Jason D. Strickland has been found guilty of permitting a serious brain injury to be caused to his stepdaughter Haleigh Poutre, in a case that drew media’s attention from around the world.

The stepfather, a 34-year-old mechanic, was convicted of five of the six assault and battery charges that stemmed from the September 2005 beating of the 11-year-old girl.

A Hampden Superior Court jury decided that Strickland was responsible for causing substantial bodily injury to his stepdaughter, though he may not have been the one who actually inflicted the near-fatal brain injury that had put the girl into a coma. He was found guilty because he permitted Haleigh’s brain injury to occur even if he did not directly caused the trauma. Had Strickland been convicted of causing the brain injury, the maximum sentence would have been 15 years. Strickland was also charged with earlier beatings from a bat, his foot, a plastic stick and his open hand.

The girl, now 14, is being treated at a Franciscan Children's Hospital in Boston. During the trial jurors viewed a videotape of Haleigh as she struggled to do simple tasks such as feed herself.

Strickland is expected to be held at the Hampden County Correctional Center in Ludlow until sentencing.

“I’m relieved to know there’s been some sort of justice,” said Allison Avrett, Haleigh's biological mother after she found out the verdict.

Prosecutors claimed Strickland and his late wife abused Haleigh over a five-year period. Holli Strickland, Haleigh's adoptive mother, died in an apparent murder-suicide with her grandmother shortly after being charged in 2005 with abusing Haleigh.