“We don’t have self-defense,” Eads said. “We don’t have reckless homicide. We have the defendant shooting toward the house where there are people, and he hits one of them and he knows what he’s doing.

“Now, if he had time to think about it afterward, he might have thought differently,” Eads continued. “If he certainly had to do that night over again, I’m sure he would. But at that moment, he decided to do what he did, and now he has to live with the consequences.”

In his closing, defense attorney Williams argued Johnson began shooting in self-defense, after Clayton opened fire. He said Johnson didn’t commit murder when he fatally wounded Logan.

“The question in this case is not only one of criminal responsibility — it’s personal responsibility, and there’s a huge difference,” Williams said. “Personal responsibility, in my opinion, is Jalon Johnson’s future. When he’s 40 years old, he has to live with the fact that he killed a 17-year-old boy. He lives with that every day now. When he’s 25, 55, 75, he will have killed a 17-year-old boy.

“That’s personal responsibility. He’s accepted it.”

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The options

A jury acquitted Jalon N. Johnson, 20, Anderson, of a single murder count on Friday. Johnson was facing 45 to 65 years in prison for shooting to death Ashtin Logan, 17, Anderson, in December.

Instead of murder, the jury also had the option of finding Johnson guilty of the lesser charges of either:

• Voluntary manslaughter, a Class A felony punishable by 20 to 50 years, or

• Reckless homicide, a Class C felony that carries a potential sentence of two to eight years behind bars.