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Homeless Tampa couple mourned as detectives make arrest in double killing

 
Annie Skeens holds a sign seeking donations for memorial services for her father, Tommy Skeens, who was beaten to death Saturday with his girlfriend, Lara Kuchar. “I need answers. … I need to know why,” she said.  
Annie Skeens holds a sign seeking donations for memorial services for her father, Tommy Skeens, who was beaten to death Saturday with his girlfriend, Lara Kuchar. “I need answers. … I need to know why,” she said. 
Published Dec. 2, 2015

TAMPA — A pair of dark smears mark the concrete at the exit to the abandoned carwash. Annie Skeens stepped inside Tuesday afternoon and pointed to the first red stain.

"My dad was sleeping right here," she said. "He hit my dad first."

The spot marked the place where Tommy Skeens died. He was beaten to death along with his girlfriend, Lara Kuchar. Steps away, beside a curb bordered with dirt and weeds, another red spot marked the place where she died.

On Monday, Hillsborough sheriff's deputies arrested the man they say killed the homeless couple early Saturday.

Ricky Fitzgerald Hathorn had been making sexual advances toward Kuchar, 45, which she rebuffed, officials said.

When she and Skeens, 52, were found, detectives said she was partially undressed, her body bludgeoned. A blood-covered piece of wood and a used condom lay nearby.

Hathorn, 46, was jailed on charges of murder and sexual battery. He was held Tuesday on $550,000 bail.

"I need answers," Annie Skeens said, weeping. "I've got a lot of questions. I need to know why."

On Tuesday afternoon, Annie Skeens, 24, and her boyfriend, Michael Northrup, knelt before a wooden cross bearing her father's name outside the carwash at 7702 E Hillsborough Ave. They prayed and embraced.

The couple's violent end was something no one foresaw, she said. Tommy Skeens had helped raise two children, Annie and Timothy Skeens, along with two other step-children. He had been estranged from his wife, Philana, Annie Skeens said.

He used to work in an independent business selling truck tires, his daughter said. Only recently had he become homeless.

He and Kuchar had been together for several years, Annie Skeens said. Kuchar was from Michigan and had three kids.

She maintained more than one Facebook page, occasionally posting to vent and tell relatives she missed them.

"Life isn't easy," she wrote on her Facebook page last week.

"Hang in there," a friend wrote.

Skeens and Kuchar had been living in a rented U-Haul trailer until a few weeks ago, Kuchar said. When they lost the trailer, the carwash owner told them they could stay there.

They became known in the close-knit homeless community, along with their 10-pound mutt, Tiny. They sometimes panhandled near the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino.

It was unclear how, or if, they came to know Hathorn.

Harold Hathorn, 52, of Mississippi was stunned Tuesday to learn of his brother's arrest.

"Me and him used to be real close until he got on drugs," Hathorn said. "Mostly I think he had got on crack. He just totally changed."

He knew his brother had encountered hard times, largely due to problems with addiction. But he never suspected the man could be violent, he said. After their mother kicked Ricky Hathorn out of her house, he eventually moved to South Carolina. It was the last place his brother knew he was living.

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The brothers hadn't seen each other in three years. But a few months ago, Ricky Hathorn called. They spoke briefly. Ricky Hathorn said he was at a casino.

"He used to love to go to the casino," his brother said.

Witnesses told sheriff's detectives that Hathorn was with Skeens and Kuchar when the couple was last seen alive. On Monday, they found and questioned him.

He admitted beating the couple, officials said.

On Tuesday, Skeens worried how she and her family would pay the costs of her father's cremation. She tried to raise money in the best way she knew how — soliciting drivers with a handwritten sign.

She carried a news article, detailing her father's killing, for anyone who might ask.

"He always took care of his family," she said. "He never bothered nobody."

Contact Dan Sullivan at dsullivan@tampabay.com or (813) 226-3386. Follow @TimesDan.