A Puzzling Murder

Summary

20/20 Podcast Summary: "A Puzzling Murder"

Podcast Information:

• Title: 20/20
• Host/Author: ABC News
• Episode: A Puzzling Murder
• Description: Unforgettable true crime mysteries, exclusive newsmaker interviews, hard-hitting investigative reports, and in-depth coverage of high-profile stories. Now listen twice weekly, with The 20/20 True Crime Vault each Wednesday.

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Introduction

The "A Puzzling Murder" episode of ABC News' 20/20 delves into the mysterious and tragic case of Lita McClinton Sullivan, a young Black woman from Atlanta whose life was abruptly ended under suspicious circumstances. Hosted by Clint Rucker, the episode navigates through the complexities of the investigation, the players involved, and the relentless pursuit of justice by Lita's family.

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Background: Lita McClinton Sullivan's Life

Lita McClinton Sullivan was a beloved member of Atlanta's exclusive Buckhead neighborhood, known for its sprawling mansions and affluent residents. Raised in a prosperous environment, Lita attended Spelman College and pursued a career in fashion, diverging from her parents' political aspirations. Her charm and kindness earned her a wide circle of friends and a reputation as someone "that would give you the shirt off her back" (05:05).

Notable Quotes:

• Tony Harwood: "She was just a gem, very, very proper." (11:03)
• Clint Rucker: "Lita was a really wonderful young lady." (05:14)

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The Marriage to James Sullivan

Despite their stark differences, Lita fell in love with Jim Sullivan, a white man from Boston with a middle to lower-middle-class background. Their interracial relationship in the 1970s South was met with resistance from Lita's parents, Emory and Joanne McClinton, who feared for their daughter's safety and societal acceptance.

Key Moments:

• Engagement and Marriage: Ignoring her parents’ objections, Lita and Jim became engaged and married in a small ceremony in Macon, Georgia (14:25). Jim introduced a prenuptial agreement that heavily favored him financially, causing strain in their relationship.
• Relocation and Struggles: The couple moved to Shirley Hills, an affluent, predominantly white area in Macon. Lita faced overt racism and isolation, leading to tensions with her husband, who became increasingly miserly and unkind (16:32).

Notable Quotes:

• Belinda Trahan: "Somebody came to the door with roses." (09:06)
• Jim Sullivan (Clint Rucker): "I need someone to take care of my problem for me." (41:05)

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The Murder of Lita McClinton Sullivan

On the morning of January 16, 1987, Lita Sullivan was murdered in her home. A man posing as a flower delivery person handed her a bouquet of roses before shooting her twice in the head with a 9mm semi-automatic handgun. The lack of a clear motive and the absence of the murder weapon made the case particularly baffling.

Murder Scene Details:

• Incident: "She was really excited. She thought that it was a gift from one of her friends." (02:32)
• Aftermath: Lita managed to squeeze the hand of the first responding police officer before succumbing to her injuries (03:21).

Notable Quotes:

• Tony Harwood: "I want you to see the puzzle. When I put it together and I show it to you, you'll never forget it." (01:30)
• Clint Rucker: "Your wife's best friend has been murdered and police are looking at you." (02:08)

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Initial Investigation and Suspects

Jim Sullivan was the primary suspect due to potential financial gains from Lita's death amidst ongoing divorce proceedings. However, alternative suspects emerged, including Marvin Maribel, Lita's best friend's husband, who became entangled in the case through dubious activities like recording private conversations.

Key Evidence:

• Crime Scene: Bullet fragments, shell casings, and a box of roses were the only significant evidence (06:07).
• Suspects: Jim Sullivan initially fell under suspicion, but Marvin Maribel's involvement complicated matters (26:34).

Notable Quotes:

• Belinda Trahan: "Somebody came to the door with roses." (09:06)
• Tony Harwood: "He was in violation of his probation, and so he went to jail for nine months." (51:34)

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Legal Proceedings and Escalation

Despite initial pressure, Jim Sullivan managed to evade justice by fleeing the country after being indicted. The prosecution's case relied heavily on circumstantial evidence and witness testimonies, particularly from Tony Harwood, who turned state's evidence against Jim.

Courtroom Dynamics:

• Federal Case: Jim was acquitted in a federal trial due to insufficient evidence linking him directly to the murder (53:41).
• Wrongful Death Suit: The McClintons won a $4 million civil judgment against Jim Sullivan, though he evaded payment by hiding his assets (55:25).

Notable Quotes:

• Clint Rucker: "This is one of the most difficult decisions I had to make because I firmly believe in the jury system." (53:54)
• Tony Harwood: "There is no cutting corners, and you spread the pieces out and then you figure out what fits and what doesn't fit." (67:35)

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Breakthrough and Final Conviction

After years of evasion, a breakthrough occurred when Belinda Trahan provided crucial testimony linking Tony Harwood directly to Jim Sullivan. This led to Harwood's arrest and subsequent cooperation, offering critical evidence that resulted in Jim Sullivan's conviction for murder.

Key Developments:

• International Manhunt: Jim Sullivan fled to Panama and eventually Thailand, where he was captured in 2002 after being featured on America's Most Wanted (56:16).
• Trial and Testimony: Tony Harwood testified against Jim, providing undeniable evidence of his involvement. Despite initial defense efforts to undermine witness credibility, the weight of the testimonies led to Sullivan's conviction (71:49).

Notable Quotes:

• Belinda Trahan: "I know any other way to explain it. I mean, open this box and like the third record I look at, here it is." (60:27)
• Tony Harwood: "I'll never forget it. The conviction of James Sullivan was the biggest puzzle that I had solved in my career." (73:53)

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Aftermath and Reflections

The conviction of Jim Sullivan brought a semblance of closure to Lita's grieving family, although challenges remained in recovering the civil judgment. The case highlighted issues of race, privilege, and the complexities of the legal system in delivering justice.

Family's Perspective:

• Emotional Impact: The McClintons expressed profound relief and satisfaction upon Sullivan's conviction, though lingering frustrations about asset recovery persisted (81:36).
• Ongoing Struggles: Despite legal victories, the family's battle against systemic barriers underscored the enduring challenges in true crime justice (55:42).

Notable Quotes:

• Clint Rucker: "The pain... continues." (80:39)
• Tony Harwood: "Seeing him rot in a prison in South Georgia brings them a whole lot more satisfaction." (81:36)

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Conclusion

"A Puzzling Murder" encapsulates a gripping true crime narrative, chronicling the tragic loss of Lita McClinton Sullivan and the arduous journey towards justice. Through meticulous investigation, unwavering determination, and pivotal testimonies, the case serves as a testament to the complexities inherent in solving high-profile murder mysteries.

Final Thoughts:

• David Miller Landau: "When somebody dies in this kind of manner, they don't stop being a member of the family." (81:47)
• Clint Rucker: "I am so very proud and I'm happy." (80:34)

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Notable Timestamps:

• 05:05: Description of Lita's character
• 11:03: Tony Harwood on Lita
• 14:25: Engagement and marriage details
• 16:32: Struggles in Macon
• 09:06: Belinda Trahan's initial description
• 41:05: Jim Sullivan's call for help
• 06:07: Crime scene evidence
• 26:34: Introduction of Marvin Maribel
• 53:41: Federal case dismissal
• 55:25: Civil judgment details
• 56:16: International manhunt begins
• 60:27: Evidence discovery in North Carolina
• 67:35: Tony Harwood on legal strategy
• 71:49: Belinda Trahan's testimony's impact
• 81:36: Reflection on Sullivan's conviction

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Speaker Attributions:

• Clint Rucker: Host and lead investigator
• Tony Harwood: Prosecutor and key investigator
• Deb Miller Landau: Author and researcher
• Belinda Trahan: Eyewitness and key witness
• Marvin Maribel: Former suspect and friend of the family
• Poppy: Lita's best friend

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This comprehensive summary captures the essence of the "A Puzzling Murder" episode, detailing the chronology of events, key players, and pivotal moments that define this true crime mystery. Through engaging storytelling and critical analysis, the episode sheds light on the intricate process of uncovering the truth behind a perplexing murder case.

Transcript

[Deb Miller Landau]

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[Clint Rucker]

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[Deb Miller Landau]

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[Clint Rucker]

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[Deb Miller Landau]

Enjoy 40% off with code. Smile [e-mail] and send something meaningful this year.

[Clint Rucker]

See site for more details. Tonight I go back home to Georgia to look into the death of a.

[Marvin Maribel]

Young wife that Atlanta wife murdered as.

[Clint Rucker]

She opened her very own front door. And all new 2020 starts right now.

[John Kingston]

This is a true murder mystery. Emphasis on murder. Emphasis on mystery.

[Deb Miller Landau]

I felt like Lita's murder case looks like a true crime story, but it goes a lot deeper.

[Clint Rucker]

Who would kill this woman? She wasn't Robbe.

[Belinda Trahan]

Somebody came to the door with roses.

[Clint Rucker]

And shot her dead. Was there a feeling that this had to be pretty calculated?

[Tony Harwood]

She was shot with a 9 millimeter semiautomatic handgun.

[John Kingston]

No obvious suspect.

[Clint Rucker]

Was she at all concerned about the fact that she was in an interracial marriage and that this was a difficult time in the South?

[Deb Miller Landau]

It was not a welcoming place for a black woman to live.

[Clint Rucker]

She said, I'm done. I'm packing up my stuff.

[Tony Harwood]

I want you to see the puzzle. When I put it together and I show it to you, you'll never forget it.

[Clint Rucker]

Your wife's best friend has been murdered and police are looking at you. It's a chilly drizzly winter Atlanta morning and 35 year old Lita McClinton is suddenly awakened.

[Deb Miller Landau]

It's around 8:15 in the morning and she heard the doorbell ring and she tightens up a rope and goes downstairs to open the door.

[Marvin Maribel]

And I think she was probably not going to open it, but she looked through the keyhole and saw that the person had a box of flowers.

[Deb Miller Landau]

There was a man standing at the door holding a long white box of long stem roses that had a big thick pink ribbon around it.

[Clint Rucker]

So she receives the flowers thinking that this is a delivery.

[Tony Harwood]

She was really excited. She thought that it was a gift from one of her friends.

[Poppy]

In a sea of red brick townhouses, Lita's white one stands out. Her best friend Poppy and 3 year old daughter have spent the night and they are still in bed upstairs just waking up.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Poppy hears her say good morning to the man at the door.

[Tony Harwood]

The flower delivery man produces a handgun. He fires a shot.

[Marvin Maribel]

She actually put the box of roses in front of her Face. The second shot went right through the center of her head, and she fell with a large thud.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Lita's friend Poppy was upstairs with her toddler, and right away, she grabbed her daughter and hid her into a closet and said, you gotta be quiet. Quiet as a mouse. She didn't know if the gunman was gonna come for her. Lita's neighbor hears the shots, then sees the guy running like bad out of hell, just booking it out of the complex, and he calls 911.

[Marvin Maribel]

The first police officer is only a few blocks away, and he gets the call. And so that police officer ends up holding Lita's hand. They thought Lita was completely unconscious, and yet she managed to squeeze his hand as he kept comforting her and telling her everything was going to be okay. And he said it was her comforting him. Poppy got out of the closet and called Lita's mother, and she couldn't get words out. And she finally just said, lita's been shot. Lita's mother called her husband. When they went to the hospital, they were put in a separate little waiting room. The doctor tended to Lita, and he came out about 30 minutes later and said, I'm sorry.

[Clint Rucker]

It was just so profoundly sad because Lita just drew people in. She had a lot of friends.

[Belinda Trahan]

And.

[Clint Rucker]

She was a good person.

[Tony Harwood]

Lita was a really wonderful young lady. The kind of person that would give you the shirt off her back.

[Clint Rucker]

How did her parents take it? Oh, they were torn up.

[Tony Harwood]

It'll never get easier.

[Clint Rucker]

Because she's gone.

[Tony Harwood]

We should have gone first, not her.

[Clint Rucker]

Atlanta's exclusive Buckhead neighborhood is known for its sprawling mansions, not murder. So when the shooting happened right here, neighbors were shocked and on edge. Sullivan was found in the doorway of her townhouse, shot twice in the head.

[Poppy]

It's pretty surprising that in this area, you know, those kinds of things probably wouldn't happen.

[Clint Rucker]

How did you learn that Leta had been killed? I ran to the TV because I heard Sullivan on Slaton Drive.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Police say a box of roses was.

[Clint Rucker]

Found near her body.

[Deb Miller Landau]

A gunman apparently posed as a delivery man.

[Clint Rucker]

And I said, oh, my God, that's Lita.

[Marvin Maribel]

Detectives on the scene found a bullet fragment, two shell casings, and the box of roses.

[Belinda Trahan]

Two gunshots from a 9 millimeter penetrated the box. The weapon was never found. To this day, it's never been found.

[Marvin Maribel]

In this case, you had just a minor amount of evidence.

[Tony Harwood]

At the time, it was the top story on the news, and law enforcement officers felt a great deal of pressure in order to bring Lita's killer to justice.

[Poppy]

For years, Lita's case was cold, buried underneath the weight of unanswered questions and fading memories.

[Deb Miller Landau]

I'm Deb Miller Landau, and I just wrote a book called A Devil Went down to Georgia about the murder of Lita McClinton Sullivan. I covered this story for Atlanta magazine back in 2004, and the more people I talked to, the more that I researched, the more I felt like I began to know Lita. So talking about the day that she died feels personal.

[Clint Rucker]

The case was also personal to Clint Rucker, the prosecutor. When I came to Atlanta to meet up with him, I learned that one of his passions is puzzles, working from the outside in, which also translates to solving homicides. Where do you begin? How do you start to connect?

[Tony Harwood]

When I am putting together a puzzle not only in real life, but also a murder case, I make an assessment. What it is I'm working with. I start to identify pieces of the puzzle that are foundational.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Lita's murder case looks like a true crime story, but it goes a lot deeper. It's a story about love and loss and greed.

[Tony Harwood]

Lita had been reared in Atlanta's Lac Leap.

[John Kingston]

You know, on the surface, she was living an Atlanta dream.

[Clint Rucker]

A prosperous upbringing.

[Tony Harwood]

A very prosperous upbringing. The expectations for her life were pretty high.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Black women have had to be exceptional in order to be seen, and that was the case then, and I think it's still the case now.

[Poppy]

One thing seems certain. A murder of this kind is personal.

[Clint Rucker]

Was there a feeling that this had to be pretty calculated?

[Tony Harwood]

Police knew almost immediately Lita Sullivan was the intended victim who would kill this woman.

[Clint Rucker]

She wasn't robbed.

[Belinda Trahan]

Somebody came to the door with roses.

[Clint Rucker]

And shot her dead.

[Tony Harwood]

Atlanta had its fair share of crime, but this was most certainly one of the highest profile cases that got reported in the news.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Sullivan was shot twice in the head.

[Clint Rucker]

A box of roses found next to her body.

[Tony Harwood]

Using a flower delivery man and shooting her. It was something that just kind of stuck out to me.

[Clint Rucker]

Atlanta, Georgia, billed as a vibrant melting pot, a destination for creatives. But if you grew up in Georgia in the 1970s, as I did, you know, this was a very different place then, one still emerging from the dark shadows of segregation and racial tensions. What was 1970s Atlanta like when she was sort of coming along?

[Tony Harwood]

We've got African Americans that are kind of ascending into really prominent positions. Lita also is ascending because her parents are a part of this movement.

[Clint Rucker]

Lita's parents, emory and Joanne McClinton, were both power players, movers and shakers in Atlanta.

[John Kingston]

Emery McClinton was on the State Board of Transportation. Joanne McClinton was a member of the Georgia Legislature.

[Tony Harwood]

Joanne will tell you stories about being in really interpersonal meetings with Dr. King. She was Maynard Jackson's campaign manager when he ran for mayor.

[John Kingston]

I think the McClintons had high expectations for who Leda would become. Leda Sullivan was a true daughter of Atlanta.

[Tony Harwood]

She was just a gem, very, very proper.

[Clint Rucker]

And she had grown up in a world of cotillion. So she really was sort of that classic upper crust black person. Growing up in Atlanta, she knew where she was going. She had a great sense of style and absolutely charming.

[Deb Miller Landau]

After high school, she went on to Spelman College. Her parents sort of hoped that she would enter the political arena like they were, but she was very much into fashion. She was working at a boutique at Lenox and in walks this guy who had unruly curls and weird glasses and just immediately saw Lita and was taken with her.

[Clint Rucker]

Fresh out of college, 24 year old Lita is smitten with James Jim Sullivan. He's a bit older, 35, and he's also white.

[Deb Miller Landau]

He showered her with gifts. He just completely showered her with attention.

[Clint Rucker]

He comes in, he dazzles her. What did you learn about him?

[Tony Harwood]

I learned that what he saw was a fantasy in Lita. I think he looked at her as a young, very attractive, very smart, African American female.

[Poppy]

Another big difference between them is classic. Lita has been raised in Atlanta's high society and Jim on Boston's gritty south side.

[Marvin Maribel]

He grew up in a very middle to lower middle class environment. He went to Holy Cross College, got.

[Clint Rucker]

A bachelor's degree in economics.

[Marvin Maribel]

He always wanted more for himself. He always wanted to be a rich person, but it didn't seem like that was in the cards. He was an accountant, he was working hard, but he really wasn't getting ahead.

[Clint Rucker]

But life is about to change for Jim Sullivan when he inherits a thriving liquor distributorship from his uncle worth millions of dollars.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Crown Beverages was worth around $3.2 million. Jim had become a wealthy man. So when the McClintons met Jim for the first time, they were like, who is this guy? He had this kind of manner that was very uncouth and brash. And they were sort of mystified about what their daughter saw in him. I mean, I think the only thing they had in common was that he was Catholic, and they were Catholic as well. But everything else was complete polar opposites.

[Clint Rucker]

Another concern, of course, was race. Remember, this is the 70s. Even though the country is watching color barriers slipping away on the hit show the Jeffersons with primetime's first interracial couple.

[John Kingston]

Your parents have never gotten over the fact that I'm white.

[Tony Harwood]

That's because you never got over being.

[John Kingston]

White at that time. This was unusual.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Georgia's anti miscegenation laws that forbade blacks and whites to marry had only been repealed 10 years earlier.

[Clint Rucker]

Still, despite their obvious differences, Jim Sullivan pops the question to Lita.

[Deb Miller Landau]

So the McClintons were like, you cannot marry this man.

[Tony Harwood]

They felt like Lita was really making a mistake and was kind of caught up in the exuberance of this relationship.

[Clint Rucker]

Despite her parents strong objections, Lita and Jim are engaged. But on the eve of her wedding, Jim drops a bomb.

[Deb Miller Landau]

He tells Lita that he has been married before and that he has four children. Lita was shocked.

[Poppy]

And then the very same night, Jim Sullivan blindsides his bride to be again.

[Deb Miller Landau]

He whips out a piece of paper and he says, can you sign this? And then she looks down and sees that he's drawn up a prenuptial agreement. And she's like, what is this?

[Clint Rucker]

Apparently determined to protect his newfound wealth, Sullivan surprises Lita with a prenup which says that in the event of a divorce, she would walk away with virtually nothing. She's reluctant, but the cake is ordered, the flowers are ready. So Lita signs the agreement and ties the knot anyway.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Lita got married in 1976. It was a small ceremony in Macon, Georgia. Joanne McClinton would later describe that as the worst day of her life.

[Clint Rucker]

The newlyweds settle some 80 miles south of Atlanta, near Jim's business in Macon. It's a world away from Atlanta, but Lita agrees to give up her current job and her income and become full time Mrs. Jim Sullivan.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They bought in Shirley Hills, a very affluent, very white part of Macon. Joanne and Emory McClinton feared for their daughter. Being part of an interracial couple in Macon, Georgia, in the 1970s would have been extraordinarily challenging. The neighbors were like, you have the gall to bring a black wife to Shirley Hills. People threw garbage on their doorstep.

[Clint Rucker]

The out and out racism had to be tough for Lita. But she moves forward and makes some new connections and friends, including Yvette Miller.

[Poppy]

When Lita and Yvette occasionally go out to eat, she notices something a bit curious.

[Clint Rucker]

We'd go out to lunch at a nice restaurant and she couldn't pay the bill, and I would end up picking up the check. And they were a wealthy couple. They were very wealthy. Then one Christmas season, a card arrives in the mail addressed to Jim. Lita opens it, and what she discovers will make her question everything. Lita and Jim Sullivan's first few months of marriage seemed to be going well. They were both intelligent, both attractive, definitely upper class, high society. But just beneath the surface, there are some obvious cracks. They seem to be loving at first. At first, he was not that nice to her, and he was not that kind to her. Was he brusque? Was he brash? He was a bit arrogant. Even though he had all of these resources, he did not, in my opinion, take care of his wife.

[Poppy]

Friends say that the once generous millionaire has suddenly become a miser.

[Belinda Trahan]

He was notoriously cheap.

[Deb Miller Landau]

He would wear his dead uncle's clothes around the house. He would use the sheath from the dry cleaning as saran wrap in the kitchen. He didn't want Lita to work, but he kept her on a very tight allowance where he gave her $150 a week.

[Clint Rucker]

Did she express any discontentment with her marriage? When we were at those restaurants, Jim just does not give me enough money to take care of me and the house, you know, she clearly was not happy. Was there talk of infidelity?

[Tony Harwood]

Lita had several instances where she questioned whether or not her husband was actually having an affair.

[Deb Miller Landau]

One day, she finds a long blonde hair in their master bathroom, and she asks Jim about it, and he says, I don't know what you're talking about. They got into this cycle of. She accused him of philandering, he would deny it, and then he would buy her sort of an expensive jewelry apology.

[Clint Rucker]

Then during the holidays one year, Leda makes another stunning discovery.

[Marvin Maribel]

A Christmas card came addressed to Jim.

[Clint Rucker]

She opened it, A woman wrote in.

[Marvin Maribel]

Something like, I'm missing your kisses. The woman's return address was on the envelope. So Lita went and spoke to her, and the woman said that she had been having an affair with Jim.

[Clint Rucker]

Lita is distraught and goes home to be with her parents in Atlanta. But her husband manages to lure her back, increasing her weekly allowance in a now post nuptial agreement.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Now it's $300 instead of $150 a week, but it still shows that all of their assets belong to Jim.

[Clint Rucker]

That's right, the successful business, Lita's Mercedes, Multiple properties. Even her jewelry still belonged to her husband in the event of a divorce.

[Deb Miller Landau]

But in an attempt at reconciliation, Lita signs the postnup.

[Poppy]

Just a few months after Lita signs that agreement, without Lita knowing, Sullivan decides to sell Crown Beverages for $5 million.

[Clint Rucker]

And that's not all. He tells her they're moving to Palm Beach, Florida.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Lita was in shock.

[Clint Rucker]

She had any clue that he was going to whistle her down to Palm Beach. But Lita's new Florida home, located a stone's throw from what would become Mar a Lago, is more elaborate than she ever would have imagined. Called Casa Alida, it's a 17,000 square foot mansion with eight oceanfront bedrooms.

[Tony Harwood]

It was just unbelievable.

[Clint Rucker]

When you went to Jim's home, you go through this tunnel and you would.

[Tony Harwood]

Be at the beach.

[John Kingston]

It's your own private beach.

[Clint Rucker]

But for Lita, everything that glitters isn't exactly gold.

[Tony Harwood]

James Sullivan very much wanted to integrate himself into the upper echelons of society. And his aspirations did not include Lita's participation.

[Deb Miller Landau]

It was not a welcoming place for a black woman to live. And when he found out that to sort of scale the level of social plateau he was looking at in Palm beach, having a black wife was a serious impediment to that.

[Tony Harwood]

She was left out of some affairs and she really became upset.

[Clint Rucker]

So even though they had money, this is a moneyed crowd. Didn't really matter though.

[Tony Harwood]

He was barely rich compared to Palm Beach.

[Clint Rucker]

Did he want to be in that crowd?

[Tony Harwood]

Oh, yes. He wanted to, you know, be accepted as one of the rich and famous.

[Deb Miller Landau]

It doesn't take long before Jim starts to flirt with other women.

[Clint Rucker]

And it's at a cocktail party that one particularly elegant Palm beach woman catches Sullivan's eye.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Jim sees Suki Rogers, who is a Korean born socialite.

[John Kingston]

She was telegenic. She had a spicy personality. I think a man like Jim Sullivan could not help but be intrigued by this beautiful woman.

[Belinda Trahan]

They started dating.

[Clint Rucker]

He's still married to Lita. By now, the Sullivans have been married nearly 10 years. But things are about to explode.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Lita finds women's lingerie in their master bed. It's the bra that broke the camel's back.

[Clint Rucker]

She said, I'm done. I'm packing up my stuff and I'm going back home.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Lita arrives back in Atlanta. The very next day. She files for divorce from Jim.

[Poppy]

But Sullivan fights Lita every step of the way and the divorce drags on.

[Clint Rucker]

Did she seem concerned, worried, nervous about her breakup? What I detected was she was excited and she was cutting the cord and leaving the gym alone. She wanted her life back. While Lita is looking forward to a new life of freedom, she can't be happy about the prospect of leaving her marriage with virtually nothing, no career, no Palm beach mansion, no buckhead townhouse. And $2,500 a month in alimony for three years. So Lita is going to divorce court, determined to fight for what she believes she deserves.

[Tony Harwood]

All she wanted was a reasonable financial settlement so that she could kind of go on with her life.

[John Kingston]

January 16, 1987, was set up to be a pivotal day in the lives of Lita and Jim Sullivan.

[Deb Miller Landau]

A judge was going to decide whether or not to throw out the post.

[Marvin Maribel]

She might get as much as close to a million dollars in cash and assets.

[John Kingston]

The morning of January 16th, Leda Sullivan. She'd lose her life that day in a murder.

[Belinda Trahan]

With Lita out of the picture, Jim Sullivan stands to gain the property that they had and retain control over all his money.

[Clint Rucker]

Sullivan was the main suspect. That is until a treasure trove of secret recordings, recordings of Lita's private conversations are uncovered. Taking this investigation in a whole new direction. And police are looking at you. In the dry states of the Southwest, there's a group that's been denied a basic human right. In the Navajo Nation. Today, a third of our households don't have running water.

[Poppy]

But that's not something they chose for themselves.

[Clint Rucker]

Can the Navajo people reclaim their right to water and contend with the government's.

[Poppy]

Legacy of control and neglect?

[Clint Rucker]

Our water.

[Tony Harwood]

Our future. Our water. Our future.

[Poppy]

That's in the next season of Reclaimed the Lifeblood of Navajo Nation.

[Clint Rucker]

Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts.

[Tony Harwood]

Fifty years ago, a young woman named Karen Silkwood got into her car alone.

[Marvin Maribel]

She was reportedly on her way to deliver sensitive documents to a New York Times reporter. She never made it.

[Tony Harwood]

And those documents she'd agreed to carry were never found.

[Clint Rucker]

Do you think somebody killed her? There's no question in my mind that someone killed her that night. I think they were trying to stop her in order to get the documents.

[Marvin Maribel]

A new investigation into the life and death of America's first nuclear whistleblower.

[Tony Harwood]

Listen to Radioactive the Karen Silkwood Mystery from ABC Audio. Listen now. Wherever you get your podcasts.

[Clint Rucker]

You know, you make a big circle, and you.

[Belinda Trahan]

Put everybody in it that's close to Lita. Everybody's a suspect, but the first one would be the husband. The first and obvious suspect was James Sullivan, who stood to gain everything from her death. All the property, all the monies, and who was contesting the divorce.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Detectives went down to speak to him in Palm beach, and they put him through a polygraph.

[Clint Rucker]

Jim Sullivan not only passes the polygraph, but there's something else. He has an alibi that puts him nearly 700 miles away from the crime scene.

[Tony Harwood]

James Sullivan was actually in Palm beach at the time of Lita's murder. When you first look at it, it looks pretty cut and dry. When you interview all the people involved, everybody points in one direction towards the husband. But when you sit down and look.

[John Kingston]

At the facts, I'm not so sure.

[Tony Harwood]

That the husband is a person that committed a crime.

[John Kingston]

Nothing surfaced in the early stages of the investigation that implicated Jim Sullivan in the murder.

[Clint Rucker]

Sullivan is cooperating with authorities, and during his interview with detectives, he mentions the name of his friend, Marvin Maribel.

[Tony Harwood]

At the time of Leta's death, Marvin and James Sullivan had a very close relationship.

[Poppy]

Remember, Marvin Maribel is married to Leta's best friend, Poppy, who was in the Buckhead townhouse with her three year old daughter the morning that Lita was murdered. But back before the shooting, the friendship hadn't always sat well with Marvin.

[Tony Harwood]

When Lita moved back to Atlanta, they started, you know, hanging out together.

[Clint Rucker]

So she's disillusioned by her relationship. Did her failed relationship have any impact on your relationship?

[Tony Harwood]

Well, from the standpoint of them, you know, being together all the time and going out, yeah.

[Clint Rucker]

Commiserating.

[Tony Harwood]

Oh, absolutely. Certainly didn't help, you know, and I can understand her being there for her friend, but, you know, sometimes you can go overboard, which is what happened in our relationship.

[Clint Rucker]

Maribel, a former New York State trooper turned entrepreneur, says Lita would often spend hours at his home with Papi. And it was during this time, he says, coincidentally or not, that his own marriage began to unravel.

[Tony Harwood]

I found a letter where Poppy was planning to file for divorce.

[Clint Rucker]

So she was planning to file for divorce without your knowledge?

[Tony Harwood]

Oh, yeah.

[Clint Rucker]

That had to be a shocker.

[Tony Harwood]

It was.

[Clint Rucker]

So then you decided to try something a little questionable after that.

[Tony Harwood]

You know, I have a background in law enforcement. I don't see it as questionable. It's your own telephone in your own house. I put a recorder on the. People call it a tap on the phone. And I started recording conversations in the house.

[Clint Rucker]

The house phone?

[Tony Harwood]

Mm. On the house phone.

[Deb Miller Landau]

He began listening to Poppy and Lita's conversations and ended up recording more than 300 hours.

[Tony Harwood]

And during those very personal conversations between girlfriends, Marvin Maribel learns that there may be some information that James Sullivan might be interested in learning that would be helpful for him in his divorce case.

[Poppy]

He tells Sullivan about the tapes and what's on them, specifically Lita's post divorce plans.

[Clint Rucker]

And soon enough, the two disgruntled husbands are conspiring to get the best of their soon to be ex wives in.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Divorce court, Marvin Maribel travels down to Palm beach under a false name. And the two men listen to the tapes. And Marvin says, I'm not going to record anymore. And Jim says, no, no, no, keep recording.

[Clint Rucker]

Was there talk of money?

[Tony Harwood]

Yeah. He offered $30,000.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Jim says to Marvin, if the judge decides to honor the postnuptial agreement, he's going to give Marvin $30,000 for the use of the information on the tapes.

[Clint Rucker]

What kinds of things did Lita talk about that could be helpful to either one of you?

[Tony Harwood]

You know, there were some guys that, you know, she would talk to, but she was legally separated.

[Poppy]

But then, just a few days after Marvin and Jim's secret meeting at Casa.

[Tony Harwood]

Elita, Papi and Lita somehow discovered the recording device.

[Clint Rucker]

How did they react?

[Tony Harwood]

It wasn't nice. She filed for divorce the next day.

[Clint Rucker]

She was angry.

[Tony Harwood]

She was very angry.

[Clint Rucker]

Lita was upset, too. So upset that she reported Marvin to the authorities, and he was charged with possession of an eavesdropping device. So when police question Sullivan about who might have a motive to murder his wife, he tells them to look no further than Marvin Maribel.

[Poppy]

And sure enough, only a few days after Lita's death, Marvin is being questioned by the Atlanta Police Department about Lita's murder.

[Tony Harwood]

I go down for the interview, and the first thing they did is read me my rights. And from there on, it was just a nightmare. I was a prime suspect.

[Clint Rucker]

You have a law enforcement background, so you knew what.

[Tony Harwood]

So I knew that I was being followed. I could pick the investigators. Police could pick them out all the time. Jim had mentioned my name to them. He said, look at Marvin Merrill.

[Clint Rucker]

This was serious stuff.

[Tony Harwood]

Oh, yeah.

[Clint Rucker]

How worried were you?

[Tony Harwood]

I was very worried.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Joanne and Emory McClinton were beyond devastated. Their eldest daughter was dead just three days after Lita's murder. They held a funeral.

[Clint Rucker]

Days dissolve into months. And authorities are no closer to finding Lita Sullivan's murderer.

[Deb Miller Landau]

The case is just sort of growing colder and colder by the minute.

[Poppy]

And while Marvin Maribel might have been angry at Lita for pressing those charges against him for eavesdropping, there was no evidence he was responsible for her death.

[Tony Harwood]

I know that people get wrongly accused, wrongly convicted, and so the only saving grace is the fact that I knew I was innocent. My process of elimination is you can determine the pieces that don't fit and just eliminate them. The way in which we eliminated Marvin Maribel as a suspect, there was just not enough to connect him Directly to the crime itself.

[Poppy]

As for that eavesdropping device charge, Marvin was put on probation, which he completed, and then he was exonerated. But on those recordings Maribel made, Lita had talked about other men, Something that her soon to be ex husband, Sullivan, pointed out to police.

[Tony Harwood]

He made allegations that she was participating in extramarital affairs and that perhaps this was the action of, you know, a disgruntled boyfriend. We have a lot of major players at this point in the investigation. We have a lot of suspects.

[Clint Rucker]

One of the first men police question is a professional athlete.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Lita and him had been friends when she was in Palm Beach. The police quickly found out that he was in prison for drug possession.

[Clint Rucker]

That athlete is behind bars when Lita is killed. So clearly, he can't be the trigger man. Then investigators turned their sights to a prominent Atlanta businessman.

[Deb Miller Landau]

And he and Lita had been childhood friends, and they sort of rekindled their friendship, and they realized that he had no motive, and they found nothing that connected him.

[Poppy]

Authorities also take a hard look at another suitor who had taken Lita to dinner the night before her death. And get this. Had also given her two roses.

[Deb Miller Landau]

The suspect was a man named Bob Daniel. And Bob had had an incident a couple months before the murder where, in a drunken rage, he came to Lita's house, smashed his car into the garage, and as the cops were taking him away, he said, I'm gonna kill that. So serious red flag.

[Clint Rucker]

But that lead didn't go anywhere either.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Bob had just had quadruple bypass surgery. You know, the police ultimately decided that Bob had nothing to do with it.

[Tony Harwood]

It's the unknowing that makes it so difficult.

[Clint Rucker]

And to know that there are individuals.

[Tony Harwood]

Who may be walking around now planning.

[Clint Rucker]

And plotting to do the same thing to somebody else is abhorrent to me.

[John Kingston]

I remember having the impression it was like a festering wound for them. The McClintons want to draw attention to a $25,000 reward in the case. The cause of finding justice for Lita became their obsession, became their passion.

[Clint Rucker]

The reward is for the arrest and conviction of those individuals responsible for our daughter's murder. To catch Lita's killer, the Atlanta Police Department assigns two veteran detectives to the case.

[John Kingston]

If Lt. Walker bears a resemblance to.

[Clint Rucker]

Actor Billy Dee Williams. Welcome.

[John Kingston]

Harris reminds one of Columbo, the dogged.

[Clint Rucker]

Disheveled detective of television fame.

[John Kingston]

Building a murder case was like making a mosaic. You know, you get a shiny piece of glass here, a gem there. You put it together, and you hope that from it emerges the shimmering image of a killer.

[Tony Harwood]

This particular case deals with what I consider to be high society.

[Clint Rucker]

It contains a little bit of everything.

[Marvin Maribel]

Intrigue, mystery.

[John Kingston]

These days a lot of murders are solved using DNA technology, ring camera technology. But back then it was detective work.

[Tony Harwood]

She was shot with a 9 millimeter semi automatic handgun.

[Belinda Trahan]

Most important thing found at the crime scene was the roses.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They canvassed all the area flower shops and quickly found that the roses had been purchased at the Botany Bay flower shop.

[Belinda Trahan]

They interviewed the worker in there and he told them that this guy came in about 8 o'clock and bought these roses and paid in cash and then left and he was in a small car.

[Deb Miller Landau]

The florist gave a description of the man buying the flowers and another man who was waiting in the car.

[Poppy]

So detectives know they're looking for at.

[Clint Rucker]

Least two men until yet another person is described to police. That flower delivery man who had looked Leta's neighbor right in the eye.

[Belinda Trahan]

There was a next door neighbor of Lita's, lived over on the right side of her condo, who lived there. His name was Bob Christensen.

[Tony Harwood]

He actually gave a description of the flower delivery man as a Caucasian, middle aged man.

[Marvin Maribel]

They went down to the police station and worked with a police artist and got sketches. As the sketches were being completed, the officers were realizing obviously that the shooter was not Jim Sullivan and that the other individuals were all three distinct individuals. They didn't look anything like each other. So therefore we knew three people were involved.

[Clint Rucker]

For investigators, this has all the earmarks of only one thing. Murder for hire.

[John Kingston]

All the evidence pointed to a hitman showing up at the front door posing as a flower delivery man and firing a gunshot into Leda's head.

[Clint Rucker]

With investigators now exploring the possibility that Lita was murdered by a hired gunman, another critical piece of evidence comes to light. A mysterious phone call.

[Tony Harwood]

And what they found was that on the same day that leader was murdered, about an hour after the actual shooting, there was a collect phone call that was placed from a pay phone right outside of Atlanta, Georgia.

[Clint Rucker]

Was this a call from the killer? I don't know about you, I haven't.

[Belinda Trahan]

Had a collect call from a pay phone.

[Clint Rucker]

So as a cop, you probably go.

[Belinda Trahan]

I wonder if that's connected.

[Clint Rucker]

And a tip from a woman 700 miles away may just be the big break investigators have been waiting for.

[Deb Miller Landau]

I said, anyone knows that if you.

[Clint Rucker]

Wanted to get a woman to answer.

[Deb Miller Landau]

The door, all you would have to do is take flowers to the door.

[Clint Rucker]

This was a huge puzzle of a case.

[John Kingston]

A hitman Showing at the front door, posing as a flower delivery man. Firing a gunshot into Alita's head.

[Clint Rucker]

How did your puzzle solving skills come into play?

[Tony Harwood]

You figure out what fits and what doesn't fit.

[Clint Rucker]

I want everyone listening to this to know that I am absolutely innocent. The loss of Jorah.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They still don't have the murder weapons.

[Clint Rucker]

But they do have witnesses.

[Tony Harwood]

Do you know anybody who possibly can.

[Clint Rucker]

Take care of my problem for me? Because I need some help here. Anyone knows that if you wanted to.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Get a woman to answer the door, all you would have to do is take flowers to the door.

[Clint Rucker]

She suggested the flowers.

[Tony Harwood]

She suggested the flowers.

[Clint Rucker]

You actually brought in a doorbell? Why?

[Tony Harwood]

To have that sense of what Lita Sullivan experienced right before her murder. She's about to meet her maker.

[Clint Rucker]

It's a deadly delivery of a dozen pink roses. 35 year old Lita McClinton Sullivan opens her front door and is suddenly gunned down.

[Deb Miller Landau]

On the year anniversary of Lita's death. There are no name suspects. They still don't have the murder weapon. They don't have a hitman. They don't have a paper trail that ties Jim or anyone else to a hit.

[Clint Rucker]

But that's about to change when they get Jim Sullivan's phone records.

[Tony Harwood]

On the same day that Lita was murdered, about an hour or so after the actual shooting, there was a collect phone call to James Sullivan's home in Palm Beach, Florida.

[John Kingston]

It turns out to be from a rest stop in Suwanee, Georgia, maybe 30 or 40 miles from Buckhead. Using a phone call to call another state. That opens up federal jurisdiction. And in this case, that's the FBI.

[Marvin Maribel]

We believed the phone call from Suwanee rest stop to his home in Palm Beach, Florida was sufficient indication that a contract hitter may have called him after doing the job.

[Clint Rucker]

Enter Special Agent John Kingston, who takes a particular interest in that phone call. And a whole slew of other calls Jim Sullivan made and received around the time of Lita's murder.

[Marvin Maribel]

I got a whole year's worth. Six months before the murder to six months after the murder.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Kingston notices a few calls. And one of them was to Bob Christiansen, Lita's neighbor. When Kingston talks to Bob, he finds out that Jim had called Bob three days before the murder.

[Marvin Maribel]

Sullivan said had he seen anything suspicious around Lita's townhouse.

[Deb Miller Landau]

And Bob finds it strange he hasn't talked to Jim in over a year.

[Poppy]

Bob Christensen shares something else with Agent Kingston. On the same day Jim Sullivan called him three days before the fatal flower delivery. Lita heard A loud knock on her door at 5 or 6 in the morning. It was so early and so unnerving she didn't answer it.

[Marvin Maribel]

So that made the call that he got from Jim even more suspicious.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Kingston also finds that a call is made between Jim's house and a Howard Johnson's motel in Atlanta, just a couple of miles from Lita's house. This is really strange. One thing that he's learned about Jim is that he's not a Hojos kind of guy. So he goes to the Howard Johnsons and asks if he can look through the records.

[Marvin Maribel]

They gave me the shoebox with all the registration cards and I pick out three that I thought, well, these were awfully interesting. So I say, do you guys have the phone records? They said, yeah, sure we do. And I'm thinking, boy, these people keep really good records. And they keep them for a long time. And I'm really glad they bring me the phone records for January 13th. I'm flipping through them, flipping through them, and all of a sudden I see 305 Palm Beach, South Florida area code. And I'm pretty sure it's Jim's number. And so I check my records real quick. I go, yep, that's his number. And then I look and I said, oh look, it's from 518. That's one of the three cards I pulled out. Well, it just so happens I have a copy of it here. And one of the things it imparts is three individuals checked into the room. The individual who actually registered used the name Johnny Furr. But three individuals is important to me because I think three people are involved in the crime. They put their car down as a Toyota 85 with a North Carolina plate. We believe that a Toyota was the getaway car for the murder. So there's two coincidences already.

[Clint Rucker]

But remember, these motel records are from January 13th. Leiter was murdered three days later on the 16th. Special Agent Kingston is beginning to surmise that the killers may have tried and failed to get to her once before.

[Marvin Maribel]

What I believe it to be is the killers having come down three days before the actual murder was committed, knocking on her door, her not answering it, and them having to stop and regroup and figure out what plan B's going to be. So I am in love with this registration car and becomes the focal point of my life for the next several months.

[Poppy]

Kingston's next move is to locate this so called Johnny Furr with the North Carolina license plate.

[Marvin Maribel]

And to my surprise, there are 150 John or Johnny Furs in North Carolina. But to my great surprise, 115 of these 150 are in a very small circle in North Carolina between the three cities of Albemarle, Concord, and Kannapolis.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They're going to knock on every door and find this Johnny Fur. Of course, they're coming from Georgia. And anytime the FBI goes and investigates in another state, they need that state's approval. And just as they're about to get to the state border, their boss calls them and says, north Carolina denying you entry, and they'll take it from here.

[Marvin Maribel]

And that pretty much kills my case. That kills my case.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Yeah. Soon after that, Agent Kingston is transferred to another job, and that whole investigation just sort of fades away. Meantime, in Palm Beach, Jim and Suki are living the high life. So with Lita out of the picture, Jim is free to to marry Suki, which he does eight months after Leah's murder.

[Clint Rucker]

He's thinking that he's the cat's meow. Eating in restaurants in Palm beach, going to parties, got another attractive woman on his arm.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Jim drives around town in a Rolls Royce and gets into a fender bender and has to go to traffic court. Jim says to the judge, well, you've misunderstood. I wasn't even driving that day. Suki was driving. So the judge says, we're going to throw it out. However, the cop who was on the scene catches wind, and he says, suki wasn't even in the car that day. It was Jim driving alone. So now Jim has perjured himself, as has Sukie.

[Marvin Maribel]

Jim ultimately got convicted of perjury, was given a year probation and a year of home confinement.

[Poppy]

Suki Sullivan also receives a year of probation.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Sukie's freaking out when she gets charged with perjury on his behalf. She's like, I'm done with this. Suki files for divorce from Jim, and the trial that follows is the juiciest, craziest gossip in town. So when it's Suki's turn to testify, she drops a bomb.

[Clint Rucker]

Did he talk to you about his former wife?

[John Kingston]

Tell me what it was he said.

[Clint Rucker]

To you about leaving.

[Deb Miller Landau]

You can hear a pin drop. It's a big moment. After 33 months of marriage, Sukie files for divorce from Jim.

[Clint Rucker]

Not surprisingly, it's another disputed divorce. But what might have been typical testimony about alimony takes a sudden turn in court.

[John Kingston]

Tell me what it was he said to you about leaving.

[Clint Rucker]

You hired someone to say I'm sorry?

[Marvin Maribel]

He hired someone to rid of her.

[Clint Rucker]

She claimed that he confessed to her that he had Lita killed.

[John Kingston]

This became a bombshell in the investigation of the murder of Leta Sullivan.

[Clint Rucker]

Sukie Sullivan's divorce testimony may be big news for the FBI, but it has zero impact on the divorce judgment, which favors her husband, Jim Sullivan, in nearly every way. His divorce was complete, but his life with turmoil was just beginning.

[John Kingston]

The opulent ocean facing Palm beach palace may look like something out of the Great Gatsby, but while we watched, a new chapter in a crime story was unfolding. We develop information here at wsb. There's going to be a raid on Jim Sullivan's Palm beach mansion. And that is the biggest break in the Lita Sullivan case since the murder itself. Investigators from the FBI, Atlanta police, and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation were on the grounds of a mansion identified as that of James Sullivan. All of a sudden, Jim Sullivan is clearly in the crosshairs of federal authority.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They got a tip that Jim, now a convicted felon, has guns in the house. Of course, you're not allowed to have guns if you're a convicted felon. So they put together a sweeping affidavit to get a search warrant.

[John Kingston]

We did see a number of guns loaded into a car and this box carried out.

[Marvin Maribel]

When they found the guns, he was in violation of his probation, and so he went to jail for nine months.

[Deb Miller Landau]

All this time, a federal grand jury has been convening in Atlanta.

[John Kingston]

They've got what they found in the mansion, they got what they found in the phone records. They've got Suki Sullivan, they've got the neighbors. What they don't have are the identities of the hit team. There's a problem, though.

[Marvin Maribel]

We and the federal government have a five year statute limitations which is going to be up on January 16th of.

[John Kingston]

92 with five or six days to go before it expired. The US Attorney made a bold decision. We're going to take our best shot with what we got right now. So they indict Jim Sullivan.

[Poppy]

Jim Sullivan is indicted on multiple counts of arranging Lita's murder for hire through interstate phone calls.

[John Kingston]

Millionaire James V. Sullivan is on trial in connection with an alleged murder for hire plot. Here he arrives for the first day of trial testimony. It was a trial that transfixed Atlanta. I mean, it was something we were covering on basically a daily basis, but we couldn't have it on camera because it's federal court.

[Tony Harwood]

It looks like the family is finally going to have some accountability for the murder of their daughter Lita.

[John Kingston]

The prosecution suggests the killers were calling Sullivan from the rest stop to say the job was done. The defense suggests otherwise.

[Clint Rucker]

Jim Sullivan is lawyered up with the.

[Belinda Trahan]

Best criminal defense lawyers that you can.

[Clint Rucker]

Find anywhere in Atlanta and maybe in the whole country. There is no evidence at this point.

[John Kingston]

In this case who placed that call or whether that call was placed by.

[Clint Rucker]

Any connected with the crime.

[Deb Miller Landau]

The prosecutors spent two weeks telling their side of the story.

[John Kingston]

Suki, the woman he married months after Lita's death, delivered some of the most dramatic testimony the jury has heard.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They build what they feel like is a really strong case.

[Marvin Maribel]

And then a big bombshell hits.

[Deb Miller Landau]

The judge says, I'm forced to dismiss this case for lack of evidence.

[John Kingston]

Judge Marvin Shub ruled that in effect, even if Sullivan may have been involved in the murder for hire, the government fell short in proving the phone calls related to the murder.

[Clint Rucker]

This is one of the most difficult decisions I had to make because I.

[John Kingston]

Firmly believe in the jury system.

[Deb Miller Landau]

And then he looks at Jim and he says, you've been acquitted.

[Marvin Maribel]

This was ultra shocking.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Suddenly it's over, and Jim a free man.

[Clint Rucker]

I want everyone listening to this to know that I am absolutely innocent. I had nothing to do with Lita's death. Her death was a great tragedy, and.

[Deb Miller Landau]

I thank God and my attorneys that.

[Clint Rucker]

This ordeal is over. The family at that point, I guess, is just sort of at a loss. How devastating was that for them? They felt like the justice system had let them down. I was not expecting this. It's extremely difficult.

[Tony Harwood]

The system today is weighed in the favor of the defense. James Sullivan seems to have gotten away with murder.

[Clint Rucker]

But Lita's parents aren't giving up.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They file a wrongful death suit in Palm Beach, Florida, and they win.

[John Kingston]

We, the jury, return the following verdict.

[Deb Miller Landau]

The jury deems that Jim is guilty of wrongful death.

[John Kingston]

Total damages of the estate of Lita McClinton Sullivan, $4 million.

[Tony Harwood]

But Sullivan is able to hide his assets and not pay any of the civil judgment.

[Marvin Maribel]

Jim Sullivan appealed her civil judgment, and he won by having the Florida court say that they had filed it after the Florida statute of limitations.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Once again, Jim has wiggled out of any responsibility, and the family is left.

[Marvin Maribel]

Dumbfounded until a call is received out of the blue.

[Tony Harwood]

A young woman comes forward. It proved to be the break in the case that everyone was looking for.

[Clint Rucker]

11 years have gone by since Lita Sullivan was gunned down on her doorstep. When a tip comes in From a town 700 miles away, a call is.

[Marvin Maribel]

Received out of the blue, and the individual calling is an attorney in Beaumont, Texas. He has a receptionist whose name is Belinda Trahan, who has told him a very unusual story about her Boyfriend, Tony Harwood.

[Belinda Trahan]

Melinda and Tony lived together in Albemarle, North Carolina, and he was a long distance truck driver for North American Van Lines.

[John Kingston]

He basically drove a moving truck.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Belinda tells her boss about a time that Tony came home from a long haul trucking trip and said that a rich white man in Florida offered to pay him to, quote, take care of his black wife in Georgia. At the time, Belinda didn't believe it. She thought he must be cheating on her.

[Belinda Trahan]

Belinda thought that it was Tony just trying to get out of town and go down to Atlanta to the strip.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Bars until he took her to meet this rich white guy in a diner somewhere and he got a wad full.

[Clint Rucker]

Of money, she says. He sits down briefly in their booth and gives Tony Harwood the balance owed for the hit on the man's wife.

[Poppy]

Belinda Trahan tells her boss that soon after this bizarre trip, she broke up with Tony Harwood and moved to Texas. But now, 11 years later, she says that he mysteriously reached out to her again, asking her to meet him at a nearby truck stop.

[Belinda Trahan]

She's afraid that he may commit harm to her.

[Clint Rucker]

And it's this new tip from Belinda Trahan that sends Georgia authorities to the Lone Star State, turning up the heat on an otherwise cold case.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Georgia Bureau of Investigator agent John Lang takes a detective from the Atlanta Police Department and goes down to Texas to talk to Belinda.

[Belinda Trahan]

She was with Tony when they met this mysterious man at this diner that they were meeting at. We wanted to show her a lineup of pictures in hopes that she could pick Sullivan out of it.

[Deb Miller Landau]

And she takes her pink fingernail and taps right on Jim Sullivan's face and says, this is the man.

[Belinda Trahan]

My plan of attack was to get some recordings with her and Tony. So we got her to get in touch with Tony again.

[Deb Miller Landau]

She's talking to him and trying to coax information out of him, knowing John Lang is listening on her end. And Tony gives enough information that places him at the scene. At the time we had the phone.

[Belinda Trahan]

Calls with Tony, she picked Jim Sullivan out of the lineup, but there was still more investigation to do. We really didn't know who Tony Harwood.

[Deb Miller Landau]

John Lang knows that Tony worked at North American Van Lines. So he calls up North American Van Lines and he says, hey, you don't happen to have your records from 11 years ago? And the guy says, yeah, there's some boxes full of files up in a musty attic. You're more than welcome to go poke around.

[Belinda Trahan]

We went up into a hot attic and opened the first box that I Went to and about. The third document I looked at was Jim Sullivan. His address was on it. Palm Beach, Florida. His signature was on it, and Tony Harwood's signature was on it.

[Deb Miller Landau]

He finds a bill of lading showing that Tony Harwood moved furniture for Jim Sullivan two months before the murder. And it's the paper trail he needs. It's like the jackpot.

[Belinda Trahan]

Astounding. I don't know any other way to explain it. I mean, open this box and like the third record I look at, here it is. I mean, it just like it was meant to be.

[Deb Miller Landau]

On a Sunday morning In April of 1998, John Lang and local authorities go knock on Tony's door in Albemarle, North Carolina. Tony answers the door and he said.

[Belinda Trahan]

You know, I've been waiting on you boys for a long time.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They take Tony to the Albemarle police station. Lang interviews Tony for three hours in this tiny room. But at the end of the day, Tony admits to taking money from Jim, $25,000 to take care of Leda. He also tells the detectives that he wasn't the one to pull the trigger, but that he was there the day of the murder.

[Belinda Trahan]

He went through the whole case, and throughout the interview, he incriminated himself even. Even more. I mean, admitted that, yeah, he was there. He knew what happened. So he was arrested for murder of Lita Sullivan, and we took him back to Atlanta that day.

[Deb Miller Landau]

After Tony's arrest, things moved pretty quickly.

[Tony Harwood]

We are here today to announce the issuance of a warrant for the arrest of James V. Sullivan.

[Clint Rucker]

They got enough to get Sullivan, and now, boom.

[Belinda Trahan]

Sullivan hears of this and blows.

[Clint Rucker]

He takes off. We have reason to believe that he's outside the country.

[Belinda Trahan]

He's just gone, vanished.

[Clint Rucker]

Investigators say he could be anywhere.

[Tony Harwood]

He is nowhere to be found.

[Clint Rucker]

We certainly do not know where Mr. Sullivan is. We have reason to believe that he's outside the country. More than a decade after his wife Lita was murdered, Jim Sullivan seems to be playing a game of catch me if you can with authorities.

[Tony Harwood]

There is an international manhunt for James Sullivan.

[Marvin Maribel]

Well, Jim had moved to Costa Rica, actually bought a home there in 1998. After an arrest warrant was issued for him, he immediately, like that night, went to Panama.

[John Kingston]

If you have any information concerning James Sullivan, you should contact the nearest US Embassy or consulate.

[Marvin Maribel]

We didn't know exactly where he had flown from Panama, and we didn't know exactly where he had gone.

[Deb Miller Landau]

His trail goes cold.

[Belinda Trahan]

They put him on Interpol, and it just was just cold.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They've tapped Phone lines, anybody that he might have called. And he's called no one, not even mother.

[Belinda Trahan]

There was a few tips that came in that the tips are just dead ends. The McClintons, they're dumbfounded that this guy.

[Clint Rucker]

Could, you know, get away again. But in late 1999, with Sullivan still completely off the grid, the heartbroken emery and Joanne McClinton do get some good news.

[John Kingston]

Last week came this. A court decision reinstating a $4 million judgment against Jim Sullivan in connection with a wrongful death case brought in effect by Lita's estate.

[Poppy]

Lita's family and law enforcement officials hope that a renewed hunt for Sullivan's money will help smoke him out.

[Tony Harwood]

Where you find Sullivan's money, you're gonna find him close by.

[Poppy]

But even this goes nowhere.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Fast forward to 2002. There is no sign of Jim Sullivan.

[Marvin Maribel]

We tried every effort in our arsenal to try and locate him, to put him on the FBI's wanted list, but to also put him on the top 10 list, which is very unusual. You don't get on the top 10 list very easily. Then we also featured him on America's Most Wanted.

[Clint Rucker]

The most recent picture we have of Sullivan is at least five years old. So the FBI age enhanced this photo, which may bear a closer resemblance to Sullivan's appearance today. If you recognize James Sullivan from either of these photographs, call us now at 1-800-CRIME TV.

[Deb Miller Landau]

A man sees America's Most Wanted on television and goes, I know that guy. He lives in my condo complex in Chiam, Thailand. And sure enough, he calls the authorities.

[Marvin Maribel]

He went to Panama, to Venezuela, and eventually to Thailand, where he got a beachfront condo.

[Deb Miller Landau]

He spends his days walking on the beach, sitting by the pool, occasionally playing tennis, as though no other trouble's in the world. The Thai police knock on Jim Sullivan's door on July 2, 2002, and say, you're under arrest. The McClintons can hardly believe it.

[Tony Harwood]

We found out from the FBI, and.

[Clint Rucker]

That was a moment of jubilation. 15 years is a long time to concentrate on the loss of a daughter. And we had determination and we had the will, and we also had all of these individuals behind us. Almost as soon as Jim Sullivan is arrested for murder, Tony Harwood, who has continued to deny being the trigger man, agrees to a plea deal.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Tony kind of sees the writing on the wall.

[Belinda Trahan]

Harwood just decided that he would plead guilty, a negotiated plea for manslaughter, and in turn, that he would testify against Jim Sullivan.

[Marvin Maribel]

It took two years, but he finally was extradited. Back to Atlanta in 2004.

[Deb Miller Landau]

He got off the plane. He was wearing a single shoe because he had such terrible gout in his foot. But he gets off and gets taken to Fulton County Jail. And there's this sort of cumulative sigh of relief.

[Poppy]

To be clear, Sullivan being tried for murder in Georgia is not double jeopardy. For one thing, it is a state case, and the previous one was a federal case. And that specifically was for arranging Lita's murder for hire over the phone.

[Tony Harwood]

The elected district attorney appoints me, along with a couple of other lawyers to prosecute the case.

[Clint Rucker]

This was a huge puzzle of a case, right? How did your puzzle solving skills come into play?

[Tony Harwood]

There's no cutting corners, and you spread the pieces out and then you figure out what fits and what doesn't fit. And that's kind of what the prosecution of James Sullivan was like. It was putting together all these different pieces so that we could make sure that the prosecution of the case was done accurately and with integrity.

[Clint Rucker]

What concerned you going into this trial?

[Tony Harwood]

He was rich. He was a white male. He had escaped the federal authorities before, and he had two of the best criminal defense attorneys representing him.

[Belinda Trahan]

They are sharp, and if they can find a way out, they're going to find a way out.

[John Kingston]

There will not be one shred of physical evidence that links Jim Sullivan to this crime.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Jim has eluded justice so many times that there's a real palpable fear that he's going to get away with it, that he's going to elude justice again.

[Tony Harwood]

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[Deb Miller Landau]

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[Clint Rucker]

America's largest 5G network.

[Tony Harwood]

Minimum of 4 lines for $25 per line per month with autopay discount using.

[John Kingston]

Debit or bank account.

[Clint Rucker]

$5 more per line without autopay plus.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Taxes and fees and $10 device connection.

[John Kingston]

Charge phones via 24 monthly bill credits for well qualified customers. Contact us before canceling entire account to.

[Clint Rucker]

Continue bill credits or credit stop and.

[John Kingston]

Balance on a required finance agreement due bill credits end if you pay off devices early.

[Clint Rucker]

Ctmobile.com after nearly 20 years, Jim Sullivan is finally on trial here in Fulton county for the murder of his wife, Lita. For her heartbroken parents, this day couldn't come soon enough. The pain, believe it or not, it increases. It does not decrease. The shock decreases, the depression decreases, but the pain continues.

[John Kingston]

It was an a team of prosecutors, great courtroom performers.

[Belinda Trahan]

Clint Rucker was a lead prosecutor and Anna Graham, Kelly Hill, Sheila Ross.

[Deb Miller Landau]

And the evidence will show that the.

[Clint Rucker]

Person who sent that hitman to Lita's door is the only person in the world who could have profited from her death.

[Deb Miller Landau]

It is the only person in the.

[Clint Rucker]

World who met Tony Harwood and paid him off for killing her. And is the only person in the.

[Deb Miller Landau]

World who fled halfway around the world.

[Clint Rucker]

To avoid facing you.

[Marvin Maribel]

Jury was nine women and three men.

[Poppy]

The jury is also racially mixed.

[John Kingston]

Jim Sullivan had Ed Garland and Don Samuel again, the people who won that big courtroom victory against the feds. What the state relies on is two types of evidence. Circumstantial evidence, and then the testimony.

[Belinda Trahan]

The.

[Marvin Maribel]

State initially started out. The nature of the crime and what happened that morning.

[Clint Rucker]

I heard two sounds. They sounded to me like steel hitting steel. I just didn't want to believe that it was a gun. And so I hesitated for a second, and then I really knew that it was a gun. She was able to squeeze my hand each time I spoke with her, like.

[Belinda Trahan]

She understood what I was saying. And for many, many years after this.

[Deb Miller Landau]

I thought that's all it was.

[John Kingston]

One day I realized that she was.

[Tony Harwood]

Comforting me more than I was comforting her.

[Clint Rucker]

That was the sort of lady I felt she was.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They had the phone calls that the FBI had found.

[Marvin Maribel]

There was a call from this room to Mr. Sullivan's home at 7:44 in the morning.

[Clint Rucker]

But all this testimony notwithstanding, it's Belinda Trahan and Tony Harwood who everybody wants to hear from.

[Tony Harwood]

Belinda Trahan was the most important witness in the case.

[Deb Miller Landau]

He told me that some white guy who wanted to take out his black wife.

[Clint Rucker]

I didn't believe it. Why not?

[Deb Miller Landau]

I've been with him for three years. Over three years. I mean, I figured he met someone because we were on the outs.

[Clint Rucker]

Most chilling about Belinda's testimony is that she confirms that there was at least one failed attempt on Leta's life.

[Deb Miller Landau]

She testifies that when Tony had gone to Lita's house on January 13th and she didn't come to the door, they drove back to North Carolina and told Belinda that, you know, it didn't work.

[Clint Rucker]

But Belinda testifies that hearing that from her boyfriend left her incredulous.

[Deb Miller Landau]

I said, just don't even lie to me. I said, because anyone knows it, if.

[Clint Rucker]

You wanted to get a woman to.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Answer the door, all you would have to do is take flowers to the door.

[Clint Rucker]

Did you in any way mean for that to be a suggestion as to how to get the job accomplished?

[Deb Miller Landau]

No, not at all.

[Tony Harwood]

Here's Belinda Trahan. And she is falling on the sword about what she did.

[Clint Rucker]

She suggested the flowers.

[Tony Harwood]

She suggested the flowers, and she admitted that on the stand.

[Clint Rucker]

You brought in the diner booth where they sat. Why couldn't you just tell the jury and show pictures?

[Tony Harwood]

I want you to see the puzzle once it's all put together. Yeah. I can show you the box. I can show you a photograph of it. But when I put it together and I show it to you, you'll never forget it.

[Deb Miller Landau]

He pushed the paper across the table like this.

[Clint Rucker]

And then Tony put his hand on.

[Deb Miller Landau]

It and took it from there.

[Tony Harwood]

And there was a particular moment when she is asked to stand up in court and identified the person she witnessed. Give Tony Harwood an envelope full of money. Please point him out.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Swipe there. He can't even make eye contact.

[Clint Rucker]

Your honor, may the record reflect the witness has identified the defendant, James Sullivan.

[Poppy]

But if prosecutors feel like Belinda Trahan's testimony is helping their case, they have to know that it's just as big a risk to put Tony Harwood on the stand.

[Tony Harwood]

Can you show the jurors the body language Mr. Sullivan used and the tone of voice, if it's possible that he used when he was a explaining to you that his wife Lita was a problem? You know, I've got this wife of mine up in Atlanta, and she is.

[Clint Rucker]

Just trying to take everything I've got.

[Tony Harwood]

And I don't know what to do about it.

[Clint Rucker]

I need someone to take care of my problem.

[Tony Harwood]

Do you know anybody can possibly take.

[Clint Rucker]

Care of my problem for me? Because I need some help here.

[Tony Harwood]

We could prove Tony Harwood and James Sullivan actually met each other. So I spent the first part of Tony Harwood's examination confirming his signature on the hotel receipt. And I put signature Johnny Ferg. The fact that he actually went to the flower shop. Who actually went inside the flower shop to purchase the flowers? I did.

[Deb Miller Landau]

They had Tony Harwood saying that he was the one who made the collect call to Jim Sullivan's house.

[Tony Harwood]

What did you say to him? I said, merry Christmas. And he said, I understand. That was it. What were you trying to convey to Mr. Sullivan by giving him that signal, those code words, that his problem was taken care of.

[Marvin Maribel]

The defense had their chance to cross examine Harwood. Not a single question. The two key witnesses were, of course, Belinda Trahan and Tony Harwood. And so, in closing arguments, the defense assailed their credibility.

[Clint Rucker]

You should reject everything that came out of his mouth. Harwood says, envelope in the bathroom.

[Belinda Trahan]

She says, an envelope at this booth over here.

[Marvin Maribel]

Garland presents to the jury a letter sized envelope stuffed with bills. Harwood had said it was all cash in $20 bills.

[Clint Rucker]

See?

[Belinda Trahan]

Oops.

[Clint Rucker]

Some of it fell out and some more. It won't fit in an envelope. The whole story just doesn't make sense. In your closing arguments, you actually brought in a doorbell. Why? What was the point?

[Tony Harwood]

I wanted the jurors to have that sense of what Lita Sullivan experienced right before her murder.

[Clint Rucker]

An ordinary moment in an ordinary moment.

[Tony Harwood]

The second reason why I did it is because James Sullivan liked to read books. And one of his favorite authors wrote a book called For Whom the Bell Tolls. I'm going to ask you, through your verdict of guilty to each and every count, to tell James Sullivan for whom the bell tolls. Tell him that it tolls for thee. And then I rang the doorbell three times.

[Deb Miller Landau]

As the jury goes out to deliberate, I think there's a real feeling, are they going to do it this time or is it going to be like every other time?

[Marvin Maribel]

I do not see this as a.

[Clint Rucker]

Slam dunk for the state.

[Tony Harwood]

There is this anxiety. You are worried, but you are hopeful. I don't care who you talk to that does this kind of work as a litigator. They will tell you, oh, I can look at the jurors and I probably can tell you what they are going to do. No, you don't. You don't.

[Clint Rucker]

This is breaking news.

[John Kingston]

We do have breaking news at this hour. The jury having reached a verdict in.

[Clint Rucker]

The trial of Jim Sullivan.

[Deb Miller Landau]

The jury came back within a few hours on the same day.

[Marvin Maribel]

It was so silent and the tension.

[Clint Rucker]

The tension was just palpable.

[Tony Harwood]

There's this anxiety. You don't know what it's going to be. You don't know how it's going to turn out. And you're worried, but you're hopeful.

[Clint Rucker]

It's hard not to think of Lita's family, her parents especially, after so many fits and starts to win justice for their firstborn child. It comes down to this moment.

[Tony Harwood]

The judge says, ma'am, would you publish the verdict? And then from that moment until they get finished, nobody is breathing.

[Deb Miller Landau]

Count one, malice murder.

[Clint Rucker]

We, the jury, find the defendant, James Vincent Sullivan, guilty. Malice murder.

[Tony Harwood]

I got a chance to hug Emery McLinton. I had never been hugged so tight before. This was his baby. And we had finally, after 19 years, brought that man a sense of satisfaction. I'll never forget it. The conviction of James Sullivan was the biggest puzzle that I had solved in my career. And it is one that gave me the most satisfaction that I had ever experienced as a prosecutor.

[Deb Miller Landau]

The court hears victims impact statements. What a loss it was to have Lita gone from their lives.

[Clint Rucker]

I dream of Lita often. She is smiling and walking in my direction and I in hers. But we never reach each other.

[Deb Miller Landau]

The jury came back and gave him life in prison without the possibility of parole.

[Clint Rucker]

I am so very proud and I'm happy. What we were waiting for was something in our judicial system, something to happen and to bring it all together. And that's what you see today. Why did it take 20 years? Do you think it goes back to the resources? He had privilege, white privilege completely. He knew how to manipulate people, and he had the resources to do that. You've got a black victim, you've got a white defendant. Did race hover in this courtroom over this case at all?

[Tony Harwood]

I think in our criminal justice system, unfortunately, race always permeates throughout a case. But I'm thankful to say the evidence in the case overcame that racial component.

[Clint Rucker]

They never received any money. Is there money? Where is this money?

[Tony Harwood]

He's been able to secret his money for the McClintons. Seeing him rot in a prison in South Georgia brings them a whole lot more satisfaction.

[Deb Miller Landau]

This is a woman who you never met. I've never met most of the people involved in this case never met her. And yet her life really made an impact. When somebody dies in this kind of manner, they don't stop being a member of the family. They don't stop being a member of the community. They never stop mattering.

[Clint Rucker]

David Tony Harwood was released from prison in 2018 after serving his 20 year sentence. Jim Sullivan remains behind bars with no possibility of parole. As for the other two men who were seen at that flower shop, no one else was ever charged. That is our program for tonight. Thanks for watching. I'm David Muir. And I'm Deborah Roberts. From all of us here at 2020 and ABC News, good night.