BOULDER — A woman who spent months faking a pregnancy before she attacked an expectant mother and cut her 7-month-old fetus out of her womb could now spend the rest of her life in prison.

Dynel Lane on Tuesday was convicted of attempted first-degree murder, four felony assault charges and one count of unlawful termination of a pregnancy, also a felony.

In a frenzied attack March 18, Lane lured Michelle Wilkins to her Longmont basement with a Craigslist ad promising free maternity clothes, beat her unconscious and removed her fetus. Wilkins survived the attack, but prosecutors said her fetus — a daughter she had planned to name Aurora — never took a breath.

As a result, prosecutors said, Lane could not be charged in Aurora’s death.

But with each guilty verdict the judge read, Wilkins, 27, found justice for her daughter.

“It was a really vulnerable moment where I felt relief and triumph that justice was served — that Aurora was acknowledged in spirit, that the hardship that she went through, the hardship that I went through was seen and acknowledged,” Wilkins said after the verdict was announced. “My thoughts definitely went to her in that moment, to everything that my family endured.”

Holding her father’s hand, Wilkins dabbed tears from under her eyes as the verdict was read.

The Boulder County jury spent a total of seven hours on Monday and Tuesday deliberating the charges. In handing down its verdicts, the jury found that Lane, 35, intentionally tried to kill Wilkins.

During the four days of testimony in the trial, Lane’s public defenders argued she did not intend to kill Wilkins. Instead, they said, Lane committed an impulsive and hasty act.

But neither Lane nor her attorneys offered an explanation for the bizarre and bloody attack during the trial. Lane did not testify, and defense attorneys rested their case without calling any witnesses.

Nearly a year since the attack, Wilkins said she has forgiven Lane and doesn’t want anything from her. But she also knows she may never learn why Lane attacked her.

She’ll never know why Lane didn’t stop hitting and choking her for almost 10 minutes. Why she cut into her abdomen three different times. Why she left her to die.

“It had just never entered my worldview that someone could be so cruel and value life so little,” Wilkins said.

During the trial, prosecutors argued that Lane was leading a double life.

In one life, she was pretending to be pregnant with the son of her longtime boyfriend. Her friends threw a baby shower in Pueblo where frosting spelled out the words “Welcome James!” on a cake nestled among blue balloons and cups.

But in her second life, Lane knew her lie would be exposed soon. Her boyfriend grew suspicious of her pregnancy as it stretched months beyond her due date. He gave her an ultimatum.

Either Lane would go with him to a doctor’s appointment or she and her two daughters would have to move out. Lane, in a pregnancy-obsessed panic, hatched a plan to get a baby, prosecutors said.

After Wilkins responded to Lane’s ad, the two women talked for more than an hour in Lane’s home. Every time Wilkins tried to leave, Lane would keep talking, Wilkins testified during the trial.

Eventually, Lane told Wilkins she had baby clothes in the basement. It was there that a desperate struggle broke out. Lane hit Wilkins over the head with a glass bottle, stabbed her in the neck with a shard of broken glass and pushed the heel of her hand into Wilkins’ throat until she lost consciousness.

After Lane cut out Wilkins’ fetus, she left the woman alone in a downstairs bedroom for more than an hour as she tried to wash and hide blood-covered pillows and clothes. Lane shoved Wilkins onto the floor to remove the sheets from the bed she was bleeding on.

Wilkins eventually regained consciousness and called 911. By then, Lane’s boyfriend had returned home to find Lane with blood on her and the motionless fetus in the upstairs bedroom.

Lane claimed she had delivered the baby at home.

At the hospital, Lane initially claimed the child was her own. Then, she accused Wilkins of attacking her and said that she cut out the fetus in an attempt to save the baby.

District Attorney Stan Garnett said the heinous crime shook the community. Wilkins’ strength “made sure justice was done,” he said.

Chief District Judge Maria Berkenkotter granted Garnett’s request that Lane be held without bail until her sentencing hearing April 29.

Lane could face up to 120 years in prison, Garnett said. She faces a minimum of 16 years.

Garnett said he does not yet know what sentence he will ask for. He asked Berkenkotter for a “thorough” pre-sentencing investigation to include psychological evaluations.

Lane’s attorney, Kathryn Herold, objected to the request to have psychological testing done. She argued that any such evaluations of Lane could affect her right to appeal.

Lane sat quietly while the verdict was read and spoke briefly with her attorneys before she was handcuffed and led out of the courtroom.

Wilkins said she is looking forward to speaking at the sentencing. She does not hate Lane, she said.

“But I am angry for all the pain she has caused, the deceit and for her selfishness, and this element is hardly fathomable for me,” Wilkins said. “I do hope she finds the time to reflect on what she did and why, and then find the opportunity to first seek inner peace and then find a way to pay the spiritual debt she’s accumulated.”

Jordan Steffen: 303-954-1794, jsteffen@denverpost.com or @jsteffendp

Staff writer Jesse Paul contributed to this report.