Jury finds Colorado bar knife killer guilty on 5 counts of murder

A jury in the western U.S. city of Denver, Colorado, found on Monday Dexter Lewis guilty of stabbing five people to death inside a Denver bar during a robbery almost three years ago.

Lewis was found guilty on five counts of first-degree murder, five counts of aggravated robbery, and one count of arson.

The robbery ending in a bloodbath occurred on Oct. 17, 2012, in Fero's Bar & Grill.

During the holdup, Lewis became enraged, stabbing four women and a 29-year-old man "multiple times", including "slitting their throats," according to testimony. He then tried to set the bar on fire with the victims inside and made off with 165 dollars in cash.

Two of the other accomplices, brothers Joseph and Lynell Hill, respectively received 70 years and life sentences after pleading guilty to murder charges, but said Lewis did all the stabbings.

Denver District Judge John Madden IV reminded the jury not to be influenced by the trial of Colorado theater gunman James Holmes, who had found guilty three weeks prior on 165 counts of murder and attempted murder.

Holmes' trial, which ended Friday, saw one juror derail the prosecutors' Death Penalty plans, forcing the shooter into a life sentence without parole.

Like Holmes' trial, jurors now enter three phases of a Death Penalty sentencing hearing before life or death will be conferred to Lewis. At any one of the three voting phases, only one "sympathetic" juror is needed to stop the Death Penalty.

The jury convicted Lewis after deliberating for nearly 10 hours on the murder charges. The last time Denver prosecutors tried an expensive and lengthy Death Penalty case was in 2001.