Man gets life for beating death of pastor

During his first interview with police, Rickey Skinner admitted that he had murdered the 80-year-old preacher who allowed him to live in a garage behind his South Side home.

“I was drug-sick, and I killed that man and took his money,” Skinner told Columbus homicide detectives.

On Wednesday, he was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years after pleading guilty to aggravated murder in the March 28 beating death of Joseph McDowell.

Skinner, 43, was in tears as he turned to two of McDowell’s nephews in court to apologize.

“Joe was a good man,” he said. “He took care of me. ... I’m terribly sorry, you guys. I don’t think I deserve to be on the streets anymore. I should be gone.”

Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Guy Reece could have sentenced Skinner to a maximum of life without parole but said he gave Skinner credit for taking responsibility for the slaying “from Day 1.”

Assistant Prosecutor Mark Wodarcyk said Skinner was a drug addict who lived with his girlfriend in the garage behind McDowell’s home in the 200 block of Southard Drive. McDowell was pastor at the nearby Southard Drive Baptist Church.

Skinner admitted to police that he was so desperate for drug money that he robbed McDowell and beat him to death with an aluminum baseball bat.

Police entered the house and found McDowell’s body after the garage exploded and erupted in flames. Firefighters found Skinner and his girlfriend outside the garage with severe burns. The girlfriend eventually told police that Skinner had confessed the murder to her.

The explosion was traced to a disconnected gas line in the garage that ignited when Skinner lit a cigarette, Wodarcyk said.

Defense attorney Thomas Hayes said his client was so addicted to methamphetamine and heroin at the time of the murder that “he can’t comprehend his actions. He’s a tortured soul.”