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Serenasailor
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Serenasailor
Post Number: 325
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: 
Votes: 1 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 28, 2006 - 04:28 pm: | 
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Just before dawn on a January morning in 1987, a man in a tweed cap banged on the door of Lita McClinton Sullivan's townhouse in Buckhead.
Looking out her window, she could see a small car parked at the curb. She didn't open her door.
(ENLARGE)
James V. Sullivan
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Later that day, Lita Sullivan recalled the seemingly unremarkable moment during a phone call to a friend in Macon. "No one in Atlanta's going to open their door to a stranger at 6 in the morning," Sullivan said, according to court testimony.
Three mornings later, Bob Christenson, Lita Sullivan's neighbor at The Coaches was taking out the garbage about 8:20 a.m. He spotted a "rough-looking" man staring at Lita Sullivan's building. The man carried a long white box.
"The hair stood on the back of my neck," Christenson told a federal court jury five years later. A Vietnam veteran, he said the sight of the 40ish, clean-shaven, balding white man in the green jacket "was like the instinct you had on patrol when you're going to get hit."
As Christenson walked into his garage, he said he heard Lita Sullivan say from the second-floor window: "I'll be right down."
Thus began a murder drama to match anything in fiction: wealth, high society, ambition, an interracial marriage and bitter divorce battle between the daughter of a prominent Atlanta family and a Boston Irishman who rose from blue-collar roots to become a millionaire. The Jan. 16, 1987, murder prompted a pursuit that spanned three continents.
Moments after hearing Sullivan's voice, Christenson said he heard two rapid shots. Recognizing them instantly for what they were, he dived for cover.
The gunman sprinted from the complex, running "like a bat out of hell," heading in the direction of West Paces Ferry Road, said a woman whose car he almost hit at the entrance to the complex.
Atlanta police found 35-year-old Lita Sullivan — an attractive, spirited society hostess and charity organizer who loved flowers — on the foyer floor next to a box of long-stem pink roses. She was dying of a gunshot wound to the head.
Police and prosecutors long have suspected her estranged husband, James Vincent Sullivan, of having something to do with her killing. He eluded their legal efforts for years, and for a long time could not even be found.
Yet Sullivan, 63, now sits in the Fulton County Jail awaiting trial on charges of hiring a hitman to kill his wife. He was extradited to Atlanta from Thailand on March 26. District Attorney Paul Howard intends to seek the death penalty at a trial that is expected early next year.
The purchase
Shortly before 8 a.m. on the day Lita Sullivan was killed, two bearded men pulled up to a Peachtree Road florist shop five minutes from her townhouse, police said. They drove a small white car.
Randall Benson, the store's clerk, told police the men were seedy-looking. He said the one who came into the store seemed jumpy and looked as if he might be casing the place for a robbery.
The man demanded roses, any color so long as they were boxed. Benson chose pink and asked if they were for a special occasion.
"No occasion!" the buyer snapped. He stopped Benson from putting a sticker from the shop on the box.
Homer Deakins, who still lives in a condo adjacent to where Lita Sullivan lived, was drinking coffee in his breakfast nook when he saw the man with the long, rectangular "rose box" walking up to Sullivan's home.
"He didn't look like a guy who would be delivering flowers," Deakins recalled. "He just looked shabby."
Forty minutes after the shooting, a collect call lasting less than a minute was answered at the Palm Beach, Fla., mansion of James Sullivan, authorities said.
The call was made from a pay phone at a rest stop on I-85 near Suwanee.
New wealth, new wife
Born in Boston on April 5, 1941, James Sullivan — son of a newspaper typesetter — graduated from Holy Cross College with a degree in economics. In 1973, he moved to Georgia with his wife and four children to manage Crown Beverage, his uncle's liquor distributorship in Macon. He made about $24,000 a year.
Two years later, the uncle died, and Sullivan inherited the business. In 1976, he obtained a divorce.
Then in his mid-30s, Sullivan met Lita McClinton, 10 years his junior, at Lenox Square mall, where she managed a boutique.
The daughter of Emory and JoAnn McClinton — the former state transportation board member, the latter a state legislator — Lita Sullivan was a native Atlantan and a graduate of Spelman College. She married James Sullivan in December 1976.
In 1983, Sullivan sold the liquor distributorship to a Florida firm for $5 million. The couple moved from Macon to Palm Beach, where Sullivan bought an oceanfront mansion for $2 million.
The Sullivans lived in opulence. But privately, according to police, court records and testimony, James Sullivan was a tightwad. He reportedly forced his wife to manage the 17,000-square-foot mansion on as little as $50 a week and was so cheap he wore World War II Army-issue underwear inherited from his uncle.
Shocking claim in court
Lita Sullivan told her parents and close friends she never wanted to live in Palm Beach. In August 1985, she filed for divorce, accusing her husband of stinginess and infidelity. She drove to Atlanta and moved into the Buckhead townhouse her husband had bought as a second home.
She demanded the $450,000 townhouse, its antique French furnishings, jewelry worth $100,000 and alimony.
Atlanta police suspected Sullivan had his wife killed because he feared losing any of his wealth or property.
At their request, the Palm Beach County state's attorney subpoenaed Sullivan's home telephone records and discovered the rest-stop phone call. But the call by itself was not enough to make a case. Investigators' other leads went nowhere.
Eight months after his wife's murder, Sullivan married Korean-born Hyo-Sook Choi Rogers, the ex-wife of a Palm Beach investor.
Widely known as "Suki," the third Mrs. Sullivan handed authorities their first break. In June 1990, she sued for divorce, claiming an "extreme fear" of her husband.
At the divorce trial that fall, Suki Sullivan testified that her husband confessed to her that he had arranged Lita's death. She said she feared "I'd be next."
The suspect vanishes
In January 1992, a federal grand jury in Atlanta indicted James Sullivan on contract murder charges. Suki Sullivan was a witness.
The charge: Sullivan violated interstate commerce laws by arranging the killing through phone calls between his Florida mansion and an alleged three-man "hit team" at a Sandy Springs motel.
Defense attorney Don Samuel moved for dismissal, arguing there was no evidence of who made the calls or what was said during them. U.S. District Judge Marvin Shoob, reluctantly agreed.
Lita Sullivan's parents sued Sullivan in Florida, accusing him of wrongful death. The McClintons won a $4 million award in 1994 but have yet to collect.
Sullivan sold his mansion in 1992 for a reported $3.2 million and moved to an apartment north of Palm Beach. But not for long. Authorities say that in late 1997 he left for Costa Rica, where he had built another home.
A major break came the following March.
A Texas woman, Belinda Trahan, said she recognized Sullivan as the gaunt, well-dressed man who talked "like a Yankee" and passed $25,000 to her former boyfriend, a long-distance trucker, at a North Florida diner. Her boyfriend, Phillip Anthony "Tony" Harwood, later pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter in Lita Sullivan's killing. He received a 20-year prison sentence. He agreed to testify against Sullivan. Harwood is the only member of the alleged three-man hit team who has been arrested.
Bolstered by Harwood's arrest, a Fulton County grand jury indicted Sullivan in May 1998 on murder-for-hire charges. But he had disappeared.
Authorities now say Sullivan dodged them by driving to Panama, catching a plane to Caracas, Venezuela, and going from there to Thailand.
He arrived in Thailand that same month with his girlfriend, Chongwattana "Nana" Reynolds, a Thai native and West Palm Beach divorcée, according to authorities.
For nearly four years, he and Reynolds, now 45 and Sullivan's fourth wife, lived in a beach resort on the Gulf of Thailand in a condo he bought for $128,000. The manager of the condo complex, Sompob Prasraki, said Sullivan mostly remained inside the complex and was feared by staffers for his short temper.
Two years ago, someone in Thailand spotted Sullivan after seeing him featured as a fugitive on "America's Most Wanted."
At the request of the U.S. Justice Department, Thai authorities began watching Sullivan, while the State Department secured papers for his arrest. Early on the evening of July 2, 2002, the Royal Thai police and the FBI arrested Sullivan as he and Reynolds returned from a walk on the beach.
Confined to a prison near Bangkok among 50 or more prisoners in a cell block built for 20, Sullivan fought extradition for nearly 19 months. The Thai Supreme Court ruled against him in January.
Deputy U.S. Marshal Scott Page, one of four lawmen who returned Sullivan to Atlanta, said American officials told him that Sullivan had a rough time in prison. "He got hurt in a fight with a Thai prisoner and needed medical attention," Page said. "A prisoner jumped on a footlocker and kicked him several times, knocked one of his teeth out."
On the plane trip back, Sullivan insisted his extradition was illegal, Page said.
"My perception of him was a guy used to having his own way," Page said, "and when you tell him it's not going to be his way, he gives you instant attitude."
A haggard, angry-looking Sullivan — his mouth covered with a surgical mask — limped into the Fulton County Jail on March 26. He had a swollen foot that became infected in the Thai prison.
Christenson, the former neighbor who moved a few years after the killing, welcomes Sullivan's return to face trial.
"It's taken so long," he said. "It's time for justice to prevail."
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Renata
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Renata
Post Number: 794
Registered: 08-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 28, 2006 - 05:31 pm: |
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I'm in Atlanta, I've heard about it. He was also on America's Most Wanted. Someone recognized him from the show and turned him in. He was living in Thailand at the time.
What a dumbass.....who marries a Spelman graduate who works and LIVES in Buckhead, and then expect her to live on 50.00 a week? To those Spelman chicks, that's hardly enough for lunch! Then he had the nerve to marry the former wife of an investor! His dumb ass knew he was going to have to PAY for those high-society poontangs.
I can only wonder what drove her to ask for the townhome, since her own family are pretty rich and could have given her a house. But I guess, since he had houses like that, taking one (and the cheaper one) didn't seem like such a big deal.
From what they're saying on the news, it seems that he may be convicted.
Let's hope so. |
Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 139
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 28, 2006 - 06:01 pm: |
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I remember hearing about this contract killing when it happened, but I didn't know it was a Black lady. The trial is currently being televised on Court TV. |
Roxie
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Roxie
Post Number: 707
Registered: 06-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, March 01, 2006 - 01:24 pm: |
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Essence magazine had an article on this murder a couple years back.
Oh, and they just had a program about it on Court TV.
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Stephgirl
Regular Poster
Username: Stephgirl
Post Number: 33
Registered: 09-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, March 02, 2006 - 01:03 pm: |
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I'm very familiar with the Lita Sullivan murder. The media blew the OJ murder trial out of proportion while this trial barely peeped outside of Atlanta newspapers and Essence magazine which published the story of Lita Sullivan.
America has place a very low value on black women's lives in general. This one is no different.
Stephanie |
Renata
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Renata
Post Number: 852
Registered: 08-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, March 10, 2006 - 11:05 pm: |
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Guilty on all counts.
Another trial ended today: the trial of Bill Campbell. Guilty of tax evasion, but not guilty of most of the other charges. |
Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 229
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - 05:36 pm: |
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Sullivan just got life in prison with no parole. |
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