Staff photo / Ed Runyan Boardman police officer Evan Beil demonstrates how Damian Cessna held a knife as he charged at Beil in 2021 in testimony at Cessna’s trial. A jury deadlocked on an assault charge against Cessna on Friday.

YOUNGSTOWN — A jury deadlocked on felonious assault in the Damian Cessna trial Friday in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court but found Cessna guilty of obstructing official business and misdemeanor aggravated menacing.

Cessna could get about a year in prison on obstructing official business, a low-level felony.

Gina DeGenova, Mahoning County prosecutor, said no decision has been made yet on whether to try Cessna again on felonious assault. If he would have been convicted of felonious assault, Cessna could have received about eight years in prison.

Cessna, 27, then of Boardman, was charged with the offenses after he and Boardman Police officer Evan Beil had a confrontation on South Avenue near Mathews Road on July 13, 2021, in which Beil said Cessna refused to put down a knife Cessna was carrying and charged at the officer, who fired 11 shots at Cessna, hitting him multiple times.

Following an investigation by the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation, then Mahoning County Prosecutor Paul Gains cleared Biel of any wrongdoing in the shooting.

Beil testified that the episode started when Beil saw Cessna riding a bicycle at 1 a.m. in the wrong lane of travel with no lights on the bicycle, and Cessna was carrying a baseball bat.

Beil testified at the trial that he made a traffic stop on Cessna, pulling up behind Cessna but remained beside his cruiser about 15 feet away from Cessna. He said Cessna asked Beil in a profane way why he was being stopped. Beil asked Cessna to put down the baseball bat, and Cessna did.

Beil, who was not equipped with a body camera and did not have a dash camera in his cruiser, said he asked Cessna to take the knife out of the sheath on his belt and toss it away.

“He says no. I will not disarm myself. I do not feel safe talking to you,” Beil said. He told Cessna to get rid of the knife or Cessna would be arrested, Beil testified. “And then I draw my firearm, order him to the ground,” Beil said. “At that point, he pulls the knife out of its sheath. He makes a grunting noise and charges at me.”

Beil said Cessna held the knife at about head level with his elbow bent in the air as he came toward Beil. Cessna said he fired until Cessna collapsed forward onto the ground.

The cross examination by Mark Lavelle, Cessna’s attorney, appeared to be done to suggest that Cessna had moved about four feet from his location by his bicycle at the point where Cessna collapsed onto the ground, while Beil’s testimony indicated Cessna had charged more like nine feet before Cessna collapsed and that Beil was about 15 feet from Cessna when they started out.