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Tyrone Howard Convicted In Shooting That Killed NYPD Officer Randolph Holder

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A gunman was found guilty late Monday in the shooting that killed an NYPD officer in East Harlem in 2015.

The jury reached returned a guilty verdict in the criminal trial of Tyrone Howard. He has been on trial in the fatal shooting of Officer Randolph Holder in East Harlem on Oct. 20, 2015. Howard was convicted of murder and numerous other charges, including criminal possession of a weapon and reckless endangerment.

As CBS2's Andrea Grymes reported, Holder's family hugged in the hallway just moments after the jurors announced their verdict. Cameras were not allowed inside the courtroom.

Howard is accused of shooting Holder in the head on Oct. 20 outside of a housing project in East Harlem. Holder was responding to a report of shots fired and a bicycle stolen at gunpoint, and he and his partner were chasing a man when he was killed, police said.

Authorities said Howard hopped off the stolen bicycle and shot Holder in the head on an East River footbridge near the FDR Drive.

Holder's family did not want to speak. Patrolmen's Benevolent Association President Pat Lynch and Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance thanked the jury for their decision.

"We want to thank this jury. They came to the correct, just and right verdict. You saw the jurors crying with their decision as they looked at this family," Lynch said. "Let us not forget that although we've gotten justice at this juncture, that when this family goes home, they realize their son is still not in that house. It doesn't fix it."

Holder was posthumously promoted to detective at his funeral by then-police Commissioner Bill Bratton. He was also issued a new gold shield with the same number of the badge worn by his father, who is a retired police officer.

A month after the shooting, Howard was sentenced to 12 years in prison in an unrelated drug case. If convicted in this case, Howard faces life in prison without parole.

Howard will be sentenced on April 3.

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