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As prosecutor Tannaz Mokayef was leaving, Kasian’s sobbing mother locked her in a hug that lasted more than a minute. The two women left together, with Mokayef wiping tears from her eyes.

In late May 2016, Olga Kasian spent days looking for her daughter, sensing something was wrong. She begged police to search the West Hollywood apartment Iana shared with Leibel. When officers did force their way in, it was Sgt. William Cotter who had to keep Olga out. He held her back, away from the master bedroom where her 30-year-old daughter lay dead, missing her scalp and her right ear, bruised and bitten on a bloody mattress.

But Olga Kasian saw it all anyway. She sat through more than a week of trial this month, despite prosecutors’ warnings that the evidence was so disturbing it would warp the picture of her daughter she held in her memory. She came anyway because she wanted to feel what her daughter felt, she said through an interpreter after the verdict Wednesday.

“Watching the trial, she feels that her daughter is somewhere here, somewhere near her,” the interpreter said. “She can feel her.”

Outside court, Olga raised her arms and looked upward, as if talking directly to her daughter.

“Where are you?” she said.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t save you. I’m sorry.”

Sgt. Cotter stood off to the side with his colleague, out of view of the cameras, watching Olga. He is a large man with broad shoulders and the sort of firm, unflinching demeanour that betrays his 30 years as a police officer. But as Olga spoke, he went red in the face. She crossed in front of the cameras and walked toward him, before the interpreter could explain what she was saying or what she was doing. She wrapped her arms around him. Cotter, more than a foot taller, crumpled into her and cried.