Crofton Woman's Boyfriend Enters Plea In Her Murder

CROFTON, MD — A Crofton man entered a plea Tuesday to charges that he stabbed and beat his girlfriend to death last March and faces a life sentence in prison for her murder. The attacker should never have been free, the county prosecutor said previously when he criticized the judge who released Ryan Gregory Hollebon, 39, from custody in December 2016. Hollebon was arrested then for domestic assault of his girlfriend, whom he killed roughly two months later.

Hollebon, of the 1700 block of Carry Place in Crofton, is accused of violently attacking Jhalandia Elaine Butler, 28, of the same address, in March 2017. Butler was pronounced dead at the scene from more than 50 stab wounds. In court Tuesday, Hollebon entered an Alford plea to the murder charge, which means he does not admit guilt in the crime, but agrees that prosecutors had enough evidence to convict him. In return, the state's attorney's office dropped assault charges against Hollebon, described as an Iraq War veteran battling post-traumatic stress disorder.

Anne Arundel County Police received a call about domestic violence about 9:24 p.m. Sunday, March 5, 2017, at the house Butler and Hollebon shared in the 1700 block of Carry Place in Crofton. Officers arrived at the scene to find Butler lying inside the residence, while Hollebon had fled. He was taken into custody the next day in Baltimore City, police said.

The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner performed an autopsy on Butler and ruled the cause of death was multiple sharped-edge wounds coupled with blunt force trauma and the manner was homicide.

Mason Tunning, who told the Capital-Gazette he is the father of Butler’s child, called Hollebon's plea deal“disgusting.” He added he was surprised by the decision when prosecutors were ready to present evidence that Hollebon was found bloodied in Baltimore the day after Butler’s murder and admitted to police that he had stabbed her.

Anne Arundel County State's Attorney Wes Adams issued a statement denouncing the judge who let Hollebon go free on his own recognizance Dec. 5, 2016, after he was arrested for allegedly choking, shaking, and banging Butler's head. When he was arrested two days earlier for second-degree domestic assault, a District Court Commissioner decided to hold Hollebon without bond, but Judge Thomas V. Miller III released the suspect.

"I am angered at another tragic loss at the hands of alleged domestic abuse. From the outset of this tragedy, one that might have been prevented, my prosecutors were keenly aware of the danger that Mr. Hollebon presented to Jhalandia Butler," Adams said in a statement last year, which didn't identify Miller by name.

During the a bail review hearing on the assault charge, prosecutors voiced implored Miller to hold Hollebon without bail because of the violent nature of the charges, Adams said. His office argued then that Butler would not be safe if Hollebon were released, and if he were released that he should be ordered to have no contact with the victim. Judge Miller denied the requests and has not commented on Adams' criticism.

Hollebon was ordered to complete an in-patient program at the Martinsburg Veterans Affairs Medical Center.

"As prosecutors, we know all too well that domestic violence usually leads to more domestic violence. Therefore, as a rule, we do everything we can to keep the accused from the victim," Adams said. "Unfortunately, at that time, the judge did not heed our requests."

Photo of murder suspect Ryan Hollebon of Crofton, courtesy of the Anne Arundel County Police Department