Pubdate: Wed, 21 Feb 2001
Source: Philadelphia Daily News (PA)
Copyright: 2001 Philadelphia Newspapers Inc.
Contact:  PO Box 7788, Philadelphia, PA  19101
Website: http://www.phillynews.com/
Forum: http://interactive.phillynews.com/talk-show/
Author: Jeffrey Bair, Associated Press

NO JAIL FOR EX-DISTRICT JUSTICE WHO TOLD DRUG DEALER OF RAID

PITTSBURGH (AP) A former district justice who tipped off her drug dealer
to a police raid was sentenced to two years of probation yesterday and
spared time in a state prison.

Gigi Sullivan, 40, of suburban Pittsburgh must spend 30 days at a drug
rehabilitation facility, followed by 23 months of supervised probation,
Allegheny County Judge Robert E. Colville said.

"We are extremely disappointed," said Kevin Harley, a spokesman for
Attorney General Mike Fisher, whose office prosecuted Sullivan. "We
argued vigorously that the crimes she pleaded guilty to warranted jail
time."

Sullivan will start the probation at a halfway house for drug addicts,
Colville said.

Defense attorney Patrick Thomassey said the program was like jail
because women there cannot leave. But some defendants at the
minimum-security facility run by the Program for Female Offenders, a
nonprofit group, are allowed out for work, doctors' appointments or
Narcotics Anonymous meetings, said Marcia Hinton, associate director of
the program.

The women who work must contribute 30 percent of income for rent and
court costs and must save another 20 percent for themselves, Hinton
said. About 50 people live at the program's dormitory in Pittsburgh, she
said.

Colville said if Sullivan's addictions are successfully treated, she can
live at home while wearing an electronic monitor for whatever is left of
the 23 months. She may leave home for work during that time, the judge
said.

Five years of parole will follow, including regular drug tests, and "if
you make one mistake, I will sentence you to Muncy," the largest state
prison for women, Colville said.

"Some folks might think this is easy. But I think you will have a
difficult time with this," the judge said. "Nowhere are you permitted to
make a mistake. I wish you the best of luck."

Colville was Sullivan's boss as Allegheny County district attorney when
she worked as an assistant in the office in the early 1980s. He became a
judge in 1998 after 24 years as the county's top prosecutor.

Both of Sullivan's defense attorneys, Thomassey and Charles Porter, and
prosecutor Donna McClelland once worked for Colville as assistant
district attorneys.

"I think half the people in this room used to work for me," Colville
said in court.

Sullivan admitted to dealing drugs, obstructing justice and operating a
corrupt organization from her office in the small town of Springdale
from 1996 to 1998. Authorities said her supplier was a used-car dealer
who also pleaded guilty to drug charges after seeking favors with free
cocaine and heroin.

Once, with state troopers waiting nearby for her to sign a warrant,
Sullivan dialed her dealer to warn of imminent "dinner guests," their
code for a raid, said McClelland, a deputy attorney general. "She made a
mockery of her role. Anything less than incarceration excuses what she
has done," McClelland said.

Sullivan, who has an 11-year-old son, already has spent 39 days at a
clinic for addicts and applied to the Betty Ford Clinic in Palm Springs,
Calif., but could not afford it, her lawyers said. Sullivan lost her
district justice's seat in a 1998 election.

"I think the judge was eminently fair," said Thomassey, the defense
attorney. "We are well on the way to getting this behind us."
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