The Murder of Jeanne Tovrea

Jeanne Tovrea

It took only three-and-a-half hours for the jury to come back with a verdict. Harrod was found "guilty" for the first-degree murder of Jeanne Tovrea and the burglary of her home. Several jurors later came forward after the verdict was given and said that the fingerprints that matched Harrod's found at the crime scene, Anne's testimony and the answering machine tape message were the pieces of evidence that proved most influential when deciding on a verdict. Even though they had no doubt that Harrod was guilty, they didn't believe he was the "the trigger man" but that he was one of several accomplices in her murder, Reeves reported. They also believed Hap was involved in Jeanne's death.

As Harrod was led in shackles out of the courtroom, someone wished him luck to which he replied, "My luck just went away." He couldn't have been more accurate. In May 1998, Judge Reinstein sentenced Butch Harrod to death by lethal injection. Neither Harrod nor his family showed much emotion during the sentencing. Harrod's mother, Marie Wollitz, was quoted by Doug Murphy for The Ahwatukee Foothills News as saying that she "wasn't surprised by the sentence" because they "were told the day after he was arrested by a very prominent attorney, Harrod was on a conveyor belt to death row."

Throughout it all, Harrod denied having anything to do with Jeanne's murder. He said in a The Phoenix New Times interview with Rubin, "If I knew something, maybe I would give it upjust because of what it's doing to my family...I'm not sitting here because of anything I didI'm sitting here because someone wants Ed (Hap) Tovrea."

Harrod, now referred to as inmate # 136270 awaits death in Arizona's State Prison. A date has not yet been set for his execution. As for Hap, he continues to maintain his innocence in the murder plot and has never been charged. He currently resides in La Jolla, California. Unless Harrod implicates him in the eleventh hour, Hap will likely remain free in connection to one of Phoenix's most enduring murder mysteries.