Man pleads guilty to setting Ohio church on fire because of its ‘religious character’
A man has pleaded guilty to setting fire to an Ohio church building and now faces up to 20 years in prison for violating the federal Church Arson Prevention Act.
Benjamin Ruckel, a 25-year-old resident of Pickerington, pled guilty during a Wednesday hearing to a single charge of setting a fire at Mount Zion Church in Baltimore and causing considerable damage to the facility.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Ruckel confessed to purposely setting the fire "because of the religious character of the church."
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Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division was quoted in the press release as saying that Ruckel "is being held accountable for a devastating church arson that impacted an entire community of worshipers."
"The freedom to congregate in churches across our nation and the liberty to exercise one's religious beliefs must be shielded and protected," Clarke said in a statement. "The Justice Department is committed to protecting our houses of worship and ensuring that all people are able to freely engage in religious practice free from violence and forceful interference."
U.S. Attorney Kenneth L. Parker for the Southern District of Ohio stated that people "should be free to worship without any criminal acts occurring against them or the place in which they come together to do so."
"Combatting these types of unlawful acts is a priority for my office, and together with our law enforcement partners, we will continue to vigorously use every criminal enforcement tool at our disposal to address civil rights violations," Parker added.
On the late evening of Nov. 27, 2021, deputies with the Fairfield County Sheriff's Office responded to a fire at Mount Zion Church while firefighters dealt with the blaze.
Authorities spotted Ruckel fleeing the burning church and eventually located him in a ditch near the building after midnight.
"Ruckel was taken into custody without incident and was transported to the Fairfield County Jail," noted the sheriff's office's 2021 statement. "The fire damage to the church was contained to one area of the structure by fire personnel."
The Church Arson Prevention Act was signed into law in 1996 by President Bill Clinton in response to an apparent uptick in arson attacks on churches, especially those in predominantly African American communities.
There were nearly 500 acts of hostility against churches in the U.S. over the past five years, including 63 churches in the first three months of 2022, according to an analysis from the Family Research Council, a Christian conservative activist organization.
