DELAND, Fla. -- A Daytona Beach man was found guilty of the slaying of a retired banker who was found dead in his shower in 2001, even though another man confessed to the crime.

Jurors convicted Richard England, 32, of first-degree murder and armed robbery with a deadly weapon. He could be sentenced to death.

Prosecutors said England and his friend Michael Douglas Jackson beat Howard "Cooter" Wetherell, 71, to death with a fire poker, then robbed his condominium.

Jackson, who said he lived with the victim for about a month before their relationship soured, initially told officials that he and England had killed Wetherell, and agreed to testify against his friend. But Jackson, 21, later changed his story, taking sole responsibility for the murder.

In Volusia County Circuit Court, Assistant State Attorney Ed Davis called Jackson a "bald-faced liar." Davis pointed to telephone calls made to a friend of England's from Wetherell's home on the night of the murder, and a cigarette with England's DNA found in the victim's trash can.

England also described the killing to friends and tried to pawn off items from Wetherell's home, Davis said.

But England's attorney Gerard Keating argued Jackson, who pleaded guilty of second-degree murder and faces up to life in prison, had no incentive to lie.

"He's a reverse snitch. ... It only gets worse for him now," Keating said.

Before England's sentencing, jurors will learn that he was convicted of second-degree murder the fatal beating of Robert Ryland, 50, at a New Smyrna Beach motorcycle shop in 1987. England was sentenced to 25 years for second-degree murder, but released in 1997.