The family of slain Logan County Sheriff’s Deputy David Wade provided emotionally-charged testimony Thursday in the third phase of his convicted killer’s trial in Guthrie.

A jury will decide next week whether Nathan Aaron Leforce, 47, will be sentenced to death for the April 2017 shooting of Wade, a former Cashion police officer.

The Logan County jury deliberated just two hours Tuesday before reaching a unanimous decision of guilt on the first-degree murder charge, as well as two other felony offenses of first-degree armed robbery and theft of a motor vehicle.

In the second phase of the trial, jurors voted to sentence Leforce to 37 years for the armed robbery and 30 years for vehicle theft.

Wade was part of a three-officer crew serving an eviction notice at a rural residence east of Mulhall and west of I-35 about 9 a.m. April 18, 2017.

Leforce, who was not the subject of the eviction notice, came out of the house and gave Wade his personal information, and then after Wade went to his truck to check for warrants and walked back toward the house, Leforce opened fire.

According to trial testimony, four of the seven shots fired at close range struck Wade, one hitting the deputy in the face.

As fellow officers rushed to Wade’s assistance, Leforce fled in Wade’s patrol truck and drove to Smitty’s One Stop convenience store on Highway 33 just west of Langston, where he stole a woman’s car at gunpoint.

Meanwhile, Wade was still conscious and talking to first responders as he was flown by helicopter to OU Medical Center in Oklahoma City, where he died during surgery two hours later.

After a manhunt involving officers from several jurisdictions, Leforce was arrested a few hours later, when he was found hiding in an outbuilding northeast of Guthrie.

A Guthrie native, Wade worked as a reserve officer for the Cashion Police Department before he was hired as a Logan County deputy.

Veronica Thomas, the former Cashion police chief who hired Wade, rushed to the hospital to sit with his family during the surgery and was present when doctors informed the family of his death.

She also was one of the people who spoke at his funeral at Lazy E Arena, where more than 1,000 mourners paid their respects, including law enforcement officers from Logan and Kingfisher counties and across the state.

Since Wade’s death, a stretch of S.H. 77 between Mulhall and Guthrie has been renamed the David Wade Memorial Highway.

Before his law enforcement career, Wade served in the Oklahoma National Guard and alongside his brother, Jerry Wade, he was deployed to Bosnia as part of a global peacekeeping mission.

Jerry Wade was one of the family members who testified Thursday during the penalty phase of the jury trial.

Testimony on behalf of the defense is expected to conclude this week, when the jury will begin its deliberations to decide whether to sentence Leforce to death or to life in prison.

Kingfisher County Sheriff Dennis Banther, who interacted with Wade when he worked as a Cashion officer, has been following the trial closely.

He expressed thanks to the Logan County District Attorney’s Office for its successful prosecution of Leforce.

“Each of us here at Kingfisher County are pleased with the verdict in the Nathan Leforce trial and understand the great lengths everyone had to undergo to get here today,” he said. “It doesn’t bring him back to us, but does bring some sense of closure to the heinous act that happened that day.”