ALLENTOWN (AP) — A jury has decided to spare the life of a man convicted in the baseball bat beating death of another man in his former girlfriend’s eastern Pennsylvania apartment.

Instead, the Lehigh County panel decided Friday that 34-year-old Larry Yaw Jr. should be sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole in the April 2016 slaying of 44-year-old Brian Frank. The life term will be formally imposed by a judge April 16.

Prosecutors alleged that Yaw kicked in the door to the woman’s unit and hit Frank at least twice in the head with an aluminum baseball bat. Jurors rejected the defense argument that the crime was committed in the heat of passion.

Defense witnesses said Yaw had mental health problems and had been abused as a child.