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Depending on how state District Court Judge Stan Whitaker stacks the various guilty verdicts, Casaus is looking at a prison sentence ranging from 18 to 30 years when he is sentenced Nov. 10.

The child abuse verdict was based on Casaus’ failure to promptly call 911 when his stepson was gravely injured. According to testimony, Casaus and his wife, Synthia Varela-Casaus, Omaree’s biological mother, waited from 30 minutes to more than three hours before calling for medical assistance.

Synthia Varela-Casaus also has been charged in connection with the boy’s death. She will be tried separately, pending the outcome of a mental evaluation.

After the verdict was read, Casaus briefly leaned forward in his seat and appeared to brush away a tear, and then resumed the posture he’d taken for most of the trial – sitting upright and staring straight ahead.

Among the lesser guilty verdicts against him were tampering with evidence for washing Omaree’s body in a shower before medical personnel arrived, and two counts of intimidation of a witness for telling Omaree’s younger siblings not to talk about what they may have seen or heard the day Omaree died.

The jury also found Casaus guilty of causing what were determined to be three “thermal” burns on Omaree’s chest. Casaus told investigators the marks had previously been caused when Omaree ran down a dark hallway in the family’s home and bumped into him while he was smoking a cigarette. A forensic pathologist who conducted the autopsy on the child testified that under that scenario, one burn mark was possible, but not three.

In addition, Casaus faces sentencing for a guilty plea in an unrelated drug trafficking case and could get up to nine years in prison for that, as well as federal charges of being a felon in possession of a firearm, which could garner another eight to 10 years.

The nine-man, three-woman jury announced its verdict shortly after 3:45 p.m. Friday, after beginning deliberations midday Wednesday.

The jury didn’t meet Thursday because a juror fell ill.

Prosecution attorney Wesley Jensen said after the verdict was announced that he was not surprised. “The medical neglect was our strongest charge,” he said.

Co-prosecutor Nicholas Marshall agreed. “It’s hard because Synthia took full responsibility for everything and that was a lot to overcome,” he said. “But the medical neglect, and him (Casaus) being in the home for three-and-a-half hours while Omaree was there bleeding out, was by far our strongest count, so I’m not surprised by the verdict.”

Marshall also noted that there was “a little bit of Synthia being on trial here,” but the judge “did a good job of trying to avoid having a trial within a trial.”

Still, the jury heard a great deal about the role of Synthia Varela-Casaus, including a comment she made to reporters while being escorted to the Prisoner Transport Center Downtown: “I was disciplining him and I kicked him the wrong way. It was an accident.”

Casaus’ defense attorney Cindy Leos said she was “partially relieved” at the verdict.

“The jury didn’t find the intentional child abuse, which was the right decision, and they were able to look at the facts and remove some of the emotion and focus in on what was probably the strongest part of the state’s case, the medical neglect.”

Added co-defense attorney Tom Clark: “The extent of the state’s case was the failure to call 911 and we hoped that the jury would focus on those medical issues. The jury spoke, and they didn’t believe that Stephen Casaus had a role in the beating death of this child.”

Casaus’ defense had said he was in the bathroom taking heroin when Omaree was being beaten.

Clark conceded that no matter how the counts are run at sentencing, “Mr. Casaus will be in prison for a very long time.”

Sylvia Varela Marquez, Synthia’s sister who is now caring for Omaree’s two younger siblings, testified during the trial about what the older sibling remembered about the day Omaree died. She and her husband were present for the reading of the jury’s verdict but declined to comment.

Present for the entire trial was Essie Sotelo, who served as a caretaker for several years for Omaree and later his younger sister, until the state Children, Youth and Families Department ordered them returned to their mother.

“I’m here for Omaree,” she said, declining further comment.

CYFD had nine contacts with Omaree and his family regarding abuse and neglect, but could only substantiate two of them.

Then, on Dec. 27, 2013, first responders were called to their home on the 4900 block of Comanche NE, where they found the boy unconscious and unresponsive.

His mother initially claimed the boy fell from a “bouncy” horse and hit his head on the tile floor.

An autopsy revealed that he had been savagely beaten to death. He lost 25 percent of his blood volume to internal bleeding, the blood pooling in his abdomen.