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Provo • On the day he was sentenced to spend up to life in prison for shooting and killing his wife at their Orem home in 2012, Conrad Mark Truman refused to say he was sorry.
He wouldn't apologize, he told a 4th District judge on Monday — because he didn't do it.
"I'm still here and I'll be fighting this thing until I die, if I must," Truman said during a sometimes-rambling half-hour statement to the judge. "I did not kill my wife … I can't say sorry for something I did not do. I won't say sorry. It's not my fault that she shot herself."
In October, Truman, 32, was found guilty by a jury of first-degree felony murder and second-degree felony obstruction of justice in the death of 25-year-old Heidy Truman.
Despite Conrad Truman's insistence that he was wrongly convicted, Judge Samuel McVey ordered him to spend 15 years to life in prison for the murder conviction and 1 to 15 years for the obstruction of justice count, to run consecutively.
Truman called the state's case against him circumstantial and that it was a "big injustice" that he was convicted.
"I've never hit my wife. Never," Conrad Truman said. "And I certainly didn't kill her. And I swear to God I didn't shoot her, your honor."
After the hearing, Heidy Truman's mother, Janet Wagner, said it was a bittersweet day for her family. Though she was in the courtroom when McVey handed down the sentence Monday, she opted to leave while Conrad Truman made his statement professing his innocence in court.
"We lost Heidy forever and he has never shown any remorse," Wagner said. "It's been about him. There's nothing worse than having your child ripped from you … in a senseless act of violence."
Heidy Truman's sister, Amanda Wagner, said she didn't feel Conrad Truman showed any remorse during his statement in court.
"One thing he didn't do up there was say that he loved her and that he was sorry that this happened," she said. "He never cried."
At Truman's first scheduled sentencing hearing in December, Heidy Truman's family told the judge of the hole left in their lives by her death. They said they missed her smile, her laugh and her teasing. Her love of life and adventure.
They also asked the judge to give Conrad Truman the maximum sentence for his crimes, which the judge granted in his order for consecutive sentences.
Conrad Truman was not sentenced in December as originally scheduled because his attorney, Ron Yengich, filed a motion asking for the judge to throw out the jury's guilty verdicts based on what he deemed were inappropriate comments made during closing arguments by the prosecutor, Craig Johnson.
After hearing brief arguments on Monday, McVey denied the motion.
Yengich did not comment to reporters after the hearing, but indicated in court that his client plans to appeal his case.
Heidy Truman died on Sept. 30, 2012, from a gunshot to the head in her Orem home. Conrad Truman told jurors that the couple had been watching the television shows "Dexter" and "Homeland" while drinking Maker's Mark whiskey that evening when, at some point, he heard yelling outside.
Conrad Truman testified that he grabbed his dog and his gun and went to investigate. He saw a strange man on his walk, he testified, and told his wife about it when he returned home.
The couple continued talking about various topics, including whether they should get another dog, when Heidy Truman became irritated with him and decided to take a bath, the husband testified.
After about 20 minutes, Conrad Truman said he heard a pop and saw his wife, naked in the hallway, bleeding and choking.
Conrad Truman testified that somehow both he and his wife ended up on the floor. He tried to perform CPR and called 911.
When police arrived, they found blood everywhere — in the kitchen where Heidy Truman's naked body lay, in the front entry, the living room, a bedroom, a bathroom and on Truman himself.
When charges were filed, prosecutors had said the motive for the alleged murder was that Conrad Truman stood to inherit nearly $1 million in life insurance benefits upon his wife's death.
But when prosecutors presented evidence of the Trumans' life insurance policies at trial, they backed away from labeling it as a "motive" for the crime. Instead, Johnson argued that the shooting was the result of an alcohol-fueled disagreement or argument before Heidy Truman took her bath.
Yengich repeatedly told the jury that his client was innocent, and that Heidy Truman likely died by accident — that she shot herself when she slipped and fell while holding a handgun after taking a bath.
Twitter: @jm_miller