DRAPER -- There are not enough apologies, says a woman convicted of killing her husband.
"To all my victims, there is never enough (apologies) to go around," said Vickie Marie Ruiz, 47.
Ruiz sat shackled at a table before hearing officer Robert S. Yeates on Tuesday. Behind her sat her family members, as well as the brother and mother of John Matthew Ruiz, who died from a gunshot wound May 7, 2006, in Brigham City.
Vickie Marie Ruiz pleaded guilty Sept. 7, 2006, to second-degree felony manslaughter, which was reduced in a plea bargain from first-degree felony murder.
The judge in the case sentenced Ruiz to serve up to five years in prison instead of the one- to 15-year term sought by prosecutors.
John Ruiz's mother, Isabel Anguiano, said her son, who received numerous military awards, always provided for his wife and three daughters.
Anguiano gave Yeates two photographs of her son to look at while she talked.
"I'm here to represent my son," Anguiano said.
Anguiano asked Yeates if Ruiz is granted parole to have "her stay out of Ogden. I don't want to run into her."
Ruiz's prison term, if she is not granted parole, finishes in September 2011.
Ruiz said she and her husband married when she was 16 and he was 17. He entered the Army at 18 and served for 20 years before retiring. She said both had domestic violence issues and problems with alcohol.
She said the abuse was not just physical but also mental and emotional. She said John Ruiz also had extramarital affairs.
When asked how many, she said, "I could count a handful, and it was always someone I knew."
The night of the shooting, she said, they had a party at their home with another couple.
She had gone outside to clean up and saw her husband kissing a woman in a motor home parked next to their house.
Ruiz said she had gone back into her home to get a .22-caliber pistol.
"I didn't intend to kill anyone," Ruiz said, her voice breaking.
When she entered the motor home, she said her intent was to scare her husband, but she saw him having sex with the other woman.
"I opened the door and stepped a foot inside and shot," she said. "I didn't know who I shot."
Ruiz said she then called 911 and told dispatchers she shot her husband.
Since entering the prison four years ago, she has entered into as many programs as she can, she said. Ruiz also said she plans to stay away from alcohol.
Ruiz said she has received support from her family members while she has been in prison.
A day does not go by when she does not think about what happened that night, she said.
"All I can do is manage my life today. This was never meant to happen."
Yeates will review the case and make a recommendation to the parole board, which will decide in two to three weeks whether to release Ruiz early or force her to serve out her sentence.
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