An Ohio woman was sentenced to 40 years in prison this week for injecting her estranged husband with an animal tranquilizer — and then burying his body — in an attack that was partly captured on a vehicle dash camera.
Amanda Hovanec, 37, of Wapakoneta, pleaded guilty to multiple charges that included distributing a controlled substance that resulted in death, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Ohio said in a statement Tuesday.
Prosecutors say she killed Timothy Hovanec in 2022 to keep him from seeing their children.
Her lover, Anthony Theodorou, and her mother, Anita Green, who were also charged federally in Timothy Hovanec's death, admitted being involved in the death or helping dispose of the body.
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The Hovanecs, who were divorcing, had three children, prosecutors said. She initiated divorce in 2020 and later began to deny her husband visitation with their children despite a court order allowing it, prosecutors said.
In April 2022, a judge ordered that the children be allowed to visit their father and further ordered that he become the residential parent and legal custodian for two months that coming summer.
On April 24, 2022, Amanda Hovanec injected her husband in the shoulder with M-99, also known as Etorphine, a controlled substance about 1,000 times stronger than morphine, prosecutors said. Audio of the attack, which happened shortly after Timothy Hovanec dropped his children off at his wife’s home, was captured on a dash camera in his Volkswagen Tiguan, said an affidavit in support of criminal complaints against Hovanec.
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Green was at the home and went inside with the children after Amanda Hovanec told them she had a surprise waiting, the affidavit said.
The victim, identified in the affidavit only as T.H., is heard saying on the dash camera video: “What the heck are you doing? Did you just assault me?” according to the affidavit. “Get off of me.”
Amanda Hovanec is then seen in the passenger side of the vehicle pulling on his hands and shirt as he tries to reach for a cellphone, the affidavit says. She moved him to the ground and held his neck, without choking him, until his body went limp on the driveway, the affidavit and prosecutors said.
“Hovanec’s violent and intentional actions were cold-blooded, calculated and cruel. Her extreme malevolence toward her husband and complete disregard for how his murder would affect their innocent children is incomprehensible and unforgiveable,” U.S. Attorney Rebecca Lutzko said in a statement.
Hovanec later confessed to authorities, saying she knew the drug would kill her hsband “within minutes,” the affidavit said.
An attorney listed for Hovanec was not reached for comment Thursday. Court records show that Green has fired multiple attorneys. She was sentenced to 10 years in prison and two years of supervised release after she pleaded guilty to being an accessory to the crimes.
Theodorou, who was charged with distribution of a controlled substance that resulted in death and conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance that resulted in death, was sentenced Thursday to 18 years in prison and ordered to pay more than $2 million in restitution, said his attorney, Steve Palmer.
“The whole thing was tragic. He’s happy to have this finalized for the good of the case," Palmer said.
When Amanda Hovanec spoke to investigators on April 27, 2022, she admitted killing her husband, abandoning his car in Dayton and burying his body in woods not far from her home, prosecutors said. Theodorou obtained the substance used to kill the victim and also helped Hovanec bury her husband’s body, the affidavit said.
Theodorou told investigators Hovanec had been talking about killing her husband for about a year because she felt it “was the only way to prevent the children from spending the summer” with their father, the affidavit said.
Authorities found Timothy Hovanec’s body on April 28, 2022.
Green told investigators she knew about her daughter’s plan to "do something" to her husband but did not think she would go through with it. She also said,she knew she was in deep when she drove her daughter and Theodorou to the burial site, the affidavit said.
“I knew at the time we were driving and we stopped ... I’m in this now,” she said.
— Helen Kwong contributed.
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