WELLSBURG — A Brooke County jury Tuesday found a Wellsburg man who had been indicted for malicious assault guilty instead of the lesser charge of battery.

The jury returned the verdict for William R. Walnoha, 44, of Wellsburg after viewing video of the altercation that led to his arrest and hearing testimony from the investigating officer, the victim and the defendant himself.

During the one-day trial, Brooke County Prosecuting Attorney Allison Cowden presented video captured by a neighbor’s door camera on Sept. 6 as well as video from a body camera worn by Wellsburg Patrolman Danny Casto.

Casto testified that he was responding to a report of an altercation in the area of 27th Street when he found the victim, a man in his 20s known to Walnoha, bleeding from his scalp.

The man testified to the court that Walnoha had struck him with a propane tank in the course of a heated argument over whether he had taken marijuana and scales from Walnoha.

The metal tank, with an attached welding torch and about the size of an adult size thermos, was presented as evidence to the court.

The two men offered similar testimony about the argument and subsequent altercation but different reasons for the tank being used as a weapon.

Casto said the man was transported to a local hospital, where the wound was secured with two staples.

The prosecutor presented video from the officer’s body camera and from the door camera of a neighbor obtained in the course of the investigation.

The jury and others listened and watched as words were exchanged between the two men, the younger man took a seat on a porch and Walnoha approached, thrusting his hand in the other man’s direction.

The younger man alternately described the motion as a shove or a nudge, while Walnoha testified he didn’t believe his hand connected with the other man.

Walnoha was then seen running down the steps and bending over to lift an object both he and the victim identified as the tank.

The younger man said the tank belonged to a friend and he wanted to prevent Walnoha from taking it because he feared losing the friend’s trust.

Walnoha testified the tank was his while also stating that it might not have been.

The prosecutor called the friend to the stand to testify that it was his tank.

Both men testified that the younger man grabbed Walnoha around the neck and Walnoha fell to the ground.

The younger man said he was trying “to get him to stop and calm down.”

He said he didn’t intend to harm Walnoha, whom he considered a role model, but observed that “his face was turning purple,” and he released him.

But before that, Walnoha swung the tank backwards at the man above him, striking him in the head.

“I couldn’t breathe. I thought I was going to die,” testified Walnoha, who stated later, “Even after I hit him, he was still choking me.”

In closing arguments to the jury, Walnoha’s attorney, Sean Logue, maintained his client was acting in self-defense.

He said while Walnoha initially approached the other man, he stepped away and only used the tank to force the other man off him.

“My client had no other choice,” he said.

In her own closing arguments, Cowden said after rising, Walnoha could have fled immediately but threw the tank in the other man’s direction.

“This was not a man who was terrified for his life,” she said.

Presiding over the trial, 1st Judicial Circuit Court Judge Jason Cuomo instructed the jury it could consider the malicious assault charge or the lesser charges of unlawful assault, battery and misdemeanor assault.

Following the trial, Logue said the verdict was fair, that misdemeanor conduct could have been inferred from the testimony, and he respects the jury’s decision.

Cowden said, “Although disappointed, the State respects the decision of the jury and believes justice was served.”