The woman who discovered her husband Robert Bruce was a serial rapist

A woman has told of her shock after she discovered her husband of six years was a serial rapist.

Joy Lynn Martinez first met Robert Bruce - who she describes as a 'Ben Affleck look-alike' - in a bar in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and after a two year romance they tied the knot.

But following his arrest three years ago, she was stunned to lea that her partner had been leading a double life, and over the course of 20 years he had committed a string of sexual assaults.

Hiding secrets: Joy Lynn Martinez with Robert Bruce on their wedding day in Hawaii

This Tuesday he was sentenced to 156 years in prison, after pleading guilty to nine charges of rape in New Mexico.

He has also been linked to sex crimes in Oklahoma, Colorado and Texas and is often referred to as the Ether Man, as police say he used chemical-soaked rags to disable his female victims.

Ms Martinez, who features on Who the [Bleep] Did I Marry?, a TV show that follows the stories of spouses who are unaware of their partner's secret life, said after the revelation she 'basically just shut down'.

'I couldn’t understand how I could be married to someone, who could be this person,' she said.

While one of Mr Bruce's friends added: 'I couldn't believe that I knew this man for this many years, and he was capable of what he has done.'

Ms Martinez and Mr Bruce met in a bar in June 2001, when Ms Martinez was 27 and recently divorced from the father of her two sons.

She told Marie Claire magazine, this February: 'He was my Prince Charming at first. He was 12 years older, but he was in great shape and loved going out. He was generous, and I was a struggling single mom.'

Like her, Mr Bruce was divorced and she said that he was 'super-involved' with his three children.

Nine months after they met he proposed, but Ms Martinez admitted that she didn't say 'yes' at first because she didn't like the way he talked about women.

She said: 'I heard him talking about other women in a cold, even harsh, manner. He often commented on how they were dressed, calling any girl in shorts or tight jeans a slut.'

 

Robert Bruce was sentenced to 156 years in prison, after pleading guilty to nine charges of rape in New Mexico

Her mother also disapproved of the relationship. However his persistence paid off, and the couple tied the knot in September 2003, next to a waterfall on Hawaii's Big Island. They then relocated with Ms Martinez's children to Pueblo, Colorado.

But a year into their marriage Ms Martinez described that her husband became increasingly
'controlling - and cheap', and after she discovered that he had secretly filmed the two of them having sex, she decided to leave.

'How could he do something like that to me?  My mind was made up.'

But after leaving the marital home with her children, she said that Mr Bruce 'morphed back into the guy who'd wooed me' and they gradually worked things out.

However her husband's erratic behavior continued to make her suspicious, and in September 2009 her worst fears were confirmed.

Still in shock: Ms Martinez says that 'it will be a while before I'm ready to really trust someone'

She spotted a headline in the local paper reading, Cops Back on Trail of 'Ether Man' Rapist, and immediately she suspected Mr Bruce.

She said: 'The idea was insane, like I'd woken up in the middle of a Lifetime movie. But the timeline fit: He'd moved to Albuquerque in the early '90s; and the article indicated that the assaults had apparently ended around 2000, shortly before he'd left for Pueblo.

'I knew he'd been in Austin for work in May 2006, when a rape there had occurred. And then there was our own weird history with the tape. It all clicked.'

Two days later Mr Bruce was arrested, after police suspected that he had tried to kill someone. He was also suspected of having placed a homemade bomb outside the house of a police officer who had been planning to testify against him in a Peeping Tom case.

Three policemen questioned Ms Martinez, and it was then she told them she suspected that her husband was the Ether Man rapist.

She explained: 'He'd probably been afraid that if he was found guilty in the Peeping Tom case, he would have to submit DNA to a national sex-offender database, which would link him to the notorious Ether Man rapes.'

After Mr Bruce's DNA came back as a positive match, he was charged with ten sexual assaults in Albuquerque, New Mexico, one in Austin, and another in Pueblo. At the time Ms Martinez described that she 'felt revolted'.

In the dock: After Mr Bruce's DNA came back as a positive match in 2009, he was charged with ten sexual assaults in Albuquerque, New Mexico, one in Austin, and another in Pueblo

She recalled: 'My head swam with anger and confusion as I replayed moments from our marriage. Every time we'd had sex, he'd closed his eyes.

'It always bothered me, and when I once asked what he was thinking about, he flirtatiously said I didn't want to know. Now I wondered if he'd been reliving the awful things he'd done to those girls.'

In 2010 Mr Bruce was found guilty of the Peeping Tom case and of attempted murder a year later.

Ms Martinez now says that she is enjoying spending time with her two sons, and while she is dating, 'it will be a while before I'm ready to really trust someone'.