ELYRIA, Ohio - A 39-year-old woman convicted of shooting and killing her husband in Vermilion was sentenced to 28 years to life in prison Thursday.

Julene Simko, dressed in a green jail uniform, wept as Lorain County Common Pleas Court Judge Mark Betleski handed down her sentencing.

Simko was taken to Lorain County Jail Friday after Betleski found her guilty of aggravated murder, felonious assault and tampering with evidence in the Nov. 18, 2009 death of 36-year-old Jeremy Simko.

Before he read his verdict Friday, Betleski examined the defense theory that an armed intruder shot Jeremy Simko. He ruled out that an armed intruder shot Jeremy Simko.

Julene Simko's mother, Judy Maldonado, said her daughter was born a beautiful, kind and gentle child.

"She was a loving, kind, gentle, sensitive and somewhat shy child," she said.

Before Jeremy Simko's death, Julene Simko never had any encounters with police, her mother said. She described her daughter as a woman with integrity and stressed that she believed her daughter was not a criminal.

Jeremy Simko had a sinister character and Maldonado claimed he attacked more than one person. He also had a difficult temper. She believes her daughter's presence in his life made him a better person and vice versa.

"She absolutely had no purpose to want him dead," Maldonado said. "I believe in my daughter's innocence."

Maldonado, 58, begged the judge to give her daughter the minimum sentence so she could possibly see her daughter free again.

But Jeremy Simko's father, Robert Simko, begged for the maximum sentence of life without the possibility of parole. He said that his son's wife could have made other choices.

"After this shooting when I went to see her, which is 14 hours after the shooting, she was watching 'Married with Children,'" he said. "She chose to shoot him in the back of the head, stage the scene so it made it look like someone else did it."

Robert Simko hopes that every day in prison is a miserable day and a miserable night for his daughter-in-law to think about what she did to his son.

"This is as cold blooded as this gets," Assistant Lorain County Prosecutor Tony Cillo said.

Julene Simko declined to make a statement during the hearing.

Her attorney, Jack Bradley, said she has maintained that she didn't do this to her husband. He also brought up multiple deviant sex acts and how she was sexually abused as a child. He said police found pictures depicting these acts at their home while investigating. She looked physically distressed was crying and looked sad in the pictures, he said.

The reason he brought up the sex acts and pictures is because the judge indicated that the prosecutor had failed to prove any motive. This also was an effort to avoid the maximum for his client.

"I was suggesting to the judge that this sexual abuse that she had received throughout the years might have been a motive even though we still maintain that she did not kill her husband," Bradley said.

"She hasn't had any arrests, any criminal charges, no involvement with law enforcement," he said.

After the sentencing, Robert Simko said Bradley tried to turn a murder case into a sexual assault case.

"And I think he crossed the line when he came up with some of this stuff that meant nothing to this. He should have brought it up during the trial," he said. "Why he brought it up now I don't know."

Julene Simko called 911 about 6 a.m. that day and reported to a dispatcher that she found her husband dead in a second-floor bedroom of their North Ridge Road home. The back door was unlocked when authorities got to the home.

She said that she was asleep on the third floor when she heard a sound and went downstairs to see what happened. She found her husband dead.

Prosecutors said she shot her husband with a .357 Magnum Smith & Wesson two inches from the back of his head.

Investigators recovered the bullet from the window and found the gun on the floor by the back door, Lorain County Prosecutor Dennis Will said.

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