A mentally ill man who confessed to strangling a woman nine years after the killing, then called his confession “a lie,” has been sentenced to 17 years to life in prison.
Aleksey Koloskov, 39, was convicted in August of charges including murder and tampering with evidence. Prosecutors said Koloskov, in 2013, strangled 28-year-old Melinda Sue Ingram in Avondale as she sat in the passenger seat of his car. He then drove to Kentucky and left Ingram’s body near a wooded area along Interstate 75 in Kenton County.
At a sentencing Sept. 30 in Hamilton County Common Pleas Court, Judge Robert Goering imposed the mandatory sentence for murder, 15 years to life, and added two additional years for tampering with evidence.
“Your time in prison – if I could
give you more, I would,” Goering told Koloskov.
The case remained unsolved until 2022, when Koloskov flagged down a police officer and said that he wanted to confess.
In a videorecorded interview with Cincinnati police detectives played during the trial, Koloskov said he couldn’t explain the killing. He had picked up Ingram to have sex with her. He said they both used drugs and that he eventually decided to start choking her.
He told the detectives that he did it for “pleasure” and that he laughed at her as she was dying.
At the time, according to Koloskov, he felt like he could do what he wanted.
“Those days I was thinking I was on top of the world, I could do what I want,” he said during the interview. “No one can catch me. I’m invincible.”
He was charged in Ingram’s death and spent several years in custody before his trial, including a yearlong stay at a state psychiatric hospital. He was diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder but through treatment was deemed mentally competent to stand trial.
He told a forensic psychiatrist that he was abusing alcohol and street drugs in the time leading up to his confession. He also said he was hearing commands he attributed to God and that he was told to sacrifice his freedom. Koloskov’s attorney said during the trial that he said he wanted to put himself in jail to fulfill a religious calling.
At the Sept. 30 sentencing, Koloskov declined to make a statement.
Assistant Prosecutor Jeff Heile said Koloskov, even now, “refuses to accept the fact that he did in fact murder Ms. Ingram.”
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Man who confessed to killing then called confession 'a lie' sentenced
