WAYNE COUNTY, Ind. — A man in Indiana has been sentenced after admitting that he tried to poison his wife so he could marry her daughter.
Alfred W. Ruf’s wife, had been hospitalized in 2021 several times and had tested positive for illegal drugs that she said she didn’t take. She had symptoms of unexplained headaches, drowsiness, diarrhea and other issues. Hospital officials said she had tested positive for MDMA, cocaine and benzodiazepines, WXIN reported.
She eventually went to the Wayne County Sheriff after she said her husband admitted to her that he was trying to kill her, USA Today reported.
Police heard Ruf say he had been “spiking” his wife’s drink with a powder given to him by her daughter. The wife gave police a bottle of an off-white powder and a Coca-Cola can that had off-white residue.
Ruf was interviewed by the sheriff’s department where officials said he confessed.
He said his wife’s daughter, who was from a previous marriage, had given him a pill bottle with the powder in it and that she told him to put it into her mother’s drink.
“Ruf stated that the substance would then make [his wife] go to sleep for approximately 13 hours or so,” court documents said, according to WXIN. “He stated that he would do this to eventually kill her.”
Ruf said the woman told him to “get mom out of the picture,” claim her life insurance and eventually get married.
He said he used the powder 12 times from September 2021 to December 2021, and that he did it to kill her. He, however, said “he felt bad” and told his wife the plot, WKRC reported. The wife said that she became suspicious and that’s when he actually told her about the drugging and affair, WXIN reported.
Ruf pleaded guilty to aggravated battery last month and was sentenced this week to four years in prison and five years of probation, USA Today reported. Originally he had been charged with conspiracy to commit murder but that charge was dropped, WXIN reported.
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