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Hit Man Guilty In Atlanta Murder For Hire Trial

Posted: 3:09 pm EDT June 26, 2009Updated: 3:17 pm EDT June 26, 2009

ATLANTA -- Cleveland Clark, the hit man hired to kill Sparkle Rai, was found guilty on all seven counts Friday.

Channel 2 Action News reporter Diana Davis was in the court room when the jury announced its verdict and she said Clark showed no emotion in court as the verdict came down.

The 22-year-old Sparkle Rai was found strangled with a vacuum cord and stabbed more than a dozen times weeks after her March 2000 wedding to Ricky Rai.

Prosecutors said Rai’s father, Chiman Rai, a Mississippi businessman born in India, hired Clark to kill his his daughter-in-law because she was black. Prosecutors argued Chiman Rai believed Sparkle Rai would bring down the family stock.

In an earlier trial, Chiman Rai was found guilty of arranging the murder and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole plus 25 years.

Copyright 2009 by WSBTV.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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