It’s the kind of story that makes you stop mid-scroll. A trained boxer, a night out gone wrong, and one tragic punch that ended a man’s life. In Lincoln, 37-year-old Max Skidmore has just been sentenced to six years and eight months in jail after killing 55-year-old Eddie Roberts with a single hit on a December night last year.
According to the BBC, Eddie was walking home after hanging out with friends at the Queen In The West pub when he crossed paths with Max, who had been out celebrating his own birthday. The court heard that Max had been drinking heavily, about two and a half times over the limit, and had also taken cannabis and cocaine. Witnesses said he was speeding around Lincoln trying to find his girlfriend before he pulled over and approached Eddie on Carholme Road. Moments later, Eddie was on the ground.
Max told the court that it was only a “slap” to “shoo him off,” but the judge did not believe him. Judge Catarina Sjolin Knight called him a danger to the public and said his story did not match the facts. This was not even his first violent outburst. Just seven months earlier, he had been given a conditional discharge for assaulting someone in a pub.
Eddie’s family is devastated. His son described him as hilarious, loving, caring, and stubborn in the best way possible, a man who could “turn his hand to anything.” It is a story that feels senseless. One bad decision after too many drinks, and now one life is gone while another will be spent behind bars.
