WISCONSIN RAPIDS - Ronald Race said he wanted to shout to his son as he watched the scene unfold, to warn him that Gary E. Bohman had a gun.

But by then it was too late. Race was watching a surveillance video recording that police collected after Bohman shot the 39-year-old Christopher Race to death in a Wisconsin Rapids bakery.

“To know your son is going to die, and there is no way to stop it, it is a helpless feeling,” Ronald Race told Wood County Circuit Judge Greg Potter on Tuesday, moments before the judge sentenced Bohman to life in prison without parole.

Bohman was previously married to Christopher's wife, and when he walked into the Higher Grounds Bakery and Coffee Shop on March 29, he shattered a young family’s dreams, Ronald Race said. He called Bohman a "pathetic, cowardly man" who couldn’t look his son in the eye when he killed him.

Yet the older Race said he doesn’t hate Bohman. He just wants to know the reason Bohman put the Race family and his own family through hell by killing Christopher.

“I hate what he did or the despicable way he did it, but I don’t feel a need for revenge,” Ronald Race said.

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Christopher Race and his new wife co-owned the bakery, and it was soon after they started a relationship that Bohman's two children began calling Christopher "father." Ronald Race thought it was too soon, but he also knew his son loved helping to raise the boys.

“Your honor, my son was a good man and an even better father,” he said to the judge. “He loved all his kids and was devoted to each and every one of them.”

He asked that Potter be sure that, whatever sentence he ordered, the 59-year-old Bohman wakes up every day in prison and realizes what he took from Christopher’s family and how he affected his own.

The victim's widow said March 29 was her first day off from the bakery in weeks. Christopher served his wife a cup of coffee, she kissed him and they said goodbye for the last time.

She told Potter about the first night without Christopher, how she listened to the sobs of her sons after they learned about their father’s death, with two of them aware their natural father was the killer. The echoing question was “why,” she said.

Bohman has a son who despises his paternity so much it pains him to use his father’s name, she said.

The woman read a letter written by one of Bohman's two sons, now 9 years old. In it, the boy wrote about building a snowman with his “daddy” a few days before the shooting. The snowman was 8 feet tall and the head was so heavy Christopher Race could hardly lift it. The boy wrote that his stepfather was strong and taught the boy to be kind to other people and stand up for them.

“I don’t understand why my own dad, Gary, could hurt someone who meant so much to me,” the boy’s letter said. “The day my daddy died, my whole world changed in one instant.”

The woman said another son, who is now 8, was present the day Christopher was killed. The boy went over and touched his stepdad's wound before trying to call 911 for help; he didn’t know his call had gone through, so he went to a nearby business to get help.

The 8-year-old drew a picture in school that his mother showed Potter. She described the scene, which was of the day Bohman would get out of jail and come to try to kill her. The boy depicted all the ways he would try to kill Bohman to protect his mom.

Wood County Assistant District Attorney David Knaapen broke down in tears as he asked Potter for a sentence of 31 years.

“I’ve been doing this job a long time and to see this video,” Knaapen said before he had to stop and regain his composure. “I’m sorry; I don’t even know this victim.”

The prosecutor said he will never forget the image from the video of the little boy coming around the corner of the counter after his stepfather was shot. Race’s toddler son and 11-month-old son also were in the bakery when their father was killed. Bohman watched the toddler walking back and forth in the café before he shot Christopher, Knaapen said.

During a brief statement, Bohman said he was sorry for what he did and would regret it the rest of his life.

Potter asked Bohman why he brought a gun into the bakery and café that day. Bohman said he wanted to hurt Race but not kill him. He wanted his ex-wife’s family to hurt the way he hurt by the loss of his family, he told the judge.

Potter rejected the excuse. If Bohman wanted only to hurt Race, he could have punched him or done something other than shoot him, the judge said.

Potter also rejected defense attorney Jessica Phelp’s request for 20 years in prison and Knaapen’s request for 31 years in prison. In sentencing Bohman to life in prison, the judge said he didn’t want him to experience any of the day-to-day things he denied Race from enjoying.

The judge also ordered Bohman to watch the video of the shooting. He wanted the man to see the effect his actions had on the children.