OKANOGAN — Just over a week after he was convicted of murder, Kelly E. Small, 50, was sentenced Friday for his previous conviction of raping an elderly Omak woman.

Small was sentenced in Okanogan County Superior Court to 31 years and six months in prison for the 2006 rape. A jury found him guilty in September of first-degree rape, first-degree burglary and forgery. The jury could not agree whether Small was also guilty of attempting to kill the 75-year-old woman who police say he choked with a telephone cord and his hands until she was unconscious.

In a separate case last week, a different Okanogan County jury found him guilty of murdering Sandy Bauer in 1998. He will be sentenced for aggravated first-degree murder and first-degree rape and burglary on Oct. 26. Judge Jack Burchard said after the verdict that life in prison is his only possible sentence, since prosecutors declined to seek the death penalty.

On Friday, Small’s rape victim was not present, but letters from her and her daughter were read to the court, said Prosecutor Karl Sloan.

Sloan said he asked the judge for a higher sentence based on a different calculation of Small’s offender score, which was discretionary.

Instead, he said, Burchard went for the lower offender score, but did sentence Small to the highest number of months within the sentencing range.

K.C. Mehaffey: 997-2512

mehaffey@wenatcheeworld.com