TULSA, Okla. — Content Warning: This article describes violent crimes, including sexual assault, rape and murder.

A Welch man was sentenced Friday in federal court for murdering his 81-year-old mother in her home on Aug. 4, 2011.

According to Acting U.S. Attorney Clint Johnson, U.S. District Judge Gregory K. Frizzell accepted the plea agreement and sentenced Michael Joe Rice, 58, to 540 months in federal prison.

In July 2021, Rice pleaded guilty to second degree murder in Indian Country and admitted that he killed his mother, Ruth Rice, by beating her to death.

Following Rice’s statement at sentencing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Morgan criticized Rice for not offering an apology for raping and murdering his mother. He then stated that a 45-year sentence would ensure Rice was held accountable for the crime while also sparing the victim’s family from having to go through further court proceedings.

According to court documents, Rice’s then girlfriend told a Craig County Sheriff’s Office deputy that she and Rice found his adoptive mother in a back hallway of her home in Welch, Okla. She explained they both believed Rice’s mother was dead. She directed the deputy to the victim’s home, which is located on the Cherokee Nation Reservation. Rice’s mother was dead in her home.

In Aug. 2011, Rice was interviewed by special agents from the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation (OSBI). Rice told agents that the murder happened over money. He also told them he was depressed. He explained that he went to his mother’s house and began hitting her multiple times before tackling her to the ground.

When she asked Rice what he was doing, he hit her in the head. He grabbed nearby bags, pushed them into her mouth to stop her from yelling. He continued to assault her and eventually went home. He told agents that he was unsure if she had died at the time, but she was no longer speaking when he left.

According to an affidavit filed in the federal case, Mize told agents that he returned to his mother’s home and raped. He said he thought she was still alive at the time of the attack. The Chief Medical Examiner confirmed that the victim had sustained blunt force to the head and was sexually assaulted.

Rice, a citizen of the Cheyenne and Araphaho Tribes of Oklahoma, previously pleaded guilty to the murder in Craig County District Court but challenged his state conviction and sentence based on the Supreme Court ruling in McGrit v. Oklahoma and the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals ruling in Hogner v. Oklahoma.

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He appeared Friday in federal court on a writ from the Oklahoma Department of Corrections (DOC), where he is serving a life sentence without parole. Now that he has been sentenced in federal court, he will return to an Oklahoma DOC facility to serve his life sentence without the possibility of parole as handed down in Craig County District Court.

“Michael Rice brutally assaulted his mother and left her for dead,” said Acting U.S. Attorney Clint Johnson. “His actions were heinous and inexcusable. I am thankful for the state and federal investigators and prosecutors who have worked diligently since 2011 to hold this killer accountable for his crimes.”

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