MUSKEGON, MI – A former New Jersey woman thought she was hiring a hit man to kill her husband, because she said “it was easier than divorcing him.”

But the man she solicited to off her husband was actually an undercover police officer, according to a report by MLive.com.

In a video of her interaction with the “hit man” – released to MLive by the Muskegon County Prosecutor’s Office – Julia Charlene Merfeld, 21, explained why she wanted her husband dead.

“When I first decided to do this … it’s not that we weren’t getting along,” she says on the video. “But … terrible as it sounds, it was easier than divorcing him.

"You know, I didn’t have to worry about the judgment of my family, I didn’t have to worry about breaking his heart, all that stuff like this. It’s, like, how I got a clean getaway.”

Authorities said Merfeld told the fake hit man that he’d be paid $50,000 in installments from the proceeds of her husband’s $400,000 life insurance policy.

The two conversations between Merfeld and the undercover police officer took place on April 9 and 10, during which she clearly and matter-of-factly discusses the murder plan – laughing occasionally, checking the possible dates for the killing on her phone and telling the hit man that she did not want her husband to suffer.

After the supposed hit man tells her he’ll fire two bullets into her husband’s head and that “he’s gonna die,” Merfeld smiles uneasily and says “it makes me sad.”

Carlos Ramos, a coworker of Merfeld's, told MLive that Merfeld offered him $50,000 to kill her husband. He called police instead.

According to MLive, Merfeld and her husband had recently moved to Muskegon from New Jersey as a result of a job transfer for the husband. The couple has two young children who were staying with relatives in New Jersey at the time of the April meetings.

During her second meeting with the detective, Merfeld shows him a bundle of notes that he had requested, including directions to the home and a floor plan, as well as a photo of her husband.

“That’s him,” she says before handing the officer a $100 bill as a down payment.

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As the final conversation ends, Merfeld’s shakes the hand of the supposed killer, who wishes her luck.

“Thank you. Good luck to you, too,” she says with a smile just before exiting the vehicle.

Merfeld was arrested shortly afterward and has been lodged in the Muskegon County Jail ever since.

She pleaded guilty to solicitation to murder on June 27. However, her husband and intended victim asked that she get no jail time at all, according to MLive.

Instead, Chief Muskegon County Circuit Judge William C. Marietti committed to cap her minimum sentence at six years. The maximum can be anything up to life in prison, depending on Marietti’s decision at Merfeld’s sentencing July 30.