A teenager charged in the fatally shooting a man at the Corliss Park apartment complex in Troy last spring has been found guilty of second-degree murder and criminal possession of a weapon. Ayerius Benson, 18, was convicted in the shooting death of Turhan Tate, 29, who was fatally shot April 15, 2010. YNN's Solomon Syed reports.

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TROY, N.Y. -- It was a long and hard deliberation, but on Wednesday, the jury returned a verdict.

"We find the defendant guilty."

After more than 16 hours of deliberations over the course of three days, a Rensselaer County jury found Ayerius Benson, 18, guilty of second-degree murder for the shooting death of Turhan Tate, 29, at the Corliss Park apartments last spring.

"Violence is never the answer," said District Attorney Richard McNally. "What instigated this incident may have been inappropriate, but it didn't warrant the response."

Evidence showed Tate choked Benson after he allegedly overcharged the victim's relative for some marijuana. At that point, Benson took the law into his own hands, shooting Tate seven times, then leading police on a search for him until he was apprehended the next day at a local store.

"He was essentially assaulted by someone three times his size, and it caused him to snap, it caused him to lose control," said defense attorney Yorden Huvan, who initially argued his client acted in self defense. He then tried to convince jurors he suffered extreme emotional distress because of the assault, which, if true, would have reduced the crime to manslaughter. Jurors were hung up on that for a good part of their deliberations but ultimately determined this was a cold-blooded killing.

"There's no real winners in this case," said Huvan. "This was a sad and tragic event with both families being affected by it. Clearly, I'm disappointed, my client's disappointed."

"That kind of thing, where an individual feels disrespected and the response is deadly physical force, that's the senselessness of this that we all just look at and shake our heads," said McNally.

The DA went on to say that the prosecution will seek the maximum penalty in this case - 25 years to life. Benson was also found guilty of criminal possession of a weapon. Sentencing is set for May 20th.