WATERLOO - A Waterloo woman said her life was spiraling out of control when she crept up to her former boyfriend's home in the middle of the night with a loaded shotgun.

Her voice wavering and her eyes soaked with tears, Beth Howie Delagardelle said she was in the midst of a raging manic episode, had lost her job and was physically ill from what she thought was cancer in August 2004 when she blasted a single deer slug through the window of her ex-boyfriend's Gilbertville home.

"What happened in a split moment has forever changed my life," Delagardelle, 45, of Waterloo, told the court Wednesday as a judge considered her punishment.

"I was a monster that night," she said. Having been diagnosed with bipolar disorder years earlier, Delagardelle said she had eased off her medication because it was interfering with her cancer screenings.

Assistant Black Hawk County Attorney Joel Dalrymple said the slug entered Robert Davis' bedroom window where it struck a fan and showered Davis and his new girlfriend, Dawn Acterman, with lead fragments while they were in bed watching television.

Dalrymple said the shooting wasn't the result of a simple loss of judgment.

"This was a cold, calculated hit," he said, noting she had dressed in all black and slipped away after her husband and family fell asleep at their home.

She retrieved a shotgun from another location, loaded it with several shells and even evaded a Gilbertville police officer at a park not far from Davis' home before opening fire.

The weapon jammed after the first shot, and she ditched it next to a building at Don Bosco School nearby, leaving open the question of how many more rounds she would have fired if not for the malfunction, Dalrymple said.

The shooting was retaliation after Delagardelle learned Davis had moved on and found a girlfriend who wasn't married, Dalrymple said.

He asked the court to sentence her to the maximum of 30 years in prison for her pleas to charges of intimidation with a weapon, willful injury, going armed with intent and carrying a weapon on school grounds.

Defense attorney James Metcalf, who asked to keep his client out of prison on probation, said a mental health doctor had concluded that while Delagardelle had intended to shoot the gun, she hadn't considered the outcome of her actions.

A longtime friend testified the shooting was out of character for Delagardelle, a mother and public relations specialist who ran her own business.

Delagardelle apologized to her victims and said she is now headed down the road to recovery. She told the court she wants to work with others who have mental illness.

Davis, who said he has a shattered bone and nerve damage, said he saw no remorse in Delagardelle. Acterman submitted a letter outlining the physical scars and mental toll of the shooting.

Both received injuries to their legs.

District Court Judge James Bauch sentenced Delagardelle to 10 years in prison for the intimidation charge with concurrent five-year terms for the remaining charges for a total of 10 years.

He said the crime wasn't a spur of the moment action.

Delagardelle was allowed to wait until Dec. 26 - after the holidays - to surrender to authorities and begin serving her sentence.

Contact Jeff Reinitz at (319) 291-1578 or jeff.reinitz@wcfcourier.com.