NEWPORT—Deliberating for just more than two hours on Thursday evening, a six-man, six-woman Cocke County criminal court jury found a Cosby man guilty of second-degree murder in connection with a 2010 shooting death.

Thirty-four-year-old Randy Ramsey, of South Highway 32, Cosby, was convicted on Thursday after a two-day jury trial. He will be sentenced on April 23 by Circuit Judge Ben W. Hooper II. In the meantime, Ramsey will continue to serve a 66-month federal prison sentence in connection with an unrelated drug conspiracy.

By its verdict, jurors rejected Ramsey’s defense that the shotgun which caused the victim’s death discharged accidentally and determined that the shooting was intentional. But the panel also decided that the state had failed to show that the killing was a premeditated act.

For more details, please see the weekend edition of the Newport Plain Talk.