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For kidnapping and killing his wife's lover 15 years ago, Dale B. Bradley was sentenced Monday to up to 40 years in prison.
Resolution of the cold-case killing of Bryan Ruff - a 22-year-old security officer who disappeared from a Kennecott guard shack the night of Dec. 10, 1991 - came as a relief to family members.
"Now we can get on with our lives," said the victim's father, Frank Ruff, after the hearing before 3rd District Judge Paul Maughan.
Bradley, 38, was charged two years ago with first-degree felony murder after a Salt Lake County sheriff's detective matched a red paint scuff on one of Ruff's boots to the paint on Bradley's car.
Earlier this year, Bradley - who is also being investigated in the 2005 death of his wife in Carbon County - pleaded guilty to lesser second-degree felony counts of manslaughter and kidnapping.
But they were so-called Alford pleas, meaning Bradley did not admit guilt, only that prosecutors had evidence that could likely result in a trial conviction.
Bradley claims he has no memory of the night of the slaying because he was in a diabetic coma.
But Ruff's widow, Jennifer Campbell, told the judge that Bradley's purported memory problem is simply an example of Bradley's cowardice and failure to take responsibility for the slaying.
"He couldn't even look Bryan in the face when he pulled the trigger," Campbell said. Ruff was shot five times in the back.
In Bradley's statement to the judge, he claimed he has "a lot of remorse" and that the case "has haunted me for years."
But he also stated, "How do I show remorse for something I have no memory of?"
The only issue before the judge on Monday was whether to run Bradley's two terms of two-to-20-years concurrently or consecutively.
Prosecutor Vincent Meister argued for consecutive terms, noting the slaying was premeditated, as indicated by the fact that Bradley had cleaned out the trunk of his car earlier that day - the first time Bradley had ever done so.
Meister said Bradley was making sure there was room for Ruff, who was transported inside the trunk to a remote location in Utah County, where his body was found in a shallow grave 19 months later.
Defense attorney Loni DeLand argued for concurrent prison terms, in part because he deemed Ruff was "not an innocent bystander."
Referring to the love affair between Ruff and Bradley's then-wife, Kristi Kalskett, DeLand said: "Historically, in common law, it was justifiable homicide [to kill your wife's lover]."
After the hearing, Jennifer Campbell acknowledged Ruff had "made some bad choices in the last weeks of his life."
Campbell said they were trying to repair their marriage at the time Ruff was killed. She said she hoped Ruff would be remembered as "a good husband and father."
At the time Ruff disappeared, he and Campbell were the parents of a 2-year-old child, Brittany, and Campbell was five months pregnant with a second daughter, Jessica.
On Monday, Brittany, now 16, told the judge. "I spent my whole life not knowing what my father was like. He [Bradley] has taken someone special out of our lives."
In Carbon County, Bradley is considered "a person of interest" in the death of his second wife, 27-year-old Crystal Bradley, who was found dead outside their Wellington home April 30, 2005.
That investigation is continuing.
Her slaying prompted Salt Lake County detectives to re-open the Ruff homicide.
Crystal Bradley's father, Dan Carpenter, of Wisconsin, said Monday that he is offering $5,000 for information leading to a conviction of his daughter's killer.