AKRON, Ohio -- Donna Moonda, the doctor's wife from Mercer County, Pa., who had it all, will spend the rest of her life in prison.

		A guide to the Moonda case Previous Post-Gazette articles, photos and graphics, plus federal court documents, are available on our Moonda index page.

Jurors yesterday rejected the death penalty for Mrs. Moonda, but unanimously sentenced her to life in a federal prison without the possibility of release.

The same jury earlier this month convicted Mrs. Moonda, 48, of Hermitage, of murder for hire and three related felonies. Jurors found that she recruited her 26-year-old lover to murder her husband on the Ohio Turnpike two years ago.

Her accomplice, Damian Bradford, was sentenced last week to 17¹/₂ years in prison for firing a bullet into the face of Dr. Gulam Moonda.

Juror Matthew J. Hayes said the fact that the triggerman received a relatively light sentence made it impossible for him to consider the death penalty for Mrs. Moonda.

"I couldn't do it, not with Bradford getting 17¹/₂ years," Mr. Hayes, a warehouse foreman, said in an interview.

Another juror, Barbara A. Francis, said she came to the same conclusion. She said she could not support a death sentence for one killer after the other got a prison term that will allow him to be paroled.

U.S. Attorney Gregory White offered the plea bargain to Mr. Bradford in return for his testimony against Mrs. Moonda.

"I would make the same decision again," he said after the life sentence for Mrs. Moonda was handed down after the jurors deliberated for 4¹/₂ hours.

Nancy Kelley, one of the two assistant U.S. attorneys who prosecuted the case, said the evidence against Mr. Bradford was strong but entirely circumstantial. Had he gone to trial and won a not-guilty verdict, Mrs. Moonda could have slipped away unpunished, Ms. Kelley said.

The plea bargain for Mr. Bradford was made to improve the chance of convicting Mrs. Moonda, prosecutors said.

But to Mrs. Francis, the detailed account of the murder plot offered by Mr. Bradford did not matter.

"The fact that Damian Bradford testified was not the reason I found her guilty," Mrs. Francis said.

Rather, she said, the combined evidence against Mrs. Moonda won the case for prosecutors.

Mr. Hayes took the same view. It was no one thing that convinced him of Mrs. Moonda's guilt. It was everything, he said.

Mrs. Moonda's initial claim that she and her husband were victims of a random robbery on the turnpike seemed unlikely, he said. Then the killer turned out to be her boyfriend after she insisted to the highway patrol that Mr. Bradford was blameless.

"Her connection with Bradford was a big part of it, but it really was a combination of everything," Mr. Hayes said.

Troopers with the Ohio State Highway Patrol used cell phone tracking records to establish that Mrs. Moonda and Mr. Bradford met the day of the murder, May 13, 2005. They also exchanged 15 text messages and eight phone calls that day.

Until yesterday, Mrs. Moonda's lawyers had insisted that she had no idea Mr. Bradford was the highway robber who killed her husband. Her defense team maintained that Mr. Bradford disguised himself so thoroughly that Mrs. Moonda did not recognize him, even though she had been seeing him romantically for a year.

But defense lawyer David L. Grant told jurors in his closing argument that Mrs. Moonda was involved in the murder plot. She lied and "misled" the highway patrol, he said.

Still, Mr. Grant said Mrs. Moonda was less responsible for the murder than Mr. Bradford. He said she is a "submissive" woman and suffers from "dependent personality disorder," which allowed Mr. Bradford to manipulate her.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Linda Barr, in a fiery speech, countered that Mrs. Moonda was the one most responsible for her husband's death.

"The defendant literally held the keys to murder, and literally was in the driver's seat the evening of the murder," Ms. Barr said.

Mrs. Moonda sobbed loudly as Ms. Barr denounced her as a greedy woman who killed her 69-year-old husband so she could try to get his multimillion-dollar inheritance.

After the jury gave her a life sentence, Mrs. Moonda cried again. But this time she seemed relieved. She rose from the defense table and hugged Mr. Grant, whose closing argument helped persuade the jurors to let her live.

Jurors elected not to sentence Mrs. Moonda on two firearms charges that could have carried the death penalty. They convicted her of aiding Mr. Bradford in the shooting, but decided to let U.S. District Judge David Dowd sentence her to a penalty of less than life on those convictions.

No matter what penalty Judge Dowd decides is appropriate for the firearm convictions, Mrs. Moonda still will spend the rest of her life in prison, barring a successful appeal.

Dr. Ravi Sachdeva, a colleague and close friend of Dr. Moonda, said he believed justice has been done.

"We're satisfied. Life in prison without parole is a serious sentence," Dr. Sachdeva said as he left court.

He said he feels sympathy for Mrs. Moonda's 77-year-old mother and her three sisters, but not for the killer who took away his friend.

Dr. Sachdeva said he runs into Dr. Moonda's old urology patients each week, and their pain is raw.

"They have nothing but contempt for Donna," he said.