A jury found a former Englewood man guilty on Wednesday of killing an aspiring Brooklyn rapper in 2011 after his initial conviction was thrown out three years ago, a spokesperson for the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office said.

Randy Manning was once again convicted of shooting Rhian "Kampane" Stoute in Englewood and setting his body on fire in August 2011. Stoute's badly burned body was found in the back of his Chevy Tahoe on Village Circle in Paramus. He was shot four times, with two of the shots killing him almost instantly.

Manning, a native of Trinidad and Tobago who lived in Englewood for a time, was originally convicted and sentenced to life in prison in 2014. But in 2020, the state Supreme Court upheld the decision of an appellate judge who tossed the conviction, ruling that the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office illegally skirted the requirement for a warrant before searching the call records and location data on Manning's cellphone.

During his retrial, prosecutors argued that Manning executed Stoute and burned his body before stashing it in a vehicle.

The prosecution said a California driver's license bearing the picture of Manning but with the name "Jamal Johnson" was found in the car with the body.

Prosecutors said said Manning even reached out to the police first, telling them he wanted to see how the investigation was going.

When contacted by the Prosecutor's Office, Manning told the detective he had seen Stoute that day but that night he had been in New York. The prosecution said the defendant's story slowly changed, becoming "more outlandish."

It was by Manning's own words that police found the abandoned house where Stoute was killed, prosecutors said, also telling the jury that after detectives stopped believing his stories, Manning admitted to killing Stoute.

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Manning's attorney had argued that witnesses hadn't been able to recall certain specific evidence. Manning even took the stand in his own defense claiming that he and Stoute were close friends and called each other "cousins."

Ultimately, the jury agreed with prosecutors and convicted Manning on all counts, spelling an end to a legal process that began over a decade ago.

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Englewood NJ man Randy Manning convicted of murder in retrial