Years of appeals end in Harshman pleading no contest in death of Antrim Township man

After years of efforts to appeal his murder conviction, Ronald Harshman has taken a plea deal in connection with the 1985 disappearance of an Antrim Township man. 

Harshman pleaded no contest July 29 to third-degree murder for the death of Melvin Elwood Snyder, according to court records. The plea means he does not admit guilt but acknowledges the prosecution has evidence against him. 

Now 70 years old, he had been awaiting his retrial on a charge of first-degree murder for Snyder's death, for which he was serving life in prison with no possibility of parole. Convicted and sentenced to prison in 2001, 15 years passed between Snyder's disappearance and the time Harshman was charged.  The prosecution had no body and no weapon. 

The new trial was scheduled to take place in January 2020. Initially set for June, the trial was pushed back after Franklin County's judicial bench was recused due to one judge's involvement in the original case and trial. A Cumberland County judge has ruled over the case the past few months. 

Following the no-contest plea, Cumberland County Court of Common Pleas Judge Edward Guido sentenced Harshman to 10-20 years in prison. He received credit for the 19 years he has already served. He is currently in custody at SCI-Camp Hill, according to the prison system's inmate locator. 

This March, a U.S. district judge vacated Harshman's conviction and ruled he be retried or set free, saying the state failed to reveal evidence to the defense that could have changed the outcome of his trial.  

Harshman's attorney argued Franklin County's district attorney at the time of Harshman's trial, Jack Nelson, had offered a favor to a jailhouse informant and did not disclose it to the defense. 

The federal district judge, Christopher C. Conner of the Middle District of Pennsylvania, said the Commonwealth "deprived Ronald Harshman of an opportunity to challenge the motives and veracity of jailhouse witnesses, whose testimony was critical" to his conviction for first-degree murder.

By failing to disclose material evidence in its possession, the Commonwealth violated Harshman's due-process rights, he said in the order vacating Harshman's conviction. 

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An affair, then a disappearance

Harshman in May 1984 learned of an affair between his wife, Teresa, and his married co-worker Snyder, according to court records. After learning Teresa and Snyder were going to Montana, Harshman confronted Snyder and fired shots near him. Snyder requested reckless endangerment charges filed against Harshman be dropped, and he and Teresa went to Montana. 

Three days after Harshman was served with divorce papers in 1985, he bought a .25-caliber handgun, according to court records. Snyder disappeared four days later on May 25, 1985. Snyder's truck was found two days later in Reiserstown, Maryland. Snyder’s wife found a .25-caliber shell casing in the Snyder barn on Grant Shook Road in Antrim Township and gave it to police. Snyder did not own a .25.

Snyder was declared legally dead in 1993, according to court records. Investigators searched the former Harshman property in 1999 for shell casings and found a single casing, which a ballistics expert matched to the shell casing from Snyder's barn.

Harshman was charged with first-degree murder following a recommendation by a grand jury, which district attorney Nelson convened to review unsolved cases.

Witnesses told police they saw a truck like Harshman's parked near Snyder's barn that morning. The next day, Snyder's wife, Joan Snyder Hall, went to Harshman's home in Antrim Township and saw her husband's body lying on the basement floor.

Hall was also charged, as she was accused of telling Harshman that Snyder would be alone in their barn the morning of May 25, 1985. All charges against her were later dropped, as a county judge determined she had been an unwitting participant.