WBRZ - Baton Rouge

BROOMFIELD TOWNSHIP, Mich. - A 55-year-old ex-church employee in central Michigan is accused of beating and strangling a neighbor to fulfill a sexual fantasy.

John D. White was arraigned Thursday in Mount Pleasant on first-degree murder charges and jailed without bond.

White told investigators he repeatedly struck Rebekah Gay's head with a mallet then strangled her with a zip tie at her Mount Pleasant trailer. He said he stripped her but does not remember if he carried out his fantasy of having sex with Gay's dead body.

Gay's 3-year-old son was home during the attack. A county sheriff says "hopefully he was sleeping."

White told the judge he was a church employee until Wednesday. Church elder Donna Houghton told WOOD-TV that White was a pastor at the Christ Community Fellowship in Mount Pleasant.