Career
He was arrested at a restaurant in Little Italy and charged with "consorting with known criminals for unlawful purposes" in 1965. Kovolick fled New York to avoid an indictment to appear before a Manhattan grand jury investigating illegal gambling, bribery and corruption. Authorities were attempting to extradite him back to New York before his disappearance, as assistant district attorney Samuel South. Yasgur filed an affidavit in Miami in February 1971.
The body of Philip Kovolick was found sealed in a steel drum at the bottom of a rock pit in Hallandale, Florida after disappearing on April 7, 1971.
Police would later charge 36-year-old John Alvin Baxter with first degree murder regarding the case. Baxter was sentenced to death.
Eventually the sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.
