Soto Gets 52 Years to Life in Spouse’s Slaying

A 38-year-old Ventura woman who shot her sleeping husband and then cut his body into pieces with an electric saw was sentenced Friday to 52 years to life in prison.

Superior Court Judge Herbert Curtis rejected pleas for leniency as defendant Gladis Soto slumped over a courtroom defense table, her dark hair shielding her face.

Her lawyers urged the judge to reduce a first-degree murder conviction to manslaughter, arguing Soto was a battered wife who lashed out after enduring years of domestic abuse.

They also pleaded with Curtis to strike a gun enhancement that tacks on an additional 25 years to life for someone with no criminal history.

“Nothing will bring back the father of Gladis’ five children, but the court can ensure that they get their mother back,” argued attorney Kay Duffy. “She is not a coldblooded killer.”

But Curtis told the lawyers that evidence presented at Soto’s trial was compelling and supported the jury’s finding that she committed premeditated murder.

Days before the killing, Soto purchased an illegal .25-caliber handgun from two men on a street corner, stashed it in a kitchen cabinet and then fired a single shot into Pedro Alba’s head as he slept in the couple’s Ventura apartment on Feb. 20, 1999. Soto hid the body in a closet for several hours, then cut it up with a table saw in the garage.

She was arrested after a transient spotted her in a dry riverbed setting fire to trash bags containing Alba’s head, arms and legs.

Her husband’s torso was later found in a suitcase in the family’s garage.

Soto was convicted of murder and related charges on Dec. 22 after a five-week trial.

She is scheduled to appear in court next month for an unrelated trial on welfare fraud charges.

At Friday’s sentencing hearing, Curtis told the attorneys he spent hours reviewing trial testimony and would not reduce the murder charge.

“I think the evidence is more than sufficient to show the defendant committed the crime,” Curtis said.

As for the so-called 10-20-life gun enhancement, Curtis said his hands were tied. Under state law, judges must impose the extra years if a jury finds that a gun was used in murder and other serious crimes.

“I don’t have the legal authority to strike this gun enhancement--period,” he said.

Soto was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison for the murder, and an additional 25 years to life for using a gun. She received another two years because she was out on bail in a separate assault case involving her husband’s girlfriend at the time of the homicide.

At the request of the defense, Curtis agreed to order a concurrent one-year sentence for Soto on the assault charge.

After the hearing, Deputy Dist. Atty. Patricia Murphy told reporters that Soto must serve 100% of the murder sentence and gun enhancement, or 50 years, before she is eligible for parole. She will be 88.

“This is a harsh penalty, but I think it is deserved,” Murphy said. “A premeditated murder is about as serious a crime as you can get.”

The ruling disappointed Soto’s friends and supporters, who left the courtroom in tears.

“I know Gladis,” wailed one woman, who declined to give her name. “I know she doesn’t deserve that.”

Soto, meanwhile, left court unusually stoic. She wept throughout her trial, but on Friday, she smiled at one of her friends while being led to a holding cell and didn’t shed a tear.

A tall, shy woman who was taking classes at Oxnard College to become a teacher, Soto did not make a statement prior to her sentencing. Through her attorneys, she requested a face-to-face visit with her five children before being sent to prison.

“For the last two months, she has been fully aware that this is the sentence that would be imposed,” said attorney Jorge Alvarado. “It doesn’t soften the blow.”

Throughout Soto’s trial, defense attorneys argued that she was an abused woman trapped in a violent marriage by a spouse who flaunted his extramarital affairs and humiliated his wife.

The couple had a history of marital problems, and Alba had been arrested for domestic violence in the past.

Defense lawyers told jurors that Soto lashed out in the heat of passion after being raped by her husband on the night of the killing and should not be found guilty of premeditated murder.

The jury rejected the defense claims, however, and sided with Murphy’s portrait of Soto as a vengeful wife who calculated her husband’s murder because she was jealous of his relationship with another woman.

At trial, Murphy suggested that Soto’s actions, before and after the shooting, showed she was not a hapless victim driven by fear.

Instead, the prosecutor argued that Soto carefully planned the purchase of a gun and waited until Alba fell asleep before putting the weapon to his head.

In her closing argument, Murphy told the jury Soto always had the option to leave her husband and, no matter how cruel Alba could be, he wasn’t threatening her life when she killed him.