe in 2015 told the Associated Press that Fields went on the trip only to visit Germany, and referred to it as the Fatherland. He could not handle being in a room with Fields after Fields spoke about French people "being lower than us and inferior to us." Fields voted in the March 15, 2016 Ohio Republican primary.

When he was a senior in high school, Fields applied to join the Army, and Derek Weimer, Fields's history teacher and a former Ohio National Guard officer, helped him because Weimer believed that the military "would expose Fields to people of different races and backgrounds and help him dispel his white supremacist views." Fields was turned down, which Weimer called a "big blow." Fields entered the Army on August 18, 2015 and was released from active duty "due to a failure to meet training standards" on December 11, the same year. Army spokeswoman Lt. Col. Jennifer Johnson said that Fields "was never awarded a military occupational skill nor was he assigned to a unit outside of basic training." Weimer lost contact with Fields after he had graduated, and was "surprised" when he heard that Fields had managed to enlist in the Army.

Fields graduated from Randall K. Cooper High School in 2015.

Principal Wilson called Fields a "quiet and reserved student." Fields was described as "shy" and "quiet" by his ex-classmates and neighbors. A woman who went to school with Fields told The New York Times that he "mostly kept to himself" and "didn't start fights or try to fight," but described him as "exceptionally odd and an outcast to be sure." However, Fields' roommate on a class trip to Europe in 2015 told the Associated Press, "He had friends, he had people who would chat with him, it wasn't like he was an outcast."

And there are others like him out there – we as a society have to do a better job of figuring out how to reach them. This isn't something that happens overnight ... it builds up over time and we need to pay more attention to this.

Fields threatened his mother with violence on multiple occasions. In November 2010, she locked herself in a bathroom, afraid of her son. Fields's mother reported to the police that he had threatened to beat her, took her phone, struck her head, and put his hands over her mouth after she told him to stop playing video games. In February 2011, Fields's mother reported to the police at 5:20 a.m. that he had not come home; she said that he was wearing a T-shirt and shorts. Two hours later, she reported to the police that Fields "was home and acting lethargic;" he threatened to run away "if police came to the condo." In October 2011, Fields threatened her with a 12-inch (30 cm) knife; she called the police the next day to say that her son had been "very threatening" toward her and that she was scared and did not feel in control of the situation because she was in a wheelchair. In November 2011, Fields spat in his mother's face and threatened her, and a woman requested that the police help Fields's mother get him to a hospital for assessment; the log for the call reads, "Mom is scared he is going to become violent here." Fields was subsequently arrested and held in juvenile detention.

Fields purchased his first car, the 2010 Dodge Challenger used in the attack, from a car dealership in Florence, Kentucky in June 2015. The car was last registered in Ohio, and Fields updated its title in Maumee, Ohio in July 2015. The Cincinnati Enquirer reported that, according to local court records, he was cited for expired or unlawful license plates by the Maumee police in May 2017.

James Alex Fields Jr. (born April 26, 1997) was the driver of the car. Fields grew up with his mother Samantha Bloom, a paraplegic, in Florence, Kentucky. After living in southwest Florence for ten years, they moved to Monclova Township, Lucas County, Ohio for her job in late 2016. Fields' mother told the Toledo Blade that he had "recently moved out on his own."

Fields' father was killed in a car crash on December 5, 1996, five months before he was born. Bloom's parents died in a murder-suicide when she was 16 on August 21, 1984 when Bloom's father, 42 year-old self-employed contractor Marvin, killed his 37-year-old ex-wife Judy and himself.

Heather Danielle Heyer (May 29, 1985 – August 12, 2017) was the only person killed in the attack.