Jurors heard evidence about prepaid texts, hotel Wi-Fi, travel records and calls between Thomas O’Donnell and Julie Harding.
BURKESVILLE, Ky. — A Kentucky jury convicted Thomas O’Donnell of murder after prosecutors used phone data, hotel records and a prepaid cellphone to trace what they called a planned killing disguised as an HVAC service call.
O’Donnell, 64, of Napa, California, was sentenced May 4 to life in prison for the 2022 death of Michael Harding, a 53-year-old Navy and Army veteran. The verdict followed testimony that mapped a three-state trail involving Harding, his estranged wife, California Highway Patrol Capt. Julie Harding, and a vacant home in Burkesville. Prosecutors said the records showed O’Donnell was the man who brought Harding to the house and shot him.
The most detailed evidence came from the hours before Harding died. Investigators said a prepaid phone contacted Harding about HVAC work at a home on Glasgow Road, a property that was empty and listed for sale. FBI Special Agent Elizabeth Wheeler testified that Harding messaged the prepaid phone at 4:10 p.m. on Sept. 19, 2022, writing that he was “35 minutes out.” The person using the other phone answered, “No worries.” Harding asked, “Is that good for you?” The response came back, “Yes.” Harding wrote, “See ya soon.” The final reply at 4:16 p.m. was, “Perfect.” Prosecutors said those short exchanges were the last steps of the setup.
The prepaid phone became a key piece of the state’s case because investigators said it traveled in the same areas as O’Donnell’s personal phone. Wheeler testified that records showed both devices making trips before the killing to Celina, Tennessee, where Michael Harding lived after separating from Julie Harding. She also said O’Donnell’s phone had been near Julie Harding’s phone in the Sacramento area two days before the killing. On the day Harding was shot, Julie Harding’s phone placed her in Sacramento, while O’Donnell’s phone and the prepaid device were near the Kentucky crime scene, prosecutors said. The defense pressed witnesses on the limits of that evidence, noting that cell data shows devices, not necessarily the people holding them.
Investigators also pointed jurors to a laptop. They said the Glasgow Road address was searched twice on a computer connected to Wi-Fi at a hotel roughly an hour from the property. Prosecutors argued that the searches showed O’Donnell had located the house before Harding arrived. They also introduced travel and lodging records to show a route from California toward the region where Harding lived and worked. The defense said the prosecution was stacking pieces of circumstantial evidence without a direct witness, without a murder weapon tied in open court to O’Donnell and without clear proof that any cash payment reached him from Julie Harding.
The state’s broader theory began months earlier, when Julie and Michael Harding’s marriage was ending. Julie Harding filed for divorce in May 2022. Prosecutors said she then withdrew large amounts of cash from shared accounts, including $102,000, $73,000 and $47,700. The withdrawals totaled more than $220,000. Court filings alleged the money was part of the murder plot and was meant to pay O’Donnell. The defense disputed that claim and said the state could not show a completed payment. Prosecutors also cited 194 phone calls between Julie Harding and O’Donnell during the three months before the killing, saying the volume of contact showed a relationship and coordination.
Julie Harding’s law enforcement career made the case stand out. She had worked for the California Highway Patrol since 1999 and had risen to a command role. At the time of Michael Harding’s death, she was separated from him and remained in California while he lived in Tennessee, where the couple had once planned to retire. Prosecutors described O’Donnell as her lover and accused the two of forming a plan that used Harding’s HVAC work to make him reachable and vulnerable. Michael Harding’s job mattered because a call for repair service would not seem strange. It was part of his daily work and, prosecutors said, part of why the plan succeeded.
Harding’s body was discovered Sept. 26, 2022, by a real estate agent showing the Burkesville house to potential renters. Authorities said he had been shot multiple times. The house was empty, and Harding had no known personal tie to it beyond the service call. Earlier in the search for him, investigators had found evidence that his black pickup had been in the Bowling Green area, but his disappearance did not immediately reveal the full plot prosecutors later described. As the investigation widened, law enforcement agencies in Kentucky, Tennessee and California worked through phone records, property access, travel history and bank activity.
O’Donnell was arrested Dec. 8, 2022, at Sacramento International Airport while preparing to fly to Tennessee. Julie Harding was arrested that same day in Tennessee on stalking and burglary charges that were separate from the murder case. Those charges involved the woman Michael Harding had been dating and an October security video that showed Julie Harding taking Harding’s dog, Charlie, from a Murfreesboro home. Julie Harding died two days later in Celina, Tennessee, from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound. She had been on administrative leave and never faced a murder trial.
During closing arguments, prosecutors told jurors they did not need one dramatic piece of evidence because the records fit together. Prosecutor Jesse Stockton said the trail pointed to O’Donnell and no one else. “There’s no evidence someone else killed him,” Stockton said. He described O’Donnell as an “amateur hitman from California” and asked jurors to return a murder verdict. Defense attorneys argued that the case still contained doubt. They said the state could not prove who held the phones, could not prove O’Donnell received money and could not replace missing direct evidence with a theory built from movements and messages.
The jury sided with prosecutors May 1. The life sentence issued May 4 brought the trial court phase to a close, though the defense may pursue an appeal. For Harding’s relatives, the verdict followed more than three years of uncertainty after he vanished while doing the kind of work that had made the supposed appointment seem ordinary. His daughter, Heather Cavalieri, said the family felt both happy and shocked after the guilty verdict. The emotional reaction reflected the long path from a missing-person concern to a murder case built on digital records.
Any next steps are expected to move through post-conviction filings, while Julie Harding’s death leaves part of the alleged conspiracy beyond trial. O’Donnell remains in Kentucky custody under a life sentence.
Author note: Last updated May 25, 2026.